Rainboots Needed

I imagined myself about 4 years old, eyes closed, arms wide open, spinning around in a bright yellow raincoat and matching rain boots with the biggest grin ever thanking God for the rain. This is exactly how I felt yesterday. We had RAIN! We needed rain, and we still need more rain, but oh how thankful I am for the drops that fell yesterday. Thank you God for the rain! 

I have a small garden in the backyard and the boys have been a great help to me. They ask lots of questions and are very interested in how a garden grows. The other day Parker looked at me and said "but Mommy if we don't have rain then you wont have any fruits and vegetables". Yes Parker, sweet child, you are right! 

I wish I could look back and see that my last blog was just yesterday rather than days ago. But, alas, its not. Life in our Powell Pod has been a rockin'...and I don't mean like "rockin' and rollin' ", I mean rockin' like a boat that's in a stormy sea. Some days I think that if I don't blog about it I can kind of put it on the back burner and not face it head on, not really have to accept and deal with what's going on. But it doesn't go away. We've been thrown several curve balls, all from different directions. Some that we still cannot talk about, some with family illness, and some with relationships. Details really don't matter right now, just a lot of yuck I'd rather not have going on. But it's there. It started to drizzle, became a steady rain, and now I find myself standing in a downpour, not prepared for the rain, not in my raincoat, and not in my cute zebra rain boots. Just standing there getting drenched. 

It's easy, with all that's going on to continue to stand in one place and get caught in the flood, to float away wherever the water takes me, to drown in sorrows. But that's not what I want. I want to stand with my eyes closed, arms wide open, spinning around in a bright yellow raincoat and matching rain boots with the biggest grin ever thanking God for the rain. And I choose to believe that "if we don't have rain then we won't have any fruits and vegetables". Jim and I were asked at church one time what our family motto was. Hmm....that's a head scratcher if you've never thought about it. So this is what we decided on: "Together may we raise our children with roots to grow and fruits to show". We desire for our children to bear the fruits of the holy spirit in their life. When I think about our family motto and the fruits that we desire for our lives to show...we must have rain for the fruits to grow. Perhaps it is the times of downpour in our lives that our fruits get the nourishment they need to grow strong. Perhaps it is times when I'm in my raincoat and boots that our fruits grow rich in flavor. Please Lord may you be glorified during this season of monsoon.

On a very very good note.....our petition to adopt was approved by the USCIS!!!! It was a letter with a lot of government verbiage, but it is one more thing checked off the list! And we still wait and pray. Please pray for our Anna Grace as she still lives in the Congo. Please pray for Anna Grace's birth parents that they would come to know the Lord and find peace and comfort in Him. And please pray for protection, health, and safety for Anna Grace. God puts me to sleep each night with a beautiful picture in my head of his angels rocking Anna Grace to sleep in the orphanage. Thank you sweet Jesus!