Court Dossier

Our court dossier was taken to our region yesterday! Now we wait to hear if the judge requests more paperwork or issues our court date! I am SO ready to see our "little man" again!!

On another note, we were blessed beyond our wildest dreams with a grant from Show Hope yesterday! I nearly fell over when I read the grant award letter. I absolutely LOVE Show Hope and all they do to help orphans! They really "walk the walk".

Perfectly Said

As is par with adoption, we wait another week! Our paperwork is still not in the hands of the judge, but maybe by the end of the week, or the beginning of next. Honestly, waiting a week just to hear that you'll have to wait another week is excruciating! A very dear friend of mine (which on a side note....this adoption journey has brought an AMAZING friend my way and for that I will forever be thankful!!) sent me an e-mail with something that Jen Hatmaker said yesterday on Facebook. If you've never read anything by her....do it NOW! Jen wrote this in response to someone asking her about the waiting in adoption:

"Oh my, I can speak to this. First, forget whatever timeline you were given at the beginning. Forget you ever heard that. Put that in the trash can. Adoption will change, shift, slow down, hit snags, be weird, be difficult, take longer than you think, take longer that you can stand. This will happen. This is the normal thing. When someone gives you a timeline, say, "Thank you for that cute little sentence. Flush." Potential adopters, let me tell you this: Get your "YES" straight at the very beginning. Decide on it. Roll around in it. Put it on the table and shellack it. Because you cannot let every delay and snag derail your certainty about adoption. When you say YES, you are saying YES to enter the suffering of the orphan, and that suffering includes WAITING FOR YOU TO GET TO THEM. I promise you, their suffering is worse than yours. We say YES to the tears, YES to the longing, YES to the maddening process, YES to the money, YES to hope, YES to the screaming frustration of it all, YES to going the distance through every unforeseen discouragement and delay. Do not imagine that something outside of "your perfect plan" means you heard God wrong. There is NO perfect adoption. EVERY adoption has snags. We Americans invented the "show me a sign" or "this is a sign" or "this must mean God is closing a door" or "God must not be in this because it is hard," but all that is garbage. You know what's hard? Being an orphan. They need us to be champions and heroes for them, fighting like hell to get them home. So we will. We may cry and rage and scream and wail in the process, but get them home we will."
Perfectly said! Get my "little man" home, I WILL!! I will definitely "cry, rage, scream and wail" (I've already done that today), but Troy and I will get him home!

Just Hanging Out & Waiting

I haven't posted much recently because there hasn't been much to report. We're waiting. Shocking, I know! LOL Hopefully our court dossier will be in the judge's hands on Friday or next Monday. Then shortly after that (fingers crossed) we should have a court date.

Hanging in there....that's about all we can do these days!

One Year Ago Today

Exactly one year ago today, Troy and I were praying together on the couch regarding God's will for our lives concerning adoption. (We had been praying together and individually for over a year.) This time though, we knew things were different. No sooner had Troy said "Amen", he looked over at me and said, "It's time to get out of the boat and step onto the water. It's time to begin the adoption process".

What a year it has been! Lots of ups and lots of downs! Adoption is an emotional roller coaster like no other. I've made some of the most amazing friends and seen numerous families enlarged through adoption. I've cried and hurt with other families as their adoption process hit bump after bump in the road. I've cried myself when the finish line seems no where in sight! BUT, I wouldn't trade a moment of this journey! Every tear, every twist in the road and every hurt are worth what's waiting for us. I've seen that precious boy and held his sweet face in my hands. I've kissed his adorable forehead and hugged him tight. That boy is worth every moment we've waited and every moment that we're going to have to continue to wait!

Adoption is hard and it can be messy (and I'm not just talking about the waiting part). BUT, there are 143,000,000+ orphans in this world that are LONGING to have a family to call their own. They wait day after day for a family to come through the doors of their orphanage/foster home to want them. As Christians, may we be willing to do whatever it takes to care for these children and to let them know that they are WANTED,they are LOVED and they have a Heavenly Father that loves them and has a plan for their life!

Hang on "little man", Mommy & Daddy are getting to you as fast as we can!! We love you more than you can possibly understand!

Baby Shower for "Little Man"

This past Saturday, my sweet friends had a shower for our "little man" AND for his baby house. It was so much fun and we have a lot of great things to take back to the baby house. (I'm not quite sure how we're going to get it to fit into a suitcase, but that's a GREAT problem to have!)

RyLee (holding "Little Man's giraffe that we bought him for Christmas)

Trying to talk about "little man" without crying...didn't work! (I can't ever talk about him without crying)

Yummy food!

Emi & RyLee helping me open toys for the baby house

Consider It All Joy

I'm am currently working my way through Beth Moore's study of James (which is AMAZING by the way). Something she wrote this week really struck a chord with me and with where I'm at right now. It was concerning verse 2 of chapter 1. "Consider it all joy my brothers when you encounter trials of many kinds..." Beth began by asking us to write down whatever trial it is that we are currently forging through. Then below that, she said to write down 3 different ways that we could respond to that trial (one of the three ways had to be what James instructed..."to consider it all joy"). Once we had those listed, next we were to list the five year implications of those choices (as best we could tell). After spending much time thinking through and writing down my options/implications, I was AMAZED! When you see it there staring you down on paper, what seems like the hardest and most difficult choice really does have the greatest joy and blessings down the road. What I was missing when I would quote James 1:2 to myself, was the word "consider". I was replacing it (in my mind) with the word feel or experience. When I wasn't feeling the joy, I was wondering what was wrong. God is not calling us to "feel" joy, but to consider (think) it all joy. Especially as a woman, it's hard to get past our emotions (or hormones)! When I took a moment to weigh my options, I saw that considering my current trial (all the waiting and constant hurdles) as a joy was easier because I realized that it brought the most glory to God, in the end. Shouldn't that be our goal in all things? If what we are going through ultimately brings glory to God, how can we not "consider it all joy"? That doesn't mean as we walk through the tough times that we're going to be all smiles. What is does mean is that we recognize that we serve an Almighty God who is "working all things together for the good of those that love Him and are called according to His purpose". It also means we consider it joy because we know that He "knows the plans that I have for you....plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." That my friends, brings joy!

On a side note, I witnessed (first hand) God answer a specific prayer that I prayed for a dear friend just this morning. It blows my socks off each time I see God not only answer my prayer, but answer it exactly how I asked. It's enough to knock you right back to your knees in awe! It's really easy and natural for us to lift our own burdens and requests before God. Let me encourage you though, you will receive NO GREATER blessing than to see God work in a friend or family member's life when you've been on your knees, on their behalf. There is POWER in prayer. Never underestimate what it could mean in someone else's life because you took the time to lift them up before your heavenly father! God showed that to me in a mighty way today!

A Bit of Happy News

All of our court dossier paperwork is officially in the hands of our caseworker and headed overseas tomorrow afternoon (hopefully)! Please pray that it's translated quickly and in the hands of the judge as soon as possible! There's still lots of waiting ahead of us, but today we'll celebrate being one step closer!