Our African Adoption

Super Quick Update

2009-02-26T10:52:00.002-07:00

Okay Malakai is waking up so here goes...Malakai started to sit up all by himself yesterday and is already a pro at it. He has also started rice cereal and tired squash with little success. He is still having a hard time with the sleep thing and naps are completely unpredictable if they even happen. He has gotten much better with his eye-hand coordination is grabing for toys much more now. He has even started to grow a little patch of hair on the left side of his head. It cracks me up since all the other hair is still fuzz but he has one long curl lol! If I have time I'll try to post some pictures of these events later.

Saving Grace

2009-02-21T22:20:00.003-07:00

Okay, the kids are sleeping...for now...type fast...very fast. I wanted to post a much overdue post about our first week home. We arrived home very late on a Friday and came home to a wonderful welcome (as I posted before). Our nights were upside down, we were tired, stressed and disoriented, but thank the Lord, Grandma was here. The first day home we were so tired that we ended up sleeping from 11-4pm during the day and poor Aspen had to wait for us to wake up, I don't now what we would have done if she wasn't here to watch her. We were so blessed by all her hard work she cleaned, did ALL of my laundry, mopped my floor twice, played with and spoiled Aspen, took me shopping and out to eat for my birthday, and best of all washed bottles for us several times a day so that we were never out of clean ones. As I'm sure you can see why I was very anxious about this week knowing that she was going home and Jared was going back to work. I didn't know if I could handle the house work, two kids and myself on little or no sleep. I've pulled through, and actually God has blessed me and given me a fairly easy week (daylight hours at least). We will be forever grateful for the time Grandma was here while in ET and home, yep that makes it almost 4 weeks! It is so great to have someone to help like this, she even did the same for us when we had Aspen 3 years ago. I bet she's hoping were done with kids now hehe just kidding I don't think she could ever have too many grand kids:)

King Size Bed

2009-02-19T11:06:00.002-07:00

Last night I was thanking the Lord for our king size bed. We have never been the type to have kids or pets in the bed with us, but last night we broke all the rules and had the whole family sleeping in the same bed...including the cat. Malakai has been having a very hard time staying asleep he wakes up a lot and still wants to be awake for a while. It seemed like he was sleeping better when was held or laying with Jared so he just slept on Daddy's belly. Sometime in the middle of the night Aspen came up and was upset so she climbed in too. I fear this might become a habit because Aspen has been waking up every night one or two times for a few months now. Before she has always gone back to her room and we cuddle, she goes back to sleep and then I come back to bed...well, we'll see how long that lasts now that she's had a night in our bed. I don't know how long I can take the the tag-team-waking that the kids have been doing. Night before last I got 3 hours of sleep when I finally got to sleep from 4:30-7:30 and then had to get up for Malakai's doctor's appointment. All I can think is "this too shall pass"

On a happier note, at his doctor's appointment my doctor told me that our orphanage staff must have done a great job of picking him up and holding him because she was sup prised that his head was not flat. What a great compliment for Hannah's Hope! He was healthy and has good growth percentiles so that made me happy too.

Happy 1/2 Birthday Malakai!

2009-02-12T09:10:00.002-07:00

So Malakai is now 6 months old. I've waited to do the classic blog thing of listing 6 things I love about him until I actually had him in my arms so here goes.

1. I love your beautiful huge dark eyes
2. I love that I got to hear your wonderful baby giggle for the first time two days ago
3. I love how smiley you are
4. I love your sweet personality
5. I love the way you kick like crazy in the bath
6. I love that you are HOME!

Our New Complete Family

2009-02-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

Sleep Deprivation

2009-02-05T16:35:00.003-07:00

Okay, I never expected jet lag and switching back to MT time to be SO hard and take SO long. We are still not there yet. I think we'd be okay if we didn't have to get Malakai switched over too. Our schedule for the past 5 days has looked something like this:

Bed at 8:00 or 9:00pm
Wake at 10pm for feeding
Wake between 12-2am for diaper, feeding, and several hours of loud awake time. Not crying but loud high pitched screeching excited sounds. Those of you who were in ET with us know what I mean.
half hour nap somewhere between 4am and 6am
Awake all day
Repeat

So basically we have been running on about 4 hours of sleep each day. The first day we were home he did sleep during the day so Jared and I took a nap with him. I thought we'd sleep for about 2 hours, but we laid down at 11am and woke up at 4pm. Poor Aspen had just gotten us home and then had to wait all day to see us. Grandma was great and kept her entertained while we rested. I really hope we can get this ironed out soon and get a schedule going before Jared has to go back to work.

Other than the sleeping everything has been great! He is such a sweet little boy and seems to be adjusting very well. He is so smiley and is working on learning to laugh. Bonding is going well, and we even noticed signs of this in Ethiopia. The first day when we went back to the orphanage he was jumping out of his skin excited and just talking up a storm when he saw the special mothers and other kids, but when we went back on the last day his attitude was so different. One of the special mothers came and kissed him and was trying to get his attention, but he just snuggled into my chest and was much calmer and quieter. He only cried once for about 1/2 an hour this first morning when he realized he had no idea where he was. He seems very content and happy now which is so nice. I had an exciting moment when I thought he might be showing signs of being attached to me when Jared said "he cried when you left for the store" but they were soon shattered when he said "but then he puked and seemed better" haha.

Aspen has been doing great with him and wants to take a bath with "brother Malakai" all the time (at least twice a day). She is her normal self though and is still very independent. Recently she has been getting a little sad because of the split attention, but other than that she's taking it all in stride.

2009-02-01T12:55:00.004-07:00

This was the nice welcome table and cake we came home to on Friday night. The last picture is a sweet one of Daddy and his two kiddos reading a story.

We're Home

2009-01-31T10:18:00.003-07:00

Jared, Malakai Mussie, and I made it home at 11:30pm last night. It was a LONG 40 hour trip start to finish and we are still very tired. We woke up to our little ones this morning and only got about 4-5 hours each. Hopefully we can nap some today. I'll be posting when I can about the trip, but first I need rest and time to finish up my journaling. To hold you over here are some pics from our trip. Thank you all for the wonderful prayers and support! We felt so covered in prayer and God's provision was over and above for the whole time...more on that later.

Introducing Mr. Malakai Mussie Blake Murphy

Packed and on our way!

2009-01-22T23:31:00.003-07:00

Our bags are packed and we are headed out tomorrow at 12:50pm!

2009-01-22T14:08:00.004-07:00

These are photos of all the donations we were able to collect except for the 10+ outfits which are not pictured! This is such a God thing, and I have to tell the neat story. So, we have been collecting donations since the beginning of January. We had people from our church, our old church, MOPS, family, friends and even some people down in Colorado helping us collect thing for the orphanage. We had a limited amount of space to Carry donations over even by purchasing an extra two checked bags. We got so much stuff that we thought there was no way we would be able to bring it all even with our four tubs and 1 suit case we designated for them. When we were looking at it all I said "okay this is going to have to be God math in order to get this all in the tubs at 50lbs or less each." Well, guess what? God did some amazing math. We got everything in first try and each tub is between 46 & 48 lbs! We were so excited!! Below is a list of all the things we got. We are so blessed to have such generous people around us. Thank you to all how contributed, the kids at Hannah's Hope will be so blessed by these gifts.

Donations List

Formula 35 cans
Diaper cream 13 tubes
Toothbrushes 78
Tooth paste 11 tubes
Diapers 14 packages
Baby Shampoo 7 bottles
Baby wash 9 bottles
Baby Oil 5 bottles
Lotion 11 bottles
Wipes 22 packs
Stuffed animals 3
Vitamins 8 bottles
Flax seed oil 2 bottles
Flax seed 2.4 lbs
Sippy cups 4
Blankets 5
Scrubs 2
Infant Cereal 2
Baby Towel/wash clothes 8
Onesiess 3
Bibs 3
scrubs 2
Baby Cereal 2
thermometer cover 2
Pacifiers 2
Socks 1
Surgical masks 10
spoons 12
Clothes 10+ older girls outfits

#23 and 9 months of "pregnancy"

2009-01-18T20:14:00.002-07:00

You may recognize this number from our wait list post. So as I started thinking back over our adoption process I realized that 23 has been our number through out the whole thing. I'll show you:

23rd of October '07 we Received Application for AGCI
23rd of April '08 we got on the wait list
23 was our first number on the boy's wait list
23rd of December '08 we had our 1st and only court date
23rd of January '09 we leave for Ethiopia to bring home our son

I thought that was pretty cool. Then I started counting our time from wait list to travel and it is exactly 9 months! Nine months to the day and then I start my "labor pains" by getting on a VERY long flight.

Travel Games!

2009-01-14T22:51:00.002-07:00

Oh, the little prayers that God answers, well and the big ones too (more on that in a minute):) I have been nervous about the flight 24+ hours...not because I'm afraid of flying but because I hate sitting still for more than an hour long movie. Mostly I have been worried about my poor husband who has to deal with my moodiness during the whole thing. Well thanks to a blast from my hubby's past, or rather childhood closet, we have a solution to at least four hours of the flight. That's right folks TRAVEL GAMES. Before I met Jared I was not much of a game person, but now that they have grown on me I welcome the distraction that pocket sized chess, checkers, battle ship, guess who, and word searches will bring. I suppose they will be good for the hotel too. So bring on the 24 four hours of gaming fun accompanied by fantastic air plane food (vegetarian of course...even better right?) Oh boy, I really am sorry honey...

Okay so for the big prayer answered. Some wonderful, wonderful, fantastic, caring, beautiful friends of ours just helped out with about 3/4 of our plane ticket fees!!! We have been SO blessed between people helping with travel fees, donations, and baggage fees I just can't say thank you enough to all these people. For the first time in this whole adoption journey I can say that we have enough to cover ALL of this step in the process...our travel fees! This feels so good. Thank you LORD for this answer to our prayers!

2009-01-13T09:45:00.001-07:00

This was the verse of the day on my homepage this morning, I love it:

Learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow.

Isaiah 1:17

5 Months Old!

2009-01-12T17:57:00.001-07:00

Our little Malakai is 5 months old and I'm so happy to be able to say that he will be home before his 6 month birthday!

Nice Shower and Awsome Cake

2009-01-12T17:44:00.003-07:00

Our shower was very nice, and we got some nice things. I only had to play one game which was great! The best part was the amazing cake that two of my friends made. Not only did it look good, but it tasted great. Here is a picture of it half eaten, but with the best part still intact. Thanks guys!

Baby Shower

2009-01-07T13:49:00.001-07:00

My friend Melissa is having a baby shower for us on Saturday. I'm excited to get boy things this time:) Since we have a lot of baby stuff already from our daughter I'm hoping to get lots of diapers, wipes and formula. Hopefully I can organize and put away all of the gifts while still packing and getting ready to travel. Should be a fun day.

Restless Heart

2009-01-05T22:50:00.000-07:00

Dad Here
Now that we have our travel dates and our plane tickets are booked and all of the endless amounts of paperwork and countless hours of conversation we have arrived at our travel date. I have been asked by several people if I am excited. I respond with a typical answer of yes we are so excited or something like that. But today I was looking at some blogs of families that have come home with their children and I realized just how much my heart is connected to Malakai. As I looked at all the pictures of the other children home with their families it hit me that I view Malakai just like I view pictures of my daughter. I think the other kids are cute but there is just that parental infatuation with your own children. It almost took me by surprise that even though I have not met my son, I can still look at his picture and know that I feel the same way about him as I do with my daughter. After this revelation I began to realize how anxious I really am to bring our son home. Up to this point the waiting has never really bothered me but as these three weeks leading up to travel are getting under way I already want them to be over. With all the things that we have to get done I know that the time will pass quickly. I just cannot wait to get on the plane and know that we will finally be on our way!

Also with knowing who we are going travel with I look forward to meeting the other families and talking with the other dads in our group. Well, I was inspired by Mike to share my own thoughts. I certainly enjoyed getting to know a little bit about him before we meet and travel. I look to all the new things that this trip will bring. My personal prayer for this trip comes from Psalm 46:10
"Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth."
Among all the busyness of the trip I want to be still and see God exalted!

Formula!

2009-01-03T22:44:00.004-07:00

We have already been able to collect 52 lbs of formula to take over to our orphanage, and we still have three weeks left. We are so thankful for the generous people around us.

Travel Dates!

2008-12-30T16:09:00.004-07:00

We got our travel dates today! We are scheduled to travel Jan 25-the 29th. I can hardly believe that it is less than a month away. Things are falling into place now. I just picked up some little boy clothes from another adoptive mom in town and got a list of great travel tips and packing ideas. If any of you other moms have a good packing list please let me know! If everything goes as planned I should have a baby shower before we leave. So this means for all of you followers that in about 30 days we will be able to post pictures of our little son. Stay tuned...

An Early Christmas Present

2008-12-23T15:09:00.002-07:00

Thank you all for the prayers and encouragement you poured out on us before our court date. The judge did in fact wake up, go to work and approve our case!! I'm so grateful to the Lord for answering our prayers. We have two babies to celebrate this holiday season our savior Jesus and our little guy Malakai "M" Murphy. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

We still have to wait for our official court decree in order to find out when we will travel, but it looks like it will be the end of January or the first week of February. I can't believe it will be in one month!

My sleep has definitely been affected by the adoption lately. I have had two different dreams that we got our kiddo home and it was a girl instead of a boy, but this is because I've been looking at all my blog friend's beautiful girls that have come home recently. Also, last night I woke up ever single hour and each time I did I would pray that if the court hearing was taking place that hour that we would be approved. Mom's always have that 6th sense and wake up when their kids need something, but I have to say that was impressive from half way around the world;) We are so happy and excited to have this news passed on to us much sooner that we thought it would be THANK YOU AGCI!

The day has come!

2008-12-22T17:58:00.002-07:00

Okay, the big day has arrived...well, in Ethiopia anyway. It is now 6pm here in Mountain time, but it is 4am in Ethiopia right now. In a few hours the sun will rise, court officials will wake up and head to work, and then they will hear a case of a family in Montana and a little boy from Hannah's Hope. They will see that everything is in order and will joyfully approve this adoption deeming "M" legally our son! At least this is our prayer. Unfortunately, we will not know for a while, but it is happening in only a few hours none-the-less. Join us in prayer tomorrow! We would REALLY like to travel at the end of January.

Hang in there little guy will be there soon...

10 Days

2008-12-12T22:19:00.002-07:00

Well we have just been doing the holiday thing and waiting for our court date. We only have 10 days until it happens. I just really wish we could find out sooner than the 5th of January, that is torture! I have mixed feelings about this period of the adoption. On one hand I feel like we should be getting so much more prepared and excited, but on the other hand it has been the least involved part of the whole process. In the paperwork phase we were so busy with forms, plans, home study etc. and then on to the waiting list where each month we got an update and moved forward. Then the referral came and all that we had to get done for that but now we just sit and wait. We get no updates on our little guy like I thought we would, no photos like so many other families got while they waited, no info on how our case is proceeding, really nothing at all right now. Oh wait, I take that back we do have to get shots next week...whoopee! I don't mean to sound negative, but it just feels a little empty looking at a picture of a child who will soon be my son but I don't know him, hear him, see him, or feel him. All I have is the connection through a few photos and prayers. I feel like I have to keep my heart in a semi guarded state in case we do not pass court the first time, but at the same time I want to start preparing for the new attachment and life that will be a part of our family. It reminds me a lot of waiting for labor. I started thinking two weeks before my due date that I could have my daughter ANY TIME...well four weeks later she popped out 14 days late! I don't do well with that any-moment-now type of waiting for long periods of time. I'm glad I have Christmas keep me occupied through this time of torn emotions. I just can't wait until we have travel dates, then I will be able to whole heartedly start preparing. I just can't wait to hold that little guy.

We have a court date!

2008-11-24T12:03:00.003-07:00

Exactly 8 months after we got on the waiting list we will have our first (and hopefully only) court date. Our court date is scheduled for December 23! Please pray hard with us that we will pass court on the FIRST try. If this happens we are looking at traveling the end of January. If we have to do more court dates it will push it back to February or longer. Whether or not we pass we will still not find out until January 5th or later due to the holidays. This is going to be SO hard, so to save me from the torture of repeating "I don't know yet" please wait until then to ask about progress:)

On another note, I had a wonderful dream about Gotcha Day. We went to Hannah's hope and picked up our little guy and it was wonderful. He cried at first but then once he was used to us he just snuggled in as I held him. We got to meet one of the staff members from Hannah's Hope and Almaz brought in a blanket of his that she had saved for him. I can't wait until we get to actually experience this and not just dream about it.

A must hear audio program

2008-11-19T20:04:00.002-07:00

Please take a few minutes to listen to this powerful audio broadcast by Kay Warren the wife of the author of The Purpose Driven Life. Click Here!

Referral Party

2008-11-19T18:24:00.003-07:00

So a week after we got our referral we had some friends over to celebrate since we don't have any family up here. This post is obviously a little late but I still wanted to post the pictures. My good friend made me the great cake in the picture.

This is the referral packet and gifts for baby M that we sent off two and a half weeks ago.

A Sweet New Arrival

2008-11-12T22:58:00.003-07:00

The first families to travel since the court closures got back last week. One of the moms has a blog and a very cute video of her little girl and our orphanage. Check it out... Here

I was able to talk to this mom, Kendra, about baby M and she said he was really little and he loved to be held. He cried every time that someone put him down. I have been praying that our boy would be a cuddly one. It is good to hear little tid bits about our children even if pictures aren't going to be allowed anymore. I read on another blog that court dates are booked clear through the end of December, so I'm now positive that ours will be January if not February. I really hope it is not February, but I guess we'll wait and see how things go.

Changes

2008-11-11T11:13:00.002-07:00

We have been incredibly busy and have not had much time to post in the last few weeks. There hasn't been much going on directly with our adoption, but there have been a lot of changes taking place in the process. Some of these changes will affect us and some might not. One change we are sad to see happen. Families who travel to pick up their children often take pictures or video of the children at Hannah's Hope who have families waiting to travel. This is no longer going to be allowed. It was disappointing to hear this news, but if it is in the best interest of the children we understand. We were looking forward to this very much, but we do have some hope. Our case worker just traveled over to Ethiopia and I think she was going to try to take some pictures for us. Right now we are waiting to be scheduled for a court date which I'm guessing will be in January. We may or may not get to know the date of our court hearing depending on what the new policy is. I'll keep you updated on that. Once we have our court date we will just wait and pray that we pass on the first try so that we can travel as soon as possible.

Tagged

2008-10-27T16:10:00.002-06:00

So I escaped being tagged for 12 months then right when we got extremely busy and got our referral I was tagged twice by two different friends :) So I'm just now getting to it. 7 things about me:

1. I am a health nut! We follow a mostly vegan diet and LOVE good food. I do have a sweet tooth though see #3.

2. I love big dangley fancy earrings. This is really the only type of jewelry that I really wear much besides my wedding ring.

3. I LOVE sweets, candy, cake, brownies you name it I like it (except pumpkin pie). My theory is I will eat healthy all day and reward myself with a small piece of dessert at night...life's too short to not enjoy! P.S. I have a wonderful vegan cookie recipe

4. I HATE shopping!!! For food it is okay, but anything else I hate.

5. I'm a terrible traveler. Yeah, I know, my poor husband on our trip to ET. I feel for him already

6. I love my friends and family deeply, passionately and loyally.

7. Jesus is the driving force in my life and he has given me the gifts of mercy and encouragement. I do my best each day to use these gifts to help those that he lays on my heart.

Referral Day!

2008-10-18T10:05:00.004-06:00

Wow, I sure got in trouble for not sharing more info yesterday hehe. For those of you who have not heard, our agency requires that we don't post pictures, names or personal info about the child until he is home, so this will be fairly limited. We will share what we can so here you go. After six days short of six months on the waiting list we finally got to see our baby. Baby "M" is a beautiful 2 month old baby boy. He is so sweet and we were blessed with having 40+ pictures of him. Julie says he has a very unique story, which we are going to keep private. He is healthy, and all his measurements are very good! We feel so lucky to have photos of him from when he was only a few days old. I can't wait for the travel group to take updated pics for us.

Here is how my day went...perfect!

We woke up and had a chiropractor appointment. It was an AMAZINGLY beautiful fall day out side! It has been kind of cloudy and icky before and now today, but for one shining day it was gorgeous. So in honor of the beautiful day I decided to take my daughter to the park and have a picnic lunch with my husband. We got burritos and went to a park near J's work. We ate and played and had a great time. When J's lunch was over he said he had to get back to work, but if he finished up some projects for next week he could get off early. So hearing this I shooed him back to work to hurry up and get done:) Well, I was about ready to pack up and come home but my daughter said "NO, not yet mommy!" So I thought "well, we should stay and enjoy the day more." We did, and not 20 minutes later I hear my phone singing "Africa" by Toto. I think my brain froze so I had to look at the caller ID to see if it was really who I thought it was and sure enough it was! I answered and Julie said I have a little boy to talk to you about. I think my voice got a few pitches higher and I said "Really, I'm so excited!" (they must hear the dumbest things from us moms in that moment ha) So she told me all about him and I tried to take it all in while forming 100s of questions in my mind. After the conversation was over I told A "you are a big sister today" she said quite matter-of-factly, "Yeah, I am" silly girl. So I hung up, called J and left the park right away. J got off work and ended up right behind me in traffic. We were about 15 mins from home but traffic was TERRIBLE! I tried to be patient and finally we made it home and dashed into the house. We spent the whole afternoon looking at pictures, calling friends and family, emailing like crazy and getting in contact with our adoption pediatrician. We had our date night all set up so I got ready as fast as I could and we headed out to celebrate. We had a great dinner of salad and clam chowder. and then we went to a coffee house for dessert and sat and chatted for a while. We were going to bowl but it was league night :( We had a great time! Since we don't have family up here we are going to have a celebration party next Friday I think with friends up here. Any of you CO folk are welcome too!

Thanks for all the congrats we received! It is so nice to have support of good friends, family, and blog stalkers :)

We Got The Call!

2008-10-17T16:58:00.002-06:00

We got our referral today!!!! It feels so weird to actually be typing this instead of reading it from someone else's blog. I'll post about the day and how it all went later, but now I have to go get ready for our date. We had a date already set up with a babysitter for tonight so it worked out perfectly and we are going to go celebrate!

Since the phone isn't ringing...

2008-10-15T15:38:00.003-06:00

I have been trying to keep myself so busy that I don't have time to wonder if the phone is going to ring, so here is what we did today.

I had heard from another adoptive mom here in town that a shop had ET chicken crepes so we decided to go try them for lunch. Much to my disappointment they no longer make them :( We tried other things from the menu and they were good, but I was definitely disappointed! After lunch we were walking back to our car and passed a few shops that I'd never been to (we were down town). We passed a game store and my daughter said "lets go in here mom" at first my defalt mommy "No" was going to come out but then I thought well, why not it looks neat and I've never been in there. So we went in and looked around. They had some really cool puzzles and I was hoping to find an African one. Well, sure enough they did have some. There are two REALLY cool ones that were a little pricey but I did find a fun one for $7. Here are some pictures of it. I plan to glue it and hang it on our little guy's wall.

The puzzle is 100 pieces almost 4 feet long. My daughter had fun putting it together with me. When we were done she said "It's Africa, we made if for "M" my brother" How cute is that!! So this was a good distraction for the day. I hope I can keep myself distracted for as long as it takes to get THE CALL.

Back to 2...I think

2008-10-10T17:06:00.004-06:00

Okay so the family that was put back on the wait list just got a new referral! As long as this goes as planned that puts us back on the list at:

Like many who have posted before me I welcome the weekend because I know that if my phone rings it has nothing to do with a potential referral. I do have a set ring tone for AGCI, "Africa" by Toto, but still any ring and I get excited. Two days of peace and then we will see what next week brings. October 23 would mark 6 months on the waiting list and I post a while ago that it would be cool because that is my brother's birthday, but I'd really rather not wait 13 more days if I don't have to. The "pumpkin vase" that my necklace is on was a cute project my friend's mom invited me and my daughter to do last week. They turned out so cute that thought I'd do my number post with it this month. Keep checking back next week because I REALLY hope to have my "referral day" post soon!

New Number

2008-10-07T21:43:00.005-06:00

But almost:

Okay so here's the scoop...we were unofficially two and then officially two for a few minutes, but now we are back to three because someone ahead of us lost their referral and were put back on the list. We don't know details, but we are just glad to know for sure what number we are. Today was a bummer of a day for me finding out we went backwards and also that time between referral and travel is now looking more like 3-5 months vs. the 2-3 that we had been anticipating. I'll just have to trust that God will continue to give me patience. I do want to send out a congrats to my friend Amy who got to "meet" her baby girl yesterday. I know I'll be there soon and I can't wait!

2008-10-06T20:49:00.002-06:00

Okay for those of you (Cassie) who are checking our blog hoping to hear new numbers, we still have not heard. I was really thinking we would today, but no word yet. I know that AGCI is planning on giving out new numbers this week through email, and I'm hoping that we also get a call. Since I think we are #2 we should be getting a call to go over the referral process even if we don't have our referral quite yet. A friend of mine who is number 1 on the girl list got this call a week ago and I have been hoping for the call soon too. Now that courts are open things should be processing again, but I know it will take some time for them to get caught up and back to normal. I kind of feel like we are sitting in traffic and the light is green way up ahead but we have to wait for all the other cars to start driving before we can actually start going ourselves. While I am very anxious and excited I am still managing to maintain a peaceful and patient attitude about the wait which is only due to knowing that the Lord has his timing. This attitude may change very quickly if we go another two weeks with zero referrals, but I'm trying my best and the Lord is calming me. For those of you who know me well I hope you can see how clearly this peace is from God because you know how impatient and passionate I usually am. The thought just came to my mind that God did the same thing to me while I was pregnant. I was so laid back and calm durring pregnancy (aside from the normal crying at the drop of a hat). I didn't have severe mood swings I just felt calm and at ease and that is overall how I feel now which is SO nice, what a blessing! I can't say that this will continue while I'm waiting to travel, but I'll take what I can get :)

Celebrate!

2008-09-28T18:31:00.002-06:00

Yay for courts opening again!!! To all of you waiting for travel, I pray your travel dates come soon. For all of you waiting for a court date I hope they will be assigned ASAP. And for those of us waiting for referral I pray the papers will start flying and many kiddos will find homes this week! The long two months are finally over!

Praise God Again!

2008-09-25T15:05:00.002-06:00

I needed to write a huge thank you to a wonderful family from our church. I got to attend a fun little birthday party for a friend of my daughter's this morning and little did I know that God had a huge blessing for us there. Not only did I get to re-connect with some good friends that I haven't seen much over the summer, but one wonderful friend also decided to give us a donation for the adoption. She said she and her husband had been praying a lot and they felt led to give us this money. I am so honored and humbled to have the support and prayer on our behalf. Receiving a donation is always a blessing, but this one came as a direct answer to one of my prayers. Since we heard the news of being unofficially #2 I have been praying that God would provide the money to pay for our international pediatrician fee before we got our referral. I thought we would earn this money from selling my old car, but God had other plans. It is so great to see how when we seek God together he will bless us through one another! THANK YOU to our sweet Godly friends who truly blessed us today, and we pray you will be blessed ten fold!

Time Flys...

2008-09-21T10:06:00.003-06:00

I have been having so much fun on my mini-vacation in CO. I came down 10 days early for my best friend's wedding that happened yesterday. We have been busy and enjoying wonderful times visiting with friends and family while here. I was really hoping that this would take my mind off of the hard wait through court closures. I was really excited to be away from the computer for a few days so I could stop torturing myself looking at blogs that were not posting about referrals as soon as I was hoping for. I thought this will be nice and then once October comes I can start getting excited again. Well apparently the few days I WAS away from the computer everyone and thier brother got a referral! My sweet husband called me Friday night while I was playing the game Catch Phrase with my three best friends the night before the wedding. This is how it went:

J: Hey, how's it going?

Me: Good what's up? (thinking I need to get back to my game)

J: Well, are you sitting down?

Me: Um yeah, (getting a little nervous b/c I didn't know if it was good or bad)

J: Well, Autumn emailed us and said we are unnoffically #2

Me: WHAT??!! Did you say NUMBER TWO?!! (all girls in the circle looking at me with huge eyes)

J: Yep!

After that we talked for a few minutes and were so excited. Thanks again to our wonderful blog friend Autumn for keeping us updated, it has been so helpful while I've been busy. I couldn't have asked for a better time to find out about the movement. My three best friends were there in person and were SO excited for us. It was such a blessing to see the true excitement and love that they have for me and for our son already. I'm glad it wasn't the actual referral call because I would have hatted for my focus to be torn between two very exciting things and I would never want to take away from my friend's wedding day. It sure made for a fun and exciting night. Now I can't wait to be posting about the actual referral. For the first time it seems like it will actually happen. I'm SO EXCITED!

Number Update

2008-09-04T14:30:00.004-06:00

With the courts closed for these two months referrals have been slow, but we have moved a little bit. We are now #...

Here is what my husband wrote when I told him in an email our new number:

"It almost doesn’t even seem real. Did Brian and Autumn get a referral? I don’t think I am prepared for when we actually will get our referral because up until this point it has all just been paperwork and kind of theoretical! Once the courts open back up we could be getting a referral asap. Yeah!!!!!!!!"

Those of you who check our blog regularly will notice a new charm on my necklace. This is a fun little coin that has an M stamped in it. This is the first initial of the name we have for our little guy. I have one with an A on it for our daughter too once we are done with the wait list charms. I'm guessing not much will happen this month, but hopefully in October there will be more movement. We hope our blog friends Brian and Autumn can be filled with peace until they get their referral as the sit in the agonizing spot of #1.

On another note, our friends who have the little guy I asked for prayer for are home. He is doing much better! He still has some sickness, but has gained 4 lbs in like 3 weeks I think. I got to meet him and hold him for the first time yesterday. He is SO sweet and the most smily and cuddly thing. Our daughter just adored him and even got to hold him. She was so sweet and would rock him and kiss him very gently on the head. I know that when our little one comes home our daughter will have a lot of adjusting, but it is good to see how sweet and interested she is with babies...maybe that will make it a little easier (for a little while at least).

We had our second ET picnic this past Sat. it was fun to see some of the familiar faces and to meet a few new families. We now have 19 families in our group and it keeps growing...praise God. That's about all the new news here. I'll be traveling next week for one of my best friend's weddings so that will keep my mind occupied while we wait out this slow referral month. I'm looking forward to seeing good things in October and maybe even a referral on my brother's birthday the 23 or our "dating anniversary" the 31st (9 years together!). We'll see...

Fun Morning Moment

2008-08-26T10:03:00.002-06:00

So this morning I was checking my email and I clicked on one from my dad that said something about the #1 hit on the day you were born. I thought it might be kind of fun to see how it related to me or if I even knew it. So you go to this website http://www.joshhosler.biz/NumberOneInHistory/SelectMonth.htm and click on the month and then the day and it gives you all the songs that were at #1 on your birthdays. So I scrolled down and recognized quite a few and several that have had special meaning to me over the years, and then I found my birth year.

Ready...the song was:

Africa by Toto

This made me smile so big. To some this may seem like a silly coincidence, but I know it is God who gives you those fun little nudges. It is a good reminder that on the very day I was born God new that my heart would be called to Africa. The song is a little vague and silly, but I do like the chorus...

Chorus:
It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you
There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do
I blessed the rains down in Africa
Gonna take some time to do the things we never had

I feel like this fits well for our adoption :) Just wanted to share my fun moment with you all. You should check out your song and see if there is any cool meaning in it for you.

Prayer for a friend's Father

2008-08-25T08:40:00.002-06:00

As we have seen in the past our AGCI families and their friends and families are incredible prayer warriors, and we need to call on them now. Many of you know C & R from the blog sites, well she and her family need prayer. She called me this morning and asked that I post this for her since she doesn't have access to a computer right now.

Her father is in the hospital and is unconscious and they are keeping him that way right now. They said that only 10% of his heart is working and they don't know how much brain function he will have when and if he wakes up due to lack of oxygen. The doctors said the chances of death are higher than life right now, but C is asking that we pray for a miracle and God to work his healing. Check her blog later today because I think her husband might be posting more about it on their blog this afternoon. I just ask that we rise up and support her family in this time of fear and uncertainty.

The road we will travel

2008-08-15T21:54:00.001-06:00

This is a picture of the road we will walk from our hotel in Adis Ababa to Hannah's Hope (our orphanage). Many people have posted this photo on their blogs and then I've watched them walk it and come home with their children. It seems so unreal that one day we too will walk that road. Until then I will wait as patiently as I can trusting that God has our little guy in his care.

Update

2008-08-15T17:30:00.003-06:00

We got our bi-weekly update from AGCI today and there was a lot more movement of referrals than I thought there would be! It is hard to say weather or not this movement affected our number, since I don't know if these families were on the boy list ahead of us or not, but it is good to see movement anyway.

The little boy I posted about earlier is due home on Tues. and will be needing medical treatment. Please pray that he will start fighting off the illnesses he has and will be able to eat and grow because right now he weights 4lbs at 4 months old.

PLEASE join me in prayer!

2008-08-15T11:28:00.003-06:00

I don't have much time to post, but please please pray for a little baby named Abdisa from now until next Tues. when he will be home here in Missoula! I'll update more when I can, but he desperately needs prayer!

We are now #...

2008-08-06T16:21:00.003-06:00

My little girl wanted to wear my # necklace for this month's picture. How cute is that seeing her little neck and hand bearing the number that represents her little brother. Not a huge movement this past month, and probably even less in the few months to come, but I know my little boy is waiting for the perfect day that we will be untited with him, and so am I.

Another good Cause

2008-07-26T11:36:00.003-06:00

My husband and I are going to start selling a product called Mona Vie. It is a health juice that is good for anyone, especially those with any health issues. The reason I'm mentioning it on this site is that this company supports a humanitarian cause called the MORE project and I found it very touching. Please see the link in our "Fun things for a good cause" links. If any of you are interested in this product or the MORE project please leave a comment on this post and we can be in contact.

The Girl Effect

2008-07-24T19:07:00.000-06:00

Check this out...

The Girl Effect

Please Pray for this girl

2008-07-23T15:43:00.002-06:00

There is a family from our agency ACGI that adopted a little girl from Guatemala. She was recently diagnosed with leukemia and has started her treatments. She could use a lot of prayer. I was very touched by a post that her mom and dad wrote on their blog and thought I would share it with you because it is a good reminder of our hope in the Lord. Click here to hear a part of their story.

A beautiful moment from the Lord

2008-07-13T23:24:00.002-06:00

Our family has had a very nice weekend together, and the icing on the cake came tonight rather unexpectedly. My husband and I went to a concert at our church to see some friends of ours open for a band called Down Here. We had planned on leaving after watching our friends play, but stayed for a few songs from Down Here. I'm so glad we did. They showed a short video of the hunger and strife of orphans in Africa along with some very sobering statistics. This was incredibly hard for me to watch because my heart has become so burdened for these people. At first I started to tear up, and then I just closed my eyes and listened to the words and to God as he spoke to my heart. I felt my husband sit down behind me and he wrapped his arms around me and I just started sobbing. Luckily it was loud and dark so I didn't cause a scene. This was so therapeutic in so many ways. For one thing, it rekindled my passion for this adoption and reminded me that there is a specific child represented by the wait list number I keep posting about. Two, it gave me even more confirmation that this is the path we are supposed to be walking right now. Three it filled me with joy because when the screen went black after all the heartbreaking photos were shown it left you with the question "will you make a difference in one life" and I was able to wholeheartedly say YES! My husband even felt the power of the moment and I believe God squeezed his heart a little too :) I was very blessed to receive many comforting and beautiful visions during my worship today and the last one came during the song the band played after the slide show. Before they played this song one of the band members said that if all of the little orphans in Africa held hands they would stretch from Seattle to New York...and back...SIX times. This was too much for my heart to handle, and then the words of the song below started to sink in. I pictured the six lines of children stretching across the Northern US and as I was grieving over this God showed me that one of those little ones that would be "standing" holding hands with other kids in Montana was picked out to live right here with us. I love when God's peace fills you...and I was overflowing. This was truly a beautiful weekend and I'm so thankful for it.

Little is Much by downhere

What is the measure of a life well lived
If all I can offer seems too small to give
This is a song for the weaker, the poorer
And so-called failures

Little is much when God's in it
And no one can fathom the plans He holds
Little is much when God's in it
He changes the world with the seeds we sow
Little is much, little is much

Who feels tired and under-qualified
Who feels deserted, and hung out to dry
This is a song for the broken, the beat-up
And so-called losers

Consider a Kingdom in the smallest seed
Consider that giants fall to stones and slings
Consider a child in a manger
Consider the story isn't over
What can be done with what you still have

Some of you may have been affected by this...

2008-07-13T22:54:00.003-06:00

I want to be delicate about this post as I know it is a very tender subject. For those of you who have experienced the heartache of infertility my heart goes out to you. I cannot even imagine how difficult that could be, but I received an email that seems to give some hope on this issue. Please read this article and pass it on to anyone that you think can benefit from it. Article

Monthly Call

2008-07-09T17:38:00.002-06:00

We got our monthly call today, but we did not get another updated number. Judging by all the other blogs I've read today we have moved up from our #12 spot. Since we did not get our new number I'm going to wait until the next bi-weekly email from AGCI before I get my hopes up on what number we could be. I hope that this month continues to be good for referrals because there will probably be a slow down in Aug. and Sept. My prayer is that our referral will not come Sept 10-22nd, but if it does I guess that's how it was meant to be. So until the beginning of August we are still #12ish.

New Number

2008-07-03T15:08:00.005-06:00

So our wonderful case worker took time out of her busy day to email us our new numbers! We are number...

A Good Picnic

2008-06-28T19:54:00.002-06:00

We had a great time at our picnic today! There were at least 8 families there and probably over 40 people. This is so exciting since we just started the group a couple of months ago. I have to admit that seeing the little kiddos who have made it home to their forever families made me a little more eager to have our little guy home. This group is going to be such a good resource for us. I already learned a lot from experiences the other families have had. Many of them had great tips and advice to give us. One family who used the same agency as we did just moved into town and live one subdivision over from us. They were very friendly and said they would be more than willing to help us out with whatever we need. I can not tell you what a blessing this whole thing is! God has really provided. Many of the families were very excited about having the group too and said that they have been wanting to have something like this for a long time but have not had the time to set it up. We enjoyed everyone who came and we very much look forward to meeting the other families who were not able to make it today. The day itself was wonderful too. It was hot enough for all the kids to play in the water but not too hot to enjoy sitting around and visiting. I look forward to seeing the group grow and meeting the children who come home to those who are still waiting. What a wonderful day!

First MFEC picnic

2008-06-27T21:02:00.002-06:00

So I think I've mentioned the group I put together for Montana families with Ethiopian adopted children (MFEC), well tomorrow we have our first get-together. I'm very excited to meet some of the other families here in Montana. It sounds like we are going to have a pretty good turn out too. I'll post later and let you know how it goes.

Our case worker emailed today and said they would be making monthly calls to update us with info and new wait list numbers starting Monday. This is always an exciting week, and this one will be good because I know there have been several referrals. I just hope I don't get skipped over this time and have to wait an extra week ;)

Two Months

2008-06-23T23:15:00.002-06:00

Today we have been waiting for two months. I think we are unofficially #16. This means we moved 7 spots in 8 weeks. If the wait continues to go at this pace that will put us getting our referral on October 23. This would be a fun day to get a referral because it is my brother's birthday. While I am anxious to have a referral, I'm still at peace with the wait. We'll keep you posted.

Great Finds

2008-06-17T16:53:00.003-06:00

Here are a few things that we got for our little guy's room while in Seattle. We stumbled across this really neat African shop and had to look around. All of the items were made in Kenya. I can't wait to start putting all the pieces of his room together.

Yum

2008-06-15T08:25:00.002-06:00

J and I went to Seattle this weekend to celebrate our anniversary. We took some friends of ours to an Ethiopian restaurant to give them a taste of our son's culture. I think over all they liked it, but most dishes were too spicy for one of them. It was good, but the combo was missing one stew that we had in Denver...that was our favorite:( On the good side though, they did have Tej the honey wine that I didn't get to try last time. Wow, what I have read about it is right, it is SWEET. Here is a picture of our time there.

Sweet Comment

2008-06-12T13:36:00.002-06:00

So one of my blogger friends left a sweet comment on our post about being #17 and I thought I would share it:

In Tim Mcgraw's words: "17 only comes once in a life time, doesn't it just fly by wild and free"...(I am praying that it will fly!!!)

Thanks "C & R"

NEW NUMBER!

2008-06-10T12:17:00.004-06:00

Okay so I was starting to get impatient and I emailed AGCI to see why I had not gotten our monthly call yet. Julie said that somehow our name got overlooked because it was close to the name of a family that has another case worker. So anyway we finally have our new boy list number! We are number 17. I'm so happy to have a new offical number :)

Two Great New Links

2008-06-09T23:18:00.002-06:00

I posted two new websites under links-check them out.

Mothers Without Borders

Red Letters Campaign

Garage Sale

2008-06-08T08:42:00.002-06:00

We had a garage sale this weekend and it went well. We are slowly, very slowly chipping away at our fundraising. It was cool to see God answer a very specific prayer of mine though. We had some friends donate a whole eagle collection and I prayed that God would send eagle lovers/collectors. All of the eagle items sold before noon (like 18 of them) while the rest of our decorations sat untouched. God is good. Everyone who came to our garage sale was very encouraging and excited about our adoption. I expected some people to look at us weird or judgingly when we said he would be from Africa, but everyone was genuenly supportive. This made me really happy, because it gives me a little confidence that the biracial family we are creating will be more accepted then I thought. Over all it has been a good weekend, even if it has been 44 degrees all day:)

It's Here

2008-06-02T13:48:00.002-06:00

We got our FDL (favorable determination letter) from USCIS yesterday. It feels good to have this all wrapped up. Monthly calls from AGCI are starting today, so once we get our call we will let you know our new numbers.

Oops!

2008-05-29T15:52:00.002-06:00

Okay so somehow we missed the fact that there was a second page to our I600a form. We got a call last week letting us know, so I finished that and got it sent off yesterday. I'm so glad that we are already on the waiting list so this doesn't really matter as far as timing goes. I think we will be getting the FDL back soon once they process our second page. Other than that we are just waiting to hear from AGCI next week about our updated wait list numbers. Oh, and we are planning on having a garage sale/fundraiser soon so prayers that it brings in a lot would be appreciated.

One month and One year

2008-05-23T19:35:00.002-06:00

One month:

Today we have been on the waiting list for exactly one month. It was kind of neat too because we got our bi-weekly update from AGCI and heard that they had a bunch of referrals in the last two weeks! This comes as a great relief because they had close to two months of no referrals. While there weren't any problems and they were just getting paperwork in order it was hard for those at the top of the wait list to see no referrals. I don't know where this puts us on the wait list because I don't know how many of those families were on the boy list too, but when I get our next monthly call I'll let you know. Jared and I are guessing it will be around 18-20.

One year:

It has been exactly one year since Jared and I started talking about adopting from Ethiopia. We officially decided in early June of '07, but I started journaling and praying the last two weeks of May. It is hard to believe that it has been that long already, but also neat to know that this has been a big part of us for a while now. So I felt like these two big milestones were worth a blog post. Yeah!

Another Cool Web page

2008-05-21T16:04:00.002-06:00

My blog buddy Christin posted about this website called Free Rice and it is an easy way to donate food for people in poverty by learning English vocab. It costs you nothing and you get to learn a little. Check it out at www.freerice.com or click on it under my links.

Guess What My Husband Found!

2008-05-19T14:31:00.002-06:00

So two months ago I wrote in my blog that I had lost some fabric that I bought for our little guy's room. Well this weekend we were cleaning and found it on top of our large freezer out in the gaurage. I would have never found this because I'm way too short to see up there, but my tall husband found it for me. I was so happy! I've included a picture. I think later this afternoon I'll go to home depot and look at some paint samples to match. I know we still have a very long time until we need his room to be done, but the planning part is fun.

Thank you bloggers!

2008-05-16T14:10:00.001-06:00

Okay so after I wrote my post last night I read about another referral which would make us #21. I didn't bother changing the post, but then two great blog friends commented on the post and told me that they thought I was really #21. It feels great to know I have people watching out for me:) Thanks Christin and Amy! I decided I might go ahead and change my charms anyway, it will be more fun that way.

Dossier to Ethiopia

2008-05-15T20:48:00.002-06:00

We got word today that our dossier came back from D.C. and will be heading off to Ethiopia tomorrow. It is pretty cool knowing that we are actually getting closer to our son. Yes, the wait will still be quite long, but we will have papers in the same country as our little guy soon...yay! We have no official news about our number on the wait list changing, but I've heard there have been some referrals which means we will most likely be moved up soon. My educated guess is that we are at least down one spot to 22. I'll be more sure next week when we get an email update from our agency. Until then I think I'll keep my charms at 23, just to be sure. Thanks for checking in!

Another Great Post

2008-05-08T15:05:00.002-06:00

I read an AMAZING blog post today and want to share it will you all. For those of you who know me well, this probably sounds a lot like me, and for those of you who don't this is a good way to get a peak at my true deep self. Although I did not write this I feel like it came strait out of my own heart. A while ago I even wrote song lyrics that say pretty much the same thing. I guess it is just neat to see that the heart of God is unchanging and can shine the same message/passion out through those who have their hearts set on Him. What a call to action!

One small step

2008-05-07T14:33:00.003-06:00

Our dossier is being sent off for authentication today. This means that all the paperwork we labored over for five months is approved by our agency and gets to travel to Washington D.C. to the Ethiopian embassy. Once that is done it will travel to Ethiopia! Please pray that it has a safe journey. I know that sounds funny, but think of it this way...it would be like writting for 5 months on a 50 page senior paper for your most crucial college class and having to send it away to three different places before you know it is safe and being graded. Then you still have to wait a loooong time before you know the grade you got. So,I hope that helps you picture our need for prayer about our papers :)

More good news to report about our group of Montana families with ET kids (It is called MFEC for short). We now have 9 members and have heard of four more. I sent out our group info to several local adoption agencies yesterday and I hope they pass it on to their ET families. I am putting together a picnic for all of us to meet in June. It is so exciting to see that we are not as alone as we once thought we might be. Please pray that God would continue to grow our group and our relationships as well. Being involved in this group will be a good way to help pass the time as we wait for a referral.

Great God Story

2008-05-02T22:45:00.002-06:00

I love stories like this one from Sharon and Mike, it just confirms how great God's provision is for us!

long time no blog...

2008-05-01T15:20:00.003-06:00

So a lot has happened since I have blogged last. We left for our Colorado vacation last Thursday and got home yesterday only to turn around and drive 4 more hours for our USCIS finger printing apointment. We have essentially been traveling since Monday, and now I am very happy to be home and back to my blog :) So now that finger printing is done we just wait for our FDL and then keep waiting for our referral. I asked the lady at USCIS how long the turn around has been for the FDL and she said it may be as short as a week! I was really surprised by that, so I guess we'll see. Even though I don't have to wait for the FDL to be on the wait list it will still be nice to have done. In honor of getting our wait list numbers I made necklace charms that I can change out as our number declines. I thought this would be a fun reminder and give me something to look forward to each month when I get "the call."

While we were in Denver this past week we visited a great little Ethiopian restaurant. I LOVED the food!! I told "J" I'm in trouble because the closest ET food is 7 hours away. I didn't get to try tej (sp?) the honey wine because they were out :( I decided this would just have to be something I can look forward to when we travel. I hope to learn to cook some of this food from some fellow adoptive families here in town. All in all it has been a crazy week, but I'm glad to be home and get back to normal. Hope to hear from you all soon.

We are on!

2008-04-23T22:27:00.001-06:00

So here we are April 23rd and we are #23 on the boys list. If feels so good to be on the list and done with the majority of the paperwork phase. We have been told to still expect 6-7 months before referral, and while I know that I will be impatient at times, I think overall I'll be okay with having this amount of time to get ready for being a mommy of two.

A post for my faithful blog checkers

2008-04-23T14:26:00.003-06:00

We got an email from Julie two hours ago saying she got our final correction for the dossier. She said she would process it and then add us to the waiting list and then give us a call to let us know our number. This has been the longest two hours!! I have been putting off taking a shower because I don't want to miss her call. The wait is killing me, but I'm just so glad that we will be on the list TODAY!!! I can hardly believe it. Now those of you who are reading this can wait in suspense with me :) I'll post as soon as I know! Here is a chalk drawing my daughter and I did today representing our guess. It is not really an educated guess, but we'll see how close we come. Also, here is a pic of all our dossier documents, I tired posting them last week but it wouldn't work.

Progress...

2008-04-17T15:03:00.004-06:00

So we have two of the three dossier corrections done and sent, we are just waiting on one more. Hopefully next week we will get to see what number we are????

GREAT NEWS!

2008-04-16T11:00:00.003-06:00

Oh how the Lord has provided...

So a few bits of business before the good news. We sent off our dossier last Friday as I had hoped and it made it to Portland safe and sound on Monday. We have three corrections to make, but they should be relatively easy to take care of. So once those are corrected it will be off to D.C. to be authenticated. Next is our USCIS, we heard from them yesterday and they said we needed to send in a copy of our marriage cert. which I didn't realize. So we sent that off today and it should be there tomorrow. This is good news because it means they are processing our file. So all this is good news, but the best news of all is...

As soon as we get our paperwork corrections done (hopefully this week) we get to be put on the waiting list! This was a huge surprise for us since we were expecting to have to wait several more months until we got our FDL letter back from USCIS. Our agency decided that since their Ethiopia program has grown there is enough time between submitting of a dossier and referral time that they can put us on the list right away and we wont really risk not having approval on time. For those of you not familiar with the process this is still probably confusing, but over all it just means we will get our little guy referred to us much more quickly now.

Small Speed Bump

2008-04-10T20:41:00.003-06:00

Okay, so we didn't get our dossier off the other day like I was hoping due to some minor concerns with the homestudy. Fortunately they were not a big deal and will not affect us so we can go ahead and send our dossier tomorrow...at least I hope to get it off. We heard some good news about the USCIS finger printing appointment timeline. Our other ET adoptive family here in town just got their finger printing appointment for 3 1/2 weeks after they submitted their forms. This may not seem super fast, but I was expecting much longer. The wait time may still be long when it comes to the FDL letter, but we will see. If it takes us about the same time that would put us getting finger printed around the 1st or 2nd of May. That's about all the new updates for now except that I have sold 3 of my fundraiser scrapbooks, yeah thanks guys!

Our packet is off to USCIS!

2008-04-07T14:16:00.004-06:00

We got our finished and notarized homestudy today. I sent off our forms to USCIS (US Citizenship and Immigration) which will "pre-approve" us to have our little guy become a US citizen when we return home. I have a feeling this will be a fairly long process for us. I talked with my homestudy case worker today and she said that the person who had been processing the files for years just retired and they replaced him with a new girl who has had NO training. Go figure that this would happen just before we sent in our application! I will try to be patient through this process, but I just want to be a number on the wait list soon. I guess in each stage we have to have something to be praying about, so this is our big mountain to be moved now. Quick and thorough processing of our I600a and dossier. While we might have to wait a while for our Fingerprinting and FDL from USCIS, we can still send in our dossier!! YAY! I am so excited about this part. We will officially move into the "dossiers in office" stage tomorrow when I send it off. It would have been today, but I have to make two more copies of our homestudy first. What a relief to have this part done!

There have been more and more families popping up around us who are adopting from ET. I just heard about another family an hour south of us who is using AGCI also-how fun. I got to have a meeting with a lactation specialist today who is going to help me and another adoptive mom prepare to nurse our kiddos if possible. This would be so great in order to boost the health of our babies. Well, that about sums up our progress. When we hear about a finger printing appointment we will let you know.

Answer to prayer!

2008-04-02T10:53:00.004-06:00

The words of one of my favorite worship songs seems to fit well for today:
"Every blessing you pour out I'll turn back to praise..."

Guess what we got back today?! Our FBI clearances!!! I can't believe that they came back so quickly. Our prayer has been that since we didn't know about those until the very end that they would not hold up our process, and they didn't! Now all we have to do is get all the corrections made and send the HS back in for approval, yeah! I am so excited this morning, God is so good. I can't wait to send off our dossier, and then 1600a!

Corrections

2008-04-01T21:26:00.003-06:00

It seems as though our homestudy has been reviewed since our social worker emailed us today with a ton more questions and paperwork to do. Since our HS interviews were conducted at the same time that AGCI received Hauge accreditation we had to go back and fill in some of the new requirements. None of it seems too hard to get done, and we should still have the corrections done before our FBI check comes back. All should be well especially once we clear up the fact that my husband was not in the military, which I think she wrote in our HS that he was! Apparently our social worker keeps getting us (mostly my husband) confused with another family she is currently working with. This has made it a little interesting. I'm praying that mid-April we be done with this whole part and move on to waiting for a fingerprinting date and FDL (favorable determination letter). For those of you who are not familiar with all the adoption jargon you can visit our FAQs page and see the process and definitions there. Our homestudy social worker said that one family waited 4 months for a fingerprinting appointment! That would mean four more months before we even got on the waiting list. I just pray that doesn't happen. One of the other ET adoptive families here in town wants to help me set up a network of ET families here in the state. It would be so fun to have this little group since there are not any populations of Ethiopian-Americans close to us. Any tips on how to connect or form organized groups would be great!

Homestudy is at AGCI

2008-03-26T22:27:00.003-06:00

Finally our homestudy has made it to AGCI for review!! This has taken so long (in my impatient mind anyway) that when I saw the email from our social worker saying she sent it in I was excited but also had a little reality check moment. You know, one of those moments when you step back and think...this is really going to happen. It was good, and the thought that we are so close to entering the next "phase" of the process was really exhilarating. My heart and mind have been completely consumed by thoughts, prayers and yearnings for Africa lately. I have even been dreaming about it.

My second dream about our son came a few nights ago, Easter Sunday to be exact. I dreamed that I was holding him and nursing him for the first time. We connected, and I just gazed down at his beautiful warm colored face and knew he was ours. I love these dreams just as I loved the ones when I was pregnant with my daughter. What a sweet way for me to start connecting with the spirit of our son.

I started reading There's No Me Without You by Melissa Fay Greene, and I am just blown away. This book is so good for me. It has helped me get a little better picture of what things are really like in Ethiopia, and has put our adoption into perspective. In the midst of all the emotional ups and downs and waiting it can be tempting to create a fairy tale in our minds leading up to the "Happily Ever After" when we finally meet our child. But hearing personal stories about toddlers being stripped from their dying father's hands and little girls aching over the loss of the only caregivers they have ever known, and seeing pictures of their faces covered in tears breaks my heart but gives me a much clearer picture of what we are doing. I would highly recommend this book to anyone, but especially those who feel a nudge in their heart for Africa.

Continued prayer for paperwork processing would be great! We are more than ready to move into the waiting stage.

Fingerprints, New Friends and Lifebooks

2008-03-20T14:35:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I got our State FBI background check sent off. That felt so good. Things are starting to come together, but I still don't know if we will hit our deadline. They said that the FBI checks take 2-3 weeks to get back. Does anyone know if that sounds about right? If so we should be in the dossier-in-office stage within a month.

Another exciting thing is that I connected with another family here in town that is in the exact same place we are with the adoption, and are requesting a little boy the same age! They are using a different agency, but it seems like all the requirements are pretty standard and similar to ours. It would be so cool if we brought our little boys home close to the same time. What a blessing it will be for them to have a friend of their own nationality to grow up with! It was a blast talking with the mom, and we were on the phone for 45 minutes the first time we talked! She knows a lady here who lived in Ethiopia for three years and who knows the Amharic language and how to cook. She said maybe some time in April we can get together with her and cook some Ethiopian food! It would be great to hear Amharic from someone too before we travel. Maybe we can pick up some helpful phrases. I am so thankful that God has provided other ET families here for us to get to know. There are a few more ET families scattered across the state too so we will have to start a little group of some sort for the kiddos.

I've been thinking of starting to put together lifebooks. I don't want my daughter(bio) to feel left out of what a neat experience "lifebooking" can be so I thought while I'm waiting for a referral I will make her one and get some practice under my belt for when I make our little guy's book. Any hints or tips you all have on making lifebooks would be great!

finger printing tomorrow

2008-03-17T14:34:00.003-06:00

We have one more background check to send off and we will be getting fingerprinted for that tomorrow afternoon. I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, but we sure have spent a fortune to prove we are upstanding citizens!

On a less official note, we have had a change in plans concerning our Ethiopian food experience. I knew as I was writting that post that something would come up. Anyway, we are now flying back home at the end of April and will be spending a few days there with friends and family to celebrate our daughter's birthday(I'll start calling her Roxy for privacy). While we are down there we will get some Ethiopian food! It will be a quick trip, but fun none-the-less. Our social worker said she hopes to have our report sent to AGCI by the end of this week, or begining of next week, so prayers that it would go that way would be great! I'll be glad when this part is done, it is such a stressful time crammed into a short 3-4 month period. I don't think I have ever read so many books, on-line courses, websites, and packets in that amount of time. I counted 6 books, 15 on-line courses, 5 magazine articles, two 3-ring binders full of adoption info, and too many websites to count all since January 1, 2008! We still have to finish one book and start another. I'll be glad when we can slow down some and use the next waiting period to continue learning, but at a slower pace. Who knows maybe even pick up a fiction book or read the ONE book I have been wanting to read since the begining,There's No Me Without You

On still another note, I lost some really cute fabric I bought for our little guy's quilt :( I'm so sad. I don't know what happened but it was the PERFECT African print and I loved it. The worst part is that it was several years old and they could not get anymore in. Maybe it will still turn up, but if not I'll be really bummed! Well, I guess that's all since I don't have any improtant updates I just have to fill the space with what I've got.

World Vision Experience: AIDS

2008-03-15T02:05:00.002-06:00

Check out this free exhibit that is touring the nation. For all you Colorado people it is coming to Highlands Ranch in July and Ft Collins in October.

April 30th

2008-03-14T18:04:00.002-06:00

I'm so excited for the end of April. We get to go on a business trip out to Spokane, WA and while we are out that way we plan to make it out to Seattle or Portland for some Ethiopian food tasting. We are not as fortunate as those of you who live in or around big cities and can access this food easily. We have done our research and the closest ET restaurants are 7 hours away in all directions. I am excited to try it and have a little experience under our belts before we travel. Only 46 days left...yum :) I decided breaking up the waiting period with other exiting things like this will help pass the time.

Hard Day!

2008-03-13T20:05:00.002-06:00

We are really coming down to the wire on our dossier and other paperwork. It looks like several our requirements will have to be redone now :( I have been stressing about all of it coming together as it should for the past month, and today I feel like all my biggest worries came true. It was one of those days when it seems everything goes wrong. Please pray for our process and our emotions as we proceed.

Life Books Website

2008-03-10T20:46:00.003-06:00

I found this website that is designed to help people make life books for their adopted kids. The thing I really liked about it was the "hand picked links" button. There are some fun links to follow from this page. I thought you other adoptive parents might like to check it out...

Homestudy Interviews Done!

2008-02-27T20:35:00.002-07:00

We had our last interview today, so we are thinking we will be sending in our dossier by the end of March (and meet our deadline). It went very well, and we are very comfortable with our case worker. Thanks for checking in on us and for all the prayers. We are ready to move on to the next steps...finally.

Scrapbooks

2008-02-23T19:17:00.006-07:00

In order to earn a little extra money for our adoption I have made some cute little scrapbooks. Each book has 20 different 6x6 pages and I have 4 boyish ones and 4 girlish ones done so far. Although they have mostly boy or girl pages they could be used for siblings too. These would be great for baby shower gifts, grandparents, or parents who want a fun way to keep photos but don't have time to scrapbook. Each book is going for a minimum donation of $38.00 plus shipping. I also plan on making some adoption/Ethiopia specific books if anyone is interested in those. If you are interested in either one of the finished books or pre-ordering a adoption/Ethiopia book please leave a comment on this blog and I will get in contact with you. Thanks and hope you enjoy them!

A bit of relief among the harsh reality

2008-02-22T20:18:00.002-07:00

As we prepare to bring our child home we are required to do educational courses about adoption. Some of these have been a very good reality check for us, and some tell of the heart breaking trials that orphans and abandon children often go through. As I was reading one course on orphanages and institutionalized children I came across this paragraph that made me so happy...

"IS THERE SUCH A THING AS A "GOOD ORPHANAGE"?

In Ethiopia, orphanage children performed as well as family children [children living in a home with a family] in various behavioral and psychological testing, especially those who entered the orphanage early. Superior social interactions with peers have been seen among orphans from Ethiopia and Romania. Indeed, in many countries, orphanages may appear attractive to desperately poor families."

From THE HANDBOOK OF INTERNATIONAL ADOPTION MEDICINE by Laurie C. Miller. © 2004 by Oxford University Press, Inc.

We know that the Ethiopian people highly value children and are very loving people. The orphanage that our little boy will come from, Hannah's Hope, is so wonderful and we have heard nothing but great things about it and the people who work there. We feel so blessed to be adopting from a great country and a wonderful orphanage whose people try with all they have to keep these children safe, healthy, and loved. We know that this does not guarantee that our child will not have suffered, but it does give us hope.

New Date

2008-02-20T21:31:00.002-07:00

So providing that all goes well we will finish up our homestudy interviews next Wednesday. It could be a very long day, but worth it if it means we can be done with that part. I feel like the rest of my dossier is just sitting there getting dusty waiting to add the last item (homestudy report) before we can send it off. Please continue to pray for quick writting and processing of the study so we meet our deadline. This and safety for our little guy are our top prayer needs right now! Not much else to report except a few very precious donations, thanks guys!

No Homestudy on Friday

2008-02-16T16:09:00.002-07:00

We did not end up having our second interview this Friday :( Our agent had to cancel, but hopefully we will get it done next week! Since the homestudy is the only thing left to do we are anxious to be one of the "Dossiers in office" on the bi-weekly emails from Martha. Please be praying that we get done soon since we are starting to feel a little bit of a time crunch with our dossier due date.

A Great Link We Should All Read!

2008-02-14T10:26:00.003-07:00

The day I first read this article I also saw some videos of starving children in Africa. I had a broken heart day for the hungry children of the world. God let my heart break and I cried as visions of tiny little hungry bodies filled my head. I just wanted to pray that God would send down food for each of them so they would never be without. Sometimes I feel so sad that my garage is a bigger and better shelter than many people's homes. As I sit here and type this my 1 1/2 year old daughter is looking out the window saying "Big houses...big windows" how right she is, we are blessed. I'm grateful for our opportunity to help give at least one child a home where he will never no hunger or poverty, what a blessing, I just wish we could do more...and I'm sure in some way we will.

1 Homestudy Visit Down

2008-02-12T15:34:00.000-07:00

We had our first homestudy visit today for about 2 1/2 hours. It went really well, and Aspen was even really good for the short time she was here with us. Our social worker is very nice and said she was impressed with the amount of adoption prep reading that we had done which is good. We have one more visit on Friday, and then possibly one more with just me at a later time. She told us that there is another couple here in town that is also adopting from Ethiopia. This is exciting because now there are at least two other families here to connect with. Anyway, we are excited to be making progress again after a month of waiting. Thanks for all the prayers!

Let's Thank Him in Advance

2008-02-12T15:10:00.000-07:00

This post is one I wrote over a week ago, just have not had time to post it. Our Sunday message was about how we connect with God, and I was inspired to write about how I've been connecting with Him lately. I have never felt more connected to the Lord than on this journey of adoption. To quote a movie I like "Food has lost its taste...colors seem dull." This is how I have been feeling about "ordinary life" Even though Christmas was fun its magical allure was dimmed this year compared to the excitement of being "on duty" for God. My life has never felt more meaningful and purposeful than it does right now. Don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean we aren't experiencing or expecting trials. Quite the opposite is true; we know this journey will bring extra challenges but we aren't as afraid of the hard times because we have to be so reliant of God. I have been filled with the joy that comes from seeing God in action and thought I'd just share that joy with all who care to read our blog. boc

The title of this post comes from a radio sermon that I heard a few weeks ago. There was a story about a man who heard the call to become a missionary in a cannibalistic part of Africa. He left is wife and children at home and as he boarded the boat to leave he wrote a letter to his wife. He talked about his plans and how hard it would be, but then he said "Let us thank Him [God] in advance for what he is going to do.” I thought that was very powerful, and a great way to view our mission! So we are thanking Him in advance for the financial, safety, and timing provisions He is going to give us.

Homestudy Dates!!

2008-02-04T16:36:00.000-07:00

Yeah! We finally have our homestudy interview dates set up. This will be exciting to get going. Please pray that we come across as baby worthy ;) (I'm not too worried) Anyway, that's the scoop for now!

A chance to make a difference for an orphan

2008-01-31T11:19:00.000-07:00

To all of you who are not at a place to take on the journey of adoption but would still like to have an impact on the orphans, here is your chance. Our adoption agency is sending staff members over to their Ethiopian orphanage, Hannah's Hope, and will be taking much needed supplies. If any of you have something you would like to donate or if you would like to make a monetary donation they would be truely blessed. You can look at the list of needed supplies under our links list. All donations must be sent by Friday Febrary 8th. Any donations can be sent to:

All God's Children International
3308 NE Peerless Place
Portland, OR 97232

Thanks and God bless you all!

Prayers for our boy and his birth mom

2008-01-28T12:35:00.000-07:00

God has been laying on our hearts and the heart of one of our friends lately that we should be doing a lot of praying for our little boy and his birth mom. We would appreciate prayers for their health, safety, birth if he isn't born yet, and that our homestudy would get going so we can turn in our dossier on time. I have also been praying specifically for God to take care of our baby just like we would until we get him home.

Got it!

2008-01-23T21:54:00.000-07:00

Not much to report except that we finally got our letter, so our dossier is complete. We are still waiting for our last reference letter to make it back to our homestudy agency.

Still waiting to start homestudy

2008-01-21T15:38:00.000-07:00

I thought by now we would be starting homestudy interviews, but one of our reference letters had still not come in (almost a month over due now) and I didn't know that until I called last week. We decided to have another couple do one for us so we can get moving. I know that there is a good reason for this delay, but I'm ready to get moving. Our Dossier is done, minus the homestudy and technically our last letter of recommendation that is hiding from me at the Post Office. I was supposed to receive the letter on Wed. of last week, but it came in a day late. Then this happened...

I saw the mail man on my sidewalk with the letter in hand...yippy...wait why is he turning around? Why is he going back to his truck? Why is he driving away with my letter?! So I called the Post Office and the said they would check it out and get back to me...they didn't. So I go in the next day and they say "It isn't here, he must have it and will try to deliver it again today" Great, except he is probably there right now and I'm not. So I get home and find the nice little pink tag on my door that says I can pick up my letter at the PO after 6pm M-F. Okay fine, I'll just get it Monday I think to myself. So this morning I load up some packages and my pink slip and head to the PO and as I walk in I see that it is closed. Why is it closed I think? Oh yeah, it's a holiday. So this darn letter that is waiting to complete my dossier should be coming home TOMORROW! For those of you wondering why the guy left, apparently he slipped and fell before I noticed him. My thinking was that he could still have thrown the letter onto my porch from there...after all it was sent PRIORITY! :) I know all you other adopting Moms know how I feel...I think I am now officially a part of the "Stalk your Mail Man Club" Anyway, that's the update for now.

I HAD A DREAM!

2008-01-21T15:22:00.000-07:00

As I was thinking of a title for this blog I realized that today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and I thought how fitting...

I had a dream...a wonderful dream last night of a beautiful Ethiopian boy about 3 years old. As we wandered the dusty roads of his village barefoot he rode on my hip and clung tightly to my neck. We passed several roadside vendors and he would translate the language for me in a sweet little voice. Our connection felt so natural and he seemed completly content to be my child and call me Mom. There was a deep love and trust present, the same that I feel for our daughter when she smiles up at me and says "Hi Mommy." What a beautiful gift of peace this dream was. I had many dreams like this when I was pregnant with our girl as God carefully prepared my heart for the amazing daughter he gave us. I look forward to more of these dreams as we get closer to bringing our son home.

I hope you all have a Dream!