Ryan Hale My life and times, stories and happenings

New babies and a little time to reflect

We've been down in Florida since last Wednesday on vacation.  We went first on a cruise down to Cozumel and then have been here in Venice since Monday.  With a few days away from work and all of the craziness of regular life, I've finally been able to start thinking a little more about all of the news that we've been getting over the last few weeks.

First, back when we were in Indiana over Thanksgiving, Gina was really starting to not feel well.  She was feeling pretty nauseous most of the time, a tough thing when you're trying to dive into the turkey.  She thought that it was just the flu coming on.  Well, we got back to Denver and I was beginning to feel the bug to go skiing.  So just before we were to go out to Breckenridge a few weeks ago, she comes in - all out of breath - and announces that she is pregnant.  Of course that made me sit straight up in bed...  "You're what?!?"

Pretty incredible given that for the last ten years, we have been under the belief that it wasn't possible for her to get pregnant any longer.  I was there when we had both tubal pregnancies, there when the doctors did the test telling us that we couldn't have any more children, there when we went through all of the crazy in vitro treatments, and there when it ultimately led to the adoption of Ellie in China.  It has been a terrible, and yet awesome, adventure that has brought us to today.  So when you have been through that series of events, it makes it difficult to even believe that it is possible to be pregnant yet again.  We definitely regard this child as a miracle and I think we've just been hanging on to see what God is going to do next!

Well, so we found out...  The day before we came down here, we got a call from our case worker for the adoption we have been working on and we have a little girl waiting on us in Awassa, Ethiopia.  We can't share her picture yet as that is a problem from a legal standpoint with Ethiopia, but those will come soon.  Her name will be Julia Joy Hale and she is five months old at this point.  Her paperwork says that she is in great health, and from the pictures that we've received so far, she is beautiful!

So two of them.  Huh...  I've spent quite a bit of time with Gina over the last year or two saying that we weren't going to have more than three.

Paige Clausen reminded us of a little prophetic word that she had for us a few years ago.  I have to admit that I was a little skeptical at the time, but she kept saying, "You know, I just see two babies."  Knowing that we couldn't have any more kids and that I had no intention of adopting more than one more, I just couldn't see how that was possible.  At this point, though, I'm sort of imagining God sitting there saying, "How about them apples?"

Don't get me wrong.  This is going to be good.  Just different than what I had imagined.  Of course, that has been the case since the beginning of this whole story.  Maybe one of these days I'll learn to sit back and enjoy the ride!