new dining room furniture!!

my sweet sister gave me her old dining room table and chairs when jon and i got married. i loved them. they had character and were so pretty. but really, the set only allowed 4 to sit comfortably, 6 was a tight fit but somewhat doable. over the years as our family has grown, i have longed for a bigger table and prayed for one too. the ones that i saw in stores were completely out of my price range, and the ones that i saw at garage sales and flea markets were completely not my style. so, we waited.

and this february (or was it march??), God dropped a beautiful dining room table set into our laps for a song. except, it needed some work. it had potential, but if you know me at all, you can probably figure out that oak isn't my fave and leopard, giraffe and cow prints aren't my decorating style. the girls loved it though. and we were grateful for more room.

well, we have been talking about painting the table and recovering the chairs since march. first, it was too cold. then, too much pollen to do it outside. but at long last, it is getting painted.

my mom helped me to find some beautiful fabric last week, and i just learned how to use the staple gun tonight. it's fun, and addictive. i love power tools.

so with jon's painting magic and my reupholstering skills, here's the first chair completed.

and just in case you can't see the beautiful fabric, here it is up close. (did i mention that all fabric was 50% off when i went shopping? God is my provider.)

now, five more to go.

inspiration

i saw this today. not only is this little girl precious, but i also fell in love with the bedspread. :) after a few e-mails with liz, the delightful friend of katie's, i found out that ikea, the land of wonder and cheap things, was the home of this textile. and so, we decided to replace this sad make-do "bedspread" that we had been using on julia's bed

(until momma can make you your own quilt like abby's):

with this beauty. (and what joy it brought to my sweet juju.)

and as an added bonus, ikea was offering free dinners for children with no purchase necessary. hello, lovely spontaneous evening. ended with the impossible to resist ikea cinnamon rolls.

our adoption journey so far...

have i mentioned that we are in the adoption process. hard to believe that it was a year ago this coming weekend that the Lord first impressed on us that the time was NOW to move forward in this journey. everyone that i had talked to about adoption always complained about the mounds of personal information and paperwork required as being the hard part. that hasn't been the hardest part for me. (although, trying to find a few hours of quiet to answer questions like what kind of dreams do i consistently have? and what is my first memory as a child? can prove a bit challenging.)

the hard part for me has been examining my own heart. wrestling through issues that aren't talked about much in my circles. issues of race and culture and special needs kids. issues os money and faith. i am learning to listen to where the Lord is directing our hearts, and i am having my heart sifted. i have discovered fears, prejudices and anxieties that are not of the Lord in my heart and have had much room to repent...and to show that i am "changing directions" (the meaning of repent) by the boxes i check on endless forms.

we have been led clearly away from adopting from the philippines for now. we have found an agency that i am quickly falling in love with and are getting to start the process over with them. so instead of a 2-3 year old child from the philippines, it looks like we might be getting a baby from the states. only He knows. and man, what a comfort His sovereignty has been through the journey. i'll try to do better about letting you know where we are in the process, but i'm not making any promises. :)

not going to catch up

catching up would be a joke. i'm not even going to try. but i did want to say this...

i married up. yesterday was a long day. a day where julia was exhausted and would fall to the floor sobbing every 5 minutes. yep, a long day. jon got home from working a 12 hour day and said to me, "why don't you clock out?"

i definitely married up.