Bittersweet and His hands

I leave tomorrow morning to bring my daughter home! I thought I might never type that sentence. It's been a loooong 18 months and we're finally HERE! Oh goodness the emotions! We are thrilled and so excited but we are also realistic. We know the heart ache this little girl has faced. We know it's going to be a tough road but we are SO thankful He has chosen us to walk through this road with Joleigh Bereket.

Today is my LAST day of teaching for a while. Cameron and I know God is calling me home for a while to be with our children. We are SO excited about this but oh my goodness it's tough. We are definitely choosing to sacrifice money in this situation. Not only do I make good money b/c of my Master's degree but I'm also National Board certified which means I am loosing a yearly bonus check of $7500/year. But you know what... none of that matters to us. That's not at all why this is so hard on me. It would be so easy to be happy about today being my last day if I were just a teacher of a subject. It would be so easy to call it quits if I did not have a passion about what I do but oh that is so far from the case at hand. I absolutely LOVE my job and by job I mean my family (faculty), my children (students). It's not from me but from Him, and He has given me an ability to connect with those kids on a level to truly touch their lives. They need me... and I need them. We have been so blessed to have a nanny come to our home for the past 6 years to take care of our children but God is giving me the gift to be able to be here now and POUR into them love and truth. I know years from now I will NEVER regret this time we followed Him and I stayed home but today is going to be hard.

Here's an amazing way He chose to bless me through my faculty yesterday... only He could be so cool!! I was told Monday I had 11.5 sick days (7 of those were donated to me by co-workers) and that I would not be paid for 23.5 days. So I was trying to plan out how to spread those days out. Well, one of my co-workers asked the faculty if anyone would like to donate days for my maternity leave... I had no idea and cried and cried at how good these folks are to me. A couple hours later, this teacher came to me with a total of days donated... TWENTY-THREE! I was a mess yesterday. He cares so much about every detail. Then last night another teacher wanted to donate and rounded me up to 23.5. I will be on leave for the rest of the school year but will not miss any pay. This journey has been so tough in many ways but so, so very rewarding and His hands have been all over it!