A story 7 years in the making

It's funny...it's like God's in control or something. I want to introduce you to our good friends Wes, Abby and Max.
It started out as just Wes and Abby (or Wabby, as we call them sometimes). We met them when they first got married. They were married in November 2003, we had been married a whole 16 months at the time. We met them in Sunday School and starting hanging out, doing the newlywed thing, going out to dinner (I think BW3s was our first couple date), having sleepovers (wait, sleepovers?). We would go to concerts or have a late movie night and they would spend the night at our house, complete with pancakes in the morning. Some of our other friends thought it was weird, but we knew they were just jealous.
In the spring of 2005 they told us they were going to stop "preventing" the whole pregnancy thing. That hadn't crossed my mind yet, neither had the thought of infertility. A few months later, we thought we would stop "preventing" also.
We would get pregnant together you know. How cute, a double shower for the pregnant Abbys.
God, had different ideas.
We had a few rough years. Not as friends, we were great friends. In fact when all our friends were having kids and stuck at home, we were still doing our late nights, sleepovers, weekend trips, spring break trips, parties, football games, baseball games, basketball games, bonfires, shopping. In fact, as I sit here and think about it, we really had a lot of great times together.
During those years, Abby and I bonded over crying and weeping for the pregnancies that were not happening. Wes and Matt bonded over their crying and weeping wives (although let me say, Abby has handled her infertility with infinitely more grace than I).
We got through our friend's (multiple) pregnancies. Then family pregnancies. Abby was busy being gracious and attending baby showers, even making the cakes for the baby showers. I was busy doing anything I could to avoid those baby showers, even making plans to sabatoge the baby showers (kidding about sabatoge).
We agonized about failed fertility treatments (I did clomid, that was it for me, that stuff made me crazy and I couldn't handle any more than that. Neither could Matt.). Abby did a few more things that at the time, were a sure success. Picture perfect. To no avail.
We cried about not having kids that looked like us. We mourned the loss of feeling a baby kick, getting the pictures of the ultrasounds, finding out the sex of our babies, growing human life in our bellies.
Then you know what? God did a miraculous work in all four of our hearts. Matt and I began to talk about adoption. Through prayer we both felt uncomfortable with fertility treatments. We read the book Adopted for Life. Then I began to see...do I really care if my kid doesn't have my eyes? Is my purpose on this planet to hand down my crazy DNA? When I stand at the foot of the Throne, am I going to be bothered by the fact I have never given birth?
Could I ever "create" a child more perfect for us than Hannah and Olivia??

No, no, no and heck no!

So we adopted. Hannah, then Olivia.

Wes and Abby, they handled much more than us, much more graciously and with more faith in their Lord who has adopted them.
Little Max is.... seriously.... the luckiest little guy on the planet. I keep telling him, I promise I'll be a good mother in law.

We love you Wes and Abby (and Max too of course).