What I MEANT To Say...

When N and I count our blessings, our Small Group is always one of those things at the top of our list. This group of people have surrounded us with love, encouragement, and nurturing for several years. They mourned and grieved with us in our hormonal infertility journey and two miscarriages. They have literally laid hands on me and prayed for God to open my womb. They have joyously celebrated with us as the first folks to know about Monkey's conception...literally...even before our family. It is with this group of friends that God has pulled us closer to Him, sharpened our minds, and made us accountable in our walks. We seriously cannot thank Him enough for giving us these folks, who I call "Jesus in skin".

This past Sunday, these awesome friends hosted a diapers and wipes shower for us during our Sunday School class. They had a gorgeous breakfast spread, including some super yummy gluten-free raspberry muffins! (Thank you Kristen!) I'm just kicking myself for not remembering my camera that morning, because the breakfast table looked beautiful. And then there was the HUGE PILE of diapers and wipes standing next to it! The generosity from everyone in our Joshua Tree class was overwhelming to say the least.





When it came time for praise/prayer requests that morning, we just had to sing the praises of everyone in that room. I had it all planned out. I knew pretty much what needed to be said. Except when I opened my mouth the dam of emotions kinda took over and I lost all composure. :-( For those of you that were there, please forgive me for blubbering, so I feel the need to really state what my heart felt at the moment.

What I meant to say was, "Thank you all for being such an integral part of our journey the last few years. We seriously leaned on you during some very tough times. Most of you carried us and had hope for us because we were too broken to have hope for ourselves. We can't thank you enough for standing by us during those times and for your generosity today. The tough economy has taken it's toll on all of us and we completely understand that some of you have given sacrificially to give us gifts today. We are very touched with you even being here to help us celebrate our SECOND little monkey, let alone the generosity of that huge pile of diapers and wipes."

The only thing that I can add since then, is a big thank you to those of you that also gave sweet little gifts to Monkey as the new big brother! We are so grateful to those of you that remembered him...you guys are so awesome! We plan on keeping those gifts on stand-by until M2 arrives, so Monkey can feel loved and pampered when the stress of a sibling arrives.

We love you man! :-)