Last week we were told that our embassy date would likely be January 5th.  Our caseworker was out of town and her replacement told us this.   We were pretty surprised and I have to say, it’s not like me to be confrontational or fight for things, but I did call her and fight for an earlier date because we had been told it would for sure be in December.  It must have paid off!  

We were told we’d know the for sure date on Wednesday.   That day we got an email that said we’d hear on Thursday.  We never heard Thursday or Friday.   This afternoon we got an email with a confirmed embassy date for December 22nd!

Let’s start with the hard part- Rick and I have both never missed Christmas at home so that will be hard for us.   It is the first year Evan really gets it and we hate to miss out on seeing him so excited at all of our families’ festivities Christmas Eve and possibly Christmas morning as well.   The other thing we are slightly worried about is airfare costs- it may be quite a bit more expensive because it’s the week of Christmas, but we’ll have to see!

Now to the many great things!   First and foremost, we’ll be arriving in Chicago on Christmas Day!   What a Christmas blessing…and talk about the BEST Christmas presents ever!  

It will also work out nice with Rick’s work schedule- he’ll have to take a few days off prior to Christmas break, but then have all of Christmas break off and not have to use sick days/paternity leave since the kids have off school until after New Years.   He can start his paternity leave (2 days a week off) after the New Year!

We have so much to do now!  On Monday I will be looking into airfare, deciding what day we will leave (depending on if we can get a driver to take us to Soddo to see AWOP’s orphanage, waiting children, meet my Compassion sponsor child, and see the area the boys are from).    We will also need to get our plans straight for the care of our children at home, since this is now the 3rd time we’ve had to arrange this.   We need to book our lodging, buy the rest of the things we need for the trip, and finish packing.   Whew!  Time is going to fly!!

We are so excited though and can’t wait to finally meet the boys and to bring them HOME!   Our *TENTATIVE* schedule looks like this: fly out of Chicago on Thursday afternoon or evening, December 17th, arrive in Addis on the evening of Friday, December 18th, travel to Soddo and back on Saturday, December 19th (possibly stay one night there),  rest on Sunday, December 20th, meet the boys on Monday, December 21st, have our embassy date on Tuesday, December 22nd, do some fun things on Wednesday, December 23rd and Thursday, December 24th, leave on the Christmas Eve night, and return to Chicago on Christmas morning or mid-day!   WOW!!

Thank you Lord for answering our prayers!   What a special Christmas this will be!!

I meant to post this over a week ago now.   I was at the hospital’s travel clinic one morning last week to get the remainder of my shots for Africa.   I was done, but was waiting in the lobby for 45 min. to make sure that the yellow fever vaccination did not cause an allergic reaction.  While I was waiting, the receptionist asked me where in Africa I was going.  I said “Ethiopia.”   The whole time I was there, people were coming in and out.   A young couple just happened to come in right before the receptionist asked this of me.  They said they were going to Ethiopia too!   I asked, “for an adoption?”   and they said “YES!”   

Now you have to understand….there are very few people in our area who have/are adopting from Ethiopia.   There are many more who have adopted from China.   I have connected with two other families from this area with an Ethiopian child/children.   I was SO excited!!   What was the chance of this?   This was definitely a work of God!    Us meeting was destined.  

This wonderful couple has two biological daughters at home (just opposite of us) and are adopting an 8 month old baby girl.   They only live 5-10 min. from us too.                            They actually passed court two days after us and are traveling to Ethiopia in a couple weeks, for a Dec. 15th embassy appointment (different agency).   We can’t wait for them to bring their baby girl home and to meet her and have her be a part of her forever family!   It will be so nice to be able to have our children get together and be friends with other children who look like them and who were also born in Ethiopia.  

It gets even stranger though.   About 15 months ago, we had a rummage sale to raise money for our adoption.   A friend of this couple came and had told me that she had friends with two little girls that were thinking of adopting from Ethiopia.   They obviously decided to adopt and wouldn’t you know, God not only made us aware of each other that day of the rummage sale, but allowed for us to meet at the travel clinic just weeks before traveling to pick up our children.

What are the odds that two people adopting from Ethiopia would meet at the travel clinic on the same day and at the same time?   Only God could have done something this GREAT!  This was no accident; this was planned.   I couldn’t have been more excited!   We are already in touch and I can’t wait for our families to get to know each other more and to be there for each other in the future.   Thank you, God!

Even though we don’t have Elijah and Jonah home with us this Thanksgiving and we still don’t even have a confirmed embassy date, we are extra thankful this year!  God has blessed us with 4 beautiful boys and we couldn’t be happier.

Hoping you and your families had a wonderful Thanksgiving day with family and friends and hoping you remembered to thank God for all the blessings he has bestowed on you.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Usually you get your embassy date assigned 2-5 days after passing court.   Well nothing about our adoption has been normal, so of course that doesn’t happen!   After one week and one day, I just couldn’t wait any longer.  I called our agency.  Now, unfortunately, our caseworker is out of town for the week.   Her replacement emailed me today saying we might have a January 5th embassy date, but that is not confirmed yet…so don’t buy plane tickets.   JANUARY 5th…WHAT?!?!?    I was blindsided and didn’t even know that was an option!   We were pushing for an 8th date and knew that wasn’t too likely, but were told we’d for sure get the 22nd and now this!  Needless to say I was mad and sad at the same time.   Mad that it would take almost 8 weeks from our court date to getting the boys, when it’s supposed to take 4-6 and used to only take 2-4.   I just don’t get it.  

 I had two beautiful friends not pass court within the last week as well and I commiserate with them and wish I could be there to hug them.  I have been in their shoes and it’s not a fun place to be.   So many things in the adoption world don’t make sense!  There are so many questions, yet we’re likely to never have them answered.

We should find out tomorrow or in the next couple days what our official embassy date will be.  I didn’t go down without a fight, boys!   I called and told them our situation and what we were told.   The replacement was going to contact their staff in Ethiopia and see what she could do and get back to me.   Our luck is…we’ll have to wait and travel the first week in January.  

In all these cases for my dear friends and for our situation, my heart aches most for the kids there waiting for us!   Whether they are old enough to know it or not, it’s just not right that they have to wait extra weeks, months, years for ridiculous reasons!

Having our court date bumped was tough, not passing the next date was very tough, but this is the worst!   We are officially Elijah Asebe and Jonah Tesfaye’s parents and we cannot go and get them and bring them home!   That is an awful feeling that you just can’t understand until you’ve been there.   It’s unbelievable to me that they have to wait 3 extra months just to pass court and come home.

We will continue to pray for you daily,  our beautiful sons!  Until that magical day when we meet for the first time, please know we love you, we think about you all the time, and we can’t wait to bring you home to your forever family!   Dreaming about you until then.                                                                 -Mommy

At 11:04 a.m. our time, the BEST phone call we’ve gotten in quite some time and quite possibly the BEST EVER came!   We were told by our caseworker, Jessica that we passed court and that we are officially the parents to two more boys!  

Today is the day we have been waiting almost 15 months or 17 months for (depending on how you look at it)!   We officially started the adoption process in March of 2008, signed on with our current agency in July 2008, were told about and shown pictures of the boys in August 2008, received their official referrals in October 2008, and have finally passed court!   The waiting is just about over and we will soon have them home! 

This morning I was getting out of the car to come into the house, knowing the call would come soon.  The last song I heard on the radio was “How Great is Our God.”  That about sums up the day!   On top of the wonderful phone call, we received updated pictures and measurements of the boys as well!   I will post pictures on the blog as soon as I can.  For now, if you have Facebook, I have a ton on there.

We are thrilled and overwhelmed at the same time!  There is now SO much to do, but we have a good start.  I’m going to call to get the remainder of my shots this week.  Rick is finished with his.  We should have an embassy date confirmed later this week or early next week and once we have that we’ll know when we will be travelling.  It will either be over Dec. 8th or 22nd, probably the later one.  When we have this, we can book our lodging and flights.  We also need to start buying the rest of the items on the packing list that we don’t have.  We’ve been working on this!   We have to pack for ourselves and for the boys.   We have our donation bins practically ready- just have to weigh them again, tape them up, and write contact info on them.

Today many prayers have been answered!  Asebe Getahun and Tesfaye Getahun are now officially our sons, though in our hearts they have been this whole time!   They will be called Elijah Asebe Henningfeld and Jonah Tesfaye Henningfeld.   We just went from two boys to FOUR!  I know what you’re thinking and I often find myself thinking many of those thoughts…don’t worry!   There will be difficult moments, but we have been blessed and I’d like to think about the wonderful moments that will soon come to be!  Our house will be FULL of love, energy, and even more happiness!  And someday, yes, someday I will get my little girl and if we don’t biologically, well- we’ll be adopting two then!  

Now is a great time to thank all of you- thank you for your support, encouragement, advice, listening ear, and most importantly, prayers!  We couldn’t have done this without you.   We appreciate you, our family and friends, more than you know and are so thankful and lucky to have you all backing us in everything we do and throughout this journey, or rollercoaster as it often felt like, known as adoption!

Happy adoption day, Elijah and Jonah!  We’ll be there soon!

Love,

Mom and Dad….Evan and Landyn too!