Camping!

I've been meaning to post these pictures for a while. We spent the weekend camping with our great friends a few weeks ago. It rained almost the entire time but we still had a wonderful time!

One step closer!

I came home from work Friday afternoon to find our FBI Clearances packaged up nicely in their Fed-Ex envelope waiting on the front porch! Just waiting on CIS approval now and then we're waitlist ready! My original goal was to be on the waitlist by Thanksgiving, but I'm so grateful for how God has prepared my heart for this wait. (Feel free to remind me of that in a few months!) It's so clear to me that He knows our child, and that it doesn't matter one bit when the papers come- that child was chosen for us long before we were here. And it helps that each day that goes by, we know we're one day closer!

How it happened

I love reading about how people have come into this world of adoption. Everyone has a different story- this is ours.

About a year ago Ross and I were sitting in church. Our church has a passion for Ethiopia. We (as a church) plan to be in Ethiopia, creating hope and opportunity for a long time. Our friend Emily was doing the announcements and welcoming everyone to the service before it started. She introduced a short video (2-3 minutes?) that was shot in Ethiopia on a mission trip. I sat there crying, (trying not to do the shoulder shaking, loud, ugly cry) and heard "Our kids are there." I can count on one hand the times I believe that I've heard God speaking to me. This is one of those times- the most profound to this date actually and I maybe spent 60 seconds thinking about it, and then filed it in the back somewhere without much thought. In the 60 seconds I thought, "Ok, well I've just had miscarriage #3- did I really just hear this? I don't want to be the crazy baby lady." I also thought, "we aren't ready for this." And then I stopped thinking about it. I didn't even tell my husband. I honestly didn't think about this again for quite some time.

Fast forward a couple of months when we started a friendship with now two of our dearest friends, Trent and Carmen. We met at church and began volunteering with them in a ministry they had started a couple years back. Trent and Carmen have two children, including a daughter they adopted from Ethiopia. God was doing some crazy things to my heart during this time. I don't know how to explain it except to say it felt like He was preparing me for something big. Ross encouraged me just to keep seeking and listening- which I did- but the thought of my message from a couple months back never entered my mind.

Moving on to February 15th, 2009. We were spending Sunday afternoon with Carmen, Trent, and some other great friends. We were cooking out, playing outside with the kids, etc. when Carmen started talking about the orphange where their daughter lived. My mind just froze. I couldn't think of anything else, just the orphans in Ethiopia. It was hardly the time to bring it up to Ross so I waited until we got in the car to go home. As soon as I said, "Ross, I can't stop thinking about the kids in Ethiopia." He said, "Me too. I think our kids are there. Do you want to adopt?" I couldn't believe in our first conversation we were on the same page.

From there we spent about 5 months praying, saving, and being excited about building our family through adoption. Since this all began Emily (who showed the footage of Ethiopia at church) and her husband have traveled to Ethiopia to bring home their two precious daughters. Our awesome pastor and his wife are in Ethiopia right now meeting their twin son and daughter and hoping to bring them home soon. And two other families from our church are in the process of adopting their children from Ethiopia as well. Our child/ren will be so blessed to grow up in a community with so many other children from their home country. And to think, this is really just how the story begins...

Gladney Approved!

If you aren't adopting with our agency you're probably wondering what that even means! Well, essentially we can now gather all of our documents to compile our dossier (all of our information that goes to Ethiopia and is translated for the courts). Well, 98% of said documents are gathered and waiting. We are waiting on our CIS Approval, and our FBI clearances. Hopefully those will be here before long- a few weeks maybe?! I know that's hopeful! Once we receive those we will have them notarized and drive to Raleigh to have it all authenticated at once. Then we will overnight that to our caseworker, she will send it on to DC, and we will be on the waitlist!