More about Natty

It's my blog and I can do what I want to. I cannot get enough of this face. I love those wet cheeks, that sweet little man playing Sorry! with Papa, and the fact that he still has chocolate up his nose in the last photo (clicking on it enlarges it just the way I like it, where you can see every pixel of his sweet face). I love sometimes that he looks just like my sister, but mostly exactly like his dad. I love his baby talk and how he gets excited and loves to play. I have my own little story about Natty and his arrival and since I poured my heart out about Gracie and Carla on their birthdays, Natty likewise deserves a proper tribute. I will make it short.

While in Mozambique, I had a cell phone. I could send and receive text messages. It notified me by croaking like a frog and would light up and buzz. It was music to my ears. I loved hearing from home. Cyndi Crain, Christine Davis, and Carla would text message me. One day after spending a day up at the Children's Center and playing with a little girl, I sent Carla a text message telling her about her. It had really been one of the greatest days of my life, taking an orphaned child to the beach for ice cream and pushing her on the swing set and singing together. It was just a day of, simply stated, doing what I was made to do and loving on a child who has no parents, but knows she is loved and it was so very fulfilling and sweet. I told Carla how I wanted to bring that little girl home with me, as any of you would. She instantly wrote me back and said she wished too that I could bring her. I know my sister has a HUGE heart for kids and would adopt in a heartbeat. There is seriously no way you can really adopt a child from Moz without having lived there for a long time, etc., but we were just sharing our similar feelings of love for others, her "quiver not being full" as she and Kevin describe it and just our heart for little orphaned children and their sweet, sweet faces. She then wrote, "I understand that you cannot bring her, but I do have a surprise coming...in March". Oh my goodness, Oh my goodness! I knew right away what that meant and I knew right away it was going to be a boy! I have not cried that hard in such a long time. Such tears of JOY and so so so so so so happy. Babies are the greatest news ever! I thought that those days of babies in my sister's home were over and little Carson's sugar would be the last I would get. So the thoughts of another punkin left me so incredibly overjoyed.

That little girl, Paulinha, is pictured here as a flower girl in Brock and Crystalyn's wedding on the beach in Pemba.

The next morning, in class under that big green tent, I was just dying to talk to my sister and hear all about how she was feeling and share my excitement, but could not. I just wanted to TALK about this BABY with someone who would listen. So I prayed. I got serious and quiet and asked God to talk to me about this baby. I wanted to know everything about him and how God felt and for Him to tell me all He knew. So He did. I actually wound up writing down PAGES of notes on things that I felt God was telling me about this new addition to the family. He instantly told me his name would be Joy. I got all confused and thought maybe I was wrong about the sex, but the name was not literal, but a name that depicted what this child would carry. Nathaniel carries Joy. I saw visions of their home and that the atmosphere would change forever because he lived there. I saw that things like depression and sadness could not live in the house anymore, because Joy had moved in.

Now that he is here and as I reflect on this word that God gave me about him, it could not be more true. The month he was born, I was in a horrific deep funk. Getting out of bed, getting dressed, going through life was hard. Going to the hospital, in my red hooded sweatshirt that I had been wearing night and day and day and night, I held that little baby in my hands and I could not be sad. I could not be depressed. I could not look at him and not smile. I watched him about 6 months later, as our Aunt Mary held him on her lap, with only months to live. Nathaniel pulled out all the stops, giggled and cooed and laughed and a scared, tired, dying woman, chuckled back. There is so much power in who we are as human beings. So much power in what we give, in the smiles that we cast and in those that we don't.

Little Nathaniel carries joy wherever he goes. He has instantly become the family mascot and 30 lbs of pure, sweet joy. His brother and sisters,mother and father just delight in him. You can't help but be happy when you are around him. He is a Boy named Joy.