It has been a long time…. since I last posted and since we’ve gotten any good news.

Sorry- the really good news of a court date is not what I can post today, unfortunately!

But, I figured there have been a lot of small updates I could have posted and haven’t had a chance to!  So here they are:

-We get weekly updates (sometimes) from our agency.  Every week that we have gotten them, they have been short and not too informative.   During all these weeks that have gone by we did learn that MOWA’s (Ministry of Women’s Affairs) extra requirement of an authenticated letter from the local court for children who have a living birth parent has caused MUCH delay!   We are not the only ones who have been delayed- there are probably hundreds of others painfully waiting too.  We know of a few who are waiting through the same agency as us, one couple is waiting to adopt their first child, a daughter just under a year old, and another couple are adopting two sisters we had seen on the dvd of waiting children (boy does it feel like forever since we watched that the first time).   We also learned that there are plans of the Hosanna House (the orphanage 3-4 hours from the capital of Addis, where our children currently live) closing down and all those children being moved to a new facility in Addis so that they have better access to food and medical care.   We haven’t heard if they have found a place yet or not, or when that move will be!   We also have not gotten one single solitary update on the boys- no pictures, no video footage, nothing…that’s been hard!   We know they have probably changed so much since we last saw a picture of them in September!  Not sure if we’d even recognize them really.

-Also during this time, I’ve been reading many posts on Ethiopian adoption forums.  I probably shouldn’t do that as much because I have just learned that court dates are getting farther and farther out.   The last one I saw that was given out, almost a month ago now, was for February 27th.   I cried a lot that night.  Once upon a time, we had hoped for a December court date, then January, then  February.  Now we are still praying for a March or April court date.  

-On Monday night, January 12th- we got a phone call!   It was a social worker from CHI (one we had never spoken with).  We thought it was the call we were waiting for- the news of a court date!  WRONG again!   The good news was- CHI had been waiting on an update of all the cases in progress (90 or so- all at different points of course) and it had finally come.  Under our boys’ names, it said paper work done!  That was great news- that authenticated letter that MOWA required must have finally gotten to them.  The other interesting news was that under the boys’ names it also listed a brother and sister’s name.   This meant that they could possibly be up for adoption.    You may remember that we were originally told that the boys were abandoned.  Then the story somehow changed when we got their referral paperwork in October- they had a living father and older siblings.  We were told they were too old to be adopted and living with the father.  That’s what CHI was told as well.   Well, now it’s January and they are on the list!   This would mean that all four children would need to be adopted together!!   Rick wasn’t home and I was going crazy…of course I’d love to take them all, but we don’t have the room for that or the money to pay the fees for two more children.  This couldn’t even be an option for us.  They said they would learn more over the next day or so and get back to us.  How were we supposed to sleep?  It’s all we could think about the whole week!  We heard nothing!  I called Wednesday, but had to leave a message.  Friday, I called again at noon (it was night in Ethiopia and if they didn’t know now, they wouldn’t know until next week so I couldn’t stand it any longer).  I got Jessica, our caseworker at CHI.   She said, “Good news!”   That’s all I needed to hear.  The kids’ aunt and uncle picked up the two older children (a boy and a girl…that’s all we know for right now) to live with them in Addis (not sure if this is permanent or temporary until the dad can get back on his feet).  This meant the boys were still ours to adopt and we could move forth!  YEAH!  A million prayers were answered. 

Backing up a bit…Monday night was when I realized just how attached we were to the boys and how much they meant to us.   Having to even think about a back-up plan in case this didn’t work out was devastating!   We just felt this was part of God’s plan and felt like they were a part of our family and extended family already.  And we surely couldn’t think about starting over either!  We have thought about these boys and prayed for these boys every day since we heard about them in late August.   Thankfully, it was meant to be!

-The Hosanna House’s license was about to expire and needed to be renewed.   CHI didn’t want this to hold anyone up in court, so they wanted to take care of this before petitioning for court dates for the many waiting families.   This was supposed to be taken care of within two weeks and at least one week has gone by, so we are hoping their license will be renewed as of the end of the week and that we will have a court date within the next 2-3 weeks!   We can only hope and pray, right!?!

 -Michelle (director of AWOP) leaves for another trip to Ethiopia next week sometime.   We are working on filling a ziplock bag with things to send to the boys.   We still aren’t sure what to send, but we are going to send each of them one of those baby picture books that can get wet, with pictures of our family so they start seeing our faces more regularly!   We have to get this out in the mail in the next day or two so it gets to her in time.   Michelle also plans on taking pictures and/or video footage of the boys for us while she is there, so we should have that by the end of February….at least something to look forward to!  It will be crazy to see what they look like and how they have changed now that they are 6 months and not 6 weeks old! 

-Our attic is done (with the exception of a few minor touches)!   Rick and all who have given of their time at some point or another (JP, Ron, Josh, the list goes on) did a GREAT job!  The room is huge and looks awesome!   We now have 3 bedrooms, officially.  The room even has a closet with a space in the back for storage and another room we were going to use for storage, but decided to keep as a library/reading room for the kids- we have 3 fun kid chairs up there and will be putting a book shelf in there.  The room has now become the favorite room in the house for all of us!  We go up there every night.   We also have the crib, changing table, and dresser that was donated to us put togehter and up there, along with MANY other baby items we either had for Evan or picked up at a rummage sale.   He is LOVING that.  It seems he wants to revert back to being a baby and go in the exersaucer and swing.  He looks so big now in them- it’s crazy how fast they grow!  He even wanted to try out the crib.  It’s been funny!  We just need to put one more crib up there and we’re set.  A couple people have either offered us a crib or were going to look into one for us, which is wonderful!

-God is awesome!   We knew that, but yesterday had just another confirmation.  A woman who I did not know rang the door bell, asked me if we were the family adopting from Ethiopia and if it was going to be happening soon.   I was a bit caught off guard as I’m sure anyone would be.  I said yes to the first question and yes, we sure hope so to the 2nd question.  She said that was all she needed to know and handed me an envelope and said “God Bless!”   I hope I said thank you!!  I was still not sure who this was or what this was about and I was trying desperately to get Evan down for a nap and Rick was still at school preparing for finals.  I got inside and opened it and there was $100 in cash and a nice note about how the Lord’s money would be put towards our good cause of adopting from Ethiopia.    It was amazing!   It just goes to show that there really are some great people out there, even strangers for that matter, that want to honor God.   I sure hope they are blessed because we definitely ARE!

Hopefully I’ll have the good news we’ve all been waiting and waiting for in the next entry!   Til then, thanks for your support and prayers!