Love is Patient

We are still waiting on our travel date, but our facilitator did tell us yesterday that he thinks we will have it next week!  Which we hope would mean that we will be heading to Ukraine in the next 5 weeks.  We really thought we would be home from Ukraine by now with the boys, yet here we are waiting to leave still.  Love is patient.  :)  We are getting lots of practice in patience.  I keep coming across this verse, "We love because He first loved us."  1 John 4:19.   I tend to not believe in coincidence when something comes up in my daily life repetitively.  So I have been thinking a lot about love this week.  And it is so true that we love because God first loved us.  We are not the redeemers of the boys, we are the redeemed.  We love them because God loves us.  We think you can really boil life down to love God, love people.  It is really pretty simple.  And goodness, the people we have seen love from since we started this process!  Just this week, we have had a dear friend donate more stuff for us to sell so we can live in Ukraine for 4 months.  (Thank you Jamie!)  And then a sweet, sweet lady found our blog and then found our Etsy store and ordered some jewelry.  Then turns out she lives like 5 miles away!  So I got to deliver the jewelry to her and visit her and hear a little of her story.  And she works with and knows my sister in law.  (Hi, Betty!)  The people God has solidified in our lives and the new people He has brought into our lives has been such a blessing.  Such a tapestry of interwoven people caring about S and V and helping to bring them home.  It is completely humbling as we see all of this love.  Since finding out I will have to be in Ukraine much longer than originally expected and that we would need more money for those extra 8 weeks, I started making more jewelry to help offset those expenses.  A new bronze jewelry connector came in this week that I had forgotten I had ordered and it says, "Love is Patient".  I am excited about getting some bracelets made with them and I will certainly be keeping one for myself as a reminder.

In the meantime, we are making some great memories.  We got Collin back on the road to the University of Arkansas last weekend for his senior year, we got Caroline moved into her dorm for her freshman year at Mississippi State University, we are enjoying every minute we can with Jocelyn, Ellie Grace, and Ali and making great strides in some projects we have on going.  God's timing is always best.

Oh, and we talk to Emileigh regularly, she just is not home.  She has started her 3rd year of physical therapy school, is doing clinical rotations now, and has been cussed at by her first patient. :)   We also really love her and are so proud of her.  I do not think she could have chosen a better profession for herself!

So, remember:

1.  We love because He first loved us.

2.  Love God, love people.

3.  Love is patient.

Oh, and keep praying for our boys!!!