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By Dave ©, July 1, 2009 11:00 pm

Gale K. asked, “Will there be more children for your family?”

Lana:

I had always planned on having a large family. My dream was six kids, a minivan, and a house with a yard and a white picket fence.

Well, life doesn’t always (or often) go as planned and having children has proven to be a rocky road. We have three little babies in Heaven (due to miscarriage) and Carmen will join them someday soon.

I am so grateful for sweet Lauren and for the time we have with Carmen. I LOVE my girls!

One of my greatest struggles in the past few years has been contentment in this area of my life. When you want more children, it is a deep stab to the heart to struggle having children and/or to lose them. I have felt the pain of watching many of my friends easily have one child after another or adopt healthy children. If you’ve been there, you know how much that hurts.

We don’t know the whole picture of this beautiful canvas. Regardless of life’s circumstances, God reminds me often that “Faith is…thanking God when I am left with shattered plans, that He has better plans.” Pamela Reeve

Dave:

Whether we have more biological children, adopt several more, or a combination of the two, I’m fairly certain that more children are on the way. Or perhaps I should say that we’re on our way to more children. Can I explain why our plans haven’t worked out so far? No. Can I guarantee that we’re going to have more children? No. But we will find a way for there to be “more children for our family”, even if we have to move to Guatemala and work in an orphanage.

P.S. We are pregnant (We, being Lana!).

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By Dave ©, May 29, 2009 9:12 am

The next question we’ve decided to address in our “You Ask, We Answer series” is from Sarah M, who asked:

Lana – You mentioned praying for Dave’s heart to change re: adoption. Can you share any specifics of how you prayed? How long did you pray before Dave got on board? Dave: Can you share your experience of feeling your heart change about this?

First Dave’s response:

Hopefully, the short film above adequately portrays the experience that changed my perspective about adoption so I’m not going to add much writing. I will add just one thing I wrote in my journal on June 26, 2005, after I had been in Peru for just a few days. Here is what I wrote:

We handed out some toys and the kids thought it was Christmas. One girl held her stuffed animal as if it were a little baby. She cuddled it closely, held it out in front of her and stared at it, then crushed it against her chest again as she gently rocked it back and forth. I took several pictures but they simply could not capture the moment. God just might be using this experience to soften my heart about adoption. These kids are precious and beautiful.

Now Lana’s response:

In 1999, a year after Dave and I were married, I asked him to meet with a lady at our church who ran an adoption program. The lady was adopted into the U.S. from Russia many years ago and started her own program to match Russian orphans with families here. I was so excited! Dave was not. He went to the meeting but afterward pretty much said no way. Fast forward a few years, a few miscarriages and finally Lauren. After Lauren was born, I really wanted to pursue adoption but Dave was still hesitant. I think he was hesitant because he had seen several adoptions that had not worked out very well. After Dave’s trip to Peru, I started praying that if God wanted us to adopt, that He would change Dave’s heart. I decided I wasn’t going to mention anything about adoption so that Dave would not feel any pressure from me. About 6 months after the trip, Dave said that he felt that we should move forward with adopting. I was SO excited!

To see other questions we may address in the future or to ask your own question, please visit the “You Ask, We Answer” introduction post.

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By Lana, April 29, 2009 9:22 am

A while back, we asked for questions you wanted us to answer.

We seem to move slowly these days so we are just now starting the You Ask, We Answer series.

I wanted to know how you both met and fell in love?

According to Lana:

In 1994, I was a freshman and Dave was a sophomore at LeTourneau University in Longview, TX. I was 18 and Dave was 19. We were babies!

We were in the same Biology class. I sat in the front row, Dave in the back row. That semester, Dave’s best friend from New York attended LeTourneau. Best Friend only went to LeTourneau one semester but God had a VERY specific purpose for him being there!

Best Friend was interested in a good friend of mine. Best Friend figured that if he could get Dave and me together, he might have a chance with my friend (maybe a double date?). So, Best Friend told Dave that the biology girl was interested in him and then told my friend that Dave was interested in me. (Oh my gosh, this sounds so junior high! Note from Dave: It was!)

Dave was really cute so I was flattered but thought he must be really immature to send his friend to tell my friend that he liked me (I’m mortified. We really weren’t this immature!). Dave thought I must be weird and that was the end of that.

Fast forward a few weeks and the washing machine in my dorm broke (Note from Dave: Uh huh. Surrrre it was.). I had to do laundry one Saturday morning, so I walked to the guys laundromat to do my laundry. I was out of clean clothes so I wore a blue flannel shirt, black sweatpants and leather loafers. (Why oh why did I wear that mess???) I sat in the laundromat and studied while I waited for my clothes to wash. I was busy studying when Dave walked in.

I remember Dave saying hi and asking if I was studying biology. Nope, not biology. He said bye and walked out. Dave remembers asking if he could call me but I don’t remember that. He now says that he felt like he had to say hi to me since I was the girl who was interested in him. (This is sounding worse and worse!)

I found out later that the day we first met in the laundromat was Dave’s birthday, October 15th.

A few days later Dave did call me. He asked if I would help him with biology.

Over the next few months, we talked on the phone and became friends. We started dating 7 months later. We got married 3 1/2 years later, August 1, 1998.

I specifically remember the incident that really made me fall in love with Dave. We were in the cafeteria when a food fight erupted. (Yes, we were in COLLEGE!) Food was flying and a friend of mine got hit with ice cream. Dave reached over and wiped off her arm with his sleeve. I remember thinking that was the sweetest thing ever.

Oh, and my friend never went out with Best Friend. She married someone else before graduating from LeTourneau!

Now for the real version (according to Dave):

Most of Biology Girl’s version is true. My friend did try to hook up Lana and me. But by that time, Lana had already fallen in love with me because it was love at first sight. I promise; it’s true! My friend told me so.

We did officially meet in a laundromat and it was on my birthday. But the actual sequence of events isn’t quite as Lana portrayed it above. You see, while Lana claims that the girls’ washing machine was “broken”, she had been stalking me for almost two months. She knew that I hadn’t washed my clothes in nearly a month. So she strategically placed herself right where she knew I’d be that fateful Saturday morning. I walked into the laundromat and, wouldn’t ya know it, Lana was the only person there. Coincidence? I think not.

I did call Lana the next week and did ask her to help me with biology. What can I say? She was (and still is) really smart and I needed (and still need) some help. The fact that she was also cute was an added bonus.

I’m not sure there was a point in time when I “fell in love” with Lana. It was definitely more of gradual thing for me. In December 1994, I received a letter from Lana while I was home for Christmas break. She shared several things in that letter that must have been hard to write. I appreciated that she would share them with me and it opened my heart to see that there might be something more to this relationship. As we continued hanging out, going for walks and talking during the next semester, I realized that I really liked Lana. Toward the end of that school year, I asked Lana if she would be my girlfriend. She said, “I guess so.” I guess so? What does that mean? Apparently, it meant yes. Note from Lana: I meant YES!

Here is a picture from 1995 that Lana’s little brother, Micah, took of us. (Micah was 5 years old!)

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By Dave ©, September 22, 2008 8:32 am

In the next few weeks, we are going to introduce two new series of posts to help you get to know us a little better and help us get to know you a little better. This is the introduction to the first series, what we’re calling “You Ask, We Answer”. In short, you can ask us any questions you want. We will review your questions and periodically pick one to answer.

You may have seen this type of series if you follow blogs like Whittaker Woman (click here for an example). Our spin on this is that Lana and I will both address the same questions. You’ll get two different responses and occasionally two very different perspectives of the same topic.

Oh, and just in case you are wondering, the second upcoming series will be, “We Ask, You Answer”. More to come in a few weeks or so.

So…what do you want to ask us?