Our adoption journey...

If you watched our last post (the smile box video) you heard the great news.... 11/1/11 was our Gotcha Day!  We  have been blessed to be able to raise this sweet little girl from the time she was just a week old.    There were times when it wasn't easy, but as with all of our children there are days both good and bad!   Thankfully God is gracious and never gives us more than we can handle!

  And wonderfully God's grace is sufficient for all! 

  I want to share a few photos and stories with you....the day we took her home from the hospital one of our children, having just had a foster placement abruptly end, said they would help care for this child but could not commit to LOVING her.After about 6 weeks the child said "Mom, I am starting to fall in love with her".  This was true of all of our hearts, you love knowing that it may hurt if the child is reunified or placed elsewhere. We pondered the truth, that really each of our children is not our own but God's whom HE loves and desires the best for even more than we do!   (Jer 29:11)    

As sweet as that is, the journey of fostering has reminded us so often of God's love for us, no matter what.  He loves us no matter where we are.  He is always there waiting for us whatever choices we or others make.   He calls us to love even if its not easy!  That is a hard thing to allow your children to learn~ our instinct is to protect them from hurt, but in doing so we often prevent them from the deeper love that God desires to pour out!

 We are reminded that all of us have been adopted, into Christ's family! (Rom 8:15)  We are his children whom he loves very much!  People have asked us how can you love a child that isn't your "own" (meaning biological)  well since this is our first adoption, our other 5 children are biological, so I didn't know.  God has poured such peace (I Tim 1:14) over my heart this week and we prayed during this journey that God would grow children he desired to be in our family in our hearts (instead of my womb) and we truly feel that  this little one is loved just as much as all of our other children.
When asked if we were willing to adopt her at one of the meetings last year, one of our children with great concern worried it would be too expensive.  The child firmly stated that all the money the children had been saving to purchase a wii should be spent on Grace instead!  WOW what a blessing to know the children love this little one so much they are willing to put aside their own desires!  She has a special place in each of our hearts.  As thrilled as we are to know she is now ours, we know that her biological family misses her and loves her and we pray that God will pour out his compassion on them.  We are so thankful for her mom's gift of life for this precious child. The whole family (including both sets of grandparents) were able to be in court and witness the welcoming of this child into our forever family!

 Each of the children have grown to love her and are wonderful big brothers and sisters! They each got a sibling bracelet to commemorate this special day of welcoming their little sister :)

We were honored to have our adoption on the first day of November, 

National adoption month,

   we were even more honored to have good friends the Quittshcreibers join us as they celebrated their one year anniversary that day of being in a Russian court for the adoption of 2 of their children!   A special day indeed!

 Grandma K "Gigi" was a huge help being here for this busy weekend!

 And Grandpa K "Papa" too!  What a blessing to have them be a part of this special day!

 Grandpa and Grandma Q (who were foster parents while Steve was growing up) were here too (it worked out great that they are staying in the area so they could be here!)  God is so good to work out even those details!

 Sisters are special, as her 2 older sisters help love, train, and care for her she is very blessed to have such wonderful role models to look up too! 

We are so thrilled that we are able to officially welcome the "little sister" into our family!!!

Thanks for all your prayers and support through the last 2 years!   If you have any questions on fostering or adoption we would LOVE to talk to you!  please pass this information onto anyone who maybe interested along with our email moquak@gmail.com and we look forward to helping the 140,000,000 orphans of of the world find forever families too! (James 1:27)

As the starfish story goes ~ we can't take care of all of them by ourselves ~ but we can take care of this one, with God's love and pray others will answer his call too!  

Steve and Amy Q and family

www.quakflock.blogspot.com

Happy Mothers Day!!!

My Mother,

isn't she Purty :)An Ode to Mothers
My mother is so sweet
She knows how to make good things to eat
She keeps the house so clean
And is cool even to a teen :)

She has love enough for us all
In Winter, Spring, Summer, And Fall
She teaches us School
And helps set up our pool

We Loooooove you mom!!!

Chuck & the rest

He is RISEN!

HALLELUJAH!! He is Risen Indeed! I just get chills when we sing the songs on Easter morning, this is one of them:

Low in the grave He lay, Jesus my Savior,
Waiting the coming day, Jesus my Lord!

Refrain

Up from the grave He arose,
With a mighty triumph o’er His foes,
He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
And He lives forever, with His saints to reign.
He arose! He arose!
Hallelujah! Christ arose!

Vainly they watch His bed, Jesus my Savior;
Vainly they seal the dead, Jesus my Lord!

Refrain

Death cannot keep its Prey, Jesus my Savior;
He tore the bars away, Jesus my Lord!

Refrain

I pray that you have the hope, triumph and victory over death that is the gift of salvation!
May your heart be open to His gift today if you haven't received it already! (pasting some resurrection references for you)
John 20
Matthew 28
Mark 16:1-6
Luke 24
Have a blessed Easter day!

a DATE!

We escaped to see Pride and Prejudice just the two of us today! What a treat! It was wonderful to see the great talent, incredible costumes, sets and just relax and enjoy it!

We don't always post the weekend verses but here they are ~ tomorrow we enter Holy Week!

Ezekiel 37:21-28
²¹ and say to them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will take the Israelites out of the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from all around and bring them back into their own land. ²² I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. There will be one king over all of them and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. ²³ They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, for I will save them from all their sinful backsliding, and I will cleanse them. They will be my people, and I will be their God.

²⁴ " 'My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd. They will follow my laws and be careful to keep my decrees. ²⁵ They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, the land where your fathers lived. They and their children and their children's children will live there forever, and David my servant will be their prince forever. ²⁶ I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them forever. ²⁷ My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people. ²⁸ Then the nations will know that I the LORD make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them forever.' "

Jeremiah 31:10-13
¹⁰ "Hear the word of the LORD, O nations; proclaim it in distant coastlands: 'He who scattered Israel will gather them and will watch over his flock like a shepherd.'

¹¹ For the LORD will ransom Jacob
and redeem them from the hand of those stronger than they.

¹² They will come and shout for joy on the heights of Zion;
they will rejoice in the bounty of the LORD—
the grain, the new wine and the oil,
the young of the flocks and herds.
They will be like a well-watered garden,
and they will sorrow no more.

¹³ Then maidens will dance and be glad,
young men and old as well.
I will turn their mourning into gladness;
I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.

John 11:45-47
⁴⁵Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, put their faith in him. ⁴⁶But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. ⁴⁷Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin.

Vs 13 of the Jeremiah passage reminded me of a praise ~ the Pettijohnn family, who we schooled with last year when Lisa passed away, God is turning their mourning into gladness. Brad is engaged to a lovely woman who also lost her husband to cancer, she also has 5 children! We were able to meet all of them yesterday and saw them again today! God thank you for bringing comfort and joy!