Peace, Love & Adoption

It's been a while since I have written about our current adoption, so I thought a little update might be in order.  Two weeks ago, we finished our home study.  We have our same social worker from our first adoption, so the visits went really fast.... she already knows us VERY well.   Lifeline has added more education since the first go round so that took a bit more time.  It included an online seminar to listen to with workbook to fill out, a marriage survey so that they can identify any red flags (thankfully there were none), and a day and half seminar we will go to in April.  It all seems a bit redundant since we have lived this out for the past 2 years but we did what we had to do to check items off the list and move on.

I discovered that I still have unreadable fingerprints. Surprise, surprise.  But this time I was prepared.  I mailed in 4 sets of my prints so that I could quickly fail them all and move on to a manual name search (rather than waiting for them to send me a letter telling me that I failed and requesting more prints).  Derek got his clearance letter in 3 weeks. Mine came in 3 months.  Last adoption it took 5 months.  At least I'm improving.  One friend joked that they might get even faster with the next adoption.... to which I must remind everyone that this child's nickname is "caboose" for a reason.

Last week we moved onto the next step where our paperwork is sent to immigration to approve us to bring a child back the the U.S.  We are in a probably 3 month stage of getting immigration approval, having documents authenticated & notarized, mailing our dossier to China,  getting "Logged In" and THEN the wait will really begin to see our baby's face.  During the last adoption, we were Logged-In and matched with Mei Sims 2 weeks later.  For a variety of reasons, it will most likely not go that fast this time.  We expect to wait up to 6-8 months to be matched although God can certainly do whatever He wants and surprise us!

One reason that I haven't written much is that there hasn't been much to say... but the other reason is that this adoption is not controlling my every thought and move.  Sure I have 4 kiddos to keep me busy but I think it goes deeper than that.  I have seen first hand that God works it all out for the good of everyone involved so any sense of urgency or panic has been erased... it has been replaced by a calmness.  I feel like I am chilled out with a chain of daisies in my hair, making a peace sign and saying "adoption, it's all good man" ... in the background is that song saying "Don't worry about a thing, because every little things gonna be alright...."

It is a very freeing place to be.  Last time, I can remember Karla (our social worker) e-mailing me asking for a piece of paper.  We were in the middle of lunch.  I told all the kids to grab their plates and eat in the car while we rushed over to lifeline. I always felt a tad bit psycho.... This time?  I realize it can wait because it's all gonna work out.  God has created a child for us and I'm certain that I can't do anything to "miss out" on being matched with the right child.  He WILL get our baby to us. Period.  No need to act like a freak.  Well, actually it would be abnormal for me to be normal but at least adoption won't be the source of my craziness for now.  The chinese say "Mei Guanxi" which means something like "It's all good, no worries, no problem."  Mei Guanxi may just be my catch phrase for the next year.... although once we have seen a face, I may throw all this "peace, love & adoption" stuff out the window.... I'll want to get there as fast as I can.


I probably won't update again until we are Logged In in china.... until then....

Peace Out

(actually, in the waiting I'll post some to update you on our new farming venture.  So stay tuned for fun pics sometime soon.  While were are adopting seemed like the perfect time to buy a farm, redo a house there, plant a chestnut orchard, raise bees and get 2 dogs, right?)