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.