Happy Anniversary!

A year ago today, the Pope family grew by two feet (the two cutest little feet that had on the cutest little Nike's!)!
Josie woke up extra early this morning and I did my very best not to complain about it. Because last year at 5:30 AM on October 2nd, I was dying for a baby to call out my name every morning.
An old friend made a comment about my last post that I wanted to share. She just said that we never know how close we are to the answer to our prayers. How true is that?
Sometimes we grow weary in our waiting. It begins to feel like our prayers are hitting the ceiling, and we begin to give up hope.
There were times when I would think that we would just never be parents. We weren't getting pregnant, we couldn't afford an adoption, doctors could find no reason that we weren't getting pregnant, we had even had 2 adoption situations fall through. It seemed that we were out of options. Even contacting DFCS to investigate foster care adoptions was a shot in the dark. I never actually believed we would get a child out of it.
But God heard all of our prayers. There was a reason for us not getting pregnant, for the other adoptions to not go through. Josie was out there waiting for us. Needing us to wait for her.
Andrew and I used to talk about what we wanted our baby to be like. No joke, we wanted a girl with curly hair that was the texture of mine, we wanted her to have Andrew's eye, my frame, and big chubby cheeks! When I look at Josie, the exact manifestation of those requests, there is no denying that God was listening.
So let our story be a story of hope for whatever it is that you are waiting for an answer to. When the answer comes, it will be in the blink of an eye. One moment you will be hoping and wishing, and the next it will be pulling into your driveway, fast asleep, with a soaking wet diaper and your life will never be the same.
He is there, he is listening, and your answer may very well be a few short hours away.