Well, it's Christmas time again! The days fly by and as the days grow more and more wintery, I am reminded of the contrast in climate we experienced while bringing Finn home. One moment I remember in particular was on our way home. We were so excited to bring our new little boy home! We were ready to be done with the small, dingy hotel room, living out of suitcases and planning meals from a laundry basket. About 45 minutes into our trip, one of the tires started making noise. We had just been discussing the state of the tires. Suddenly, the noise started getting louder, and pretty soon, as we are crusing down highway 35, very busy at that time of the morning, the tire blew. So much noise, the truck violently vibrating and the thought of four people in the back, including our three kids and Dan's sister, who came along to help. We were thankful for the spare we knew we had in the back of the truck. So there we were, pulled over on that busy highway, cars barely moving over as they careened by, just a couple feet away from Dan's head as he bent over the blazing hot road to get the tire off, no easy task. Seeing that people were not moving over, I got out and stood near my husband's head, I thought they could probably see the angry, sweating woman standing near the broke down truck, if they didn't happen to notice Dan. It was SO hot in that merciless sun in south Oklahoma. We were many, many hours from our destination. When we finally got the spare on, we thought, with relief that we could be back on our way. We knew it wouldn't hold for the rest of the trip, but hopefully it could get us to Wal-Mart for a new one. A new one we didn't have the money for. How would we pay for food and gas on the way home now? About two miles after we put the spare on, it blew too. Not full enough, and not new enough for those hellfire hot roads of the south. Now what were we to do? Hundreds of miles from home and friends. A mile from the next exit...in the middle of a mountainous forest. We limped our way along the rough terrain on the side of the road till the exit. Every turn on the tires brought really loud banging sounds, in my imgination wreaking horrible, permanent damage to the undercarriage of our vehicle (there was damage, but Dan was able to patch it together later.) My stomach was a mess. What would we do? Thankfully, there was a gas station/restaurant, where we were able to wait till we got help. What help? Some people stared at the big gash in the huge tire of our Expedition. And at the family with the brown baby, and white baby. I was worried about Finn, with a minor heart condition. Not to mention how would I keep two babies happy and quiet while we were waiting for...what? Who would help us? Thanks to Facebook, we already had friends and family praying and offering to help. But what could they do, hundreds of miles away? How could the Lord allow this to happen to us? We did not have the money for an extra hotel stay, we could not afford a $300 tire change. Of all the folks that came and went that day, three stopped to help. One gal offered a phone number. One family walked past and the mom came back, to press $80 in Dan's hand saying,"God told me to give this to you, don't argue with God." I walked out of the restaurant, where, incidentally they were about to begin filming an interview with the owner for a cable tv show. Even MORE pressure to keep the boys quiet. As I made my way to our truck to retrieve some diapers, I noticed Dan talking to a couple, sounding very relieved and grateful. They were taking the broken tire to a Wal-Mart that was about 40 minutes away, to get it replaced. Praise the Lord! As we sat down to wait for them to return, Dan revealed to me about the money that had been given him. Tears welled up in my eyes. I felt we had been in such a desperate situation, with three kids, two under one year old, and nowhere to go, no one to call. The Lord was still with us. We waited for hours, but just as they promised, Bobby and Carol returned with brand new tires, mounted on the old rims. There were two~It had cost them close to $300, and they would accept no reimbursement. They were children of God, good Samaritans, helping out a family who REALLY needed it! They couldn't have known that we needed every last penny we had, just to make it home. They couldn't have known that we travelled all that way to bring home a special needs baby that we had just adopted. They just helped. We may never see these special people again, I didn't think to get their contact info, but one thing I know for sure, we will see them in Heaven, and those are two people I will be sure to track down when I get there! It was such a relief, such a miracle, to be back on the road. But we still had two older tires, and the thought of those blowing made me sick. However, every mile we drove the nauseau abated a bit and my hyper-awareness calmed. We even made it to the hotel room we had booked in Kansas, very late, but we made it!