We are your average, American family; dad, mom, three boys, and two dogs that are constantly causing trouble.

Except we look a weeeeeeeeee bit different.

We are actually two white folks, including one with a bunch of freckles who doesn’t tan well, plus three black boys, ranging in age from five months to 18 years old.

Ok, we’re an anomaly and we know it.  Some people think we are just plain weird. I’m okay with that.

To be honest, Brian and I really don’t care what people think of us.  The choices to form our family have quite obviously not been due to public opinion.

We didn’t plan on adding three children in one year.  We didn’t plan on adding children of all one specific race to our family.

We agreed, from the start of our marriage, that our family would include children who needed homes, stability, and love.

This year, three children entered our lives that needed just that.  They just all happen to be boys and they just happen to be black.

One through legal guardianship.  One through foster care.  One through adoption.

At this point, just one has our last name.

But don’t be mistaken, each one has our heart.

A year ago today, I wrote a post about our city and our family.  At that point, we had just welcomed our J-man into our home a few months before.

Thinking about Martin Luther King, Jr., his impact, his life, and his role in the city that we live rang especially deep in my heart last year.

Today, I can say that MLK’s words and his mission for equality bears even more weight and significance in my life.

Now, as parents of a black teenager, we have witnessed that misconception and prejudices about race are still prevalent and thriving.  The road for our boys will not be easy.

We feel a very strong burden to give them the foundation in which to navigate a world where color is often still the first thing a person sees when making a judgement on character ability.

We believe that their culture and their heritage is paramount to who they are and needs to be cultivated.

We pray that the first and foundational thing in which they identify themselves is their faith in Christ.

We envision a future for them where their relationships and community is not defined solely by their race, but instead by common values and beliefs.

We hope that one day, our son will not be feared because he is walking down the street in a grey hoodie and jeans.

We pray daily that our boys will become Godly men of integrity and honor, who do not believe anything is owed to them, but instead stand and fight for justice of those around them who cannot.

‎Brian and I know that the choices we have made to form our family won’t be accepted by everyone.

We know that we don’t have all the answers on how to raise our boys.

We are quite aware that we will make many mistakes along the way.

But we are very sure that the three boys placed in our home this past year are here because they belong in OUR FAMILY. Not just anywhere, but here, with us and our two crazy dogs.

“Faith is taking the first step even when you can’t see the whole staircase.”

– Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

We have faith that though we don’t know what the road with our boys looks like ahead, we are a family formed with a purpose.  And we are going to move forward and figure this out this crazy life together.

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 Leslie and her husband, Brian, live in Montgomery, Alabama where he is a youth pastor and she coordinates ONEfamily, an orphan care ministry. She’s a mom to five boys, some with two legs and some with four legs. All of them are amazing and usually stinky. Leslie enjoys quiet places, watching SEC football, and drinking an entire cup of coffee –  none of which happen on a regular basis. She blogs about life with her boys over www.waitingonaword.blogspot.com   

I watched the sun and clouds shadow the mountain as the morning rose up from the night. Praying as I watched for the clouds to stand aside so that I could see it all. But, not to see the mountain this time, covered with oaks, pines, and cedars. This morning I longed to see passed the clouds of uncertainty.

It was his words that triggered it all, his remembering days of loneliness and the days he cried alone in a Ugandan orphanage. And though he is only 5 years old, his words spoke a volume full when he said to his new mother, “I was crying and you weren’t there.” I remember Psalm 68:6: “God sets the lonely in families, he leads out the prisoners with singing.” But, a secret that I never knew before is that He causes a family to be lonely for the ones He plans to set among them.

And I feel the words stirring me. And the question pressing hard on my heart, “Is someone crying and I am not there?” And do they know that I am crying for them, too?

But those pesky clouds; always descending on me, always blocking my view of His will. Causing me to look through the mist and wonder what it is I exactly saw before, back when it was lightening clear? And I imagined that Mary wondered too. She was full of the Spirit’s plans for her, full of this divine DNA stretching at her abdomen, reminding her daily that she was set on a course beyond her own imagination. But surely people looked at her and wondered if she was “one of those kind of girls”; a shame, a disgrace. And Joseph might have thought so, if not for a dream. Did she always believe that she carried the Liberating King in her womb and at what moment was she seen as fully legitimate in all the eyes around her?

And I long to feel legitimate here in my little cabin, sitting at my computer, watching for the bread crumbs to continue to drop and lead me inch by inch on this journey of adoption to it’s glorious conclusion. You may be carrying a dream as well, something uniquely your own, birthed deep inside your heart/womb. No, not as grand as Mary’s, but His plan anyway, and all those hours and mornings before all is fulfilled we wake up and go about living with the “life” growing in us, affecting our choices and behaviors, our thoughts and our plans. And I suppose the temptation to be afraid, or to doubt the plan doesn’t change it, just steals the joy from the journey–just lays a wedge between us and Him.

So here in the black and white I speak softly. With the black and white keys I peck out a confession to the bright white screen. “I feel like a mother full with child, but such a strange gestation it is! Because if I am to hold my offspring in my arms, I must follow a path of uncertainty, filled with questions, with governments, with forms, with deadlines, and with astonishing price tags. This journey, already taken by others, has sometimes ended in failures, heavy financial losses, disappointments, yet also with great success. I feel my abdomen stretching and I pray to see it all through to the end.”

And to my cry to feel “legitimate” as a prospective adoptive parent to dark skinned beauties far away and across an ocean—he seemed to answer me with 10,000 God “yes-es”. He took away a bit of the “shame” of not knowing how a girl like me, and an already full family like ours could even begin to afford an impossibility like this. All of the the “yes-es” were in the form of dollars and each one provided by way of the new job that the “man of this house” secured just a short while back; a company reimbursable grant for adoptions for up to 2 children and up to $10,000. They were 10,000 reasons to keep trying, to keep praying for miracles, to keep hoping for more.

So during this gestation period where fear sometimes grips, and uncertainty sometimes clouds my view, but where hope keeps pulling me up and forward I am asking Him for more “yes-es”.

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I’m Rhonda and I live in a house full of “menfolk” on a small hobby farm in the Ozarks. My husband and I have been married for 22 years and have four sons ranging in age from 12 to 21. I tiptoed into the land of blogs in the spring of this year after immersing myself into the stories of some amazing people and writers that were willing to share their lives in very generous, sacrificial, and honest ways on their personal blogs. Most were telling of the miraculous ways in which they entered the realm of adoption and followed it to a life changing conclusion. My family felt the call of adoption tugging at our hearts and I wanted communicate about it as well. I am yet amazed by the people that I have met through this new venue and hope to always follow their example of sharing from a heart of gratitude and ambition to encourage others along the way.

I came across this picture today. I’m so thankful that Wes captured one of the sweetest and hardest moments I have ever experienced.

I am forever grateful to Max’s birthmom for giving us the priceless gift of a 7 lb. 11 oz. baby boy.

There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think of her.

We love her dearly.

We pray for her daily.

Will you do me a favor? Please make it a point this week {or as long as you feel led to} to pray for birthmoms and their families. There are moms at this very moment who have chosen adoption as the best option for their baby.

Here are a few ideas to pray for.

* peace about their decision

* healing – physically and emotionally

* a loving support system surrounding them

* a tangible feeling of God’s love for them

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Abby has been married to her college sweetheart, Wes, since 2003. After 5 years of infertility, they began the journey of domestic adoption. Blessed with a (more than they had planned) open adoption experience, they were able to witness the birth of their first child, Max, in the summer of 2010. Wes and Abby are trusting God as he leads them in their relationship with Max’s birth family. You can follow their story, including their second adoption journey at Akers of Love.