One week ago...

Who: Natalie, our Gladney case worker, to me

What: The single most important phone call of my life

When: April 27th, 2010, 5:13pm

Where: Driving on Interstate 85/40 in between two 18-wheelers

Why: Introduction to our sweet baby

How: By the Grace of God

We had a feeling the referral would come last week. In fact, the overwhelming anticipation intertwined with immense peace that I began feeling on Sunday, April 25th, is a combination I've never quite experienced before. What I could have never imagined, however, was that Natalie would call me on my evening commute! Last Tuesday, I left one of my schools around 5pm after a long meeting. I was trying to rush home to make it to the shipping store to mail my niece's gift in time to make it for her birthday and also trying to determine if I was going to have time to make it to yoga after that. When my phone rang at 5:13pm and I saw the (817) area code, I think I stopped breathing. This is how the bulk of the conversation went down after the hello/greetings:

Natalie: "I have a referral ready for you!"

Me: "Uh, uh, okay, ah, uh, okay, um, okay, ummmm (truly, this is all I could come up with!) Okay, well I'm on the interstate driving home from work and I'm going to try not to wreck!"

Natalie: "Don't do that; be careful."

Me: "Okay, can I find out where Jeff is and call you back when we get home?"

Natalie: "Sure, just call me back when you get home."

Me: "Okay, well bye-WAIT-can you tell me if it's a boy or girl and how old our baby is?!"

(I almost forgot to ask her!...Jeff and I agreed a long time ago that Natalie could just tell me these two pieces of information before I called him and we both called her back.)

Natalie: "Sure, it's a baby BOY and he's just over 1 month old!"

Me: No idea. Really, I have no idea what I said to her at this point. Complete and utter shock.

After hanging up with Natalie, I immediately called Jeff. Here is what I remember from that conversation (still trying not to wreck):

Jeff: "Hello"

Me: "Baby?" (the tears start to fall)

Jeff: "Yeah?"

Me: "We have a one month-old baby boy." (can't control the waterfall at this point)

Jeff: "Are you serious?!"(I had already made an earlier call to him that very afternoon and he was disappointed when it wasn't "the call.")

Me: "Yes, where are you?!"

Jeff: "Driving, on my way home." I'll be home in about 15 minutes." (We hardly ever drive home at the same time.)

Me: "Me too!" Okay, I'll meet you there to call Natalie back."

Jeff: "Okay, uh, um, okay, are you going to call anybody?"

Me: "I really want to call my mom."

Jeff: "Okay, you call yours and I'll call mine!"

I called my mom after that (still driving) and told her that we have a baby BOY! I don't remember the rest of the conversation with her after that. (Sorry, mom!) When I pulled into my driveway about 15 minutes later, my husband was standing there with the biggest smile on his face. I jumped out to give him a hug; it was wonderful but very brief :-). After rushing inside, I saw that Jeff had somehow--in the five minutes before I arrived--managed to clean off the dining table, set up the laptop, and the camera/video.

There are really no words to describe our emotions for the next several minutes, when we called Natalie back and saw our sweet angel for the first time through emailed photos. Although I must have felt a thousand things all at once (including, "Is this really happening?!"), JOY trumped everything. To see this beautiful, incredibly healthy, baby boy on that computer screen staring back at me was truly unforgettable...and I just couldn't (and still can't) believe that God has blessed us with this gift. Sadness followed as we were told his story of his time before arriving in Gladney's care. We are choosing to keep many of those details private at this point, but all I can say is that God's angels were with him every step of the way.

The remainder of the night was filled with many smiles, laughter, hugs, praises, tears, phone calls to family, texts/emails to friends, and even "bubbly!" Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep that night (or most of the subsequent nights last week!). After dozing off in the wee hours of the morning, I woke up at 5am to the sound of what I thought were his cries. I closed my eyes and asked God to dry his tears. Then, as I imagined his drying, mine began to fall...many tears of gratitude...Thank you, Jesus, for this amazing gift....

Like cold water to a weary soul, is good news from a distant land. -Proverbs 25:25