Seriously, God is hilarious.

When we said "yes" to our daughter, we only had her 9 month pictures and a very small amount of information from when she was 16 months old. The doctor who reviewed her file and gave us the "worst case scenario" scared us into thinking she might have a condition that sometimes means a person can't walk. It was something we hadn't suspected or thought we were open to. This was part of the difficulty of making the decision. I had a very rough 2 weeks; there were a lot of tears, prayer, depression, and spiritual battles. I came through it believing that God was good and this girl was perfect, walking or no walking. But I prayed to my good God and asked that we could get an update, on Thursday, and that she'd be walking in the picture (and last minute I threw this in: "And could we see a smile? I'd love to see a smile, but if not, that's ok too"). Because, you know, I didn't want to burden Him with unnecessary requests. Well, here's the photo we received ON THURSDAY. Please notice her shirt. Seriously, God is hilarious.

Introducing....

On February 5, I looked on my agency's website and saw the cutest little girl. Her mouth was open and I just wanted to smooch it. My breath caught short, but I doubted. Our home study was just finished and our paperwork wasn't even in China. I emailed our agency consultant about her anyway and heard NO. No, she is too close in age to your son. She's too cute, I thought, to be my daughter. So I prayed, "Dear Lord, please provide a wonderful family for this precious girl, a family who will love her forever. And keep her safe and loved until they come." I kept checking her status and a few weeks later, I breathed a sigh of relief, she was matched with a family. "Thank you Lord for answering prayers."

Friday, May 17, 7 a.m., I'd already been up way too long due to a certain small person in this house who is a ridiculously early riser. He was watching Elmo and I was groggily checking facebook. A face popped up on my news feed - HER face, the same open-mouthed, smoochable face. An advocacy friend was posting that her family had to back out for personal reasons and she was available again. My heart skipped a beat or three or ten. I emailed Mark, "Can I ask again?" "That's fine", he said. Dear adoption agency lady, please please please reconsider us. Love, Jodi. Or something like that. YES, she said, you may look at her file, but it might not work out because of this reason, and that reason, oh and that other reason.

Friday we read her file and reread her file and we had questions. Nobody answered their phone on the weekend. No specialists to review her file, no agency lady to tell us if she'll put her file on hold for us. So I waited, and my heart grew and grew and I pictured her sitting at our dinner table and playing outside with Little Buddy and I teared up with doubt. Maybe this isn't it. Maybe the barriers are too great. Maybe the timing is all wrong. Maybe...

Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday... Holy Emotional Rollercoaster. One review came in and the doctor said lots of problems, she could have lots and lots of problems. I panicked and started googling every possible problem, Mark starting shutting down. I bawled like a baby on Monday night when I felt like we were losing her, I walked around like a zombie in a cloud of confusion on Tuesday. Tuesday afternoon we got a call from a specialist who said he didn't see anything that indicated any major problems. Through tears, I asked him, "Are you sure?" What about this? What about that? Nope, we don't see that, he said, and by the way he said (more than once), she's really cute. I hung up with the specialist and lost it. Wednesday - another doctor responds and confirmed the first doctor's report; there are a lot of unknowns. I go from wanting to do a heel-click in the parking lot of Aldi, just sure everything was going to be fine to laying in my bed crying, thinking we were crazy for even considering it. Thursday, May 23. Mark walked in the door from work and out it came, all my emotions, all my thoughts, all my fears about saying yes, but specifically the greater fear of saying no. I just couldn't do it, I just couldn't say no to her. He stood up, walked over to the counter, picked up the mail, and said, "Well let's do it then." (Oh to be a man!).
There's more to this story which I will share later. But I know you just want to get to the good stuff, so here it is:

PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW.

OUR DAUGHTER 
(We haven't agreed on a name yet! But we're getting there...)
She'll be 2 years old in September. We love her so much! 
This photo was taken in May of this year.

Here  is the first picture I ever saw of her (9 months old).
Doesn't she look oh so smoochable?!

Also 9 months here:



The best day ever and when we travel.

Ok, I just need to say that the last 2+ months have been rough. I've never been so emotionally drained in my life. Getting my hopes up, being disappointed, and over and over. I felt like God had squeezed out every last morsel of spiritual and emotional energy and then ZAP filled me all back up in one day. Wow, what a day.

 

This morning Little Buddy and I had our photo shoot. Him finally wearing his "Big Brother" t-shirt and me taking the photos I've been wanting to take for so long!

 



I'm in a Facebook group of wonderful ladies in the process to adopt from China and we have a secret pal exchange. Today of all days, this arrived in the mail from my secret pal. I really had to hold it together and not start sobbing. The Little Sister outfit...it's killing me. I just love it.

Wait, there's more...my wonderful mother-in-law sent Mark and I flowers as a congrats!

Stop it, I'm not done. Mark came home early from work and said he had a surprise for me. My birthday is next week and he wanted to buy me a new charm for my bracelet with our daughter's birthstone. It's the blue one, 3rd from the left. Such a thoughtful surprise!

And of course, we need to end our beautiful day of celebration with ice cream. Look at these two cuties!!

Now onto the travel question if you're still around reading this! Oh how I wish I had the answer to that one! "When do you get to go get her?" you ask. "Not soon enough!" is my answer. There are several steps we're waiting for. The next big step is LOA (letter of acceptance); this is the official approval we need from China to adopt this child. Then we have more immigration paperwork to do. (Which, by the way, I know nothing about. I need to get on that!) AND THEN we will need to wait for TA (travel approval) AND THEN CA (the date of our American Consulate appointment in China). AND THEN we can go. Sooooo...I don't know...November? December? Maybe, horror of horrors, January? Maybe God will surprise us and it will be October? I think the best answer is not before October and probably before March! Stay tuned.

She's OURS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

GOD IS GOOD!!! After what seemed like a lifetime, we locked the file of our daughter. She's 22 months old and perfect! We can't wait to tell you all about her. Once we receive pre-approval from China, we can do that. It's a good story, so stand by!

Waiting for you, ONLY YOU.

If you're following along in this journey, you'll probably remember when we were waiting for THE LIST (the shared list) to come out. And right when we were ready for the list, only a very small one came out and then no list for months. Thankfully, we found who we feel is our daughter on our agency's list, although we still have not locked her file. Our agency called me this afternoon and told me that the shared list is finally coming out tonight and wondered if we wanted them to look for a different match for us. I'm sure the agency consultant realizes our wait to lock this girl's file has been longer than most people and wanted to know if we were tired of waiting and were ready to move on. NO, WE WILL NEVER STOP WAITING FOR YOU LITTLE GIRL! Even if it takes years, we won't give up on you. WE'RE COMING! I don't know when, but we're coming!

Here is a picture of Little Buddy on the morning of the 4th of July. He picked up Mei Mei's picture (Mei Mei means little sister in Chinese and that's what he calls her for now), sat down at the table and just stared at her. I got teary-eyed while he hugged and kissed her picture. We long for the day when we can hug and kiss her for real!!

Only He can fix this

(Charles Spurgeon from Morning and Evening):

"Mere formalists may be content without answers to their prayers, but genuine suppliants cannot; they are not satisfied with the results of prayer itself in calming the mind and subduing the will - they must go further, and obtain actual replies from heaven, or they cannot rest; and those replies they long to receive at once, they dread even a little of God's silence. God's voice is often so terrible that it shakes the wilderness; but His silence is equally full of awe to an eager suppliant. When God seem to close His ear, we must not therefore close our mouths, but rather cry with more earnestness; for when our note grows shrill with eagerness and grief, He will not deny us a hearing for long. What a dreadful situation we would be in if the Lord should become forever silent to our payers? "For if You remain silent, I will be like those who have gone down to the pit." Deprived of the God who answers prayer, we should be in a more pitiable plight than the dead in the grave, and should soon sink to the same level as the lost in hell. We must have answers to prayer: ours is an urgent case of dire necessity; surely the Lord will speak peace to our agitated minds, for He never can find it in His heart to permit His own elect to perish."

Still praying for the file of our little girl to be locked. And we're not the only ones, many in the adoption community are at a standstill. Many children may age out and never be adopted because of these delays. Many children have medical needs that are not being tended to. Pray not only for us but for all of the families and children affected by these delays and problems. [The Lord] has been the helper of the orphan. (Psalm 10:14) Only He can fix this, please continue asking him to do so.

Encouragment

There has still been no movement in our adoption. No file has been locked. Nothing. One of my friends from my online group said it the best when she said to me, "You're waiting for the ok to fall in love with a girl you've already fallen in love with." So true, so true. It's really painful and I don't think I could have understood it until I was in the midst of it.

There is one thing that is keeping us in this without completely going over the edge. God keeps showing up in small ways to remind us we're on the right path and that He's still in this. When I was in college, a few friends and I went to a church about an hour away from our school. We lived on campus, so the distance to the church caused us to miss lunch by the time we arrived back to the school. In this wonderful little church were several families that would invite us over for lunch so we wouldn't starve. We mostly went to one family's house and they were so welcoming and fun. They always had amazing food and a nice place to rest and do homework. I still keep in touch with them and they have since adopted their daughter from China. She sent me this email today:

Just wanted to let you know that we are still collecting coins for your adoption. Our jar is about half full. I love how God provides coins and just wanted to share the last couple with you. This week when I went down to do laundry, there was 51 cents laying on the dryer. And yesterday, we were eating lunch out and looked down on the booth seat and there was a quarter. It wasn't there when I sat down, because I slid over that part of the seat! Love how God provides!

I love how God not only provide funds, but encouragement when you feel so defeated. Thanks to this wonderful family for thinking of us, helping us with funds, and for their reminder of God's faithfulness!