Author Archive

RevolutionaryLove.TV- The Sequel

Monday, December 15th, 2008

“RevolutionaryLove.TV- The Sequel.” Last year Revolution Church did a series called Revolutionary Love. It was great and I am glad that we are revisiting the series.

Week 1: The message today was about Sacrificial Giving. Boy did I need to hear this. David and I had discussed and prayed about what gift we should give to the church for the Christmas offering. After making a decision we felt good about we were dealt a financial blow in the amount of $6000 in attorney fees for Madilyn’s bmom. We had $1700 left in our adoption escrow account, and our attorney sent this to the other attorney prior to Thanksgiving. Once we returned home from our Thanksgiving Break we had a message from the attorney wanting to know when the remaining $4300 would be paid. She wanted her money now. We bit the bullet and sent the rest of the money not really knowing how our fiances would play out for the rest of the year.

After hearing the message on sacrificial giving we decided that the amount of money we had decided to give the church was STILL the amount we need to give. Well we like most people do not just have this kind of money sitting around (especially after spending so much on the adoption). We will be giving sacrificially… meaning we are going to cut out other stuff to make this gift to the church happen. We are going to sacrifice and give to God what we know we need to give. We know God will take our gift and do a great work with it, and we will be blessed by giving.

At the end of the service the offering plates were passed and we each drew a card that contained needs of a local women’s shelter. We drew diapers, toothbrushes and aspirin. I told Caleb that since he had drawn the card out of the offering plate that he should use his own money to help meet the need. He is such a stand up kid. He gets $20 a month, pays $2.00 in tithes leaving him $18 for the month. He decided that he would give $10.00 to help purchase items for the women’s shelter. He could have been selfish and offered less but he gave 1/2 of his monthly allowance to this cause.

Caleb and I went shopping and purchased 2 bags of diapers, 20 adult toothbrushes, 8 children’s toothbrushes and 8 bottles of aspirin. At the checkout the cashier smiled a toothless smile and said, “you must have some headache.” I told her our church was collecting items for the women’s shelter.” She looked like she was about to cry and said, “Thank you, they helped me when no one else would.” WOW…..

Christmas Photo Shoot

Tuesday, December 9th, 2008

For the past several years it has become our tradition to create our family Christmas card with a picture of Caleb and Piglet. This year tradition changes, since we could not get Madilyn, Caleb and Piglet to all cooperate at the same time. David took around 75 photos and only got 4 that turned out decent. We had fun taking the pictures.

Thanksgiving Vacation

Saturday, November 29th, 2008


This year David and I decided to stay close to home and spend the holiday with just the four of us. We rented a cabin from Mountian View Cabins, which is located on Fort Mountian. It only took about an hour and ten minutes to get there. It has been a long time since we had not traveled for hours to go and spend time with immediate family.

The cabin had a pool table, hot tub and steam room and a great view of the mountians from the back deck. We enjoyed just spending time doing nothing. Prior to the trip I pre-cooked all of our meals and froze them so that I would not have to spend so much time in the kitchen. All of the pre-cooked meals were good. Thanksgiving was the only meal I actually cooked while we were gone. It turned out pretty good.

The day after Thanksgiving we went to the top of Fort Mountian and went to the overlook, the ancient wall and a rock tower. It was a beatiful day for a hike, we got some good pictures of the view.

It was nice to relax and be disconnected. By disconnected I mean no phone and no internet. We just spent time playing games, watching movies, reading and spending time with each other.

Now we are home and back to reality.

Frustration–

Friday, November 21st, 2008

Seems like every time we start moving on in life, we get a letter or email from the attorney with not so great news. Today we got our bill and the bill for the bmom’s attorney. I am still puzzled as to why we have to pay this bill for her. She is the one who sued us. So now we owe around $7000 to attorneys, we have already paid around 3000 in attorney fees. Our attorney said we can work on a payment plan, hers pretty much wants to be paid sooner rather than later. Guess we will not have any extra money for a while, since everything will be going to pay these bills.

I am trying to be positive but I am so tired of being jerked around by these people. I just want this to be over and finalized. Pray that this happens in January as planned and that we do not have to pay anymore attorney fees.

Ready for Thanksgiving

Friday, November 14th, 2008


I am so ready for Thanksgiving. I am tired of getting up and going to work everyday. I just want to spend some time with David, Caleb and Madilyn without the worries of work and graduate school.

I am looking forward to going to the mountians and getting away from it all. This will be the first holiday in a very long time that we are not traveling to see family. It will be quiet and I will miss seeing other family members, but we need time to connect and have fun with just the four of us.

I keep wondering when our life will slow down. It just seems that we always have something going on.

Rolling Over

Thursday, November 6th, 2008


Madilyn has started rolling over. However, she is very sneaky about doing so. She waits until we leave the room to roll over. We have finally caught her at it, but it took us a few days catch her.

She also appears to be teething. She has been a big drool bucket the past few days, and has been a bit grouchy. Hopefull this ends soon.

Just Rollilng Along

Thursday, November 6th, 2008

Well we are just grooving along here in the Lloyd household. We do not have any new information to report concerning the adoption or finalization. However, we have been blindsided with the bill from the bmom’s attorney, which is around $6000.00. Not too happy about this, she sued us and was trying to get us to buy her baby, now we have to pay her attorney. These laws need to be rewritten, we had our own legal fees to pay and were not prepared to pay even more. Pray for about this funding… we do not want to put it on credit, and we don’t have it all in the bank. Hopefully her attorney will accept a payment plan.

Church Haters

Sunday, November 2nd, 2008

Recently our church started a new location in an industrial park. Prior to starting the church the pastor made sure that noise level would not be an issue with the county. We have been meeting in our new location for 7 weeks. For the past several weeks the neighbors that have property that border the church have called the cops. Tonight they called the cops twice on our youth service. Not real sure what we are going to do. We were told that we would not be in violation of the law because the church is in an industrial park. I guess my problem with this is that if we were a business the neighbors would have the noise everyday of the week and would not complain. Right now the noise is only for a few hours about 3 days a week.

4 Month Check Up

Monday, October 27th, 2008


It is hard to believe that Madilyn is already four months old. Today she had her 4 month check up. She is 12 pounds and about 24 inches long. She is only in the 17% percentile on weight and height. She is a small girl. However, she is very healthy and doing very well, so the doctor is not concerned with her weight or length at this time.

Adoption Update

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

The darkness at the end of the tunnel has now grown to a light at the end of the tunnel. We talked with our attorney yesterday. Our 180 days started on July 1 not October 1, which is when the TPR (termination of parent rights) was signed. We should receive our court date for finalization sometime toward the end of November or early December. Our court date should be during the 2 week of January.

We were told by the adoption agency that we would not have to go to Iowa for finalization, however, we are now being told that the agency was incorrect and that we do have to attend the finalization hearing in Iowa. So that means another long trip to Iowa. At least this time we will not be stuck there not knowing what is going on like we were in July. That was the longest 17 days of our lives. I guess we can take pictures with the judge and make a big deal out of it. It would be great if additional family members could attend, but that is such a long trip, so I doubt that anyone else will be able to attend.

At the time of finalization paperwork will be filed for a new birth certificate. This birth certificate will be issued with the name we have choosen Madilyn Rachel. We will then be able to apply for a social security number once we receive the reissued birth certificate.

I feel like this process is taking forever, but Madilyn is only 4 months old, so I guess it has not been forever. I just want to see her Birth Certificate with our name on it. I want my insurance card to have her name on it, not the name she was given in the hospital. It will happen, it will just take time.