On June 13, Hope turned three. This was her second birthday to celebrate as a Birchfield. Hope has been part of our family for just over a year now. We really can’t imagine life without her for it seems as if she has always been a part of our family. To see her now and to remember how she was when we first met her shows how much a child needs a loving and healthy family. She doesn’t even recognize herself in pics from the orphanage. In fact, she thinks the pics are of a boy!
Back to the Birthday. We only had a small celebration with our friends, the Colees. We enjoyed Domino’s Pizza and an Elmo cake compliments of Beth. Hope is still not sure what all this birthday stuff means, but she sure knows how to open presents.
Our good friend, Chip Colee, is the Minister of Music at our church. Each year he takes the high school choir on choir tour/mission trip. This year he took 78 high school students including Dow to Dallas. Chip was led to have this year’s theme on adoption. The pictures above show the choir’s shirts which read ”I’m adopted,” and on the back are the words “by the King.” Chip included the song, “Orphans of God” and many key scriptures into the program as well as some adoption stories including ours. Our family along with so many others were blessed by the choir’s Homecoming Concert on June 13 (yes, Hope’s B’day).
Hope is taking a tumbling class and learning her letters. We tried swimming lessons, but she just isn’t ready to trust in the water yet. Of course, Beth has taken this task on and is doing a great job with her. She loves to go to the lake and now likes to ride on the wave runner. When we are in the car, she often says, “go faster Mommy (or Daddy).” She likes to call Beth, Sister or Bethie.
Hope has certainly been an inspiration to us. We have been led to start a church orphan ministry at our church that we expect to launch this fall. We sense the Lord leading us to reach out to foster care children in Montgomery, adopting families, and orphans overseas. The Lord is really bringing this all together as our church seeks to obey His Word to take care of orphans. I not only think about how different her life is but ours as well. We are excited about where God is leading and the mighty things He will do.
