Surprise!

It is with great joy and thankfulness that we introduce the newest member of our family! Mary Frances Howie (she's going to go by Francie) was born on October 4th, 2014. She weighed 7 pounds, 2 ounces and was 19 inches long.

David and I were able to meet Francie shortly after she was born, and we fell in love with her immediately :) We connected with Francie's wonderful birth mother back in June, so it's been hard to keep quiet about our sweet baby the past several months! (And I looked back on the blog and realized that the last adoption update I posted said that we were switching back to international adoption and were going to pursue a child in Hong Kong unless something came up domestically before we had to officially switch. Well, surprise! Something - or someone - came up! :)) We wanted to be VERY respectful of the birth mother's privacy, and we still do going forward! I won't be saying anything about her other than to say that we have so much love and respect for her! Francie has a wonderful birth mother, and I'm so thankful for her and the loving decision that she made for this precious baby. Francie is definitely one loved little girl!

Unfortunately, I can't show any pictures of Francie's sweet face just yet, so you'll have to take my word for it that she is absolutely precious! Francie has special needs and has already been through so much in her short life. She's currently recovering in the hospital from a pretty major surgery that she had 3 weeks ago. She's a little trooper, though, and we are so proud of our sweet girl!

I obviously have a lot to catch up on, so more details to come as I'm able to share! Thank you for your prayers as Francie continues to recover.

"The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy!" Psalm 126:3