Merry Christmas

Since we aren't getting out Christmas Cards this year, here are our greetings to you!

May this Christmas season be saturated with the awe and wonder of the birth of Baby Jesus...

Merry Christmas!

Aaron

This is Aaron. He is 17 years old and pretty amazing. Aaron was our first adoption. When he was 3 years old, his photo appeared in the "Minnesota's Waiting Children" Booklet that was produced then. Despite his many disabilities, we were drawn to him immediately. To our surprise he was Caucasian, we had never really thought that God would lead us to a Caucasian child because we had always felt strongly called to adopt transracially. I think that God loves to remind us that it is not us choosing a child to adopt anymore than we choose our birth children. The description of Aaron was daunting--profound mental "retardation", g-tube fed, respiratory issues, wheelchair bound-- not to mention deafblind... We requested information but really felt that we were not qualified to take such a complex and fragile child.
We received an incredibly large packet of medical information about Aaron. There were so many things that we "knew" we couldn't handle. We didn't know sign language, we had never fed a child with a g-tube--we really didn't know what we were doing as parents yet---Tyler and McKenna, our birth children were only 1 and 3 years old themselves. Who were we to think that we could do this? I threw away all the paperwork I received about Aaron.
And he just wouldn't go away...Thankfully! Every time I would mention to a friend that we said no to this little boy because of one of the various issues that he had (i.e. deafness etc..), they would offer us assistance and assurance that we could really handle this. A friend was a sign language interpretor and offered to help us learn sign language. Another friend reasured us that G-tube feedings were not difficult and we would feel comfortable in no time. One by one all of our fears were falling away....and God was drawing us near so that could hear His clear direction...
And then I turned on the TV to watch the news, and there he was! Aaron was the featured child on "Thursday's Child.." which features waiting children in Minnesota. Seeing him, I knew immediately that this was our son.
We knew then that he was our son and that we needed to bring him home. After speaking with the foster parents, who are wonderful faithful believers in Southern Minnesota, We made plans to bring our litle boy home.

Aaron is a ray of sunshine. He has the most easy going personality around. He entertains himself with the simplest of things---a sock, a ray of light that shines through the window, and anything falling--he loves that!
Over the years, Aaron has become increasingly medically fragile. He is severely allergive to Latex and many other things. He requires oxygen overnight because of severe sleep apnea. He loves school and Sunday school at Bethlehem. He participates in Special Olympics bowling and bocce ball and has some great friends there. He has really great people who work with him and we are so thankful for those people. Those who are the best helpers are always those who understand that Aaron gives back so much more than we can give to him.
Aaron is a treasure. a gift. He reminds us everyday what courage is. He brings us so much joy....