9 Lessons I have learned through Adoption.

Adoption Day July 22nd, 2010

Note: A few months ago I had the privilege of teaching at a Woman's Conference at Calvary Chapel Sao Vicente. CCSV is a church that is very near and dear to our hearts. Our family had a blessed time with our friends Pastor Celso and his beautiful wife Tati. One of the three messages that the Lord put on my heart to teach was "9 Lessons I have learned   through Adoption". For whatever reason the Lord put it on my heart today to post my notes from this teaching. I have already shared some of these ideas on this blog but I wanted to re post them to keep a record of what the Lord has been teaching this mom of many and I hope that He will use it to encourage someone else. With much love - Dani

Lesson 1.) We are chosen to be sons of God. 

(Rom 8:15) For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”

 I have learned that it is very important to teach our children that adoption means acceptance and adoption means love. My oldest son Josiah has been told this so many times he started to tell people “Did you know I am the best kid in the whole world? Do you know why I am the best kid in the whole world? My parents could have picked any kid in the whole world but they chose me.” 

In fact our family has put such an emphasis on making sure that our children know that adoption is a special thing our biological son Ezekiel who is 4 years old started telling people that he was adopted. Adoption is acceptance. Adoption is love. We were chosen to be sons of God. Did you know that you are loved? Sometimes we as women just need to hear that don’t we? YOU ARE ACCEPTED! YOU ARE LOVED! YOU are loved by the God of the universe.  

Lesson 2 .) The Lord made a sacrifice to have a relationship with me. (John 3:16 )“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."  When we first got our kids it was really difficult. The kids came to us with lots of issues. It wasn’t their fault, they had come from a difficult life but never the less in the beginning it was very hard to parent them. I remember a time about a month after we got the kids, Nathan had gone back to Brazil to take care of the church and the kids and I had to stay in the U.S.A. to finalize the adoption. At the time we had 6 kids. Our oldest son Josiah was 5 years old, Hope was 4 years old, Grace, Lilly and Jer were ALL 2 years old and E.Z. was only 6 months old. Imagine 6 kids under 5 years old. Four of the kids were under 2 years old and FOUR babies were using diapers!! That is over a 1,000 diapers a month!! Imagine! I remember one day I was really sick, super sleep deprived, missing my husband and dealing with some MAJOR bad attitudes (mine was the worst I am sure). By noon, I had poop thrown at me, been bit, dealt with TONS of screaming, and to top it all off my face was dripping with spit from an angry two year old. My 5 year old had told me that he hated me and he wanted to go back to his “old mom”.  After I finally got everyone settled and down for a nap I sat on my bed and cried out to the Lord and said,

"Father, what am I doing? Are these kids ever going to realize what we are doing for them? Are they ever going to appreciate what we have given up for them? Are they ever going to love me the way that I love them?" 

As I sat on my bed listening to the unusually quiet house I heard my answer in the form of a question. The Lord said to me - 

“Do you realize what I have given up for you? Do you love ME the way that I love you?" 

Wow! It was in that moment that something in my mind clicked. Jesus ALREADY knew what I was feeling because He had ALREADY done it. He gave up being with His Father (WOW!) - so I should be able to get through being away from Nate for a time while we finalized the adoption. 

The Lord knew what it was like to have His kids spit in His face because He ALREADY did it - AND (here is the crazy part) He did it all for me and He did it for YOU.

Lesson 3.) Jesus is not ashamed to call us HIS brothers!  (Heb 2:11)“For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren” 

 Shortly after adopting our kids, I remember shopping at Walmart in our pretty conservative little town. Because I had 6 little kids we usually did our shopping in the afternoon which also happens to be when the older/ sometimes rather judgemental senior citizens of our town would also do their shopping. On this particular shopping trip I remember Josiah gleefully singing the “Thong Song” as loud as he could while I avoided eye contact from more than one horrified fellow shoppers. Poor Hope wanted to hide under the cart as all attempts to quiet Josiah's concert only encouraged him to sing louder. In the moment good girl Hope was a little ashamed for people to think Josiah was her brother but Jesus is not ashamed to call us HIS brothers. Wow!

Lesson 4.) We are considered joint heirs and brothers with Jesus.  

(Gal 4:5-6) to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!”

 July 22nd, 2010, our adoption day was one of the best days of my life. Like our wedding day or our other children's births is was a day that was much anticipated, planned for, and prayed over. Because it was such a crazy day I remember very little details of the day and the adoption ceremony itself. So while the details of the day are foggy one thing is forever etched in my mind and I will remember it for the rest of my life and that is what the judge said to us right before she pronounced the kids "Cates forever". The judge looked Nathan and I in the eye and very seriously said  “Mr. and Mrs. Cate I see that you already have three biological children and I want to make one thing very clear. These children that you are adopting today will be considered the same as your biological children. They have every right and every inheritance as if they were born to you.” We as Christians are considered joint heirs of Jesus. We are sons of God. 

Lesson 5.) When we spend time with the Lord we look more like Him.  (2Corinthians 3:18) “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding a(2Corinthians 3:18) “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” One of my favorite things as an adoptive mother is watching our family grow and mold together. Everywhere we go people try to “figure us out”. Everyone wants to know how on earth two 28 year olds could have 8 kids. Sometimes we will tell people that we adopted but I always hate when people want to know WHO was adopted. My favorite response is, “I forgot”. Nate likes to say, “Hey if you can’t tell why should we?” I love that people can’t tell who is adopted and who is biological; this means that we are doing our job as adoptive parents. 

 Lately I have been seeing traits of Nathan in the kids more than ever, whether it is Josiah making a cheesy joke, Jeremiah making a funny face, or Lilly having an unnatural obsession for chocolate I am always finding myself telling the kids 

“You get that from your dad!” Every day the kids are becoming more like Nate because they are spending TIME with him, they have a relationship with him, and they are picking up on who he is as a person. I hope and pray that this is how I am with my Father Jesus Christ. I want to become more like Him as I spend time with Him just growing in our relationship and growing in His Word. I want to look like my Dad. 

Lesson 6.) The Lord sacrificed His perfect SON to have a relationship with me and imperfect sinner.  (yes, this verse again, hey it is that good!!)  (John 3:16 )“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 

 I remember when my kids first came to us Lilly was having a really hard time. Like I have already said, it was not her fault, she had been through a lot in her life and she just didn’t really like people. At the time out of all the people that she didn't like the one that she hated most (again, just in the beginning) was me. It was SO hard trying to love someone who only hated me. I remember one day she did something bad and I had to put her in a time out. When I asked her to go to the time out chair for her discipline she was so angry she put her hands on her hips and marched away. As she was walking away and glaring at me from across the room she spotted my 6 month old baby Ezekiel who was laying on the floor. Before I had time to make it across the room she got to the baby and kicked him in the face with her cowboy boots on! My heart broke! I loved the kids so much but I did not want to see my biological kids suffer because I had chosen to adopt my other 3 kids. I would do anything for any of my kids. I would lay down my life for any of my kids. The only thing that I would not be able to do would be to sacrifice the life of one of my kids for another kid. That kind of sacrifice would be an almost impossible sacrifice but if we really stop and think about it our Lord made an even greater sacrifice for us! At the time of this story my Lilly was bad but nothing compared to the sinner than I am. My baby Ezekiel was innocent but nothing compared to the innocence of the sinless Son of God Jesus Christ. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16) The Lord sacrificed His perfect Son to have a relationship with me. THIS IS LOVE!

Lesson 7.) There is no evidence of our past life. We are new creations in Him.  (2 Corinthians 5:17) “This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”  I have been talking a lot about the horror stories of when the kids first came to us, but something very interesting is in only four and a half years of being in our family our kids are totally different people. Most people who meet our family are not even able to tell who is adopted and who are our biological children. Why? Because there is little to no evidence of the pain and the past life that my kids had. They have become new people. The old has passed away and new life has begun.   My kids have new names, new identity and a new family. This is something that the Lord desires to do in our lives as well when we accept Him as our Savior.

 Lesson 8.) The Lord has patience with me as I continue to grow in Him. 

 (Philippians 1:6)“being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ”

My kids are still not perfect (none of them are, they are sinners just like their mom ;) .) but they are continuing to grow every day. Sometimes the kids have bad days but I am trusting that the Lord will be faithful to complete the good work that He has started in their lives. When my kids have a bad day do I get mad and say “Ok, you have gone back to your old ways, no more love for you!” NO! I know that my kids are not perfect and I still love them. The Lord knows that we are not perfect and He choses to love us anyways. He will have patience and grace to forgive us when we fall and He will be faithful to continue the good work that HE has begun in our lives. 

Lesson 9.) I must choose a relationship with Him. We have sacrificed a lot for our kids and over the years we have had a lot of people say funny things like “You guys are saints!” or “What a blessing you are to those kids” but the reality is it isn’t only the kids who were blessed when we adopted them. Nathan and I are blessed every day to have every one of our kids as part of our family!o We love watching them play, we love watching them learn, and we love watching them grow. We love seeing their different personalities and we love getting to know them more everyday. There is no greater joy than having a relationship with our kids. When our kids choose to talk to us, when they choose to spend time with us and share their hearts with us everything that we have done for them is totally worth it. Our Heavenly Father is also wanting to have that same kind of relationship with us. The only thing is we need to do is accept that relationship with Him. We need to choose to walk in that relationship and to spend time growing in that relationship daily. You have the opportunity to become a daughter of the Living God. If you are have already accepted Jesus as your Savior ask yourself “Do I look like my Dad?”, are you looking more like Jesus daily? If you don’t see that you are growing in your relationship with Him now is the time to recommit yourself to Him and start the process of becoming more and more like Him.  

(Rev. 3:20)“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”

The Cate Family and the Ministry in Brazil Update, April 2014. Thank you so much for your prayers and support!

Steps of Faith, 3 Years Later.

'For we walk by faith, not by sight. ' ( 2 Corinthians 5:7 ) Three years ago today I woke up a mom of three children and by the time I went to bed I was a mom of six kids all five years old and under. Today as we celebrated our "Happy Homecoming Day" with our every growing family I could not help thinking about the "what ifs".

  What if we had not been in the U.S. when we got the call about the kids? If that call had been two days later we would have been in Brazil.

 What if we had not trusted what we heard from the Lord when He told us to adopt our kids?

 What if we had not trusted that He would provide the funds needed for the adoption?

 What if we had been too scared that adopting three little ones at once would be too much for us?

 What if we had worried more about what people were saying and less about what we knew the Lord was telling us to do?


 I do not know the answers to most of these questions but I am sure of a few things. If we had not trusted the Lord and taken the GIANT leap of faith that it took to adopt our kids we would have missed out on a huge opportunity not only to bless others and change their lives, but we would have missed out on so many blessing ourselves. I can not even begin to imagine our lives without Josiah, Lilliana, or Jeremiah - they themselves are HUGE blessings to us!


 In our crazy life I often feel like Abraham as we hold to the promises that the Lord has given us even when we have no physical way of seeing how those promises can possibly be fulfilled. I have had times that I have felt like Moses wandering around the desert trying to trust that he actually did hear from the Lord. I have also had days where I have felt like Peter moments after he stepped out of the boat when he started to sink and all he could do was cry out "Lord save me!". Yes, like all of these guys I know that taking a step of faith is HARD but I also know that it is worth it.

 If you are reading this and you know that the Lord is calling you to do something I want to encourage you to obey His voice and take that step of faith and do whatever it is that He is calling you to do. 

 Will it be easy?- No.
 Will you have doubts? -Yes.
 Will the Lord be faithful to you? Will He take care of you? Will He keep His promises? - 
YES, YES, YES! 

"Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments"  (Deuteronomy 7:9)

"You get that from your Dad!"

One of my favorite things as an adoptive mother is watching our family grow and mold together. Everywhere we go people try to “figure us out”. Everyone wants to know how on earth two 25 year olds could have 7 kids. Sometimes we will tell people that we adopted but I always hate when people want to know WHO was adopted. My favorite response is, “I forgot”. Nate likes to say, “Hey if you can’t tell why should we?” I love that people can’t tell who is adopted and who is biological; this means that we are doing our job as adoptive parents.

Lately I have been seeing traits of Nathan in the kids more than ever, whether it is Josiah making a cheesy joke, Jeremiah making a funny face, or Lilly having an unnatural obsession for chocolate I am always finding myself telling the kids
“You get that from your dad!” Every day the kids are becoming more like Nate because they are spending TIME with him, they have a relationship with him, and they are picking up on who he is as a person. I hope and pray that this is how I am with my Father Jesus Christ. I want to become more like Him as I spend time with Him just growing in our relationship and growing in His Word. I want to look like my Dad.

2Cr 3:18 “ But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

A family of 8 - 1 year later.

I will always consider January 21st 2010 to be one of the best days in my life because that is the day that the Lord in His infinite wisdom decided to bring Josiah Jacob, Lilliana Faith, and Jeremiah James to become part of our family.

One year ago today we got the surprise call telling us that they needed help and half an hour after that call we were on the way to pick them up.

The past year has been by far the most faith stretching, patience growing, spiritually maturing year of my life. It has been an experience that has tested my husband and I in every aspect of our lives - spiritually , emotionally, financially, and physically. In those hard times I have been so thankful that I have been able to look back and say, “I know the Lord has called us to do this. He IS going to do this.” Through every trial, whether it was in those first few months without Nate, or during those seemingly endless adoption paperwork nightmares, the Lord has been faithful. He has never abandoned us even for a moment and I am in awe of all that He has done.

When the Lord brought us our kids they came with hurting hearts and lots of baggage. Now one year later it is like they are three entirely different children. This is not because Nate and I are the world’s best parents . No. This is a work that only Jesus could do. Only Jesus could make these kids into who they are today and only He could turn them into the awesome Jesus loving adults that I know they will become. In all honesty the kids still have hard days. Josiah still has lots of questions about what happened and why, but in these difficult moments I have hope. I know that because the Lord is the one that began this good work in our kids HE will be faithful to complete it.

I have so many amazing memories in this past year I am pretty sure I could write a book, but instead I will take a minute and share my favorite moment with each of our three newest additions. If you are reading this you might not think that these moments are very special but as their mom I will forever hold these moments in my heart. :)


My favorite moment with Josiah –
Josiah has A.D.D. so school has always been difficult for him. We are homeschooling this year and after the first week I thought that we were going to need to look into something else. I just didn’t think that I was cut out to teach him to read. Man was I ever thankful that we didn’t give up a few weeks later when we were snuggled up on the couch reading and he just GOT IT! All at once it was like a light turned on and he was able to read whole sentences at a time. He was SO excited and I could not have been more proud of him. He kept saying “Mommy I CAN read! I AM smart!!” Ahhhh.. it was a great day. :)

My favorite moment with Lilliana –
If any of your know Lilly you know that she is a spitfire to say the least. I am pretty sure that she will keep her daddy and I on our toes (and our knees) for many years to come.
When Lilly first came to us she was the hardest two year old that I had ever seen. She did not show us any emotion for the first month and when she did start to show her personality it scared me how mean and angry she could be at only two years old. That being said we have seen a change in Lilly that only Jesus could do. She has gone from being the little girl that would not smile at all to become the little girl whose eyes literally dance when she smiles. She has now become our most affectionate child, and I lose track of how many times a day that she runs over and says “I wanna kiss Momma!”

My favorite moment with Lilly was when she was looking at my wedding pictures and said “Momma I wanna grow up! I wanna get married! I gonna marry Daddy- he’s MY prince!”

Lilly is absolutely in love with her daddy. Her favorite thing to do is dance with him. Every time I see them dance together I think “What if she had never had this? What if she never had a daddy to dance with her, or a daddy to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day?” In those moments I always stop and thank the Lord again for bringing these kids into our family, not just for them but for us as well. Now Lilly will have a dad to walk her down the aisle and I get to be the mom that gets her ready to go down that aisle. :)

My favorite moment with Jeremiah (Jer Bear) –
Jeremiah is our little blonde haired blue eyed boy that has a smile about as big as his face. When people meet our family it is always Jeremiah who steals their heart within about a minute of knowing them.

Jeremiah has many health problems. He has hydrocephalus and a V.P. shunt in the right side of his brain along with a handful of other things. Because of his health problems he is considered “slow” but I think that it only adds to his cute personality. Jeremiah is always making us laugh, he doesn’t always quite know why everyone is laughing but he is always laughing the loudest and the hardest and in doing so only makes us laugh more.

Jeremiah is just starting totalk and he is really figure out what he likes and what he is into. So far he has found four things that he LOVES - bugs, basketball, cars and SUPERMAN !

On Christmas Eve my mom sent him a Superman shirt with a cape. Jeremiah put it on and ran around the house playing Superman. When I called him I said, “Jeremiah come here.” He looked up and said, “No! I SUPERMAN!!!!” I think he wore the shirt for three days straight before we could convince him to take it off to wash it and for days he only wanted to answer us if we called him “Superman”. ;)

So there you have it. A couple of my thoughts and memories of this past year. I am so thankful, blessed, and humbled that the Lord choose me to be “Mommy” to these kids. I praise the Lord for His faithfulness over the last year and I am looking forward to the years to come.

Our Trip Home

I know that is has been awhile since I have had the time (or the internet) to be able to get on here so we have LOTS to catch up on! The best and biggest news is that WE ARE HOME!!! That is right ladies and gents, our 4 weeks trip that turned into an 8 month, 2 day trip has come to an end. We are now finally back home in Brazil and we have 3 of the very best surprise souvenirs that a girl could ask for. ;) God is faithful!

We knew that our trip home would be an adventure. I mean lets face it, everything in our life is an adventure - we have 6 kids. But this trip far surpassed any ideas of what we thought that we would be getting into.

We arrived at the airport with what we thought would be enough time to check in and say goodbye to our friends and family. Nate was in charge of the check in and I was in charge of the kids. As Nate was checking in the guy who was helping him said that there was a problem with our three newest kids tickets. He said that because they were traveling to Brazil on a tourist visa they would need to have round trip tickets. This came as a shock to us for a few reasons.

1. The people at the Brazilian Embassy in Miami saw our one way tickets, gave us the visa, and told us that we had everything that we needed to get the kids their permanent visas once we were in Brazil.

2. We had traveled with Grace on a tourist visa with a one-way ticket and had no problems two years earlier.

Anyway, to make this part of the very long and stressful story shorter we had two choices. We either had to pay the $3,500 for tickets that we knew that we did not need and would not use, or loose all of our tickets and miss our plane. Obviously we had to get those tickets. It was a HUGE hit. But there was really nothing else we could do. We scrambled to find enough credit cards to divide the cost onto and we started to run! By the time that we finally got checked in we had 12 minutes until our plane took off.

Now, just so you are able to get an idea of what we looked like in the airport let me give you the down low on what we brought. We brought to the airport a grand total of 17 boxes, 2 large strollers, 4 car seats, 8 carry on bags, 6 children 6 years and under, and 3 adults. Praise the Lord that our all-knowing God put it on both of our pastor’s hearts to send Pastor Jim with us!! We would never have been able to make it if he had not been there.

But lets get back to the story. We had 12 minutes to get from the front desk all the way to the plane. That means going through security and everything. The guy who gave us our tickets suggested that we didn’t even try because he said that with twelve minutes we would move up about 5 people in a line of about 100 waiting to go through security. After security we still had to make it to the gate. It seemed impossible but we had to try. We yelled out one mass goodbye for all our family and friends. I guess it was not all that sentimental, but we didn’t have time for anything else, and we figured that we would be back in about 10 minutes.

As Nate and Jim gave all of our 11 passports to the security guard I leaned down and told the kids. “ Hey guys we are going to go on an adventure. We need everyone to obey, and we need everyone to do everything as fast as you possibly can!”

As soon as the security guard gave us back our passports the real fun began. Pastor Jim began to yell out or story and ask/beg people if we could pass them in line. After about 30 seconds we realized that only about half of the people in line spoke English, so while Pastor Jim was telling people in English I was yelling out the same thing in Portuguese. We were a sight to be seen for sure! I guess enough people felt bad for us though because everyone in the line let us pass and we made it through security with about 4 minutes to spare. We ran as fast as we could to the shuttle and after the shuttle we ran as fast as we could to the gate (of course it was the very last gate). Once we got to the gate the door of the plane was already shut, so we had to wait for the plane to back up and open the door. I’m sure it goes with out saying, but we got quite a few dirty looks from other passengers when we got on the plane late, and with 6 kids.

We had other problems once we got on the plane, the biggest being we paid for 8 seats and we were only given 5 seats, but at this point we were so happy that we actually made it on the plane we were not going to complain! All three adults had one kids in their lap, and Josiah had to sit in the row in font of us.

After landing in Panama, we again thought that we had sufficient time to board our next flight. The plan was we would get off our plane, load the kids into the waiting strollers, take everyone to the bathroom and then find our gate. Well, we got as far as the “getting on the plane” part of the plan with out a hitch. But instead of the strollers waiting on us we ended up waiting, waiting, and waiting on our strollers. They were lost!!

Now as you are reading try and remember that we have 6 kids who are now very tired, hungry, needing to be changed, a few smelling like puke and to top it all off they are “unleashed” as we have no stroller to keep them tied down. It was pretty crazy- backpacks were dumped all over the airport floor, shoes and jackets were being taken off as fast as we could put them back on and they were all wanting to go in 6 different directions, all while we were try to talk to people and figure out what happened to our missing strollers.

I guess we didn’t know how close we were to our next flight taking off because out of nowhere a Brazilian lady that we sat next to on the last plane came running up to us yelling that she heard them giving us the last call on the loud speaker.

On a side note I have to say this is one of the reasons that I LOVE Brazilians!! This sweet lady didn’t know us, she was just waiting for her plane, heard that we were going to miss our next flight and went running to look for us! She then helped us carry our kids as we went running (again!) to our next flight.

Those were another crazy few minutes! Everyone in the airport was staring at us as we were running as fast as we could haul all these little kids and all of our 8 carry on bags. Yikes!

We again made it. We again had to wait for the plane to open the door and let us in, and we again got more than a few dirty looks from the other passengers. ;) Oh well, what can you do?

The flight from Panama to Sao Paulo was about 8 hours but the kids did great! They slept for most of it, ate and played for the rest. We were so nervous about how they would do with out those car seats to hold them in, but they were awesome! I love those kids!

Once we arrived in Sao Paulo we thought that we would be able to get our beloved and very missed strollers and boxes, but we were wrong. We waited for a few hours but they never showed up. The kids had a few minutes of almost losing it sometime in there, but all in all they were real troopers. Especially if you consider the fact that it was then about 4a.m. their time and we had to make them walk through the airport and through customs. Crazy, crazy, crazy – but the kids did great.

The flight from Sao Paulo to Floripa went well and seemed very fast. Most of the kids slept for a majority of it. And when they woke up WE WERE HOME!!!!!

All of our luggage, stroller and car seats did not make it that day. Actually it took four days before we had it all.

The first few days with out our stuff were another adventure in itself. We had all been in the same clothes for four days, and I don’t think that anyone of us had not been peed, pooped, or puked on. A special few of us had the blessing of all three. ;) Plus it was just hard with out all of the stuff that we brought to make life easier, like high chairs, towels, toys and bed linins. To say that we were all excited to get our boxes home would be an understatement to be sure! Some more great news is we were able to get out of paying the $3,500 for the tickets that we would not be using. Praise the Lord!!

So all in all it was a long trip, but it is over now. I was thinking that our flight home was a lot like this race that we are running in life. It was long, it was exhausting, and there were moments that I thought that we were not going to make it. But when ran, we ran with purpose. We wanted to make it home! And in the end of the race it sure is great to be home!



“..let us lay aside every weight, and sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith..” (Hebrews 12:1-2)

My Twins. :)

Have you ever had the Lord speak to you? Remind you of things? Like maybe reminding you of things that He had promised you, and you had just forgotten about? Well I have, and I am forever amazed that the God that I serve is so BIG, yet so personal that He would even bother to speak to little old me.
A few months ago I was having a really hard day with this whole adoption process. I was just feeling like this adoption was NEVER going to be done, and my kids were never going to be “my” kids. I was asking the Lord why this was so hard. I mean, were we pushing for something that was not supposed to be?
As I was praying about all of these things on my heart I started to think about my twins. I was thinking about how I had missed so much of their little lives and wishing that I could have been there for them. Anyway, as I thought about them, I started to think about where I had been, and what I had been doing when they were different ages. As I thought about their birth, and where I was the day they were born I stopped in my tracks.
The twins were born on Feb. 4th 2008. On Feb. 4th 2008 Nate and I were at a Pastors Conference in Brazil. At this conference there was an orphanage close by. Before we even arrived at the conference I had joked to Nate saying I wanted to go to the orphanage and maybe meet our next kid. He had just laughed. Anyways, once we arrived at the conference I asked a few people about the orphanage, but they all told me that the doors were closed, and we would not be able to visit. I was a little sad, not that I had really expected to adopt a kid at that time, but I knew that this was a desire in my heart.
I decided to once again give this desire to the Lord.
In my quiet time that day I prayed,
“Lord, You know that I would LOVE to have more kids someday. You also know that Nate and I both have it on our hearts to adopt, and I believe that this desire is from You. I ask that you will bring those kids to us in Your time.”
As I prayed this prayer I felt the Lord like I have only felt a few other times in my life. He said, “Start praying, your kids are already born.” I wrote this down, and I told Nate and my friend what the Lord told me that day. I did start to pray for the kids- whoever they were. I knew that the Lord would bring them in His time, but little did I know that the VERY same day that the Lord told me this, my precious little Lilliana and Jeremiah were born!
How cool is our God?! He knew before these crazy awesome kids were even born that they were going to be a part of our family. He put it on my heart to pray for them from the very day that they were born, and then He reminded me of His faithfulness, and His perfect plan just when I need that extra encouragement! ☺ He is just too cool!!

“ Lord your greatness is just insane! I will never be able to wrap my little head around it. I am so glad that you see our lives from start to finish. Thank you for you plan for my life. Please help me to never get in the way of your plan and always be open to be used by You. I love you!”

The Joys of Motherhood! ;)

Oh man what a day! I am starting to get the feeling that life with 6 kids is going to be just full of adventures! This morning started out pretty normal. We woke up by 6a.m., got breakfast for everyone, cleaned up a little.. changed 6 poopy diapers by 7:30a.m. ..then bathed and dressed 6 little stink pots.. same old, same old. E.Z. was not feeling well and because I was planning on some of my very best, very oldest friends coming to visit I decided to lay him down for an early nap. My oldest boy Josiah (or Ben age 5) and Hope (4) were running around the house playing while I took care of the younger 4kids needs. For some reason they kept trying to go into my room . I was not sure what they were trying to get in there, but I had to redirect them multiple times. They both know that they need to stay within ear shot/ eyesight when they play.. they just were having a hard time with the whole “obedience thing” this morning. Anyway, to make a long story a little shorter, soon after Josiah came away from my room we figured out that the door was locked- and Ezekiel was asleep inside the room! After questioning the kids Josiah admitted that he was the one who locked the baby in the room. After sending him to his room (until I could talk to him more in depth about the importance of NOT messing around with locks – again!) the search for the missing key began. We spent the next two hours looking EVERYWHERE for the key. Couches were moved, all drawers were opened, and all purses were dumped out. The key was nowhere to be found. The more time passed the more stressed I got . I knew that Ezekiel was not able to get out of his crib, but because he was a little sick I was afraid that he would soon start to cry. I knew that if he was crying in there and I could not get to him I was going to lose it.
My dear old friends came in the middle of the chaos and tried to help us think of ways to get to the baby. After we had worn out all other options my mother-in-law looked up numbers for a locksmith. In sheer desperation, and as a last attempt to get out of paying a $150 locksmith fee I resorted to bribes for the kid.
“O.K. guys, if you find the key I will give you $3!!” Josiah looked up. Finally I had his attention!
“Ummm…. Do you mean the key to your room?” Josiah asked. “Yeah.” I answered. He then reached into his pocket and pulled out the key!
“Josiah, have you had this in your pocket the whole time?!” I asked in disbelief.
“Umm… do I get the $3?” Josiah asked. Ahhh!! I didn’t know what to do.. kiss him or ground him!
All ended well . The baby was fine, we had a great visit with my friends, and Josiah learned never to play with locks. I guess I should just be happy that he thought that a $3 reward was enough to come forward with the key, and he didn’t wait to give us the key until it went up to $5!
Oh the joys of motherhood! 

“ Lord thank you for my crazy kids. Help me to always have patience with them. Give me wisdom in raising them. Help me to always have joy in the midst of the chaos.”

Jesus Loves Me This I Know!

Hello all you (two) people out there. It is I, Dani. :) If you know Nathan and I at all you will be shocked that we have made a blog for two reasons. The first reason being we are both far too unorganized to ever keep it up. The second reason being that we are both way too busy living our life to ever have time to write about it.
That being said, we are both going to try to be better about keeping people up-to-date on what is going on in our lives, and the work that the Lord is doing in us and through us. :)
One thing I love about growing up and going through life experiences is being able to better relate with some of the different examples that the Lord gives to us in His Word.
When Nate and I got married five and a half years ago I was better able to understand His example of the relationship between Christ and the church in Ephesians 5. When our first daughter was born in January of 2006 I was able to get a glimpse of just how much God loved us that He sent His only Son to die for us as talked about in John 3:16. Now that we are going through this adoption process I am better able to understand His examples of adopting us (found in Gal.4:5, or Eph.1:4).
I have six kids and not one of them is perfect (try not to be shocked). My three new little blessings are handfuls to be sure. Most of it is not their fault. They have been through a lot in their little lives.
A few weeks ago I was having a very tough day. I was sick, super sleep deprived, missing my husband, and dealing with some MAJOR bad attitudes.
By noon I had poop thrown at me twice, been bite three times, dealt with TONS of screaming, and to top it all off my face was dripping with spit from an angry two year old.
After I finally got everyone settled and down for a nap I cried out to the Lord and said,
"Father, are they ever going to realize what we are doing for them? Are they ever going to appreciate what we have given up for them? Are they ever going to love me the way that I love them?"
As I sat on my bed listening to the unusually quiet house I heard my answer in the form of a question.
"Have you My daughter? Do you My daughter?"
Wow! It was in that moment that something in my mind clicked. Jesus ALREADY knew what I was feeling because He had ALREADY done it. He gave up being with His Father (WOW!) - so I should be able to get through being away from Nate.
He knows what it is like to have your kids that you love spit in your face. Why? Because He ALREADY did it - AND (here is the crazy part) He did it for ME!!
So yes, while it may seem to me like no one knows what I am going through at times I have been reminded yet again that HE knows, and He cares!
I am also encouraged to think about the reasons why He did what He did for me. He did this all in order to have a relationship with me. This is my heart's prayer for all of my kids. I want a relationship with them. I want to always be there for them. I want them to always be able to come to me with anything.
I am so excited to see where that relationship takes us down the road in this life. I can not wait to see my kids walking with the Lord, growing in the Lord, and making the world a better place because they are in it.
Please continue to pray for us as we continue to take this step of faith.
Love always, Dani

From 5 to 8

Ok so I know I have been needing to start this for a while, but I didn't know exactly where to start. So I have decided to start with the story of how we went from being the Cate 5, to the Cate 8. I think this will give you the background so that you understand as we continue this blog telling the stories of our walk of faith, the spiritual lessons we are learning, and the funny things our kids do, so here is the story...

We went back to the states in December for the holidays and to visit our family and church, planning to stay until the 23rd of January. The trip had been going really well, but then on the 21st of January we got a call from a that lady we used to help take care of her son, Benjamin, 4 years ago when we lived in the states. We used to watch Benjamin to try and help this single mom get back on her feet, but to make a long story short, after months of trying to help, and even talking about adoption, the Lord closed the door, and we ended up moving to Brazil. So we went to Brazil and didn't hear from her at all for 4 years, until 2 days before we were supposed to return to Brazil. While we were in Brazil she had twins. So she had not been doing well, and didn't have the ability or support to take care of the kids. Again to not go too much into detail, there were many problems at home, and social services was called to step in and do something with the kids. So a friend called us(since we just happened to be in the states) when she knew that she was not able to care for the kids anymore. So we went to her appointment she had with social services that same day(two days before we were to leave). Trusting that the Lord had us there at that time to help those kids even if just for a time, we decided to take them home that day, and see what God would have us to do. That morning in my normal daily devotions I was reading in Matt 18, and in verse 5 Jesus says "Whoever receives one little child like this in my name receives me." So that was confirmation that it was the Lords will to take them in and help them in some way, but thinking that it would be to help find a loving home for them, but not thinking to take them back to Brazil.
So we decided to have Dani stay with all six at our assistant pastors house and try to figure all this out, while I would go back to Brazil to the church, and the ministry. So I get everything packed, rented a car, had my tickets, and begin the 4 hour drive from Tampa to Miami to go to the airport, to go home to Brazil. About 5 minutes into the trip God begins convicting me through a Bible Study I was listening to in the car. The text was 1 Sam 13, when Saul makes a sacrifice without waiting for Samuel, and the whole thing was about being careful not to get ahead of God, even when it seems like a spiritual thing to do. God was convicting me, but I brushed it off and continued driving and put on another study. This time it was 2 Sam 5, when David goes to battle against the philistines and he prays for direction from the Lord, and God gives him victory. Then the philistines come back again, and David does not assume to just go up again, but seeks the Lord again, and God tells him not to go up, but to go a different way, but still gives victory. So God convicted me again that He has a different way for this to happen, and not just to do what I think in my mind, but to be lead by the Holy Spirit. So after an hour and a half of being convicted and fighting against it, I finally listened and turned around and went home.
So I canceled my ticket, and in time God confirmed to us that it was for us to adopt these three kids. So over the next two weeks we had two court appearances, a home study, a stack of paper to fill out that was thicker than a strongs concordance, and several visits from social services. Thank God the judge had favor on us and let the kids stay in our custody until the adoption is finalized, but that will stll take three months to happen. After those two weeks I did end up coming back to Brazil on my own, but in God's timing. If I hadn't been there for those court hearings we would not have been able to keep custody of the kids or do the homestudy, so God had a purpose in mind, and HIS timing is always perfect!
That is our latest huge step of faith in this journey we are on, and now I hope that I can continue to record on a regular basis the way that God is working all these things out on a daily basis as we continue in Him day by day.