Finally FINAL!

The very last step in our adoption was for the court in Colorado to issue new birth certificates and give the final approval for Vaughn and Eloise to become Baldwins.

Guess what? On September 3, 2013, our adoption become finally, final- no turning back-oficially official! (As a side note: I love that it is impossible to say who really came first in our family. Tried for 4 years to get pregnant, worked for 2 years to adopt, found out we were pregnant the day after we bought our plane ticket to Africa to pick up our adopted kids, adoption became official the day after Avett was born...)

We finally got around to telling the kids about the finalization on Sunday morning during devotions. We waited to tell them because we wanted to celebrate with them by doing something special. Turns out life with three kids is pretty stinkin' busy and 'something special' can be pretty hard to pull off. So we reverted to going out for ice cream as our celebration. To explain it to them, we got out the stack of paperwork and talked about all that had happened and how they were finally Baldwin's and they would be in our family forever. I really don't think they got it, but it was fun trying to explain it to them and answering their questions.

That morning during devotions we talked about how God wants us to follow him and sometimes give up everything in order to do that. Afterwards I asked the kids if they wanted to follow God and they both said "yes". Then I explained that if you wanted to follow God, you had to invite him into your heart and I asked them if they had ever done that. They both said 'no' but said they wanted to. Then Andy led them in a prayer inviting Jesus to live in their hearts! It was so cool to be there for that. And so, on the day that Vaughn and Eloise were welcomed into our family as Baldwins they were also welcomed into the Kingdom of God. Although we weren't there for the day they were born, we were there for the day they were born again.

And we celebrated with ice cream as the angels rejoiced over us....