Welcome Sweet Baby!

Benjamin Jer William Sanborn

Born on: January 18, 2011 at 1:36pm

Weight: 5 pounds 11 ounces

Length: 17 inches

More details to come...

Nursery Finished...Almost!

BIG NEWS!!!!!!  The nursery is almost done!  A big shout out to Aunt Brenda and Mimi who spent their whole day with me yesterday putting everything together.  On Tuesday, I had an actual panic attack describing my list of "to do's" to a sweet friend.  This friend innocently asked how I was.  When I lied and said, "doing great", she called me out on it and said, "you sound really stressed".  And the flood gates opened!  I started crying, and my heart stared racing and I was rambling on the phone with her.  As soon as I hung up the phone, I started praying and had very little peace.  I didn't sleep well the next few days and was just sad and overwhelmed.  On Saturday my in-laws offered to take the kids for a sleepover and I almost said no because I didn't even know where to start.  Mimi and Aunt Brenda swooped in and took over.  They took me shopping and arranged the furniture (I swear I put all the furniture in the same place and it didn't look as good).  We even found a pillow that matches our bedding that says "Sweet Pea".  Can you believe it??!!  They helped me hang some cute stuff on the walls around my house (not just in the nursery), and ran some much needed errands with me and help make really mundane decisions I could not have made.  I will post pics when it is totally done!  I feel so much better now, I even did my quiet time in the nursery this morning.  I wish I could move in there!  Thank you for continuing to pray for us as we get closer to bringing our Sweet Pea home.  21 days closer to be exact!!  AHHH!!!

Dear Baby Sanborn,

January 10, 2011

            Sweet Pea-

            You are captivating my every thought.  It is beyond excited, and different too.  I am excited of course, I cannot wait to meet you.  I am willing myself to wait patiently.  I have to say we still have a lot to get ready, but I just want to fast forward to the day we meet you.  I can’t wait to hold you and sing “you are my sunshine”.  That is the song  your Mimi and Pappy sang to me, and I sing to your brother and sister.  We have tried to keep a little distance from you as adoption is never a sure thing until the papers are signed and that wont be until the day after you are born.  It is so difficult to try and bond with you now, knowing in a few weeks we could have our hearts broken.  Sweet Pea, I really cannot entertain the thought that you will not be part of our family.  This is either because the Lord is protecting my heart, or because He is giving me a glimpse into our future.  Whatever the reason, I simply cannot concentrate on anything these days.  I am PANICKED because we don’t have a name for you yet.  Although, I am growing very fond of Sweet Pea J.  I want to start calling you by name, but we haven’t settled on anything yet.  Nothing jumps out at me as YOUR name.  We are praying for you-fiercely!  We pray for your development, and safety.  We pray for your birth mom and her feelings as all of this is happening.  We pray for your siblings that will be returning home without you.  We pray for the doctors that will be involved in your care.  We pray for wisdom for the nurses that will take care of you as well.  We pray for the social workers involved and the lawyers too.  We are covering you and this whole adoption process with prayer.  We wait with anticipation until we hold you in our arms in just a few short weeks (27 days to be exact).  We love you!

Stroller

Okay, may not be post worthy to most of you!  Here in the Sanborn home, I was quite excited when Mimi bought us this fabulous accessory.  She bought us the stroller for the babies five years ago, but there wasn't much choice.  We didn't know how old they would be, and it had to be a double (obviously) and there just wasn't much out there.  This time around we are welcoming a tiny baby and need an "infant seat" instead of a convertible car seat (that will come later).  So of course we need a travel system!!  I WAS SO EXCITED!!!!!!  My mom did a bunch of research on line and picked one that got awesome reviews (on-line and by friends and total strangers we asked).  My cousin Bryn even humored me by letting me push it around the house the weekend I got it while we were supposed to be watching chick flicks.  So here is the stroller...  Drum roll please...

Really Lord??!!

It's funny...  My life has been a series of events that only God could have orchestrated (I know hindsight, right).  And at every hard place, I have made the choice to give it all to God.  Not by my choice often- but because I felt there was no where else to turn.  And never by my own strength, always with the perfect strength given to me, and by so many of you who have prayed for and encouraged me.  And yet, I continue to want, no,  need to control whatever little piece I can.  Building our family is the perfect example.  Even this adoption, which we thought would be another Ethiopian adoption.  God just wants me to trust Him regardless of where He takes me.  So when He told us, to trust Him and move in a different direction we did.  Now he has blessed us with the wait for a specific baby- baby boy Sanborn (yes, we are working on a name).  I was so excited because it is so close, but plenty long enough to plan out every little detail. Or so I thought!  About 10 minutes after the last post, our social worker called us and told us our birth mom was in labor- at 33 weeks.  Not the full term we expected with an induction on Feb 7. A little earlier than is best case scenario and much too early for my plan book!!!  Birth mom is fine now and was sent home to "bake" our baby boy for a little bit longer.  I feel like God was sending us a message.  We are not in control of this journey, He is.  He will decide when it is best for our baby to come to us, my planner will not decide.  Thank you Lord for reminding me that you have all of this in your hands.  You have a plan for all of this and are in perfect control.