Merry Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!

Well....I officially fail at blogging!  But I have two of the most wonderful reasons in the world!  If you are still following this....you are very, very patient (perhaps to an extreme, friend ;-)!).  However, I have a hard time leaving loose ends, so here we go anyway!  It is my joy of joys to share with you that we did indeed welcome our precious Hannah GuangYue on March 2, 2015.  She is just incredible, and these 9.5 months have flown by far too quickly!  This baby girl is sweet, caring, smarter than her mama, and has a real flair for the dramatic!  She is an amazing sister to Vivienne, and we are simply so, so blessed with her.  Those of you who helped bring this child into our family....thank you is just ridiculously inadequate.  We are so grateful!  I could talk about this child, and about watching her change our family in wonderful ways, for pages and pages.  But if you know us in "real life"....I think I may have already done so (eeep!). 

Suffice it to say we are home now, we are doing truly well, that adoption is this rich, crazy, beautiful thing that God graciously did in our lives.  The vast majority of adoptive parents will tell you that adoption will change your life....and they will immediately tell you they would not have it another way.  This self-centered, entitled culture tells you not all life is equal....that some lives are not worth pursuit or protection.  That if it is work, it isn't worth it, or is less authentic.  That you just can't love someone you don't share biology with (Long side note, but it throws me that the people I hear this most from are generally married...so a person can love unrelated adults, but just not unrelated children... just saying...huh?  They also had no idea beforehand how much they could love their biological children, if they have them!  My adoption mama friends with biological children would tell you it's not different).  Oh my gosh, how upside down wrong.  How turned on its head.  There are hard parts to adoption, some parts very hard....as with anything you will ever do that has any value at all in life. 

There are things that will be difficult, but they are so rarely the things people who have never adopted before or known an orphan (including social orphans) gossip about.  The hardest things for us have  been that "stuff" deriving from the realization of the harm done, the brokenness of this world, that sinks further and further in when you choose to enter the suffering of your child and walk it with them towards healing.  And the sleepless nights...yeah, totally do not often get to "skip that" in adopting a toddler or older child, sorry friends!  Trauma is a real thing.  So is Healing.  The best things are those blessings and joys you already know children bring with them by simply being themselves, and the incredible work God really will do in your life as He knits your family together until the alternative of never having known this precious little child is just almost literally unthinkable.  The love.  The grace.  The JOY.  This is not rosey-painted speaking.  It is not everything I would tell you if we were face to face over coffee, but these are my overarching thoughts about adoption packed into in a short, simple blog post. 

We are in a "nesting" season right now and for some time, spending some time not "in process," just nurturing each other.  We are open to adopting again (okay, yours truly may never be emotionally "done"- you can't undo what you know once you know it, right?), but are also open to however God wants us to fulfill that call we were all given to care for these little ones, whether that's through adoption or giving, praying, advocating, volunteering.... 

I have been dying to say this through two blogs now, and since this is it for a while, I am just going to go for it!  If you are ready to accept a child where they are, and accept that healing that takes longer than a couple weeks is going to be necessary....If you are someone open to learning a lot in preparation for this child and as you take one step at a time together....If you are okay being the grown up and delivering love even when (when!) a child is hurting or struggling (that whole little thing where you are the person in this relationship who needs to "grown up" :-))....And most of all, if you are willing to allow God to do something awesome in your life in bringing you into a deep, forever relationship to a child.  My advice from the other side is to dip that toe in...no, DIVE!  Trust that His desire is for these precious children to be in families, to have roots and foundation and relationship, to have the chance to know Him.  Trust that He will equip you as you seek to gather up one of His own, and that He is trustworthy with your life- and your whole family's life.  Deep breath and go, they don't have time to wait where they too often are, and love is waiting.  Thank you so much for listening to me ramble, for praying, and for caring! 

With much love and appreciation, 

Elizabeth

In Guangzhou together

 God knew exactly what- who, actually- these two needed!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Precious little life

 

 

 

 

 

Merry Christmas!

 

 

I-800, Cable letter, and Article 5

We have some good movement to report!  Last Wednesday, we heard from our immigration officer that our I800, the petition to classify Hannah as our child, was approved.  Thursday, we received the physical approval by mail.  Friday, we confirmed that our visa paperwork for Hannah, which is necessary to be in place before we can travel, was sent to the US consulate in Guangzhou, China!  We completed more paperwork ;-) and early this morning we learned that an important letter from the National Visa Center was cabled (okay, now it's an email) to the US consulate in Guangzhou, where our interview on Hannah's behalf will take place.  This is still called being cabled....So, we have been cabled!   

We are now waiting for that letter, along with some other paperwork, which together comprise our Article 5 documents, to be dropped off in China.  Once they are picked up (a standard two weeks later), we will be waiting for our Travel Approval (TA).  Yes, that is exactly what you think it is.  How awesome is that?  TA typically takes two weeks, but can be more variable.  We will need to secure a consulate appointment (CA) once TA is issued, which usually takes only a couple days.  And that's it- at CA it will be time to book flights!

Receiving our I800 approval and being cabled allows us to better calculate our travel dates.  Or it would, except for Chinese New Year coming up!  The couple weeks everything is shut down, plus the fact that Hannah day and our consulate appointment are really bookends in a two week process that includes several steps from the legal process of her adoption, obtaining her Chinese passport, her medical exam for immigration, and our immigration interview.  So although we might have all the approvals needed to travel, we most likely will not be able to complete our adoption process in time for the holiday.  There is a cut off date that is our latest possible family day prior to Chinese New Year- after that, it's almost a month until the next possible date....that's if the consulate does not get a backlog of appointments following the holiday.  Our travel window is happily getting too narrow for me to talk about dates here, though!   

Our updated prayer request list includes:

• Continued prayers for Hannah's heart to be prepared for her adoption and for her to heal and thrive while she waits
• Preparation for our hearts as a family
• Safety and protection on all fronts as we progress through the last steps and travel
• Praise!  We need to guard her circumstances because this blog is open, but we can share that Hannah was moved this past fall, and she is receiving wonderful care where she is now.  On Christmas Eve, we received a beautiful update about her.    
• This new home for Hannah is also a prayer request, because her adoption will now make a total of three huge moves where the important people in her life all changed...all of it in the space of a couple years of life.  We are thankful that Hannah will have had several months in this healing home before we meet, and we know she is there and our timing to come for her is all for a purpose.

Thank You

You are one incredible, uplifting, adoption-loving circle of family and friends!  In December 2014, our final fundraiser, hosted by With Every Act of Love, totaled $1,200 towards Hannah's homecoming!  All of 2014, you dove right in with us, donating piles of items to a crazy huge garage sale, purchasing t-shirts, jamberry nails, art prints, envelopes, and sometimes even going undercover, donning anonymity to help Hannah come home.  If you played a role in any of that craziness, we have "tagged a bag" we are carrying with us to China and back with your family name (or a single initial, Anonymous!).  And we are going to make it!  Despite a (wonderful) 60-90 day forward leap, and some last minute challenges of the variety that are known to present themselves at the eleventh hour, we are still going to make it!

What else is there to say? 

Thank you.

You are simply amazing.
We are mightily blessed to be surrounded by you.