Mike turns 40!!!

The pics say it all. We feel so blessed as we celbrate Mike's birthday to have 3 amazing kids with another on the way!

Accepting Samuel

Yesterday we got all the signed, notarized, documented papers in the mail to formally "accept" the referral of Samuel. After AGCI gets it they will send more papers and we can learn more about the process from here. As far as we know the next thing will be a court date set in Ethiopia to go over our paperwork and approve us to move forward. I have been so distracted this week trying to finish up the paperwork and Mike had been forwarding emails to me about things he was finding about traveling to Ethiopia and from a nurse in his clinic who has adopted from Ethiopia. I discovered last night that an email that I thought I had sent to him (thinking he had forwarded it to me from the airline company) I had actually sent to the airline. It included my comment that there prices were not good along with a comment that I cannot wait to spend a weekend alone with him!!! Oooops! Just a nice example of my state of mind right now!
We continue to feel so excited about Samuel and the girls have been trying to convince me that there is room in their room for his crib. Silas says, no, he is a boy and needs his own room but since Mike and my room is on a different floor that Silas thinks he should have a monitor in his room for Samuel because he could get to him quicker in the night. Very sweet. In reality Samuel will sleep in our room at first and we will go from there!!

IT"S A BOY!

Many of you hopefully got to see our exciting news about our new son! Unfortunately I did not realized that I am not allowed to post his picture so I had to remove it! We received a referral for 18 month old Samuel on 2-3. We are so thrilled and in high gear processing all that that will mean and preparing for his arrival in 3-5 months. Silas, Kate and Maria are all thrilled but will be learning a lot about patience in the next few months!

Living Words

This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?"
~from Romans 8~

Adoption Update #5

We have made a bit of progress on 2 of the waiting lists!
Waiting for a boy: #9
Waiting for a girl: #22
Waiting for siblings: #15 (unchanged)
I just got back from a wonderful trip to Charlotte NC to see my dear friend Mandy. We visited an old church of hers there and I got to meet a beautiful baby girl from Ethiopia who came home to her family there in September. It was so fun as it made it seem so real! Maria is really hoping for a baby girl but given our placement on the lists we are trying to prepare her for a boy! : )

Adoption Update #4

Well, we finally got the call with the update but not too exciting. Our waiting list numbers have not changed much:
Girl ~ #26 (up from #28)
Boy ~ #13 (unchanged)
Sibling ~ #15 (unchanged)
This is a bit disappointing but Christy at AGCI said that they gave out a lot of referrals this week that are not reflected because the families are not taken off the wait list until they formally accept the referral. She said they have 30 families travelling from the end of December to Early Febuary to bring home children from Hannah's Hope (the orphanage run by AGCI). What a miracle to think of all those orphans joining their forever families! We would appreciate prayers for Hannah's Hope. Pray for the caregivers and that they would be able to get enough formula for their babies. Also pray for the children that they would begin healing and have peace, joy and hope at Hannah's Hope that they have never had before.

Adoption update #3

Yesterday we received an appointment letter in the mail in response to our Orphan Petition (we sent to CIS to get permission to bring an "orphan" into country). We are to go the their office in Spokane on January 16th at 9am. The letter said "To process your application, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services must capture your biometrics." Sounds scary! Well, we know it just means they need our fingerprints on their fancy machine. They are not too interested in our convenience - just show up when they say! So, Mike had to reschedule some patients and plan to take the day off next Friday.
That is all for now - I am expecting to hear an update from AGCI by the end of week but we are down to the last few hours so we shall see!