Tonight is our Court Date

Tonight. I can't believe it. Our court date is tonight!! I'm so nervous about it! I know that God is in control and HE will determine the outcome of tonights decision. Please pray that all the necessary paperwork is there and that the judge will sign everything to FINALIZE our adoption!! I will post tomorrow as soon as I hear anything!

Tentative Travel Dates!

We got 'em! :) Our TENTATIVE travel dates! I emphasize this because it is all depending on whether we pass court or not if we can travel on these days! But, our dates are.......June 6-13! :):) Ohhhh, we can be with our son for his FIRST birthday! And to be in Ethiopia for this occassion is going to be an incredible memory! :) Now our dates are not set in stone, so we have a little leeway on when we will actually leave, but we will hopefully be home on the 13! Thank God!! That is only 4 weeks from today that we could be leaving! So great!!!!!!! But for now, PLEASE pray for our court appointment! Sometime during the night on Monday-Tuesday a judge in Ethiopia will be hearing our case! Thats only FOUR days!! WOW!! We should hear from our agency on Tuesday if we passed. Please, please pray that our adoption will be finalized! Thank you all for the support you have given us! We are blessed to have such wonderful friends and family who are so supportive of this adoption! Praise God!

Court Date

I have very exciting news!! Yesterday we received an email from AWAA telling us that our court date is May 12!!! Now, I was not expecting to have a court date until the end of May AT THE VERY EARLIEST!!! I am shocked and amazed that God has graciously given us this date! There are many other families that have been waiting longer than us, who have court dates at the end of May. I feel a little guilty that we got one so soon! But, God has perfect timing. And there is also no guarantee that we will pass court the first time. There are many factors going on here! Please be praying for us! There have been alot of power outages in Ethiopia right now. There have been times judges have not made it to work, or have not had time to see cases. There's just too many variables to say it's a slam dunk done deal!!! We have not been given our Tentative travel dates yet, but I expect them soon! Our email said to expect travel anywhere from 2-4 weeks after our court date!!! THAT IS SOON!!! We are going to be VERY busy in the next few weeks! :):):) PRAISE GOD!! I will post more as soon as I know anything!

Today is the Day.....

WOW. I can't believe this day finally came. We got our referral!!!! Praise God! At 11:34 am today we got our referral call! I screamed when I saw the caller id! Just last night my friend, Kristy, told me to set a different ringer specifically for our agency's number! And it was a great idea!!! As soon as I heard that ring it was aaallllll over for me! Although I didn't cry as much as I thought! I screamed. ALOT. Little crying. Alot of screaming. :):):) We conferenced Josue in and Terra told us the info she had on him. He is 10 months old, healthy, beautiful!! I had to wait until Josue got home from work to look at his picture. Luckily he got to leave early! :) We opened that email & looked at our baby's face!!! WOOOOWWW!!!!!!!! He is gorgeous! He's healthy, big beautiful brown eyes, bottom teeth, curly hair, chubby cheeks!!! I'm in love. Head over Heels!! I don't even know what to say!!! Awesome. Just awesome. I can't post pictures or any info on him until everything is finalized in court. Sorry!!! You will have to see his cuteness at a later time! We have an appointment tomorrow in Columbus with an International Doctor to go over his medical report. But everything looks healthy & Terra said he has the healthiest report she's ever seen! I'm just so happy! I don't even know what else to say! :):):):)

Still waiting.......

A whole week and a half still at #3!!!! This is the longest in about 5 weeks that we have stayed at one number! *sigh* I'm really feeling the wait. More importantly I am thinking about our baby! I'm wondering if he's healthy? How did he get to the orphanage? How is he handling all these different & new things in his life? Moving from orphanage to the Transition Home, getting medical tests, adjusting to nannies? This child is on my mind 24/7!! I feel so distracted while I'm at work! :) But, everytime I think of him I pray for him! And I pray that God will direct my thoughts & prayers to pray specifically for what he needs. So please keep praying, friends!!! Pray for this child as he experiences loss and transitions! Pray for peace in his little heart & health for his body! And then pray that we will see his face soon! :)

We are sooooo close!!

We are getting so close to our referral! We are now # 3!!! And yesterday we got our "on deck" email from our agency! Which basically means we are "officially" close to getting our referral! :) We could get our call anytime now! WOW. I can't believe it. Josue and I finished our Hague training last night. Nothing like cutting it close! It had to be done before we could get a referral! Haaha! The month of March absolutely FLEW by & all of a sudden....we're #3! So we hustled and watched a bajillion hours of training ! Okay, it was more like 10 hours, but close enough!!! :) After each video we had to take a quiz. It was informative, but a little boring. But we are finished.......so bring on the referral!!!!!!! :) Now I need to keep calm everytime the phone rings!!!

Congratulations to the Low Family!!

We are now # 6!!! Awesome!! And as great as this is, it's even better because it was my friends Matt & Kristy who got their referral! They are also fellow Ohioans. I have been praying that they would get their referral before our other Ohio friends travel to Ethiopia next week! Well, this morning I was like "ya know, I'm gonna pray it is TODAY that they get their referral!" Then at lunch Kristy and I were texting back and forth, and I thought "this is NOT a coincidence that we are talking to each other today." Well, low and behold I had a missed call from Kristy after work and I was like there is only ONE reason she would call me today!!!! So I called her back and yelled "Kristy why are you calling me?" And she yelled back "Cuz you're number 6!!!!" I said "Did you get your referral?" She said yes and I just started crying!!! Right there in the Walmart parking lot!! I wonder if anyone saw me! :) Oh well, I seriously DID NOT care!! I was just soooo overwhelmed at how God showed me how in control he is! And how he moved me to pray this morning & then WHAM answered that prayer within hours! Amazing. So I am over the moon with happiness for this wonderful family! And how God is continually showing that even when we wonder why & struggle with this wait, He is NOT held by our timelines & His plan is so much better than we can even imagine!!! Praise God for His faithfulness and loving plans for His children!