Bethany Joy

Taking a break from our regular scheduled programing to brag on one seriously cute chubby 18 month old=)

Finished the picture book

I'm thinking it was because of the good news we had today. I finally got the desire to finish A's picture book. We get to leave this book with her during the time we have to leave her after the first trip till we pick her up for good.
It's a fabric book so she can't tear the pages=) I'm praying that she will enjoy these pictures as much as we are enjoying the pictures of her!!!

Good news!!!!!

I FINALLY have good news to report!!!! Talked with our social worker today and our case has been submitted to court!!!! YEA YEA YEA YEA!!!!!!!!!!!
Now we wait 2-4 weeks to get a court date...but i'm totally okay with that=)
Just so happy to be out of the nightmare wait!!!!!!!!!!!!

4 months

I almost hate to post anything at this point. My blog has been so sad for months now. But so we can keep people up to date on whats happening and also to chronicle our journey to A....here we go....
What should have been a few weeks waiting to get submitted has now turned into 4 months of waiting still with no hope of when our case will get submitted.
And here we head into another week..............

I made friends with lots of other families on the Bethany Boards and two of them are currently in Ethiopia and working on our behalf. One of the families is asking around about our case and whats holding us up and the other is taking pictures and videos of A for us. I'm so thankful for all the support we have been given from people we have never even met in person! Please pray that Monday (late Sunday night) answers will be given to help us determine what is happening with our case.
We also have a conference call scheduled with HQ here in the states to see what we can find, but that isn't until the 22nd.

We are working at 'counting it all joy' during this VERY hard time. Who knew having patience and endurance worked into you could be SO incredibly painful!

Oh my goodness........

Are we really going into ANOTHER week of waiting?! I suppose we are...........
I barely have words to describe the pain we have been feeling over these last 3 or 4 weeks. It's like one of those horrible nightmares that won't end and just keeps going over and over. I guess the movie Ground Hog Day is the best way to describe it.

Monday we hope for this coming week that finally our case will move.
Tuesday we shrugging off doubts and continue to hope.
Wednesday we start questioning why we hoped.
Thursday we feel that hope slowly slipping away.
Friday as stephen says, "I crawl into bed pull the covers over our head and cry"

And that has been the case every week for the last month and a half. I know unless you have REALLY been in our shoes you can't understand. Even for most other adoptive families that we know, few know the pain of waiting this long, this early in the process. Having your case stuck in one step of the journey for months on end. Knowing that you still have month of waiting in front of you before you can bring your child home.

To make matters worse we have really been concerned with all thats been going on in Egypt. Ethiopia is not really that far from Egypt. Our concern is that there could be some kind of political unrest there and cause huge delays with getting A home or worse...

Last week was really hard because I guess we had more hope since corporate said that we should be getting submitted to court. But by friday night we realized that it was just another week, same as every week before. And here we are at the beginning of week 16 and we feel that hope creeping up on us. Everything in me wants to tell it to go away, that there is no hope, but I know there is.

At the end of each week when I feel as low as I possibly can, the Lord has been faithful to come and minster to my heart and prepare me for the coming week.

So here we are starting another monday. This week is going to be extra challenging for several reason....
-Several families with similar DTE's and Referrals are traveling to meet their children.
-We again are told to expect to submitted to court
-But we also are going to be celebrating little A's 2nd birthday on Tuesday the 8th.
We are excited to be planning a little birthday party for her here but also just realize how far away we are from bringing her home.....which is very hard

Since all of my posts have been sharing the pain in my heart I wanted to give thanks for one happy thing. Two fellow adoptive family were in Ethiopia last week and took some pictures and video for us. We haven't gotten them yet but hope to sometimes soon. I'm so excited to be able to see the video of her, I'm sure it will make me cry again but it will be good crying=)

So if you would join us in praying for
-the Lord to allow our case to move forward
-A to have a wonderful birthday
-that A would be able to gain the weight she lost during her time in Awassa. She will be turning 2 but she only weighs 16 lbs....she lost 6lbs in 3 months!