3/4 Done!

Well, turns out that waiting to do the Profile Book in one fell swoop was just the right thing to do. It was not without stress, however. There may have been crying and gnashing of teeth and snippy comments to John on Friday night. I continued to scan things in to send to Wal-Mart for printing the next day and it was late and I was oh-so-tired and all I could see were the piles and piles and piles of neverending scrapbook supplies. That's not even thinking about the boxes and boxes of stamping supplies I'd borrowed from a friend that sat behind me on the kitchen counter.

It was more than overwhelming. By the time Emily and Kendall arrived around 10a on Saturday morning, I was going through 3 boxes of old photos I'd forgotten I had, like I didn't have enough going on with the 300 photos I'd printed off for the occasion sitting on the table ready to be sliced and diced and pasted in the album. But the thought of starting all that was just too much. I'm sure Emily walked in, realized I was a total spaz and wanted to leave but she stayed for a while keeping me motivated and calm.

Throughout the day more friends and family stopped by. Sara came and helped by scanning in the remaining pics...and brought a giant mint mocha frap from Starbucks so she might have been my fave for the day. Liz came by and offered some great advice, my mom stopped by several times for a progress report, and my sister spent more hours than she probably should have on Saturday night and came back for more on Sunday. She's amazing.

I got all the pages laid out and completed, all that was lacking by the time I went to bed on Saturday night (well, technically Sunday morning) was the writing and descriptions. I worked on Sunday typing them up, and then once I've typed them up I will hand write them in on the pages. That way I don't mess up what I've already done.

I really thought the writing part was going to be easier. But it's definitely not. I thought the whole process would be fun, but it was incredibly difficult.

How do I capture two lifetimes in 25 pages? How do I capture childhoods and family members and friends and adventures and passions and interests in less than 100 photos? We're talking 57 years between the 2 of us!

How do I capture the spirits of our friends in one snapshot? How I describe our parents and sisters and nephews and brother-in-law and grandparents in a page? How can I tell someone about the places we've been, the things we've seen when all I have is 12 inches by 12 inches? How can I possibly convey our love for each other, and all the laughter we share in one book?

There's so, so much I want to tell the birthparents of our baby. I want to show them how wonderful we'll be as parents. How we will take care of their baby like no one else could. I want them to know we have so much fun, and we have so much love to give we could just burst. I want them to know the choice they're making is right...we're the ones.

So, it's all a little overwhelming. There's no way I can really share our lives in such a small amount of space. I heard once that life is what happens between the snapshots. We have a lot of snapshots...but there is so much more to our lives.

So anyway...all that to say I'm almost done typing (well, halfway done typing) then I'll hand write notes in the book and then I will be done! All before we even sit down with a room full of other couples just like us to find our perfect family.

I have another prayer request today. Please pray for peace for us this week. I had no idea I'd be so emotional about it, but I have been. I am easily overwhelmed and I know this weekend is not going to be an easy couple of days. I'm sure I will cry, I'm sure I will be weighed down, I'll get scared, I'll get hopeful, I'll be excited, I'll be sad. And that's just me...John's in this, too. So please pray we have peace and that this weekend goes well. That we get the reassurance we need that we're doing the right thing.