Getting a little closer

The last few months has been very emotional!  There has been little to no movement,and everyday that goes by the wait gets harder!!  We have now been waiting 29 months, WOW I can't believe it's been that long.  And then on top of no movement 2 weeks ago our agency sent an email with another huge disappointment!!! Our US Embassy has now decided to change the way they do things.   Our paperwork will now be reviewed by the US Embassy before the Ethiopian Courts.  And they will add a few steps to their process also!  And due to this change it will add 4-6 months of waiting on the back end.  So from referral to bringing your child home it will be 8-10 months :(.  This devastated us because the reality of bringing home a baby was now shattered!!  We struggled on what to do next???  Should we drop out of the program? Should we pursue a different program? Should we increase our age?? Should we look into foster care??? I prayed that The Lord would show us what he wanted for us!   My heart was breaking.  It took us a good week to think about things clearly.  After talking to our family coordinator it eliminated a few of our options!  We were just too CLOSE to quit now!!! I kept hearing a voice tell me I would have never brought you to this if I didn't want you to finish it!! How easy would it be to just quit, but we have to have faith that The Lord will fulfill his promise to us!

2 weeks later after praying hard for a sign, someone received a referral and we finally moved up after 3 months!!!  We are now #3 for 1 infant and still #1 for siblings. In the meantime we were still praying about whether or not to increase our age.  This past week we felt the push to increase it just by a little!  Maybe The Lord didn't want us to have a tiny baby?!?! So last Tuesday night we took a huge leap of faith and increased our age!!  We are now requesting 1 infant girl 0-16 months, twins up to 2 yrs old and or 1 infant girl with a sibling up to the age 5!

Today we received more WONDERFUL news!!  Today we received our "On Deck" email!!!!!! Some of you would ask what is that?? That means we are now at the top of the list and we will be the next few families to receive our referral!!! YEAH!!!!!!  I have waited and dreamed about the day we receive that call and get to stare at our baby girl(or two) picture!! Hopefully our next update will be
the great news!!

We are so excited to soon have a picture to go with a her Name!!! Please pray with us that day will come soon for us!  This wait has been the hardest thing we have had to do during our marriage!  We also pray that after we receive our referral that the new process won't take as long as they think!!  Staring at that picture for 8 months is going to be harder than the wait so far!!

Thanks so much to our friends and family for being there through these tough times!! We can't wait to see what The Lord has in store for our family!! We are so ready for the next phase of this journey!!

Another year gone by...

A lot has happened in the past year, since my last post, movement with our adoption has been slow and spotty at times.  We are blessed to know that we have had some movement and now sit at #11 on the waiting list, we were #31 this time a year ago.  Moving up 20 spots in a year is a lot to be thankful for!!

We have tried to keep busy, and the boys are growing fast.  They are keeping us going between church, school, and soccer, but we don't let this distract our thoughts from the our future with Rayne! (Rebecca is looking forward to dance/gymnastics and whatever other girlie things she can be involved in!)  We know that it will all work out in God's time, but it is also hard to not be selfish and want her home now...

The past year we have celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary, took the boys to Universal Studios, everyone turned a year older, gained some weight (Danny), lost some weight (Rebecca), and Danny started a new job.  Triston is now 14 and has surpassed Rebecca in height.  The twins, Colin and Caleb, are now 10 and Eli is 7.  The age gap has widened farther than we had expected but the boys are all still excited and continue to ask for updates on our status.

We "celebrated" tonight with a nice big chocolate cake, with a candle for each family member including Rayne.  We lit the candles, spent a few moments praying and thinking of Rayne, and blew out the candles...each making a secret wish for Rayne! I can't wait for them to come true!  It was really special and significant for all of us!!

We have had some positive information coming from the adoption agency.  They have said that the State Department is working on expediting the Visa processing.  This would result in only having to travel to Ethiopia once and would not require leaving Rayne behind while waiting for her Visa to be approved...we are cautiously optimistic and hope this is the case.

We are getting anxious to be in the TOP 10!! Hopefully it will be soon.  In the meantime will will be busy updating more paperwork that will be expiring AGAIN!  We are praying that 2013 will be the year but are reserved because the unknown can always happen.

Today was bitter sweet and has been really hard for us.  Our hearts are so heavy.  But we are faithful that the Lord will show us his will for us as a family.  Please continue to pray with us as Rayne finds her way to her FOREVER Family!!

One Year Down

It's hard to believe but yes today marks our 1 year DTE date!!!!   It has been a roller coaster of a ride but we're still in for the long haul.  We are currently #31 on the unofficial list for our baby girl.  A year ago we started at 45 and moved up to 49 and have moved up and down all year.  It's been so hard to get excited when you move up a # because the next day we could move right back.  To date we have moved 18 spots this year.  We were hoping to be out of the "30's" before our anniversary date but that didn't quite happen.  With the way things are moving now it will probably be at least 16 months or more before we receive our referral.  It's so hard to prepare for something when you don't have a clue when that may be.  We just have to have faith that the Lord knows what he has planned for our family!!

Our journey has been a total of over 17 months and when we first started this process we thought we would have her home by now.  Wait times continue to increase and we plan for them to increase again really soon :(.  Things with our agency have picked up a little this month and we hope it keeps up.  We pray the Lord will just flood us with Referrals!!!!

We went out and celebrated with the Family last night.  The boys talk about her all the time and get excited when we mention "baby sister".  And I couldn't have an anniversary date without buying something.  So the boys help pick out a dress and a new toy for her.

It's been an emotional journey, but we know it's going to be all worth it when we see her beautiful face!!!  Our hearts ache for her!!  Just hoping we don't have to wait too much longer!!  We hope you will continue to pray with us as we wait for our daughter.  WE LOVE YOU RAYNE!!

Movin' On Up

Well, here it is, we have been DTE (Dossier To Ethiopia) for 4 1/2 months now!  It has been a long stressful time full of highs and lows.  I know it has been awhile since my last update. We have celebrated each month with the boys, they get so excited when we tell them it's been another month.   The 4th of each month is a happy day in this house!!  It's really hard for the kids to understand the time frame but we just all have to remember it's all in God's timing.  That has been hardest part of this whole journey the "unknown".  The Ethiopian government has gone through a transition and it has affected the flow of referrals and the processing time has slowed.  We continue to remain as positive as we can as we wait for the day we get the call for our little girl.  We are slowly moving up the list, and are finally out of the 40's!!! Woo Hoo!!  We are currently 39th on the unofficial list and we are hoping to see some significant movement in the next few weeks.  As we slowly move up the list it still seems so far away, but we are faithful in His plans for our family!!  Even with the recent uncertainties we remain confident that this is where we have been lead and are eagerly awaiting adding our Ethiopian Princess to our family.

Dossier is COMPLETE!!!

Dossier is complete and arrived at America World this morning.  Next stop State Department and the Ethiopian Embassy.  Lord willing we will be DTE (Dossier to Ethiopia) on Friday, February 4th.  It seems like it has taken forever to get to this point, but we are finally here...now the really hard part begins...waiting.  We know that it will be awhile before we receive our referral, and that it is all in God's time.  We are just finally relieved to have the paperchase behind us and we are looking forward to the future God has planned for us with our daughter.  The daughter that He has chosen for us.  Everyday that goes by will be another day praying for Rayne!

Dossier almost complete!!!

We are getting closer.  Our dossier is almost complete.  We are waiting on 2 more documents and we will be done and one step closer to bringing home Rayne.  With the final 2 forms we will be able to mail off our dossier and get on the list for our little girl.  It has been a struggle at times but we know this is a long process and we just have to have patience and faith.  We know that the daughter God has planned for us will be OUR daughter and will complete our family.  So until then we will continue to be Praying for Rayne!

Almost done with paperwork!!!

We've got our appointment for our fingerprinting, only a little paperwork left and we will be done and waiting on our referral.  It feels like it has been a long time coming but it will be a wonderful day when we mail off our dossier.