Baby Reynolds Week 26

Pregnancy progress pictures:

8 Weeks 6 Days

14 Weeks 6 Days 

26 Weeks

20 weeks

Have Yourself a "Gilead" Little Christmas

December has been Jam packed this year at Gilead House. It's hard to believe all that we were able to squeeze in this month. As busy as the season has been it really has been a "Gilead" Christmas for me. In Bible Gilead means "a hill of testimonies" A hill is an understatement of how many testimonies people of God have shown by reaching out to the ladies and children of Gilead house this month. As a believer I feel it is important to take time to share with other believers all that God is doing in his kingdom. Here are a few of my favorite highlights of the month.

We began the month with Hillside youth group throwing a Christmas party for our Gilead House kids. It was a really special time. All the youth made it a point to include our kids and really love on them. At the end of the evening one of the moms told me, "I just can't understand why a bunch of teens would want to come here  when they could be doing other things." It gave me the chance to share that Christ was that reason.

Hillside Youth and Gilead House kids

The next week we were so blessed to have Lauren, from FBC Batesville, MS, come and spend a week serving with us. We got to know Lauren when she came last summer with her youth group for a week. While Lauren was here she helped us by setting up a new mom's room and doing a lot of organizing! Her sweet and gentle spirit was such a blessing to our staff and moms.

Lauren putting together a bed

Our moms and kids were blessed by so many this year with Christmas gifts. FBC Batesville sent hundreds of diapers and wipes, along with winter gear. They also blessed our mom's with gift cards allowing them to even pick out a few things for their kids themselves. A lady from a local church donated play mobile toys that we were able to surprise the children with set up on Christmas morning. We also had several church knitting groups custom make socks, blankets, and scarves for our mom's and children.

Setting up for Christmas Morning

The story that touched my heart the most, however, was that of 3rd grader Anabella. After seeing a homeless man on the street she began to wonder about the children of Marin who might not have a special Christmas. After praying and talking with her mom she decided to give all her good grade money ($50) towards buying Christmas presents for other children. She challenged her friends at school and other church members to donate a little money and in the end managed to raise $1000! She was able to bless all of the Gilead House Children with 2 gifts and the children of 3 other shelters! That totaled over 30 children! It is amazing that God and use even his youngest children for his purpose!

Surprise gifts for one of the Gilead House Families

We finally had a group of teens from another local church Flipside Youth Group come and help us take down our Christmas decorations. In their time at the house they were able to clean up and Assemble several new bikes the house had gotten for Christmas  They also had a chance to love on a few of our Gilead Kids. One mom told me, "It was such a blessing that they were able to give me a break from my kids just for a few minutes."

It  has been such a blessed Christmas season. So many Christians have shared the testimony of Christ in so many different ways with our Gilead House families. I am looking forward to getting to do follow up with our moms in the coming weeks. I hope hearing about others sharing the love of Christ has inspired a few of you to go out in the new year and do the same.

Merry Christmas 2012

Cinnamon rolls on Christmas Morning

Christmas day was nice and relaxing this year. It's hard to believe this is Steve and my last Christmas as a family of 2. We were so blessed this year as my family traveled all the way from Mississippi to spend the holidays with us! We will blog about their trip separately. Steve and I were so blessed by so many people this Christmas. One of our favorite gifts this year was an internet booster! It is allowing me to type this blog from the couch! This is something we haven't had the privilege of doing since moving off campus.

Gifts aside throughout the day I thought many times, "It will be much different next year." As many of you know we are now almost 26 weeks along! This time next year we will have a (most likely) mobile baby. The most exciting things about Christmas will not be the gifts and Santa Clause (Side note: we have not decided what we want to do about Santa Clause yet...), but things like the lights on the tree and Christmas ornaments hanging just a little too low. Steve and I are so ready for our world to be turned upside down! In my limited understanding of parenthood I can only think it will be much like I felt when I became a Christian. The feeling of, "how did I ever think I was complete and happy before?" For now, however, while I wait in anticipation, I am enjoying treasuring all of these things up in my heart just as Mary did long ago. (I also have an appreciation for how far she traveled on that donkey!!!)

January 2012 riding a donkey in Jordan. It's a very bumpy ride!!! I can't imagine doing it with a  baby on board.

A little look at Christmas this year:

Daddy (Steve) bought Baby Reynolds 1st Christmas gift! A pouch of veggies!!!

A stroller from Mom and Dad Bullock

Carlena came over to celebrate the birth of our savior too!

Rebecca in her new helmet.

Our BIG gift from Mom and Dad Bullock!!! Thank you from all 3 of us!

Baby Reynolds Week 20

Wow! We've made it to the half way point! If the second half of our pregnancy goes as fast as the first half did we're going to have a baby here in the blink of an eye!

Since we last posted about Baby Reynolds we've had a couple of check ups. We got a healthy check up at week 17 and and went in for the big ultrasound at week 18.
The big ultrasound was a blast! It was amazing to see that there was someone in there growing and wiggling around! We were also amazed because got to learn a little about our little one's personality too! Our baby is a little bit shy and a little bit stubborn. Our technician, poor thing, was frustrated because the baby did not want to move around to take the pictures she needed. Despite the lack of cooperation she was able to see that the baby had all it's parts. Praise God! Unfortunately, she could not get a good picture of the heart. Sooo we're to return in two weeks to try again. On the bright side we get to see our sweet little one again!

Today we go in for another regular appointment and are hoping for another healthy check up!

Here are a few pictures for those of you who are curious:

(If this helps you figure out the gender please do not share with us! We're still in the dark!)



Baby is showing off their drinking skills for you! (Open the mouth)

(Close the mouth)

The End of an Era

As the end of school draws increasingly closer so does the end of an Era. I have now spent the last 19 years (not including preschool) of my life, with no breaks, being a student. That is all about to change! I cannot quite imagine what a life with no papers, reading requirements, and tests will look like. "What will she do with all her new free time?" they ask. My response, "I have no idea." Without a doubt I will be busy. After all I will be trading the title of "student" for that of "Mom." However, I know as most mom's do that I will be much more than that title. So, this morning, I have decided to brainstorm some of the things I plan on filling up my free time with after graduation.

*** Note: While there are many papers to be done and books to read even in this last month of school I feel this is an important project because it will give me the motivation to finish strong.***

Laura's List of Free-Time Fillers:

• Make cute crafty things for the baby
• Make some easy to pop in the oven (nutritional) freezer meals in preparation for the baby
• Read my copy of the new Duggar's book that Steve got me for my birthday I haven't had a chance to open
• Load and unload the dishwasher in a timely manner
• Send some hand written cards to loved ones
• Go to the weekly farmers market for free samples
• Skype with people
• Finish my Middle East trip photo album
• Join a local mom's group
• Take Guitar lessons

 

The Duggars are my favorite!

 

 

Cute baby outfit crafts!

 

I have no idea if any or all of these time fillers will be accomplished but it sure is fun to dream!

Baby Reynolds Week 15

Sorry we're a few weeks late giving the update on our last baby appointment which was week 13. The appointment would have been really short except that I didn't know they wanted me to go to the bathroom and I went right before they called me into the appointment. Luckily as I'm learning (from the 2-3 trips to the bathroom a night) it doesn't take long before a pregnant lady needs to go again! Baby Reynolds is doing really well and has a good strong heart beat! We didn't get to see a picture of our little one but hearing them was really great too!

So when is the next appointment?

Our next appointment is in 2 more weeks.

So how are you feeling Laura?

This is the most common thing that people have been asking so here's my short answer: Thank you for those of you who have been praying for my morning sickness. It has eased up a lot with only a few hard days a week. With the second trimester kicking in please pray with Steve and I that I continue to feel better and get some energy back. Working 2 jobs and being a full time student is not easy! That being said I will be wrapping up my time as a babysitter at the first of December and a student December 14th! I can't wait for graduation day!!

Is it a boy or a girl?

We don't know and hope to keep it that way until baby Reynolds arrives! I know that may sound crazy to some but it sounds fun to us. We love surprises!

Here is an updated picture on the pregnancy process:

Week 14 Day 6

Here is a picture of week 8 to compare:

8 weeks 6 days

Baby Reynolds!

In case you hadn't heard yet… Surprise! We’re having a baby!

I decided to write a blog that would hopefully answer many of your questions about baby Reynolds.

You were in the fost-adopt process. Did you think you couldn’t have children? What’s happening with that now?

All are fare and good questions. Yes we were in the fost-adopt process and that has sadly been put on hold. We were about 1/3^rd of the way through our paperwork when we found out. We were able to talk to our social worker Rolf about it and he was very gracious. He encouraged us to apply again when we felt ready. There has never been a known issue that we couldn’t have children we simply feel called to adopt. Therefore the process is not over just put on an extended pause for right now.

Were you trying to get pregnant?

Maybe a better way to word the answer than a yes or a no is that we were ready to be parents and God blessed us in this way. We are very excited to be parents in 6 and a half months!

How far along are you?

That is a tricky question. We believe we are at 10.5 weeks. However, that being said when we went in for our 8 week appt. the doctor told us the baby was measuring at 9 weeks and 5 days. She assured us that we were not going to have a giant baby that it was just on a growth spurt. So we really don’t know how big our baby is now haha. Steve said it’s a Reynolds therefore it’s going to be big.

When is your next appointment?

Our next apptointment will be on September 27^th. Not sure what we’ll find out but we’ll keep you posted.

Do you want a boy or a girl?

We don’t care at all and have no guesses yet. Oh and we’re planning on keeping it a surprise even to us! Sorry for those of you that we disappoint by that.

When is the baby due?

April 5^th

When did you find out? (Ok maybe no one is asking this but it’s a good story so I’ll share anyways!)

This summer we went with 8 of our youth group and 3 other leaders to Disney Land. I suspected that something might be up about halfway through the trip, but seeing as there was no alone time to sneak away I didn’t know what do you. The morning of Disney I started to stress out a little because I began to worry that I shouldn’t ride the rides. If I was pregnant I didn’t want to hurt the baby. I also didn’t want to get Steve’s hope’s up over nothing. I came up with a plan to ask for the keys of the van to run to Target. I was turned down because I was not on the rental insurance. I finally broke down and asked Steve to take me. Steve asked me if I remembered that we were about to leave for the park in 30 minutes and that he was responsible for buying everyone’s tickets. I said yes and that it couldn’t be avoided because I needed to see if I could ride all the rides. Confused he asked what that even meant and I told him there is a chance I might be pregnant. Shocked he said oh ok and we were on our way. With no time to take the test before we left I was doomed to wait until we arrived at the park. God blessed me with a chance for Steve and I to be alone. Another leader had needed to go back to the hotel for something and did not have a ticket to enter. I did what felt like a science experiment with stalls flushing all around me and then waited for what felt like forever before seeing the word “pregnant” appear! I came out so shocked that I all could do when I saw Steve was say you’re going to be a dad! Our moment together was short because the other leader walked up and so I quickly excused myself back to the bathroom because I started tearing up. It truly was a magical day and the happiest place on earth!

How is Laura Feeling?

In short not great. I’ve been dealing with a lot of morning sickness. That title is the meaning joke ever because really I feel sick most of the day. While I have learned some things that help I still am feeling pretty sick all the time. Please pray with our family that by week 12 I will be getting some relief! Please also pray for me that Tuesday nights I would be feeling well. I have a night class then and it has been really difficult to go so far.

Here are some pictures:

(Please be warned if you're not into pregnancy pictures!)

Baby's first outfit!

Celebrating with Donald!

6 weeks and 5 days

8 weeks and 5 days

Fost-adopt update: Meeting with Rolf

"So how did the meeting go?"

Without a doubt yesterday was wonderful! I got up and changed shirts about 3 times before I was satisfied. (Partly because I couldn't decide how casual or dressy I should be and partly because of the bad sunburn on my back.) After finally picking a shirt I proceeded to iron it. For anyone other than Steve or my mother this is a big statement. I NEVER iron. I must have been anxious. Shortly after my nicely pressed shirt was completed we headed out the door for Sebestaphol. It's a little town about an hour or so north of where we live. After getting turned around several times we figured out where we were going and grabbed breakfast at the McDonald's just down the road. Once we finally got our order (and I mean finally! How long does it take to make a sausage biscuit?) we quickly ate and showed up right on time for our meeting. We took turns describing what we imagined Rolf to look like. I suggested 35 skinny and balding. Steve felt he would look 40-45 and chunky. It turns our in reality our Rolf was quite normal in body build with a full head of hair (mostly gray) and a full beard. He told us at some point in the meeting that he was 57 years old. So we were both way off. Personality wise we were a bit more on par. He was super sweet and comfortable to talk too. While we don't think after talking he is a Christian he is surly a person of peace.

He began the meeting by asking us if we had any pressing questions. We had some but felt that if he went over the process it might answer some of them. He slowly walked us through the process and shared potential scenarios with us of things that might happen. After sharing he gave us time to ask a few of our unanswered questions and then gave us a few minutes alone to discuss and make sure that this is what we want. We shared we sill wanted to move forward in the process and that led to a mound of paperwork. Half of the paperwork we filled our at the office. The other half he sent home with us.

Things we learned that surprised and encouraged us

The process of adoption is much shorter than we expected. Each child's parents are given 6-18 months to meet the requirements that will allow them to get their children back. If in that time frame they have not been able to get their act together they are offered to us for adoption. Once we agree it is then a 6 month process until the adoption is completed. So the entire process could be completed in 1-2 years. There is risk involved no matter how low risk they believe the child is. This is because at any point if the child's relative wants to keep them they get first choice in adoption. Please pray with us that the child who we receive will stay with us.

We also were encouraged by the prudent parenting law. This allows us to leave our child with an adult we trust for less than 24 hours without having to get them fingerprinted. It also allows us to have guests in our home for less than a month without having to have them fingerprinted. We are so grateful that our friends and family who want to help us will not have to hassle with red tape.

One last very cool thing we learned is that can travel with our child before the adoption is completed. For example if we want to vacation back to Mississippi or Washington we can bring them with us! The court simply has to approve it. 

Most people have been asking us, "what's the next step in the process?" 

The  answer is filling out all the forms we were given. This includes 75 essay questions on our life, getting a physical, a financial form, getting finger printed, drawing a floor plan of our house, going to the DMV (YUCK!!!!), paperwork for our employer to fill out, emergency contact information, and instructions on how to prep our house for an inspection. (Feeling a bit overwhelmed just thinking about it all!) Once this is all completed and submitted we are then going to be assigned our social worker (Rolf will be their supervisor.) She will then come to our home for the home study. Much to my surprise this does not mean an inspection. She will be coming to "interview" us over a series of meetings in order to write a 15 page document on us that will be sent out to agencies looking to place children. Once our home study is complete we will go to our intensive 18 hour training weekend. We have several other training events to attend after that and then we will be certified! So we still have a long way to go but we are so excited about what lies ahead of us in the next few months. We are still on track for a January or February placement of a child!!!

Well I guess it's time to start working on all this paperwork I have have instead of just blogging about it! We love you all and want to thank everyone who sent us encouraging messages last Thursday. It is such a blessing to know we're not in it alone!

Ps. if you're interested in doing foster-care or fost-adopt yourself in California check out: http://www.tlc4kids.org/

San Diego Mission Trip

Last week Steve and I had the chance to go with 2 other adults and 3 of our youth to San Diego for a mission trip. It was a great week and very challenging. We spent each morning working in a local nursing home building relationships and each afternoon serving in the SD Food Bank distribution center. Here are a few pictures from the week!

 Mount Soledad

 Steve, Ryan, and Zac during the daily Starbucks run

 My with my nursing home friend Ms. B.

 Joesph the puppet gave us a lot of joy throughout the week!

Packaging food boxes at the SD Food Bank

Our rice baging gear. Notice the beard net on Steve!

Carlena and I enjoying the beach

One night we went to the board walk on the beach for a treat. We enjoyed some rides and some good funnel cake!

TBC with the whole Youthworks group at the end of the week.

Thanks to everyone who prayed for us while we were gone. We were truly blessed by the experience and saw God moving in huge ways!

Fost-adopt Update Q&A

It's been a while since our last update on our road to adoption so I wanted to let you know what's going on. The questions below are some of the most popular we've been getting recently.

Where are you in the process?

This Thursday (7/12/12) is our first face to face meeting with our social worker Rolf! We are so excited to get to know him and learn more about how this process is going to work. Our meeting with Rolf will be an in depth explanation of how everything will work. He has also asked us to come ready with all the questions we can think of to ask. So far Rolf has been a great person of peace through this process as we have spoke on the phone several times. Please pray for us that this meeting will clarify any questions we have and set us at ease.

How are we feeling right now?

I suppose like all soon to be Parents out there we have been experiencing a verity of emotions thinking about our new son or daughter; excitement, joy, nervousness, anticipation... Knowing, however, that our Heavenly Father has his hand over it all has given me a lot of comfort.

What's the time line looking like?

We unfortunately were unable to do the most recent intensive training weekend we will need for certification because we were out of town. We don't expect this to slow us down because we have another chance to do it in the fall. Please pray for no more scheduling problems. After our meeting we will know a little better what the overall time line will be but we were originally told that our goal of a February placement was realistic. We look forward to updating you on what the next few months will look like after Thursday.

Who are you looking at adopting?

As of now we have no update on who the child will be. We listed on our application boy or girl age 0-11. In the interest meeting we went to they said normally older children are not put on the adoption track and babies are hard to get because the demand for them is high. So, with that being said, the likelihood of a baby or an older child is much smaller than a toddler or a young elementary school aged kid. We praise God that he knows who we need and who needs us! Please pray with us for our child's physical safety and spiritual health.

On behalf of Steve and I, thank you for praying for our family as we continue through this wonderful crazy journey! I will try to update you all after our meeting Thursday so check back soon for more details!

Mississippi Team Day 5

This will be my final blog on the awesome week we had with the Mississippi folk. Sorry it's taken me so long to post about! I guess this news is almost 2 weeks old now, but I wanted to share some more stories of what God did through this group of people surrendered to his will. I pray that as you read this blog and the others from the Mississippi team's stay in the bay you too will be challenged to go out and share your faith as you live life wherever you are. (And of course if you want to come take a trip to share in the Bay we would be happy to host you!)

We began the day bright and early and headed south of the city to a place called Daly City. Our plan was to work with habitat for humanity to minister to both our fellow volunteers and supervisors while giving us the chance to pray for those who will be receiving the home we worked on. This particular sight was a condo complex with 32 homes. Each future resident must put in 500 hours of work as their down payment and then commits to giving 1/3rd of their income as their monthly rent. This allows people to continue to make their payments even if times are hard.

Upon arrivals we were asked to volunteer for jobs. Our group split up into three of the 5 offered jobs. I ended up on the insulation team. (I think the sucker the people who have never done any house building before into doing this job... not knowing all of what it involved I happily chose it because it needed the most people to help.) I will say I enjoyed the people I got to know... the insulating not so much. I was blowing blue jean out of my nose for the next three days! Once again I had some great chances to share so it was totally worth it! I'm sorry to say I can't remember his name now (I can picture his face but that doesn't help any of you) but I was able to speak to a gentlemen there to gain experience about Christianity before I even arrived at my insulating sight. He had just been to a Catholic church last week for the first time ever. He told me he was searching out what he believed and thought he would give it a try. I got to explain why I chose a Baptist church and I think it gave him a few things to think about. Please pray that he would hear the truth of the Gospel and find salvation!

Once we had received instructions I got to work with a small group of high school seniors from LA. None as far as I could tell were Christians. I got to talk to one boy Johnny an international student from China about his beliefs more in depth. He said he didn't believe there was anything so I was able to ask what he thought would happen after he died. (Thank you Evangelism 101 with Dr. Pate!) He said he thought he would go to heaven. I found this a little humorous (on the inside of course) but I was able to share with him my thoughts on life after death. Please pray specifically for Johnny to pass the Toffel (sp?) an entrance test international students must pass to enter college in the United States. Please also pray for a campus ministry to find him and minister to him next year.

My final good conversation at habitat was with a girl named Audrey. She was a pleasure to work with. She had some social problems but she figured out quickly that I was a trustworthy person. She would come to me and ask what needed to be done next. After a while we were able to get into some spiritual conversation. Knowing that she would be going back to LA the next week I suggested that she try out a Baptist church. She told me she would (and based on our short time together I think she will) Please pray for Audrey that she is welcomed into whatever church she tries and that the Holy Spirit would prepare her heart.

Some people got more fun jobs than insulation :)

After a long day at habitat we headed over to FBC San Francisco for their Wednesday night dinner. We were able to spread out to meet different people who showed up off the streets for a meal and try and be an encouragement to them. I was so impressed with this ministry! They offered a free hot meal bathrooms to clean  up in and as one man told me an environment where he felt like he could catch his breath for a few minutes. It's amazing how easy it is to take 4 walls and a roof for granted. I was able to meet a great new friend that night named Francis. We talked about sports for about 30 minutes and he could name every big player who had come out of Mississippi even though he was originally from New York. I asked if he was going to stay for the bible study later and he said he hadn't really thought about it. I told him I was going and that I would love him to join me. He said ok and I prayed he really meant it. He found me about 30 minutes later after he finished his meal and we headed over to the small group forming in the corner. He listen as we sang and didn't say a word through the entire lesson just listened. I took a few peaks at him and noticed he had found himself to the book of John and read through the first 10 or so chapters. After it was all said and done I was able to get him a Bible to keep and ask him what he thought. He said he heard some things he had never heard before and that he liked it. Please pray for people to follow up well with Francis. Please also pray that he comes back again for the weeks to come. Selfishly I would finally ask you to pray for me that I will see Francis again to follow up with him myself since we hit it off so well.

Thank you to everyone who lifted this Mississippi team up in prayer. Please know that God was moving in powerful ways as a result of it. I am so glad I got to be a part of it and am thankful for boldness the Holy Spirit gave me to speak the words He wanted me to say. We will miss this group dearly. One final way you can pray for us that we also shared with this team is for more workers to be sent here. As you can tell from even this one blog people are willing and ready to hear the good news they just need someone to tell them! We can't depend on them finding there own way into a church we need to meet them right where they are. So Please pray for San Francisco and the people God is calling to come and share the good news here!

Mississippi Team Day 4

Day four was a lot of hard but rewarding work. We got up early and drove about 45 minutes to south San Francisco. Our goal was to reach out to people working along side us at the San Francisco Food Bank. We wanted the community to know that we as Christians are concerned with helping others. Many people in SF see Christians as uncaring and judgmental. We wanted to help break that stereotype by bringing a holistic gospel to them. One that meets needs while bringing the good news of Jesus. There were about 40 other volunteers working with and around us. We had the chance to engage in good conversation with several of them. The other volunteers were there for various reasons: community service hours for school, court appointed hours, filling up time while looking for a paying job, wanting to make a difference... Bringing up this topic was an easy inroad to learning about them. It also gave them the chance to ask us why we were there serving.

The food bank where we served distributes food to all the other food banks around SF. There are over 400 food banks around SF. This food bank is like a warehouse. They send out over a million pounds of food every day. It was an impressive operation to say the least. While there we had two jobs. The first was to repackage rice from 100 pound bags into 1 pound bags. The second was to go through crates of oranges and pick out rotten ones After that we repackaged the good ones into small boxes. Together with the other volunteers we were able to package over 11,000 pounds of rice! That rice averages out to about 33,000 meals! We were shocked to find out that we packaged 25,000 pounds of oranges! We learned that they along with all the produce there will find there way into someone's hand within a maximum of 72 hours! All along the way we made it a point to pray for the many people who would receive this food. Steve and I hope to bring our youth group out to do this again because we had such a fun time and it was such a great ministry opportunity!

Please pray for all the people who have recieved and will continue to recive the food we packaged. Please also pray for the many people we had conversation with like Rebecca, George, and Vladimir.

Packaging Oranges

Some of the team working  hard making rice bags.

After the food bank we headed off to do a little sight seeing. Our first stop was Lombard Street. The steepest street in America. While our dreams of driving down it were crushed (no cars with more that 8 seats are permitted) we did get to get out a look at it.

The van parked on Lombard Street while the team got out to take pictures. I admit was was nervous to get back in for fear of it tipping

Our next stop was China Town for some souvenir shopping. After driving around for a while we finally found a cheep spot that would accommodate our 15 passenger van. (We give God the glory for this spot because we were almost at the point of giving up!)

Picture of China Town

Molly and Will showing off some of their purchases.

We ended the night with a great cookout and hangout time put on by Brett and Allison. It was a true blessing for us to get to know everyone more and refresh after a long day.