Relief

Visa applications were sent out by FedEx yesterday.  

Our family photo album that we can send to Natalie was finished today, and her lullaby CD was purchased.  

Stress level is going down and life is good!
  

Visa Applications

This week I have been working on our visa applications to China.  For some reason this felt like the most stressful thing I have done in this adoption process.  It shouldn't have been that difficult, but I was about to scream my head off a few times!!!  I think the added stress of Christmas right around the corner and my classes I am teaching just intensified the stress.  With adoption papers, you always want to get everything mailed off as soon as possible because you never know how long the wait time is going to be. 

In order to apply for visas, we have to hire a courier to take them into the Chinese Embassy in Washington D.C. (just like we did with our dossier papers) because you can't just mail them in.  As I was trying to decide which courier to use, and reading Holt's instructions, I was getting so confused because they each said something different.  I thought one said that you could hand write the applications, so I did that for all three of ours (Chad, me, my mom) only to find out that they had to be typed.  These are the kinds of papers where everything has to be just right or China might reject them, so I think I quadruple checked everything I did.  We also had to go get another set of passport pictures taken.  Apparently the ones we took 7 months ago were too old.  Good grief. 

I had everything ready to go yesterday, hoping to get to FedEx before the big winter storm hit.  There was one last document that I was waiting on, a formal invitation letter from the Chinese government to show that we had a reason to be in China at that time.  I did not end up receiving that until last night due to the time differences in the work days between here and the west coast.  I was so frustrated that I could not get out of the house to go send them off due to the blizzard.  Chad does not understand that, he thinks there is really no difference between sending them one day versus the next, or even waiting until after Christmas.  He is a little paranoid that they will get lost in the massive amounts of packages and mail going out this week, and it does make you nervous since you are sending your passports with it.  What he doesn't understand is the huge relief I have just getting those things out of my hands and my house so that I don't keep looking at them and stressing over the details.  I keep getting them out and looking over everything again, like the boogie man came in and stole some of my papers during the night.  :)  I am heading out later this afternoon to GET IT DONE. 

Fortune Cookies

When we ate our fortune cookies after dinner last night, none of the fortunes were really all that great.  On the back of each of them, there was an English word given, along with the Chinese version of that word so that each of us could learn a little Chinese. Here are the words that each of us got:

Luke:   LEARN CHINESE - TV   (this is actually very appropriate!)

Logan:  LEARN CHINESE -  Living Room

Jenna:  LEARN CHINESE - Bowling

Tera:  LEARN CHINESE - Family

Chad:  LEARN CHINESE - Daughter  


Chad thought it was amazing that out of all the words there are, that was the one he got!  I have to agree. 

LOA Arrived

Holt called with the good news that we received our LOA today!!!!!  Once we were matched with Natalie on October 31st, we submitted a LOI (Letter of Intent) to China stating our intent to adopt her.  After that, we were told that we would have to wait 1-4 months to receive our LOA (Letter of Acceptance) from China, approving the match and all of our paperwork.  I read a lot of stories on Holt's China blogs about the length of time that others had waited for their LOA, but ours came in 6 weeks!  This was a major factor in determining when we may be able to travel, and now they are saying that we should go in early MARCH.  For the first time in this entire process, I feel like things are going really fast and I am thinking I better start getting a little more prepared for her.  

Tomorrow once I receive our LOA from FedEx, I will be submitting our I-800 application to U.S. Immigration.  Once we receive the approval from them, Holt sends that document to China and our final travel approval processing begins.  We will soon be applying for our visas into the country, and hiring a courier in Washington to personally take the applications into the Chinese Embassy and get more authentications. 


We are so excited to see light at the end of the tunnel now!  I can't believe that we will be with Natalie when she turns 2 on March 25th. Amazing!

New Pics

Video of Natalie

National Adoption Awareness Month

Below is an email that I received from Addie Sanchez, a friend of mine who is adopting from China as well.  I thought it was really interesting and decided to post it here, in the spirit of National Adoption Awareness Month. 

Orphan Statistics

It is estimated there are between 143 million and 210 million orphans worldwide (recent UNICEF report.)

The current population of the United States is just a little over 300 million… to give you an idea of the enormity of the numbers… (The current population of Russia is 141 million)

Every day 5,760 more children become orphans

2,102,400 more children become orphans every year in Africa alone 

Approximately 250,000 children are adopted annually, but… 

Each year 14, 505, 000 children grow up as orphans and age out of the system by age sixteen

Each day 38,493 orphans age out

Every 2.2 seconds another orphan ages out with no family to belong to and no place to call home

In Russia and the Ukraine, studies have shown that 10% – 15% of these children commit sucide before they reach age eighteen

These studies also show that 60% of the girls become prostitutes and 70% of the boys become hardened criminals 

Another Russian study reported that of the 15,000 orphans aging out of state-run institutions every year, 10% committed suicide, 5,000 were unemployed, 6,000 were homeless and 3,000 were in prison within three years…

In a perfect world, there would be no need for adoption. Biological families would stay together.  Children would be raised by loving parents or grandparents and remain in their homeland, surrounded by their culture and connected to their roots tangibly.  Obviously, these statistics illustrate that we do not live in a perfect world.  Adoption is not the answer for solving the underlying issues of poverty and disease and famine and war.  It won’t stop the cycle of more children becoming orphans.  It is a life-line thrown out to a precious few… it rescues a small percentage from the going over the falls.  

It can be difficult to allow ourselves to really think about these statistics and what they represent.  Its easy to respond numbly and see the statistics in terms of thousands or millions… but when we allow ourselves to become personally involved and risk the heart-grief that follows awareness, they become more than mere statistics… they become real children with real hearts that ache for their parents and real bodies that hunger for care.  These precious children need advocates.  They need men and women willing to make a difference… willing to stand in the gap and act on their behalf. 

Natalie Nicole

We finally decided on a middle name.  She is going to be Natalie Nicole.  I have always loved both of those names and I love them together so there it is!  I have picked up a few things for Natalie over the last several months, but NEVER looked at clothes that were this small.  I am wondering if she will even fit in 2T's when we get her because she is so little.  Couldn't resist buying this little dress, in her little size, and dreaming about how cute she will look in it. 

More Details About Natalie

Chinese Name:  Tu Zhen

Birthplace:  She was found in the Children's ICU ward of Women's and Children's Hospital of Ningbo City

Birthday:  March 25, 2011

Present Location:  Enmei Children's Welfare Institute of Ningbo City

Description of Personality:  Active, likes listening to music, quick reaction, lovely, has a ready smile, gets along well with others 

Favorite Activity:  Outdoors 

Favorite Toys:  Dolls and Blocks

Introducing Natalie Reelfs!

                                                          Born on March 25, 2011

This is our beautiful new daughter!!!!  We got a call from our agency on Tuesday with this referral, and were so excited because we had just been waiting for this call.   I almost immediately said no because she is about a year younger than what we thought we wanted.  I struggled for several hours with whether or not to even accept her file so that we could see her pictures and information.  Right before I went to bed, I went ahead and emailed our social worker to tell her to go ahead and send the file.  I felt like I couldn't say no without at least looking.  When Chad and I saw her yesterday, it did not take us long to decide that she was the one.  We looked at her little face and just saw our daughter.  Chad was in love immediately and just wanted to get on a plane and go get her! I have thanked God a number of times that He prompted me to look at that file, and that He also provided other confirmations in different forms that all worked together to accomplish His plan for this child to be a Reelfs. 

We looked back through our photo albums of when Jenna was that age, and especially at her 2 year old pictures.  We were both just so overwhelmed with how fast the time has gone, and how absolutely adorable a young 2 year old is.  This helped to put things in perspective for us, and to realize how blessed we would be to be able to have this extra year with her.  She is completely perfect for our family and we felt a total peace about saying yes.  I think I have looked at her pictures about 200 times in the last 2 days.  I can't even describe what I feel right now, and how I am already thinking of her as "my baby girl."  We are ready to move forward with the next set of paperwork and everything else that needs to be done in order to bring her home.  It will most likely be another 6-7 months which is so difficult to even think about.  We want her now!  

First Gifts

 When we arrive in China and Natalie is handed over to us, we have  been warned that she may be extremely resistant and scared.  We will be completely unfamiliar to her and we don't look like anyone she knows.  We don't sound like them either.  I bought her this little blanket bear, which I will give to her as soon as we see her.  She will love it, right? 

This cute little dress was Natalie's first gift, from my good friend Diana.  

 

Who Knows The Mind of God?

After we got the call a few weeks ago that the agency had decided on another family for the little 2 year old girl we were interested in, my first reaction (besides crying) was to wonder what was the point of  me seeing her on the website?  What was the point of requesting her medical file and information, only to spend hours and hours communicating back and forth with doctors, calling our insurance company, typing out a letter about our intentions to pursue her and how we would deal with her medical condition?  I am busy trying to keep up with teaching and hauling my kids around to all of their various activities, so I really could have used all that time for other things, not for something that ultimately wasn't going to end up happening anyway.  What was the point of going through all those emotions, and then being so sad when we didn't end up with her anyway?  What was the point of having people pray for us, only to have to turn around and tell each of them that we didn't get her?  It seemed all for nothing and a big waste of time and emotional energy.  

I still do not know for sure what the point was.  I do know that God uses everything in our lives for His purposes, this situation included. I know that somehow, it was important that we went through this disappointment.  

Because of this happening, we ultimately lowered the age of the child that we wanted.  We decided that we wanted her to be an older two year old - younger three year old when we travel to China to pick her up.  Looking at Farrah (that was the American name that the agency used to refer to her) made me really open my heart to a younger age.  We had originally said we wanted our daughter to be close to four years old by the time we got her.  From the very beginning I have never really known what age would be best.  I think God knew what I ultimately really wanted, but was a little too afraid to ask for.  Maybe he used this situation to open my eyes.  Maybe it was to expose and educate us on medical conditions that we had previously not considered.  Maybe it was to connect us with doctors in our area and give us more comfort by knowing about various medical treatments.  Maybe it was to show our kids how to pray about something, but really leave the answer up to God and trust that He is in control of it.  Maybe it was to have a lot of people praying for this little girl, that she would find the right family.  Maybe it was for me to see, yet again, the incredible amount of support that I have from my friends and family.  Especially my mom!  She is just about as emotionally invested in all of this as I am, and I love that.  I know she feels my pain.  She was excited about this little girl as well, and disappointed when it fell through.  I think we bonded a little bit more because of it.  Maybe, if for absolutely no other reason at all, it was to make me desperate to talk to God, begging Him for direction and peace no matter what.  He answered.  

Who knows the mind of God?  None of us, and I don't need to.  I just need to open my eyes to all that He might be doing, to ultimately lead us to the perfect little girl that He has chosen to be in our family. 

Her Name Is....

As I am sure you can tell by the name of this blog, we decided to name our little girl Natalie.  It took me quite awhile to get Chad to go along with it, but he finally gave in.  We have been referring to her as Natalie for several months now.  

Every other week or so I throw out a different name, just because there are so many names I love and I want to pick the perfect one.  Usually now when Chad talks about her, he just says "whatever we're calling her today."   

We are waiting on a middle name until we know her Chinese name.  We'd like to keep her given name as her middle name if possible.  If it really is something we don't want to keep for some reason, then I am thinking Natalie Noelle would be cute, since Natalie does mean "Christmas'' and all.  You can't find a much better meaning for a name than the birthday of Jesus!

However, until I see her little face, I do reserve the right to change her name at any time!  

Shoes!

Well I don't know who my daughter is yet, but I do know she already has some cute shoes!  Couldn't help myself.  I am so excited to have another little girl.  

 
First little dress I bought for Natalie.  I am thinking she will look great in this color.  I got rid of all of Jenna's clothes up until age 7 since we were sure we were done having kids.  Fortunately I have friends who are now saving things for her as well.  And of course I will be doing more shopping as soon as I know how big she is!

Where Are We Now?

After 5 months of working on this, our dossier was complete and sent to China on August 10th.  As you can see on my table, there were so many copies of everything that I needed serious space to organize it!  One complete set of papers was sent to the Chinese Embassy in Washington, which they kept.  The originals got sent to China, the agency (Holt) kept a set, and I have a set here at home.  Needless to say, when those originals went out by FedEx I held my breath until they were logged in in China.  

I have realized that I am an absolutely horrible blogger.  I only did this because so many other adoptive families have done it, and I know it will be really nice to have this all documented so we can look back on it and show our daughter someday.  I can't believe that I have not written an entry since June!  I guess I felt like there was never much to say and just got behind.  Well now it feels like a lot has happened so I am ready to get back to it.  Once we have a match and know who our daughter is, I am sure I will update all of the time!

To summarize all that has happened:  We applied to adopt on March 5th, 2012.  For the next 5 months I worked on our dossier (official set of paperwork required by China for adoption) and now for the past 2 months, we have had nothing to do but wait for a referral.  When we first began this process, I asked a member of the Holt team to give me an estimate on how long she thought it would take for us to get a match once our dossier had been sent to China.  She said about 3 months.  That would be about a month from now, and I had it in my head that we would get matched sooner.  I don't know why, I guess I was being really optimistic.  

About a month ago, I saw a little girl on Holt's website that I fell in love with.  Most of the children that are shown on the photo listing are ones that need extra help in finding their forever families.  They tend to have medical conditions that are more severe, but not always.  This little girl was younger than we had said we wanted.  She had just turned 2 and therefore would still be 2 years old by the time we would travel to China to pick her up.  After about a week of reviewing her file and thinking and praying about it, we told Holt that we wanted to pursue her.  There was also another family that had requested her information from the website and also wanted to pursue her adoption.  When this happens, there is a committee who meets and decides which family (there could be several families involved) will get that child.  They told us that they would make a decision by the end of the week.  My social worker warned me to "guard my heart" since this child may not be matched with us.  I thought I was doing that, and I knew that I would trust God no matter what the committee decided.  We got a call a few days later that they had chosen the other family for this little girl.  I held up for half of the phone conversation but then just started bawling.  I guess I had really opened my heart up to her more than I thought, and it was difficult to go from picturing her in our home and in our family to hearing that she would never be ours.  

My good friend Maygon gave me a necklace shortly after this, which is a pendant with a saying on it.  It says "Faith in God includes faith in His timing."

I love how God provides the love and support that we need, when we need it.  My friends and family have been so amazing, always asking us how it is going and praying for us, giving us words of encouragement when we need it, and loving us through it.  I am so thankful for every one of them!

Chinese Authentication

This was the final authentication that our dossier documents needed before being sent off to China.  Once documents were notarized, state certified, and then certified by the US Department of State, they were brought by a courier to the Chinese Embassy in Washington and each one received this sticker on the back of it.  I can't read it but it looks pretty cool. 

Fingerprinting Appointment Letter Received!

Well I opened the mail today and we have already received our notice from the USCIS for our fingerprinting appointment!  We will go on July 5th to the office in Omaha to have these biometrics done, and should get approval for that by the end of July! 


This means the dossier should be in China around the end of August.  I cannot wait until the day when it has been mailed out, we will be celebrating somehow!

Making Progress

Well it is now June and it seems like the paperwork is almost coming to an end....for now anyway.  We completed our home study in May, and now have all documents ready for our dossier except one.  Once the home study was completed, we could file our I-800A form with U.S. Immigration.  We will receive an appointment to get fingerprinted (again, yes) by one of their official offices sometime this summer.  I am really hoping for June but that is unlikely.  Once we do that, we have to wait 3-4 weeks for those to be processed.  We should then receive what is called an I-797, an approval from Immigration for us to adopt from overseas. 

Yesterday I took all of the notarized documents that we have at this point to the Secretary of State's office at the Capitol Building in Lincoln.  They each needed to be state certified, or state sealed.  It is the next level of authentication after the notary.  Amazingly I was in and out in 10 minutes!  Once we get the I-797 form here and notarized, I will go get that state certified and then everything will be ready for the last two authentications.  First it all goes to the U.S. Department of State in Virginia, and then to the Chinese Embassy.  We have to hire a courier to hand deliver them to those places for us, which was just one more thing I didn't realize and it kind of freaked me out.  I did talk to someone who did it and found out that it was a really fast service and they received their documents back in just a few weeks.  By my estimation, our dossier should be ready to be sent to China in August or early September. 

I have thanked God many times during this adoption process that I am an organized, detailed person.  I do NOT know how people do this otherwise!  It is so much to keep track of and almost impossible to understand it all.  I really think being pregnant for 9 months was way easier than this.  Big swollen ankles and all.  That was a physical challenge, and this is such a mental and emotional challenge.  I know that the day we meet our daughter it will all be worth it.  I sure wish it wasn't so far away.

The fun thing is that since our home study is done, we are eligible to be matched with a child at any time.  We thought that wouldn't happen until our dossier was logged in in China, and it may not.  But it's pretty exciting to think that we could get a call anytime. We actually did get a call from our social worker this week about a little 4 year old girl who had just come into the system and she was totally healthy.  Then we found out that our paperwork was not far enough along to be considered for her anyway.  It definitely gave us hope though!

Adoption Timeline

Many of you have asked about the timeline for this adoption.  I will try to summarize as best I can, I still don't fully understand all of it myself. 


The entire process is pretty much divided into two parts, everything you do to get your paperwork to China and then everything that happens after you are matched with a child.  For us, we are expecting to send our dossier off to China hopefully in August.  After officials in China get it logged into their system, Holt is notified and then we are eligible to be matched.  This could take anywhere from a month to six months, but because we are looking at adopting an older child with a special need, most likely it will be on the quicker side.  When a child is referred to us, we will receive the complete medical file, photos, and any other information on that child (such as where they have been living, where they were born, etc.)  We will have an international adoption doctor review the file and then we have a few days to make a decision on whether or not we will accept that child. 


If we do accept the referral, then we submit an official LOI, a letter of intent to adopt.  We have to wait for the LOA, letter of approval from China, which can take awhile.  There are more steps after that which I will explain when we get closer to that point.  All together it is about 6 months from the time we accept a referral until we travel to China.  We should be traveling sometime late next spring or early summer. 

Moving Along

Things feel like they are starting to come together.  For several weeks we waited for the background checks to be completed, and they finally came through.  I had spent so much time on paperwork and reading books and things on the internet, my mind was spinning.  I needed to take a step back for awhile and just live my life without obsessing about the adoption all day every day!  Now we are getting ready for one of the most important parts of the process....the home study.


 I have been learning about this whole process of notarization, state certification, and authentication.  Most of our documents for our dossier (which is the big batch of paperwork we eventually send to China) have to be notarized, state certified, and authenticated.  These are basically just three levels of verifying that we are who we say we are and our documents are valid.  Each state has different things it requires from the notary as far as the format they use when signing documents.  I didn't realize this initially, so we had to redo some of our papers to get this format correct.  We had each gone in for our medical exams and I ended up going back three times to get everything signed just right.  I have now started emailing every document to a China dossier specialist in Holt's main Oregon office so she can double check everything and give me feedback.  After many changes and efforts to get things to match up on various financial documents,  I now have almost all of them ready to go to Lincoln to get state certified.  The main thing we are waiting on is the home study to be completed.


We went through our mandatory Parenting in Process class a few weeks ago along with 4 other couples who are adopting through Holt.  It was a great experience, just being able to meet them and talk about all the issues relating to adoption.  We met our social worker, Bonnie, since she was teaching the class.  She is fantastic!


So:  home study meetings are all scheduled.  Bonnie will come on May 3rd to meet with Chad and I for a few hours.  She'll see the house, go over a ton of information with us and try to get a feel for who we are as a couple and what type of child we are open to adopting.  Since we are doing a special needs adoption, we have a long list of medical conditions that we need to go through and identify which ones we are open to.  We met with an international adoption doctor several weeks ago and he helped us begin this process.  We are basically looking at a minor correctable special need of some sort.  I will go into more detail in another post.  Then, Bonnie will come back on May 10th and meet with us again as well as the kids.  I am a little nervous about what the kids might say during this time!  You just never know.  After that, she will write up the official home study report and come back on May 17th to go over it with us.  Then it will be sent to Holt for their review, and once approved, we can include it with the rest of our documents and head to Lincoln for state certification.  Whew.

Personal Data

Chad informed me that I left off the most time consuming thing that we had to do last week, I don't know how that happened!  

Along with all of the other paperwork, we each had to fill out a 22 page personal data information form.  The majority of it contained open ended questions such as:

What do you currently do that includes the culture of the child you wish to adopt?  How do you plan on incorporating the child's culture into your family/home/school/community?

If you had negative information about your child's birth parents, at what point would you share it with your child?

How often do you go to work early?  How often do you work late?

What repair attempts or methods to resolve conflict do you use in your marriage?

Please comment on the health, behavior, and personality of each of your children and discuss any unusual situations that may exist for them.  Give a physical description of each child.  

What differences might there be between biological and adoptive parenting?  


Imagine 22 pages of this.  We each had to complete one and it probably took 4-5 hours to do.  I can't believe I forgot to include it on my original list! 

First Round of Paperwork

FIRST ROUND OF PAPERWORK.....DONE!



Well week one of the adoption process has been a busy one.  After submitting our application we were approved by Holt to move forward and so the paperwork began!  In just a few short days, we have turned in:

1.  Fingerprints to the Nebraska State Patrol so they can do a criminal check through the FBI.  I could have told them that we have no criminal records of any kind but it doesn't quite work like that. 
2.  Background check forms for every state we have lived in since the age of 18, and this is quite a few for us.  
3.  Address forms stating every address we have lived at since the age of 18.   Needless to say, I had to do some serious digging to come up with these.
4.  Employment Verification forms
5.  Disclosure statement 
6.  International Service Agreement, signed and notarized
7.  Detailed financial statement
8.  Copies of our birth certificates and marriage license, so they can see that we meet the age requirements and length of marriage requirement for China
9.  Photos of our family and the exterior of our house
10. Copies of last three years of income tax returns, page 1
11. Directions and map to our home, for the social worker when we begin our home study
12.  Personal references




Now we wait for about a month until the background and criminal checks come back.  We are signed up to take our mandatory Adoption Parenting class in mid-April, and also made appointments for physicals and blood tests.  Once ALL of that is completed, we can begin the home study.  


I have been told that you rush to get things done, and then wait.......................and then rush to get more done, and wait...........................sounds like a fun cycle.  So now we wait.  

Sharing the News

As we began to share this news with family and friends, we received many positive comments, support, and encouragement.  Our kids, Luke (12) Logan (11) and Jenna (7) are all very excited.  Jenna was instantly in love with the idea, jumping up and down all over the family room and shouting "Yes yes yes! I want a sister!  I want another girl in this house!"  Logan took a little longer to warm up to the idea.  He is his mother's child, and not a big lover of changes but he came around and now is giving me the thumbs up.  Luke is usually open to just about anything, and he had no problem with the idea.  Of course for him, being a 7th grader and all, he can't really see past the next day at school let alone really get into something that won't happen for at least a year.  But he is on board and the whole family has been talking about the new little sister that we are preparing for and praying for. 


Among family and friends, there were a few comments that especially made me feel more peace and helped to confirm that we made the right decision.  Here are a few:

When I expressed concern over being able to handle a 4th child because of my personality type, my good friend Amy said "It is really important for adopted children to have lots of structure, consistency, and boundaries.  I don't know anyone better at that than you!"

As we talked to my parents about it and went over the pros and cons, suddenly my dad threw his hand up in the air and said "Let's take a vote.  I vote yes!"

My mom found it so exciting that she has just recently been reading Mary Beth Chapman's book, Choosing to See.  Steven and Mary Beth Chapman adopted three girls from China.  When looking at their little pictures in the book (BEFORE we told them our news) my mom had wondered what her little Asian grandchild would look like, if she ever had one.  Since my sister and I are both done having kids, I found this very WEIRD.  I am positive that God ordained the timing of all that.  

One of the most amazing ladies I know from church immediately said "You are changing the world!  What a blessed child to have you for a mommy."

And finally, during the sermon on Sunday morning, best quote of the day:  "If your vision is not intimidating to you, then it is insulting to God."  A great reminder that it is OK to be intimidated by something but we know that God's hand is in it and we can have peace in that. 

The Big Decision

We are adopting from China!


How did this come about?!?!

Seven years ago after Jenna was born, we decided that we were done having kids.  Three has been a good number for us, and we have been content with that.  Especially now that the kids are older and all in school, life seems relatively easy!  We can sleep in when we want to, go out without having to get babysitters, the kids can make their own meals, pack their own lunches, do their own laundry......LOVE IT! 


Three weeks ago we went to a Winter Jam concert with our kids, where several different Christian bands were playing.  At the concert we heard about Holt International, an adoption agency that is in need of families to sponsor children who are waiting in orphanages all around the world.  This is a very small commitment of $30 a month and we went ahead and chose a child to sponsor until her adoption goes through.  This got me thinking of the families that adopt these children and change their lives forever.  During the concert I just really felt drawn to this idea of giving a child a family.  

I prayed about it and asked God to continue to bring this to my mind if it was something that He wanted me to really consider. At the time I assumed I was just having an emotional reaction from watching the amazing videos of adoption stories all around the world.  Throughout the following week, there were a few things that did bring this back to my mind and I still felt my heart being opened to becoming a mommy to an orphan, even though adoption has never been something that I have been interested in. 

I talked to Chad about how I was feeling and expected him to say "Absolutely not! We are done having kids, remember?"  He was immediately open to the idea, and agreed that there is more we could be doing with our lives to impact the world and use the time that God gives us to really make a difference.  I was shocked that he was open to it, so then we decided to really pray about it and see what happened.  We researched a TON of information online, read adoption stories, looked into Holt International a little further, and found out that they only have about 5 offices in the United States.  One of them is right here in Omaha less than 10 minutes from our house!  For some reason even this small thing was so encouraging.  

We attended an informational meeting at the Holt office and absolutely loved everything we heard.  We listened to the differences between the adoption programs in various countries that Holt works with, such as Ethiopia, Uganda, Haiti, South Korea, Thailand, and China.  Afterward, Chad and I looked at each other and we both felt the only country that made sense for us was China.  Again, the fact that we both felt the exact same way about everything was a great confirmation for us.  

After a little more researching, deliberation and prayer, we decided that we want to adopt a little girl between the ages of 3 and 6.  We both feel total peace and excitement about this and couldn't wait to get started!  The application has been submitted and paperwork is well under way.  

More to come.....stay tuned.