The Joy of the Update!

Today I have been jumping up and down for joy because we received another update about our little angel. The photos are just precious to us and we stare at them for hours... it's as close to our little girl as we can get for now. We live for the updates and for paperwork milestones. We are happy to say that we have received our LOA and our I-800 approval notice for Meili. Now we just need our NVC letter and our Article 5 letter. Then  we just wait for our TA (travel approval) I talked with Holt today and they think we will be traveling around July 13th! So close yet seems so far away as I stare at her precious photo.

Things have been busy around here to say the least and at times I feel like I want to pull my hair out, but the Lord just reminds me to let him take care of things and so I learn more to ever depend on Him for my every need. He seems to have a pretty good track record of taking care of things and always working everything out for my good and his glory. Speaking of his glory...today I just sang to the Lord from my heart giving him praise for taking care of Meili for his provision for this adoption and for loving me even when I was "stubborn" and seemed "unlovable" at times during these last few years. To think when I was mad at God for not allowing me to be pregnant he was doing things more wonderful for me than I could ever imagine. To think that when I had refused to read my Bible because I was upset with Him that he was forming the most precious child in the womb just for us. It grieves my heart that I had acted that way, but the Lord has taught me so many valuable lessons through it all. God is faithful even when we are not, He is not like us... He is far greater, far more loving, merciful, just, kind and patient than we are. Praising God for who He is! Thank you Jesus for forgiving me of my sin and restoring me to a right relationship with you.

God is so awesome and He gave us some great news today! Meili is doing well. She is still in her foster home with 2 parents and another little girl. She has been looking at our pictures and calls Karl Baba, Me Mama, and Ian Gege. Her foster mom says she is very smart and knows many words already! She speaks the local dialect not Mandarin or Cantonese. We learned she sleeps in a crib and sleeps through the night and also takes a 2 hour nap during the day! She eats congee, milk and bread only. She is still small but seems to be doing just fine. I can't wait to introduce her to some American foods :) I can see from the pictures that she already has a great little personality and I can't wait to experience it and to hear how her voice sounds and watch her play. It also looks like her foster mom enjoys dressing her up as well...she will be a cute little fashionista when I get my hands on her ;-) We are dying to go get her and can't believe how much God has blessed us!

Until then we have much to do...I have been working hard on setting up the garage sale and getting everything priced and plan to have it next weekend! I hope many of you will come and check it out. I am selling all of Ian's old baby clothes and toys...along with so much more so I hope to see you all there and if you could spread the word for me that would be great too. We also got a phone call today that her crib has arrived so we will be picking that up tomorrow and getting it set up. Yay!! Next month I plan to focus on packing and getting ready to go because well July will be here soon and boy are we so glad!

Well enough talk...here are her pictures...enjoy!

Update on our precious daughter!

Hello Everyone!!!

Wow it seems like it has been a while since my last blog. A lot has happened in the last month! Including a crazy tornado that shook up our little town. It has been so awesome to see what the Lord has done through the storm. Storms always bring rainbows!! I love that about my Lord! I could not believe the destruction from the storm but it was amazing to see the whole town come together to bring restoration and healing. It made me think of what sin does to our lives. It comes in and leaves a path of destruction that doesn't come without cost. It cost Jesus pain and suffering on the cross so that we could be forgiven and our lives could be restored to have a right relationship with God. He comes in and cleans up our hearts and renews our minds. Praise be to God that he loves us so very much!!!

Update on Meili....

Okay so let me just give you some background on our precious child.  Meili was abandoned and brought to the orphanage at 1 month old. When brought to the orphanage she was diagnosed as special needs because she has an extra thumb. As she was in the orphanage she was not doing well and was considered failure to thrive. She was developmentally delayed and not growing properly. Her head size was a little large in proportion with the rest of her body and we thought she might have hydrocephalus or something else we just didn't know. At 8 months old they moved her to foster care because of her "poor constitution" and at 1 year she weighed only 13 pounds. I prayed and prayed and prayed that she would be okay. We prayed and prayed and prayed as a family she would be okay and I know that you all have been praying for her as well. That is why right now with great delight and joy and excitement I have such wonderful news!!!! Meili is doing great!!! They say that a picture is worth a thousand words and as you can see from these pictures that she is just doing wonderful!! She is now 17 months old, on target developmentally, and her head looks great and she looks healthy and well now!!! Seriously I can't thank our precious Lord and Savior enough!!!!! He heard all of our prayers and answered them!! It is truly a miracle of God that she is doing so well now!! I thank God for her foster family for taking such good care of her!! We are so happy so excited and so beyond blessed by the Lord!! We can't believe this gorgeous little girl is ours!!!  We love her so much and it is so hard to wait to go get her.The update could not have been better we are so thankful to the Lord for taking care of her.

What we are waiting on now....

We are currently waiting on our LOA (letter of acceptance) which the Chinese government sends after they have reviewed our dossier paperwork. We are hoping to get it by April. After we get that we will sign it and return it to Holt and then we will file Meili's immigration paperwork with USCIS which will take 10-14 days. After that they will give us her approval and we will mail that to Holt with some other papers and then we will be waiting for our TA (travel approval) which takes about 2 to 3 months. Once we receive travel approval we will travel in about 2 to 3 weeks. Anyway that is why it is taking so long...

Where we are at on the money...

God has blessed us so much!! He has amazed us in how he has been faithful to provide for this adoption. What once seemed impossible he has made possible! I can't thank everyone enough for all that they have done and given to us. Your support and encouragement to us has been life changing and amazing! Holt sent us the final bill for what we still owe on the adoption which was $13,000.00. Due to the wonderful giving from family and friends and Uncle Sam's tax return we only lack $3,000.00 to pay the rest to Holt. Then we only have travel costs which is $10,000.00 (okay yeah that's a lot of money) But I know God will continue to be faithful as we are being obedient to him. My next fundraiser will be another huge garage sale! (which I need to get busy on setting up)

What you can do to help...

Please continue to pray for our precious Meili. Also please pray that the Lord would continue to have his hand on everything in this adoption. Please let me know if you would like to come over and help me set up my garage sale (I could use all the help I can get) Also if you have any tables I could borrow for the sale that would be great too! Right now I'm going to work on getting everything organized and set up...so I will keep you posted on when I figure out the actual date. Since the weather has been so nice it would be great to do it earlier if I can get it all together. Thank you all so much for following us along on our journey....


Here she is!!!!

Meet Meili!!!!

Special Announcement...

We are so proud to announce that we received a very special phone call on January 23rd about a very special little person in China who needs a forever family!( Just FYI: January 23rd was also the night of our Anniversary!) Thank you Lord for such an awesome Anniversary present!! We have been busy to say the least since that phone call :)

Let me just start off by saying that we think she is the most precious cutest baby EVER!! We already love her beyond measure and can not wait to meet her!!! Her Chinese name is Zhan (she was named after the orphanage) and she is currently 15 months old. Her only known special need is that she has an extra thumb. She is currently in foster care now.

I have not been able to post anything until now because we were waiting to find out that our match is secure and now that it is we are excited to tell the world about our precious daughter! We have her pictures up all over the refrigerator and did I mention we are excited!!!  Our families are very excited too!!

Whats next...

Now we do more paperwork and wait and then more paperwork and then wait...we are still thinking we will be traveling in about 6 months from now. We are continuing to put her room together and prepare for her arrival home. I am also going to be doing another garage sale on May 31st and more fundraisers to come...

What the Lord has been up to in all of this...

He has continued to change us and refine us. We are learning to be obedient and to have a faith like we have never had before. I used to think that having faith meant hoping that everything would work out for the best possible scenario but Jesus is showing me that faith is an unshakable trust in the Lord. The truth is I alone can't handle anything but through HIM I can handle anything he wants me to do. I am learning to be Brave for Jesus and to let him be in control of my life! That true joy only comes from being obedient to the Lord.  The Lord is so Amazing and we are just PRAISING HIM for giving us the honor of being her forever family!!!

What you can do to help...

Please pray for Meili while she is waiting for us in China. That she is being well taken care of, for her health and overall well being and that the Lord would just be preparing her heart for us and the new transitions to come. Thank you so much for your prayers!! We love you all and thank you for following us along on our journey to Meili.

WE ARE DTC!!!

We are so very happy to announce that our Dossier has been sent to China!!! What a huge milestone this is for us! A very huge PRAISE TO THE LORD!!! So now what happens...well the waiting part begins. First we wait for our LID (log in date) that is the official date they received the dossier that they will use to start the countdown to when we can travel to China. The reason is that the dossier has to be in China for 6 months before we can travel to pick up our precious girl. Also we will be waiting to find out who she is. I have updated our medical conditions list that they will use when matching a child to our family. I have talked to the agency and they said about a 2 week wait for LID and about a 2 to 4 month wait for a child referral. Once we get our referral we will be busy doing some more paperwork!!! Just when you think your done your not really done with paperwork, but this paperwork will be much easier and much more exciting so we are happy to do it :-) Then finally preparing for travel to China!!!

While I'm waiting I have many things to do to keep myself busy....working at Carters, planning some more fundraisers, going to start working on adoption grants, getting her room ready (very excited about this one), reading everything I can get my hands on to get prepared for parenting this precious child, organizing our documents, completing household projects, researching doctors for Meili and setting up her appointments for when we get back (as soon as we know who she is and her condition), getting immunized for our trip, starting Meili's life book (kind of like a baby book but its for adopted children), collecting things we will need for our travels to China, trying to learn some mandarin, and practice making some Chinese food for when we get back home with her. Thanks for continuing to follow us on our journey...

Dossier is on the way to Holt!!

I am extremely excited to announce that the COMPLETED DOSSIER is on the way to Holt where they will review it and then send it on to China! The next thing we will be waiting for is our LID as soon as we have that that means we are officially in the system and can receive a referral!! What a great way to start off the new year. We thought we would never get done with all that paperwork! God knew he would get us through :) Happy New Year everyone! Love to all of you...

Just Received our I-797 Approval!!!

Today was a great day!!! Today we received our I-797 approval!!! We are super excited that we have been approved and now all we need to do is get it notarized, state certified, and authenticated. Then we mail our completed Dossier to Holt!!! I am hoping to get it mailed off  by next week!!! Merry Christmas us!!!

Is Beyond Blessed By Friends

I am writing this post just to say that I am so beyond blessed by all the beautiful people in our lives. How much they love and how much they give is so amazing to me. God continues to show his love through his followers. Right now we have a family that is auctioning off a piece of award winning artwork and giving 100% of the proceeds toward our adoption which is absolutely AMAZING of them to do! We just thank them and give praise to God for what they are doing to help and for raising adoption awareness in the community. If you haven't checked out the art work I encourage you to do so. It is a beautiful piece of art with so much meaning behind it .....Here is the link.... http://www.ebay.com/itm/Orphan-Award-Winning-Artwork-Matted-and-Framed-/280792921653?pt=Art_Mixed_Media&hash=item41608ff635

Many Blessings to you all...