Day 861

Yesterday marked 861 days since we were accepted into the Ethiopia program.  861 days full of highs and lows. Happy days and very sad days.  861 days I've waited to see my boy.   

For those who have been following our journey, you know that on February 5th we received a referral for a beautiful 6 year old boy.  He stole our hearts instantly.  Sadly, 7 short weeks later we were told we couldn't move forward with his adoption.  The days following were some of the darkest days of my life.  I felt an amazing sense of peace during this time though.  A peace that I know only comes from my God.  F will always be special to us.  We will love him.  Forever.  Due to the selfishness of man, he will have a tough childhood.  A life no one should ever live, much less an innocent boy.  He is our F.  After grieving the loss of his referral, we pushed on to find our Townes.  That brought us to day 861. 

Day 861 was exciting.  It was wonderful. It was absolutely crazy.  But guess what, I got to see my boy.  My sweet 8 month old baby boy.  I love his face.  Well and the rest of him.  It's just the picture only shows his face.  

When I was struggling with the reality of being pregnant and our adoption being pushed back, God was orchestrating His  plan.  So much more beautiful than I could ever imagine.  Sweet Townes was growing in his beautiful birth mother's belly just as Annalee was in mine.  This is unbelievable.  

Many ask, so when do you go get him?  Ha, that's a loaded question!  We have a while guys. Things are moving SLOW.  I'm preparing myself for a long wait.  I will try to update when we move along.  We have no way of knowing how long.  Just one of the lovely parts of adoption.  Hurry up and wait.  Celebrate every milestone along the way.  

Thank you for your continued support.  Day 861 rocked my socks off.  I love this day.  And I love you.  

The Boy We Thought Was Our Son

It's been a rough few weeks.  We received word that our case was being investigated further but that everything looked good.  We prayed this was true.   After a month, I began to fear something was wrong.  So much that I stopped looking at F's picture.   

Since February 5th, this little boy stole our hearts.  Finally a face to settle deep in my heart.  I carried his picture with me and proudly showed it off.  I would catch myself staring at this terribly pixelated picture.  I imagined this sweet boy being part of our family.  I saw him at our kitchen table during family meals teasing his older sisters, riding in the back seat trying to make Annalee laugh, playing on the farm with his cousins.  We had started to make plans for his room. 

But after receiving a phone call yesterday, we know that this precious child will not be our son.  Without giving too much detail, we can no longer move forward adopting F.  I had prayed that if this day came then it would be because he was going back to his birth family.  This would be joyful as every child deserves to be raised by their biological parents.   But we live in a broken world.  And this is not the case for the sweet boy who melted our hearts.  We live in a world where adults use children as chess pieces.  Where people put their own wants and needs before innocent children. In a world full of corruption.  And now this little 6 year old boy will quite possibly never know the love of a family.  We can pray that this will not be the case.  We will advocate for him. His picture will remain on our refrigerator.  He will always be special to us.  The boy we thought was our son.  

I do not know what God is trying to show us.  If He wanted our hearts broken a little more, then He has surely succeeded.  They're broken plum in half. Maybe F needed an advocate.  I don't know.  Please pray for this child.  Pray that something miraculous will happen and he will not spend the rest of his childhood in an orphanage.  I pray that he hadn't been told we were coming for him.  I pray he's not waiting for us.   

I do not know what lies ahead in our adoption process.  Right now we are trying to grieve the loss of F's referral.  We are trying to prepare our hearts to be joyful for our next referral.  Whenever that will be. 

His Face

I have some news that I want to shout from the mountaintops. 

I saw my son's face.  

That's right, we got THE CALL Thursday night.  It was the last thing I was expecting.  Those words I have been waiting to hear for 2 years.  "We have a little boy we'd like for you to look at."   My heart skipped a beat.  I could hardly speak.  My nerves.  Oh they were shot. Happiness, disbelief, nervousness, amazement.  Yeah, all that.  

I am unbelievably amazed at God's work in our adoption journey.  I could go on and on for days guys.  

Josh and I had been praying about increasing our age to 6.  We had discussed this during our home study update.  Never knowing less than a week later I would be looking at my precious boy.  

Our sweet little 6 year old boy.  We are in love.  Our hearts are so full.  

We officially accepted the referral today and are prayerful that Townes will be moved to one of the orphanages our agency is currently working with very soon. Like this week.  Please join me in this prayer.  It needs to happen.  

Now we work at getting him HOME. It's so hard to know when this will happen. Many things have to be done before he can.  We will go to Ethiopia twice.  These are averages, but our 1st trip for court could be around 4 months from now.  Then around 6-8 weeks between visits. 

We pray he will be home by the end of summer. Once again, we as adoptive parents love our timelines but I have learned to not hold tight to them.   

I also pray that his heart begins to heal.  That he will be open to us and let us in.  As exciting as all of this is, I now know some of my son's story.  And it breaks my heart.  Please keep him in your prayers.  He's suffered so much loss already.  I cannot imagine.  Sweet, sweet boy.  I love you.  

Thank you friends for all your prayers and encouragement.  You have lifted us with prayers when we felt this day would never happen. You have given from your own pockets to help make this happen. I don't know how to adequately say Thank You.  But Thank You.  Thank You.