December Visit to Haiti

Philipians 4:6-7 Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ. Jesus. 

So many times we are asked "How do you make it through the wait?" as we are nearing our 3 year mark into our adoption journey of our daughter. I will say that the only way I can explain not going insane throughout this process is a peace that comes from Christ. It is CRAZY how long this adoption is taking, and it feels like every time we turn a corner and move to a point where things are supposed to go smoothly and quickly, something goes sideways that wasn't expected. But, I will say, I have found a peace in the wait and am trusting that the Lord will use this wait for good. It is a peace I don't understand, as I desperately want our daughter home, but again, I have peace through the wait.

Last week was a FABULOUS week.  Ed, Claire and I traveled to Haiti for a week and spent wonderful time with our daughter (sorry, still can't publicly say her name or share a picture, but we are getting closer).  On our trip we shared time with two other adoptive families from our creche.  One of my greatest takeaways from this trip is getting to know our daughters personality better as I watched her interact with her friends and also as she opened up to us more. 

Enjoying stunning views from the Baptist Mission in Kenscoff, Haiti

First she is stunningly beautiful inside and out.   Her personality is bigger than life and she is a natural born leader. She has no problem speaking her mind, but it is always in love.  She is very playful and the one who is cracking the jokes and making everyone around her smile. She can be shy in a new setting, but only for a short time.  Once she warms up, she can be very silly, and if she thinks no one is looking you will hear her singing to herself and dancing.   She is very observant and has such a caring heart.  If she sees anyone getting upset about something she will immediately sacrifice something she has to make them feel better.   Despite this long wait, she is so joyful and very clearly ready to come home to us.  

I have been very blessed to travel to Haiti multiple times throughout this process, however, Ed hasn't been able to come as much and this was his 3rd trip over a 3 year period.   Because of that, our daughters bond with me has become very strong, but Ed's bond with her was not as cemented.   My heart overflowed this trip watching that bond grow.  There was one moment on our last night where we went out to dinner and during dinner. completely on her own she went over to daddy to sit on his lap.   Ed's face was beaming and my heart was full.   I feel like both Ed and I are now equally connected to our daughter.

Also beautiful to see is how easy and natural the connection comes with our new daughter and Claire.   They have so much fun together and all you can hear when they are together is giggles.   At one point on the trip the two girls were playing and out of nowhere Claire said "I have the best big sister ever".   Be still my heart.   Our older daughter is so sweet in her interactions with Claire and they have so much fun together.

The cherry on our trip was on our last day we got fantastic news that we finally got the piece of paper we have been waiting on for 5 months that is needed to proceed to the next step.   This "should" have taken a few weeks for us to progress to the next step, but again, things went sideways and it instead took 5 months.  We are over joyed to once again be able to say that it appears things are moving forward in our adoption again.  We are now at the point where things should go smoothly and quickly, but we need every prayer for it to actually go smoothly.

In very vague terms we basically have 4 steps left to homecoming with each step has lots of mini-steps within it.  Our next step is for our file to go to court and for the adoption decree being issued......which would officially complete the adoption in Haiti and our daughter will have our last name at that point and we can then share pictures and her name.   The next step is to get approval of the US, then from the next step is to issue her passport, and then the final step will be her VISA which gives us the all clear to bring her home!   The most optimistic opinion says she can be home by this Spring.  A more realistic homecoming is probably more like summer 2016.....but we are praying for early Spring. 

Trusting in the Lord

It has been about a month since we received our exit letter which transitions us out of the Haitian side of things and after a few small steps, into the American side of the adoption.    This exit letter was imperative on moving closer to bringing our sweet daughter home and finally being able to share her name and picture with all of you that have walked with us through this journey. We still aren't at that point yet, but we are getting closer.  Keep those prayers coming.

We get bi-monthly updates on our sweet girl and she is stunning and is growing into a beautiful young lady.  It breaks my heart to see her growing up apart from us and we are relentlessly praying that she will be home with us by this Christmas.  In February she will turn 11!  We started this process right after she turned 8.  I still struggle with wrapping my mind around how this can possibly be.  We are trusting and believing that the Lord will bring our daughter home by Christmas, even when it appears impossible.   

Claire has been growing more and more excited to bring her sister home as well.  The other night I was tucking her into bed, and our big dog Jack-Jack was in her bed too and it was quite crowded with all three of us in bed and she told me we are going to have to teach Jack-Jack to get out of this bed so there is room for sister soon.  Apparently Claire is planning that they will be sleeping in the same bed together when she gets home.  In everything we do Claire is commenting on how her sister will be included when she comes home. She is very excited to have a sister.

As I believe we are nearing homecoming I have also been praying much more intentionally about preparing our daughters heart for our family and the HUGE transition she is going to have to make. She consistently tells us she is very excited and wants to come home and Chances for Children does an amazing job preparing the kids for the transition, however, it is still a transition that I don't think any of us could fathom making.   New culture, new surroundings, new friends, new family, new school, new rules, new environment, new everything.....when I start to list it all out I feel overwhelmed for her.  We are praying that the Lord will cover her and protect her through this transition period.

I also have been thinking a lot of her birth family and what they mean to me and how we are truly connected.   Ed and I firmly believe that our daughter's story is exactly that, her story, and when she comes home she will not bring one physical thing with her, the only thing she will have that is hers is her story, so we will not take that away from her and don't feel it is right to tell her story, so you won't hear anything from us on that.  However, we are aware that when we bring our daughter home we MAY be able to meet some of her birth relatives.   In Haiti so many families are forced to make hard decisions out of love for their children and such a huge portion of the population regularly face loss that we can't imagine.   With that being said, we have felt very called to cover our daughter's relatives in prayer, as we know ALL of our hope can only be in the Lord.    This is one area, if you felt led, we would love to have join us in prayer and have a very tangible way for our daughters relatives to know that they are covered in prayer by you.   

I had the following quilt made which will be a gift to our daughters relatives (which we may or may not get to meet, but are sure we can get it to them).   I pray that this would provide them encouragement and let them know they have angels in America covering them in prayer.  On it is has a block that says "For He will order His angels to protect you wherever you go" and also has scripture from Psalm on it.   But my favorite part is the angel wings.  On each wing there are ties, and it is my hope to tie a ribbon for each of the prayers prayed over both our daughter and her birth relatives to those ties......So we ask you to join us in prayer, and if you feel led, you can send us a ribbon representing your prayer, which we will tie to the blanket on the angel wing.  If you are part of a community/prayer group, and would like to share in this opportunity with your group, I would love for your group to take the blanket and prayer over as a group and add your ties.  Send me an email at klisst@prodigy.net if you need our info to either send us your prayer ribbons or if you would like to have the prayer blanket for you to pray over and add your tie.  I would love to see many prayer ties on behalf of our daughter and her birth relatives!

Prayer Quilt which will be given to our daughters birth family after the adoption is completed

From no news to tons of news

Oh how things can move SO slow in adoption and then in an instant so much can happen.   So in early August I traveled with a team of 13 others from my church to Chances for Children and got to visit my sweet little girl and spend  5 wonderful days with her.  We had a great trip.   She is so open and loving and such a fun little girl. She laughs so much and loves to play games. She especially loved that we had quite a few teenagers on our team and she thought they were the coolest!   She also amazes me with her compassion, kindness and respect.   She has one little baby at the creche who she especially loves.  She pulls her out of the crib all the time and just loves taking care of her, carrying her around and making her giggle and laugh.  I just love seeing this nurturing side in my daughter.  She truly is an AMAZING girl!  I can't wait till all of you can meet her and the day I can finally share her name and picture publicly.  So onto the big news.......

We are getting much closer.   We started the process of adopting our daughter in May of 2013, so currently we are well over 2 years into this process.   Since February of 2014 we have been stuck in IBESR, which is the government agency over adoptions in Haiti.   This is the step where everyone gets stuck, and while we were stuck for 18 months in that phase, I know of families who have and are stuck for even longer.  When you are stuck there is no estimate to know when you will get unstuck, you just have to wait and wait and wait, with no news, it is excruciating.   But as of last week we received the best news ever that we are finally unstuck and have EXITED IBESR!    This is HUGE!  It means we can actually answer the question everyone asks all the time of when is she going to come home.   There still are a few more hurdles, but none of them should cause major delays.   We have a few legalistic steps that still have to occur in Haiti, but in about 2-3 months we expect our adoption decree to be issued which means she will be given our last name and we will finally be able to share pictures and her name.   Shortly after that we will enter the US side of things.   This step had been backlogged recently, but I am feeling very encouraged after a recent call with our agency where they said they are seeing this step clearing up and moving faster for families right now.   Once we exit the U.S. side of things we just have to wait for a Visa and passport to be issued and then that will finally be the day we can bring her home.   We are praying for her to be home by Christmas.  We are told that might not be a realistic expectation, but I really believe it can happen.    What a great Christmas that would be!

Thank you to everyone who has supported us and given us encouragement along this way.  We truly have felt your prayers. It feels SO good to finally be moving forward and I am looking forward to much more news from this point forward!

Still can't show you her face, but here is a picture from my trip in August. 

Still Waiting......

I know many of your are curious as to where we are at and the number one question(s) we get is "What and why is this taking so long".  I wish I had an answer, truly , no one can really explain what the delay is, all that we know is that our file is still tied up in IBESR (Haitian governing authority over adoptions).   But I thought I would do a quick update to tell you where we are at and where we hope to be going soon.

So in March we had our two week required socialization visit with our daughter where we were interviewed by a social worker who determined we were a great match and she recommended to IBESR that our adoption be approved.   So after that we needed a few signatures and that would trigger and "exit letter" which literally would exit our adoption out of the Haitian system and she would at that time be legally ours in Haiti (but not in America yet).  So let me give you some insight into our frustration and the time delays that almost all families face when adopting in Haiti.   By the guidelines produced by the Haitian government the time from the end of the bonding trip to the time of the issuance of the exit letter "should" take 2 weeks......we have been waiting 3 1/2 months thus far and are still waiting.  And we know that the families that have gone before us have been waiting 5-6 months on average.  But we are hopeful!  We have reason to believe it is coming any day now.  And honestly, the days get harder and our patience is further tested when we "think" it is coming and then each day passes and we don't get it.   Our whole family is on pins and needles for this news. Every morning as soon as I wake up I check my email as our agency and Haiti is 3 hours ahead hoping to see "that" email in my inbox.  Every day when I pick up Claire from school the first thing she asks is if we got our exit letter.   It is really hard.  But we are taking a huge faith walk right now and trusting that Gods timing is best and He has a reason that we may never know for allowing the delays and our job is to continue to walk in obedience with joy through the wait.

We also have a lot of faith that God can move mountains and that even though we are given time frames we don't like for our family, those are not HIS time frames and He can provide us a miracle by moving past "mans" given time frames- Proverbs 19:21 "Many are the plans in a persons heart, but it is the Lords purpose that prevails".    That being said, I do have a lot of days where I know Proverbs 19:21 in my heart, but I find myself relating more towards Proverbs 33:10 "The Lord nullifies the counsel of the nations; He frustrates the plans of the peoples".  That is how I feel during so much of the time, frustrated!

So next question you are wondering- "what happens after the exit letter, do you get to bring her home?".  I wish, but nope, that is not the case.  So after the exit letter we then have to begin the adoption on the American side of things and go through the immigration process.   This part use to be pretty consistent in averaging 5-6 months.  However, once again for no real reason, this process has recently been averaging families 9-12 months, at least that is what we are being told. But after all the immigration/US adoption stuff she finally can come home!

 Ed always says I am hopelessly optimistic....and in this case I am going to stick with that train of thought.  We were told this last time frame a few days ago and I have decided to refuse to believe it. I wouldn't even let it sit or soak in. My God is bigger than that!   So please join me in praying for our daughters home coming  by Christmas 2015.  It is a tall order, but I know it can happen! We started the process of bringing our daughter into our family in May of 2013, so we are already over 2 years into this journey.

I am very excited though that I will be returning to Haiti in August with a missions team from our church and will get to spend some great time with our daughter during that trip.  These trips mean the world to me and are so helpful in continuing to build that bond between us.   So I am counting down the days....21 to go!

"Mommy, Mommy"

Well we are in our way home now. The goodbye was tough, our girl at a few moments would let the sadness of our goodbye show, and then at other times the tough armor she has been forced to wear throughout her life from all her losses would go on and no emotion of the goodbye would show in her. As she pulled out of the driveway on the last day, she was wearing a smile and waving. I had my sunglasses on to try to hide the emotions inside as I know her heart and how she hurts for others more than for herself, so I didn't want her to see my sorrow so I bared a smile back and a wave goodbye.  This is that part of adoption that is hard, really hard! But I know the future blessings to come and the ones we have already experienced with our daughter will far outweigh the pain as God will make beauty from today's pain. 

So as I am flying home I am reflecting on the whole trip, and I continue to be heart broken for the deep sadness that is masked in the creche by the kids there with their playfulness with each other and the laughter you hear.   But throughout each day the moments come, you see the pain emerge in their eyes,  a trigger, each and every child at the creche you will see it. They instinctly know they need a mommy....and it so ironic that every female visitor they call mommy and at all times there will be a little one at your feet, arms up, hoping you will pick them up and give them some love, "mommy,mommy" they say.

I am self conscious about my body, lots of women are, I know this, but it's a struggle I don't let others see, but it's there. But on this trip, I found myself not only losing this part of me and not caring, but actually feeling myself happy that I am "a little squishy". You see, these little ones, no matter how small, know they need a mommy. Ed, Claire, and I were all ready and willing to hold the little ones at anytime, but we all noticed they would fight the most for me....and I kept clearly hearing that these kids need that soft, squishy, mommy type of cuddling.  They would tolerate Ed and Claire's lap, but they wanted mine. Every child there, no matter how active, once they got a spot on my lap would stay there perfectly content for as long as I let them. So many of them would drift off to sleep and I would wonder how few of times in this child's life have they actually been held as they drift off and the contradiction of how many times our children stateside have gotten this luxury, to the point that they don't know it is a gift. Part of our adoption process is this two week bonding trip and I knew the Lord had us here for this time not just for our daughter, but to be that mommy for those other kids whose mommies can't be there or who don't have one....Yet.

There was one boy in particular, for privacy I can't say his name, so I'll call him "A". "A" is the wild one, who was always climbing the thing he shouldn't climb, jumping off the highest point he could get to, always doing something he wasn't supposed to do. I've seen those kids before, and usually those types will never settle down in your lap, but I kept hearing the spirit say "A" needs to be held the most, make room on your lap for "A", and every time I did, that whirlwind kid would nestle into me so close and his hand would always grab tight to any part of me, like he had to hold tight so he wouldn't lose this "mommy moment".  Everytime it left me awe and also broken hearted that such an energetic kid would have such a huge need to be held that he could restrain all his energy to be held.  In these moments such great joy I would feel knowing the Lord let me hold one of His babies, let me be part of this, let me be that mommy for an hour to "A" and the other little ones. 

I had some great time with Kathi, the director of C4C, and was asking about their needs, and she said there greatest need is to have people come and just hold babies, love on them, interact with them, bring them a toy, as being in this environment is the toughest on the babies and toddlers. The older kids have each other and school, it's not the best situation, but they have something, the little ones need a mommy right now, even for an hour. I keep thinking of all the squishy mommies I know and how blessed each of those mommies would be to get to love on these kids.  

Deuteronomy 24:19-22

When you are harvesting in your field and you overlook a sheaf, do not go back to get it. Leave it for the alien, the fatherless and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. When you beat the olives from your trees, do not go over the branches a second time. Leave what remains for the alien, the fatherless and the widow. When you harvest the grapes in your vinyard, do not go over the vines again. Leave what remains for the alien, the fatherless and the widow. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt. That is why I command you to do this.

We are all so blessed with leftover "grapes from our vinyard", we have so much extra love we can give as we have been so greatly loved ourselves. There is a need, I have seen it, I have experienced it, and for "A", I met it. Can you go and meet an orphans need? Ask me how if you're interested.

Learning from our daughter

"When a child walks down the road, a company of angels goes before him proclaiming 'Make way for the image of the Holy One' " - A Hasidic saying from the book Their Name is Today.

Our daughter is such a blessing and is teaching us so much about faith and love. She so easily and willingly is giving her heart to us. She has the kindest spirit and you can see the joy she has in her smile which is almost always on her face. 

In our preparing for our adoption we have read many books on the "issues" many adoptive kids have. Some include being emotionally unavailable, behavior issues, etc. So we were always prepared and were expecting these things. But God has been so good in preparing her heart and knitting our hearts together.  We have encountered none of these things with her on this bonding trip. She has been sharing things with is about her life and past hurts that I/we never even knew if would be able to get her to talk about and she is openly talking about this stuff with us. It amazes me how readily she is to share her heart. We have had a couple of hard cries with her about how much she has been hurt in her life so far and it wrenches my heart to see her have such sadness in her but also shows me how resilient she is that she can still be full of joy and so forgiving of her past. This girl is a fighter and is going to do BIG things in her life.

We can clearly see how her resiliency has come from the love and care Chances for Children has shown her.  It is not fair that the term orphans exist, it is not fair the suffering these kids have endured at an age when they can't defend themselves. But I know that it is OUR job to step in and right these wrongs. In Isaiah 1:17 the bible says "help the oppressed.Defend the cause of orphans". We are in no uncertain terms called to care for and defend the orphan.  We got to spend time with the head of child sponsorship for C4C and she shared that in order to be full funded they need to have 336 sponsors, they currently have 170! You can help, you can sponsor a child at www.chances4children.org or get in touch with me and I'll get you pointed in the right direction. Or come visit on a missions trip. The below picture looks all fun and games, but literally it is like this every day with kids fighting to get some lap time and they thrive when they get one on one attention. Can you come and be that lap for a child to sit on? Ask me how.

So to clarify for everyone she is not coming home with us on this trip.....which again tears my heart open as it is now impossible to imagine our family without her and I feel like us leaving will be yet another pain she has to endure.  We are flying out this Friday and we have not told her yet as at any mention of us leaving she gets so sad. 

Today is our IBESR social worker interview, which is one of the final steps for the Haiti side of this adoption, then we will move on to the American side of things which typically takes another six months, but there are rumors right now that I don't like to hear saying it will take longer than that. I am shutting those rumors out and expecting God to show off His power and move these things along quickly. This summer is my Godly goal!

However, I have to admit I've been contemplating drilling breathing holes in my suitcase and sneaking her home now, it seems like the only rational thing to do😉.

Please keep our interview today and our goodbyes on Friday in your prayers. 

To God be the glory.

More updates

We have been in Haiti for one week and our time here has been so sweet in so many ways. 

First, our girls!!! Seeing our daughters come together and so happily accept each other is beautiful. I am blessed to see their hearts weaving together. As our oldest daughter was going to school today and was on her way out Claire ran out because she needed a huggie and a kissy from her before she left. The girls were playing the other day and both got hurt and skinned both of their knees and it was so sweet as both were more concerned with the others injury than their own and took care of each other and then together hobbled over to mom and dad.

We have had so much time laughing and playing together.  This evening we played the board game sorry....do you remember how to play. The main gist is often bumping other players back to start. I have said over and over how sweet our daughter is, but I thought how she played the game was a true testimony to her kindness and sweetness. So as soon as she got the first sorry card she refused to play it and instead would try to send her pawn to start. You could tell it really bothered her to hurt someone or make them feel bad even though that was part of the game.  And she is that way with everyone and in everything she does. When around the babies at the creche she loves to make them smile and is so good with them and all the kids.  Yesterday we went to Duet, which is a very sad orphanage and she jumped right in and helped with those kids and was so sweet with them too.

I can see why our daughter has such a loving heart, as EVERYTHING Chances for Children does is centered around Christ and loving one another. The staff at every level are so tender and caring and you can see how much they love the kids. Yesterday when the girls hurt their knees it was well after shift change and one of the nannies, Madame Patrick, who had already been off work for quite a while and was heading out saw our daughters knee and turned back and took the extra time to take her in and make sure it got cleaned up and was not going to let our daughter go anywhere with a banged up knee. She also at another time came up to Claire to tell her what a great little sister she is and that she is beautiful.  The drivers, the cooks, the cleaners, the nannies, the teachers, the directors, everyone is so loving and kind and all are excited for our family. C4C works through Christ in such a loving way to be that first step in healing for an orphan and it shows in the joy that the children have. 

Tomorrow we are going to go shopping at the American grocery store with our daughter and she is SO excited. I don't know for sure, but I am pretty sure this will be her first time ever at a grocery store....at age 10!  We knew we were going to need to go and at first it looked like we were having to go today while she was in school and she was so sad. We definitely need some more lunch stuff and a few supplies, but she was so sad over not going with us we had decided if she couldn't go we wouldn't go and would just make due with what we have. God knew this was something special and it turned out no cars were available today so we had to go Saturday which meant she could go. It will ground you and make you fully aware of how abundantly blessed you are when you see the excitement of a child getting to go to the grocery store for the first time. She was praying about it and thanking the Lord for allowing her to go and how she knows He will be with us as we shop and with her while she sleeps dreaming of her shopping.  Ed and I knew that this could be an area she might over indulge in and we could end up with a full shopping cart for just a few days of supplies so we decided to set some ground rules that each girl could get two things outside of what we have on our family list. We thought this would be met with resistance, but instead it was met with gratitude and like we were allowing her so much. It also helped that here desired items made it on the family grocery list which are bananas and apples.

Such a great first week and every day keeps getting better as deeper connections are formed.

To God be the glory!

Sunday Funday

Another great day. We started out with church, much different than back home. Everyone dresses in their Sunday best clothes. When we arrived we first sat in the middle of church. Very soon we were escorted to the front (literally right next to preacher pulpit) of the church where special guest sit. I could tell our oldest daughter (by the way, I am not allowed to share her name publicly which is why you don't hear her name) did not like being in the spotlight like this. So it was even more awesome that she chose to stay up front with us where she was not comfortable being rather than returning to the pews to sit with her friends. Seriously, we are having great progress with building our bond as a family. I think having Claire on this trip is really helping build that bond as the two of them have connected so easily. 

Three and a half hours in all the Haitian children who were as young as three sat perfectly still in church, meanwhile I thought Claire was going to die being in church that long. She started pulling out all the stops, but she got through it (just barely). Ed and I both loved the service, Haitians have a great love for the Lord and are so spirited in how they express it. They also like to put people on the spot and asked for us to come up and say a few words, which Ed did awesome, although I could tell he was a little nervous.

From there we returned to the creche, pretty low key day on Sundays around there, but all the kids love any attention and loving they can get. And of course we got schooled at soccer. Ed, I , our oldest, and Claire played on one team against a team of one, he is six years old and he destroyed us. 

This afternoon our oldest also asked me if I would do her hair, which is a big deal and definitely another step in that bond/trust building process. I was so nervous. For a year now I have been learning how to do her hair and studying up, but have never actually been able to practice. But I have to say, it turned out really well and also helps facilitate more bonding. I also am so proud of how Claire has embraced her sister and is so welcoming to her in the family. She got really excited to help too.

Tomorrow our daughter has school so we will spend our time loving on all the little ones that aren't old enough for school while she is at school. The little ones spend a lot of time in their cribs and they are SO happy when you spring them from the baby room and give them some one on one attention and love. 

We are really having the best trip so far and I/we just love our time as a family. We are praising God for how He has worked to connect our hearts together, as we came expecting "adoption/attachment" issues to deal with, and while we know those are still to come, we haven't had any yet and it has been all fun/sweet times. To God be the glory!

Off to a great start

Wow, Ed and I keep commenting that our bonding trip is going better than we could expect. God is good. We flew in to Haiti Friday and made it up to the creche by three. Our newest daughter was playing on the playground and we had such a great greeting from her. She is really the sweetest little 10 year old girl. She is full of laughter and smiles. Claire and her have hit it off so well!!!!! Like beyond our expectations well. Our two girls spent the past day and half connected at the hip, laughing at everything, and playing a few tricks on mom and dad. Our time together as a family feels so easy, so right, and what we have been longing for in our hearts for the past two years. I have imagined this time for so long, but it is even better than what I dreamed.

Our two week trip will mainly be just hanging out as a family. We have an appointment with the US Emanassy next Tuesday and then at some point in time will have an interview with a social worker. We sure do love this time!!!! We will keep you updated.

Blessings in Disguise

It is very easy to miss seeing how God is protecting you and is also guiding you, many times we don't even realize that God protected us.  Not only that, I think at times I find myself having disappointment over situations that have not gone "my" way, but not always do I get to see the blessing of why it didn't go my way; sometimes you do though.....

Most families when they get their adoption referral (which is what we recently got which triggers the two week trip) go to Haiti within a few days of receiving the referral. That had always been our plan.  We were disappointed when we found out that wasn't going to work as there were some accommodation issues with the dates we wanted to travel.  But Ed and I both have felt God making it very clear to us as to the reason for the need for the wait and can see Gods hand in guiding us through every step.   Which I think so often, we forget to see that sometimes our unanswered prayers are really for our protection or for our future blessings.

Point in case, for our socialization trip we actually are going to be flying through New York to get to Haiti.....not the normal plan, but because our trip pushes up against Spring Break flight cost are double what they usually are and the most economical route is through New York flying on a Delta flight.   Had we traveled in "our" timing, today we could have been flying Delta through New York.  Did you see what happened to a Delta flight at LaGuardia today and the storm everyone on the East Coast is dealing with:

Delta Flight Skids off Runway at LaGuardia

Yup, God guided us right past that one.   For sure we would have had problems flying out today, and because we are required to have 15 days on the ground in Haiti for this trip, it would have caused major problems if we had flight delays that delayed our trip. Forecast for our travel dates next week in New York- sunny and blue skies!

Next, we have been hugely blessed to walk through this adoption journey with two other families at our church who are all adopting kiddo's from Chances for Children.  This is a huge blessing both to us and to our kiddo's that are going to continue to have each other in their life from Haiti to Clovis.   Well, had we gone in "our" timing on our two week trip we would be there on our own.  But now, with this delay of two weeks before we could go it looks like now one of these families will get to be in Haiti with us for part of our trip.  Huge blessing, and once again, all from His guidance.   Not only will Ed, Claire, I and our daughter be bonding on this trip, but I believe this will help grow our daughter and this families children from C4C closer together in preparation for their transition to Clovis.

So, let me keep going on other ways we are seeing His hand.   Our daughter currently is at Chances for Children, but prior to that she was at an orphanage that has much to be desired and is a very damaging environment/circumstance to be in for a child (or for anyone. I will tell you more about this place in later blogs and have previously blogged about it before...utterly heartbreaking).   The kids at Chances for Children who came from this other orphanage, called Duet, frequently get to go back there and visit their friends who are still at that orphanage.   At Duet they have a wall of pictures and there is a picture on that wall of our daughter from many years ago when she lived there, and in the background of that picture is the face of a beautiful lady who is very involved with C4C.   On a previous mission trip I had gone to Duet with the child that will be becoming our daughter and she saw that picture.  I remember her telling me a little about her time at Duet and how hard it was there and that the lady in the picture loved her so much and made her feel loved during that time.   My heart melted at that story both for the tragedy of our sweet girl and what she has experienced in her life, but also with gratitude for all the volunteers that have gone before us, like this lady, and shown love to our child before we ever knew her and when we couldn't be there (side note- if you feel the tug to go on a mission trip GO, need help figuring out how, message/email me and I can point in the right direction).   So after that trip I reached out and shared that story with the woman who was in the picture as I knew who she was via Facebook.  Well guess what!!!!!  With the new timing of our trip, that is the Lord's timing, that lady will actually be in Haiti with us for part of our trip.   To able to thank her in person for the love she showed to a child who desperately needed to be loved.....well, there are no words that will be able to express our gratitude, but what a huge blessing it will be to meet her, encourage her, and see our daughter see her again!  Yup, God gave us another peek as to why we needed to wait and to follow His path on this trip.

So one week from today is our big day to begin travel and we are SO excited to see our sweet girl again.  Claire is going with us and it is really cool to see her getting more and more excited and the plans she has for the things her and her sister are going to do.


Proverbs 3:23-26

Then you will go on your way in safety,

and your foot will not stumble.

24When you lie down, you will not be afraid;

when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.

25Have no fear of sudden disaster

or of the ruin that overtakes the wicked,

26for the Lord will be at your side

and will keep your foot from being snared.

Hebrews 12:2

2 Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed - that exhilarating finish in and with God - he could put up with anything along the way: cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God.

Light at the end of the tunnel

It is here, it is here!  REFERRAL DAY!  387 days we have been stuck in this phase waiting to get that one email saying your referral is ready....and praise Jesus, it is here, it is really here!  We are packing our bags and will be flying out very soon to Haiti.

On Friday, February 13th Ed felt very convicted our prayers needed to focus on praising the Lord in advance for the referral news and that we would receive news of it.  We had already been told if it didn't come that Friday don't expect it the following week as Haiti would be shut down for Carnival (Mardi Gras equivalent). So that Friday night I felt like I entered back into my "well, here we go again, another week of no news" mopey mode.  Ed kept sticking strong to praising Jesus and saying it is done and let's thank him for what He has done......and by golly, it was done in fact.   When the world (our agency and everyone who is in the know on Haiti adoptions) said don't expect news, we found out our file was signed during that week of "no activity".  I just love when God likes to show His power and how He can move when everyone else says the movement can't happen!

So that being said, there is a whirlwind of activity that needs to happen before we leave and still quite a few pieces that have to be ironed out, so consider me scatterbrained until I get on that plane.   But as scatterbrained and busy as I am, I sure have been thinking of the Lord's provision and blessing to us on this journey.   I am reminded of some of the ways God has covered this journey.  When we very first started the adoption conversation with Claire she wanted nothing to do with it and clearly did not want any siblings. When I went to talk to Claire's teacher this week about the very soon leave of absence (oh, did I mention she is going on the trip- lots of sister bonding time), her teacher told me the story of how on the first day of February when they were going over the calendar for the month Claire got up and very proudly told the whole class that today was her sisters birthday and her teacher said she was beaming.   Claire talks about her sister with all her friends and just last night asked for help spelling her sisters name so her and her friends could make cards to give to her, so yes, the Lord covered this area. And then I think back to my emotions on this journey, it is a really long roller coaster ride, and for a while things will be going ok, and then every once in a while I would have a big dip and get really down, and I tell you what, EVERY SINGLE TIME, within 12 hours of reaching a low place, the Lord would send me some sort of a life raft to keep me afloat during the wait, some sort of good news, progress up date, story from someone else visiting the creche, something....literally every single time.  So another area I clearly saw His movement and felt the Lord at my/our side.  We also have had many obstacles that have been overcome clearly by His movement, the change in the years of marriage requirement that allowed us to adopt from Haiti when we were initially told we weren't eligible, huge financial barriers met, providing us a awesome network of other adoptive parents to walk through this journey with.....I can go on and on.   He has glorified his great name through this journey and we are so grateful to the Lord for everything we recognize He has done, and also for the many things He did to make this adoption happen that we aren't even aware of.

So I know the number one and two question is what next and when does she come home.   Well, right now we are working out some final details. We either will be leaving this weekend for Haiti, or on March 12th (I'm praying for this weekend as I am so excited to get to our sweet girl).  We will spend two weeks in Haiti for our "socialization trip" which is required by Haitian adoption law.   It will be a pretty low key trip with most of the focus on bonding our family together.  We will have one appointment in Port Au Prince with the US Embassy and one meeting with a Haitian Social Worker (please pray over this meeting as I feel very nervous).   The rest of the trip will be spent loving on our sweet girl.    She will NOT be coming home with us at the end of this trip though, as there is still more steps in this adoption journey.   We have been told that she should be home within 5-6 months after our bonding trip.......another area I am praying the Lord will move beyond our expectations and get her home MUCH sooner than that.  

So for now we will work through the details of getting to Haiti, but with a huge smile on our face all along, as we have so much joy to be here at this stage!

Oh the waiting

I wish we had news, and I keep thinking we should have news, I should have some sort of update, something encouraging, yet I find myself with nothing to say and I just keep trying to keep my eye on the end as we continue through this long season of wait.

I think the waiting has gotten harder lately since we have been given lots of hopeful information.   This week we hit our one year mark since we entered IBESR, and in two and a half months we will hit the two year anniversary since we started this adoption journey...TWO YEARS.  That is two years that our child has had to live away from us, not be part of a family.   There is so much weight to this number of two years.    We knew it would be a long journey, we were told from the beginning it would take two years, but what is so hard, is even if we get our referral today, our child won't be home at the two year mark.  Our hope and prayer now is that 1) something changes in the process of the last steps that can expedite all that is left to be done so she can come home earlier than what our given timelines tell us to estimate, and 2) that our child gets home early summer and definitely before the new school year.  

We have been very hopeful since Christmas time that our referral should be any day now, just last week we were given an update that gave us high hopes that we should have news that week....the week came and went with no news.  This week was met with news of political demonstrations in Haiti that shut down government offices.  I literally wake up every morning and check my email before I even get out of bed to see if that referral email is in my inbox......our agency is on the east coast.  And about 1 p.m. every day my bubble of hope begins to burst for that day as I realize I am nearing the close of business on east coast time and most likely won't be hearing news that day.  Another day gone.

So, here I am with no actual news to report. The best I can report is that we should be getting closer, the news should come any day.  So while I wait, I just pray....and pray.....and pray, because that is all that I can do and so now we wait on HIM.  We are so thankful for those of you that are praying and interceding on our behalf as well.  During these "lows"  I really do need the prayers of others.  Right now, is one of those low weeks.  Prayers for movement, prayers for encouragement for us and our children, and prayers for endurance.  So if you are one of our prayer warriors, please keep pressing on as it is SO appreciated!