Birth Certificate!

Another small hurdle cleared: Desi has a birth certificate! With this, our agency can work on getting her a passport and then we can be assigned an Embassy date (still praying for July 20th) and get our official invitation to travel! Yeah!

The next couple of weeks could be really stressful and hectic! Booking airfare and a room at one of the guest houses in Addis, packing, and preparing to be gone for a week! Keep us in your prayers!

Baby Shower!

Last weekend, Sandy, Jenni, and Joyce threw me a wonderful baby shower! It was such a blessing and so much fun to celebrate Desi before she arrives.

Here I am in the kitchen before the shower...that's Jenni behind the huge container of sangria....which I happily partook of at my own baby shower...never did that before!

The tables were beautiful and we ate off Grandma Poe's Havelin china....fancy!

One of my favorite gifts was this lovey (aka 'B') with Desi's name embroidered on it...from our beloved babysitter, Nicole, and her mom, Debbie.We received a lot of nice things for Des, but also got some wonderful donations to take to the orphanage where she's at now. Hmmm...what could be in this big box???

Oh, yeah! A cutie pink car seat! She's going to look tiny in it! Thanks, Sandy and Joyce!

This will look great in the new-to-us minivan that we're working on getting for our expanding family!

We're still waiting for a travel call to let us know when we can go get her....

Update....finally!

Yay! We finally received our long-awaited update on Desi! We've been asking and waiting for quite a while! It turns out that her social worker in Ethiopia got married and went on vacation!

So we have some new info on her....she's growing! She has gained a little over 2lbs in the 3+ months that she's been in the orphanage in Addis! Praise God! The report also indicates that she is thriving and healthy and doing great! ....Just needs her mommy and daddy to come and get her!

There were some wonderful pictures in the update too! (I'm not sure if I'm really suppose to post pics on here, so I'll hold off until I know for sure it's okay....sorry! You are really missing out because she is B-E-A-utiful!) The sweetest thing is that one of the pictures has her surrounded by the stuff we sent her in her care package! And one pic shows her in the lap of one of the nannies looking at a picture of Jakie from the photo album we sent her! My eyes welled up when I saw that she was looking at pictures of her new family! (Eyes welling up again....) The report said that she loves looking at the photos!

We are still hoping to travel in mid-July...keep praying that we get our Embassy date on the 20th!

Other Notables:

• We got round 1 of our travel vaccines....ouch! We both had a very sore arm for about 4 days! Round 2 this Friday!
• Sandy, Jenni, and Nannie (Joyce) are so graciously throwing me a baby shower on Saturday, so I am so excited for that!

So, I'm as happy as a clam today! Took J and Em to the pool this morning which is so much fun! The kids are doing awesome in the water this year! Loving summer! Yipee!

Court-PASSED!!

Praise God! We passed court! Desalee is really really ours now! Officially!

Thank you to everyone who has been praying for us! We are so relieved and excited!

The next step is to get her a Birth Certificate, then after that a Passport. With those documents we can be assigned an appointment at the Embassy in Addis Ababa. Hopefully that appointment will be on July 20th, which will put us traveling from about the 14th of July until the 22nd.

Now to start thinking about travelling to get our baby girl and bring her home!

I'm gonna sleep much better tonight!

This is it!

This is it! The time is here! Tonight as we sleep, the Ethiopian courts will be in session and our case will hopefully be heard and approved!

We may have to wait a couple of days before we hear the news....I'll definitely post as soon as we get word.

PRAY! PRAY! PRAY!

Love, S

PS: check out my cool new Ethiopian time and weather widget on the sidebar! Now we know exactly what time it is and what the weather is like where our little girl is.

As Wednesday and our court appointment near, I am feeling so anxious. This was a big court week for our agency....11 families will have court before the week is out! Praise God today, 4 out of 4 families that had court passed on the first try! This is wonderful news, especially for those precious children who are now officially adopted into loving families. As I watched the discussion forums online, there was so much joy and encouragement...I hope that this will be the same way on Wednesday, when myself and 5 other BCS families will have our cases heard.

And yet, a close friend who is also on this journey learned today that her family will have to wait longer....they now await their 5th court date. I can't understand it. I am praying for their family because I know that their hearts are hurting. It's so hard to wait.

I won't lie...MY HOPES ARE UP! WAY UP! I know that it would not be unusual to hear on Wednesday that our court appointment has been rescheduled...I will come crashing down! But I know that whether it's pure joy or anguish this week, that God is there for me, along with a lot of other people who love us and are praying us through this!

I really don't think that it's about God's favor for us at this point....to believe that would be to insinuate that those who don't pass somehow are not in His favor? I know that's not right. So I just believe that it is His timing...which I don't always understand, but still, He knows what He's doing.

Last year for Mother's Day I got a beautiful hand-made bracelet, with charms of the initials J and E...my little treasures.

I knew, last year that it was missing a charm, I just didn't know who that charm would represent. So a couple of weeks ago, I sent the bracelet back and had Desalee's charm added. Now it's complete. And it's a reminder to pray for her and for J and E whenever I wear it. It also reminds me to be grateful for the blessing of my kids. I love them so!Thank you to everyone who's been praying...keep it up for Wednesday! Ethiopia is 8 hours ahead of us...so start early!!

Less than 1 week until Court!

We are less than one week out from our first scheduled court date! I am so anxious, I can't wait for it to get here! I've been surfing around on some online forums for our adoption agency...browsing the conversations about various adoption and travel related topics. It may be hurting more than helping. Aside from being more obsessed with the discussion boards than I am with Facebook (if that's even possible) I'm getting some good info, but at the same time, it gets me balled up in a bundle of nerves!

I did figure out through the forums that if we pass court on the 9th, then our Embassy date will likely/hopefully be July 20th. It looks like most families travel the Thursday before and come home the Thursday after. It's good to have an idea of when we'll be travelling. Another source of stress? The immense cost of airfare to Ethiopia this time of year! YOWZA!!! I think I need to sell a few more kitchens!

It also looks like there are about 10-11 other families with court dates on our within a day or so of the 9th, so these will be the families that we travel with (if we pass court). I hope that the forums are a way to get to know these people a little better....we are going to be sharing one of the most amazing experiences of our lives with them, afterall!