On our way!

We're coming, "Y", and we couldn't be more excited!!!!

Kad's First "Gotcha" Day

In some ways, it feels like just yesterday we were just walking out of the orphanage gates with our little boy for the first time. Yet, in so many other ways, it feels like he has always been with us.

He has grown and changed so much in this past year and its been such a blessing to watch his little personality emerge. I don't know how God intends to use our strong willed, goofy, loving little boy as he grows, but we're so blessed to have a front row seat to watch it all unfold!

I thought it was appropraite, as we celebrate Kad's first "gotcha day", to debut our adoption video.

So, here it is: Our journey to Befekadugeta!




Happy Gotcha Day, sweet Baby Kad. On June 7, 2011, you made us parents for the very first time. Now, here we are, hours away from boarding a flight back to Ethiopia to meet your sister. It has been an incredible year, and we couldn't imagine life any other way!

Plans are set

We officially have set plans and tickets booked for Ethiopia.

We will be leaving on June 7th (which happens to be Kad's first "gotcha Day") and coming back on June 16th. We're flying Emirates Air from Seattle to Dubai, spending the night in Dubai, and arriving in Addis on June 9th. If all goes according to plan, we will be meeting "Y" for the first time that afternoon.

I can't believe we'll be hugging "Y" next week. It still seems like a dream!!

Oh...and we're taking Kad with us, so our entire family will be on the same continent together for the first time.

June 7th can't get here soon enough!!

We have a COURT DATE!

I CAN NOT BELIEVE IT!

We were at Pike Market today, and I realized I missed a phone call from the infamous "703" area code. Mike had walked down the street to buy diapers for Kad (because, yes, I completely forgot to pack some). I thought maybe our agency had some question about our paperwork or a general program update, so I returned the call. There was no way that we could be getting our court date since our dossier just went to Ethiopia on May 11th, right?!?!?

WRONG!

Not only do we have a court date, but our court date is only THREE WEEKS AWAY!

On June 13th, we will be appearing before a judge in the Ethipoian court building and (hopefully) becoming "Y"s legal parents forever!

This seems like such a dream! We were praying to go before court closure, but we didn't think there was ANY possible way we could be going in JUNE!

Right now, we're just enjoying this miraculous moment and trying not to think of everything that we need to do to get ready (plane tickets, packing, etc).

We'll be meeting our little girl SOON -- Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

Amazed

I want to write this post, just so I remember how amazed I am today, but I'm so in awe that I honestly don't even know the words to write.

We needed $6,500 by today to pay our agency for our dossier submission fees. Keep in mind that we just paid an outrageous amount of money in early February for our initial agency fees, another huge sum that was due on April 3rd when we accepted our referral and now...we need an additional $6,500 and we were given the due date of Friday by midnight to pay online. If we couldn't pay at that time, it would delay our dossier going to Ethiopia. Ugh.

Adopting again so soon after bringing Kad home was not in our financial plan. For his adoption, we had saved and saved, knowing that we would have nearly two years to pay for his adoption in full. For "Y", that's simply not the case.

"Y" is very literally waiting for us at this point. Her file is ready to be submitted to court, but our dossier needs to be there and translated before we can move forward as a family and get assigned a court date. The thought of ANY delays made us feel sick, but we also didn't have the entire $6500 to send tonight. We feel strongly that we shouldn't enter into debt to pay for this adoption, so we've just been praying that somehow, God would provide this enormous sum of money. I think our exact prayer was, "Lord, please just let money show up in our mailbox without any effort or inquiry on our part."

Well...he did it.

Today, we got a check in the mail for exactly $6,500! The full amount we need TONIGHT to submit our dossier.

We've never been the recipients of such incredible generosity, and it just affirms to us that although we have at times thought about how crazy it is that we're adopting again so soon, we're right where we're supposed to be and doing exactly what we are supposed to be doing.

We've always been told that "God funds what he favors", and this is the first time we've experienced that so personally.

To the donors of this incredible gift....your love for our family and for our little girl is overwhelming and so, so humbling. We can't thank you enough for so tangibly helping us bring "Y" home!

Out of Our Hands

I can't begin to tell you how excited we are to say that our dossier (the mountain of paperwork we had to compile and send to Ethiopia) is out of our hands and on its way to our agency in Virginia. Once they look it all over one last time, it will be couriered to Washington DC for authentication by the Department of State and the Ethiopian Embassy.

Then...it will be on its way to Ethiopia! Our official DTE date ("Dossier to Ethiopia") will be May 11th.

When it arrives, it will be translated and registered with the government office there and then our file will be joined with "Y"s and submitted to the Ethiopian courts. We're so hoping to get a court date before they close for the rainy season in August. We know its a long shot, but God has made this adoption process move at record pace so far and we're praying He choses to get us a court date with the same speed!

Today, we're celebrating this HUGE milestone of submitting our dossier and being one step closer to meeting our little girl!

REFERRAL!!

What?!?!?

That's right, Michael and I are THRILLED to announce that our little family is growing, and Kad is soon to be a little brother.

What?!?!?

Yes...LITTLE brother. We just accepted the referral of the most beautiful eleven year old girl we've ever seen. We've spent months trying to work out the details, and just when we thought there was no way it was going to happen, God worked it all out in a way only He could orchestrate. We're so amazed and humbled that He has chosen us to parent this sweet little girl.

To fill you all in on the story to this point, remember a few posts ago when I was telling you about my friend Mary meeting her kids for the first time. (if not, please take a minute and read it here) Well...her oldest daughter's best friend. The one who thought she would never have a family.

She does now!

It has been an amazing journey that should have never worked out the way that it has, but God obviously intends for her to be our daughter.

We first heard about "Y" on January 18th. Our hearts broke for this little girl, and we began praying for a family to be open to adopting her. Well...just five days later, Mike said (completely out of the blue), "Is it crazy if I think I'm supposed to be "Y"s dad?"

Ummmm....YES! But, crazy works for us!

So, we began praying specifically that if God intends for "Y" to be our daughter, that He would make the path to her clear and open.

First, we had to find "Y" an agency that would comfirm if she truly was "adoptable" and accept her into their program. There are very few American agencies that work with her orphanage, but we found a great Chrsitan agency who agreed. Ironically, just two weeks before we heard "Y"s story for the first time, we had already sent off for an information packet from them. The agency is America World Adoption based in Virginia, and they are WONDERFUL!

Next, we had to get accepted into their Ethiopia program, pay a TON of agency fees and complete a homestudy. At the same time, our agency would be working to complete "Y"s file so that she was eligible for adoption. The chances of our home study and her file coming together at the exact same time were slim to none. Its a good thing God does his best work with "slim to none" odds :)

"Y"s file came together in three weeks, and we got our home study done just two days later. And last week, on April 3rd at 8:12 am, we got the official referral call!

"Y" will soon become our daughter!

I'm so excited to tell her one day how desperately she's wanted, how fiercely we've fought for her, and how faithful God has been to all of us as we worked to become a family.

Adopting an eleven year old wasn't anywhere in our plans, but we're so grateful that God's plans are always so much better than our own!

We still have a lot of hurdles to jump as we complete our dossier and wait for a court date, but we're so excited to be one step closer to bringing "Y" home to her forever family!

You're getting your miracle, little Ms. "Y", and we're so blessed to be getting ours too!