Hart and I have been waiting on the adoptions side of DSS for over 7 months now. Before that we had gone through almost 8 months of paperwork to get to the final approval process. Needless to say, it feels like forever.

During this silent wait, we have met some really wonderful friends, the Harris family. They felt God calling them to become foster parents. Literally the week they got approved they got placed with a little girl that is not yet ready for adoption, but an adoption plan is about to begin. You can read Abbie's story here.

Watching them juggle through "should they" "shouldn't they" foster and then seeing how God has brought a beautiful sweet little girl to their family so quickly, it definitely encouraged Hart and I to consider fostering more deeply, to lift it to God, to open our hearts to it and pray if it was right for us.

Believe us, we have come up with every excuse NOT to do it. But there is still a small voice leading us there.

Believe us, we are seriously SCARED TO DEATH about it, but we are pushing through our fears and praying that God will help us in each moment as we now venture into becoming foster parents.

We have currently decided that we are going to continue pursuing foster care unless God shuts the door closed, like if I were to become pregnant, or some other issue were to arise that we were unable to do it.

We are truly clinging to God's grace and praying He will make us ready for the task at hand.

Please pray that God will help us through the next several weeks as DSS approves us as foster parents. Due to the fact that we are already approved and have an active home-study with them, it is much quicker to the approval process. The need for foster parents is so real that we expect to be called quickly. Our age range is still only 0 - 2 years, but the risk is much higher that the child will be re-unified to their birth family.  This could mean that we may be placed with a child that then has to leave us. While I selfishly pray that they never do have to leave us, I know that this could be a reality and we need to be prepared for it.

Please pray that God will bring to us the child that we are to adopt via foster care and that he will do this right away! Pray that this child will be protected and guarded from whatever terrible issues DSS is having to remove them from.

Please pray that our heart issues will be resolved by the Holy Spirit. That our fears would not inhibit us to love deep the children God brings our way.

Please pray that the child God brings will get along with Cai with ease and that they will be sweet siblings whether for a short time OR in our forever family!

We cherish your prayers! Would you get on your knees and pray for us right now?

Love in Christ,
The Traylors

Prayer for my Gramie

Having a baby is one way to make you feel like you are getting older or to make you actually face the fact that you are an adult. Visiting a nursing home is one way to make you face the fact that you are going to get old and gray. I've been faced with the idea of getting older the last couple weeks. My grandma (91) went into the hospital and is now at a transitional unit rehabilitation center. Visiting at the hospital wasn't as much as a confrontation with the fact that you will be old-and-gray-whether-you-like-it-or-not. While there did seem to be a lot of other elderly on her medical floor, you can't see in all the rooms and there are other people that are there, of all ages healing. However, last night I went to the rehabilitation center for the first time.

You know the helpless scene.

Lots of old people just sitting around. Some slooped over drooling barely holding their heads up. Gray hair, balding. You are confronted with faility. One lady actually slipped out of her wheel chair while I was there and had to have help getting up. Walking down the hall, there's that smell. It's the smell of old people and urine. It's hot, because old people like it hot, because they are always cold. And then the food. It's gross mashed up food. Then, you walk in the door of your grandma's room and you have one thought on your mind. Get this person that I love out of this depressing place!

My Gramie is awesome. She is young at heart. She always wears earrings everywhere she goes and red lipstick. She's got to have color on. She wears bracelets and beaded necklaces layered and they don't have to match. She loves Jesus and breaks out in prayer all the time. She reaches out and touches whoever she wants to talk to and she makes people take a second to talk to her. She smiles at others and everyone thinks she's just cute as a button!

We spent some time just hanging out, me and her, last night. She is in pain, but prayerfully, she will be able to leave that place sooner than later. I think she is there for one reason and that is to pray for the other people. She admitted she thought that was true, too.

If you guys would please pray for my Gramie. If you have met her, you know how cute she is. She needs to get out of that rehabilitation center and into a better place, and I don't think that place is Heaven quite yet. My mom and I are working together to make that happen soon. I don't care for the staff at this place, minus her night nurse last night, who actually seemed to care and do her job well.

I will keep you posted. In the mean time, I'm going to thank God that I have health in my body, and go clean my house.

We are SO close! Update/Prayer Requests!

We are so close, I can almost taste it! I think it hit me tonight how surreal having a baby is. I mean you know it is real. You deal with all kinds of crazy pregnancy symptoms constantly. You have this baby moving around inside of you, shoving his little feet into your ribs, making you go, "OH!" BUT... at the same time, it is so hard to believe that in just 3 days you will be holding this tiny baby in your arms.

We had our final doctor's appointment today, which included our millionth ultrasound today. I meant to ask how many we have had so far, because I sure have lost count. Everything looked great and we feel so blessed by God! We got to see our Cai give a big ole yawn and he had the chubbiest cheek that just made me want him OUT NOW, so that I could squeeze it! He measured in at 7lbs 1 oz and the 63 percentile at 38 weeks in utero.

It just makes me praise God over and over again for the overabundance of his grace and mercy on us!

At times, I can tell that Satan tries to make me fear. Another surgery. So many things that could go wrong. And, yet, I remind myself that Satan is powerless. He MUST go to GOD for permission to do all things. God is in control and I'm so thankful for the overwhelming peace that comes from that. God has kept this baby in his hands this entire time, and he is not gonna stop! God has protected him from the weird blood antigen that could have attacked him. He has kept me and baby safe during these last few weeks of developing preeclampsia. God has kept all of us safe and secure!

Assuming that God has Micaiah be born on Tuesday, he will be exactly 2 weeks younger than his sweet cousin Naomi. That is just sooo cool. We will have two babies born to this family two weeks apart! I just can't wait until Christmas when they will get to meet for the first time!

Please keep us in your prayers these last few days!

• Pray that Micaiah is strong and healthy and that he will get here that way, too.
• Pray that I will get over this chest congestion/cough that I've had for about 2 weeks now.
• Pray that my c-section will go well and that my doctor will do a really great job, for no complications or problems!
• Pray that we will be patient as we anxiously await this next Tuesday's arrival!
• Pray that our family flying in, will arrive safe and sound!