Who Knows What This Means??

"The Insanely Important Folder" this morning:


And that same folder this afternoon:


I'm thrilled to announce that our dossier is officially on its way to Washington DC for authentication at the State Department and the Ethiopian Embassy! In a few days, the courier service will return it to our adoption agency in North Carolina, and it will then be forwarded to Ethiopia. YIPPEE!!!

The second best part of that announcement is that we're officially done with this eight-month-long "paperchase" process. I can't begin to tell you the number of hours that have gone into collecting countless forms from around the country, visiting various agencies and facilities for numerous purposes, and asking our precious friend, Libby, "Could you notarize just one more form for us, please?" I'm glad to see that incredibly difficult part of this process go, but the very best part of this step today is that once our dossier is shipped to Ethiopia, we're officially on the waiting list for our baby's referral! :-)

Josh and I were talking earlier today that we have volumes of papers and forms that we've had to work through, and each step we've accomplished seemed to lead to 25 more. So now it's crazy-exciting to know that our next "step" is to see our son's picture. To know who our son is.

Amazing.

Our request is for a boy between zero and six months old, and our agency said the wait time on a referral in that age range is at least 3-4 months. So here's hoping for a big Christmas present!!

Please pray with us for patience during this wait time and for a smooth transition through the in-country portion of this process. There are many, many obstacles that can pop up at any moment, and we would love to have you praying with us for protection along every step of the way. We really want our little guy home soon!

As if the "Off-To-DC" step wasn't enough, Josh has orientation and registration for seminary tonight. This is another massive and exciting step for our family, and we're praying for God's provision on many levels. We feel a bit overwhelmed at times, but like I told a friend earlier today, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that if God asks us to take a step, he won't let the floor crumble beneath us when we do.

We just need to remind ourselves of that sometimes.

Wordless Wednesday

All Grown Up

Catherine was a little four-year-old blondie when I first met and started babysitting for her family all those years ago. And last week, I shot her high school senior pictures! I'm not sure which is weirder, though...that Catherine's a senior or that I now have a four-year-old blondie of my own!

We had a last-minute location change for our session, and it couldn't have worked out better. We had the best time running all over the place for these photos (including IN the water!)


I kept trying to get some "serious" shots from Catherine, but she just cracked up every time I would snap a picture. Finally, though, she was able to hold it together to get these beautiful shots.


And besides, if her giggle box got turned over too bad, and she couldn't help but smile, I took the opportunity to grab some wonderful candids.


(Of course, there was always the No-Face option as well!) :-)


There's no doubt about it...Catherine's a beautiful girl. But what gives her true beauty is the fact that she loves the Lord, and she's happy for you to know about it! There's a radiance that comes from within when that joy is in your heart.


Oh, and before I go, Catherine had a little message for me as we were wrapping up her session...


I love you, too, Cat!!!

Crazy, Funny, Silly!

As I mentioned back in this post, I had the super-fun task of doing Catherine's senior pictures last week. And although we got some stunning shots, we shot some plain, old-fashioned silly ones, too! This is one of my favorites of her just being a bonafide goofball. :-)


There are loads of crazy and funny faces over on I &hearts Faces, so click the button below to join in the silliness.

My Best Friend, Photoshop

This has been another one of those weeks where I feel like I'm on a treadmill that's going 10 miles per hour but my legs will only move at half that speed (this is all incredibly metaphorical, of course...you and I both know you'll never find me on a treadmill!)

It's the same story as last week--only add a rush of photography sessions. And rather than spend an hour typing out what our crew has been up to, I'm going to toss a few of my favorite photos from each session in here and hop back onto Photoshop for more.

I've been doing this little cutie's photos since she was two weeks old. I've loved getting to know this family and watching their sweet baby girl as she's grown. When I first met her, she weighed five pounds, and at her nine-month session, she had just finally graduated to 3-6 months clothes!!


And remember this adorable munchkin I met at the Botanical Gardens not long ago?


Well her baby sister decided to make a five-week-early entrance into the world, and it was my joy to shoot newborn photos with her and the rest of the family.


Following in the Weekend of Many Babies, I also had a fantastic time doing a maternity session with a mom whose sweet little girl I met for photos a few months ago. I'm going really easy on the pictures here. Although the mom was absolutely radiant (and made gorgeous photos!), this isn't my belly to show. :-)


The last session I'm working on was from a young lady who is very special to our family. I used to babysit her and her siblings while I was in college, and she was the flower girl in our wedding. This is what she looked like back then...


...and you'll have to stay tuned to see her now in her Senior pictures. Unbelievable!

Plan B

Do you remember the last time you rode a merry-go-round? Mine was a few months ago at the zoo. The kids each picked their favorite animal to ride, and I did a sort of Go-Go-Gadget-Arm maneuver to try to hold everybody in place as the merry-go-round began to go. Now there are two different ways to get on one of those spinning contraptions...you can step on easily while it sits perfectly still, or you can run in mad circles trying your hardest to grab one of the poles as it speeds past you.

I feel like I've been grabbing at a virtual merry-go-round all week long.

Thankfully, most everything that's been happening has been exciting and good. We had a series of adoption-related paperwork finally come through, which has sent me spiraling a bit out of control in an effort to get our dossier finalized and sent off to Washington D.C. (where it will be authenticated at the State Department and the Ethiopian Embassy). Then Josh and I made the decision to go ahead and start kindergarten with Abigail this year instead of waiting until the next school year when she's five. And since I'm homeschooling, that decision brought with it a whole slew of excited, curriculum-ordering, schedule-planning madness.

Since two members of our family are now starting school this August, we thought it would be good to have a room in our house designated as the study/schoolroom. Do I think a separate walled-off space is necessary for a successful homeschool or seminary student? Not in the least. But if we could make it work, Josh and I decided it would be well-worth our efforts.

Not long ago, we had a contractor come look at the screened-in porch off of our living room to tell us how much it would cost to convert it into living space. Our original intent had been to use it as an extra bedroom, but as we were tossing out ideas as to where we could have the study, the "bringing the outside in" plan came back into play.

UNTIL, that is, we remembered how much the contractor's quote was. It was somewhere in the ballpark of "need to sell a kidney to pay for it". Actually, we talked quite seriously about trying to make it work, but we both felt uneasy about it. After some thought and prayer on each of our parts, we came back together with the same decision...God doesn't want us funneling money back into the Lewis family. The goal isn't to work, make money, spend it on ourselves, then work more, make more money, and spend more on ourselves. God has put some really neat opportunities in front of us, and He gently reminded us that a bigger house isn't what's important.

With that option off the table, then, it was time to get creative. Josh and I talked at length about how we could change and rearrange to accomplish all the goals, but we kept hitting roadblocks. Then my friend, Kerry, came over, and I mentioned to her what we were trying to do. She tossed out a few ideas here and there, but then she said something that really got the ball rolling.

"Why don't you put your TV over the fireplace?", she asked.

My first thought was something along the lines of "Already thought of that...won't work". And half of that statement was totally accurate. Josh had mentioned that idea a while back, but we realized we couldn't move the TV out of the entertainment center because of our DirecTV satellite hookup. But wait!!! We canceled our satellite subscription a couple of months ago (and Josh built an antenna by hand...whole separate post!), so the TV was now free to move about the cabin.

Moving the TV out of the entertainment center and over the fireplace was the first in a long line of falling dominoes this weekend. Here's a little rundown...

Move TV over fireplace.
Move entertainment center out of living room.
Move couch to where entertainment center was.
Move chairs to other side of living room.
Move eat-in-kitchen table out of kitchen.
Move dining room table and chairs into kitchen.
Move computer desk into dining room.
Move eat-in-kitchen table into dining room as school desk.
Move entertainment center into dining room as school storage and bookshelves.

And those are just the big steps. In the end, we have a living room that's set up better than it's ever been before, we have a table in the kitchen that our whole family can sit at at the same time (including the new baby), and we have a fully functional study/schoolroom that is now one of my favorite rooms in the house.

And the total cost?

Some sore muscles...but NO MONEY!!!!

There is one little downer to the new arrangement, though. Because of where the couch is now--no more couch toss. Sad.

All of that was just DaddyDay morning this weekend. There's more to share, but I need to get back to editing my most recent sessions. I'll be back with Abby's big weekend (camping with PaPaw and GrandPam) and a few photos from the shoots I'm working on.

Wordless Wednesday