We received an unexpected surprise in the mail today....my closest childhood friend sent us a gift for our adoption expenses. I was overwhelmed to tears! Let me just be honest folks and say we don;t have a pocket of money saved up for this adoption. We are taking a HUGE step of faith with this and trusting that God will provide. We know He will.
Thank you so much friend, you know who you are...I pray that God will give it back to you a hundred fold. Your gift will take us that much closer to our baby, and we will save the card to show her one day, when she can understand, that you love her and wanted to be a part of bringing her home. I love you!
Em
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Her Name
How did we come up with it?
Ashlei .........Had to be an "A" name (Jay's insistence,not mine) We always talked about Ashley
so we changed the spelling to give it an "Asian" flare.
Mei (pronounced May) In Chinese, "Mei Mei" means "little sister" so we liked that. Also, the
English pronunciation is very southern (we are in South GA you know!)
Jay actually gave her this name last Christmas on our long car ride from AR to GA. He has pretty much named the other ones so I think he did pretty good.
Ashlei .........Had to be an "A" name (Jay's insistence,not mine) We always talked about Ashley
so we changed the spelling to give it an "Asian" flare.
Mei (pronounced May) In Chinese, "Mei Mei" means "little sister" so we liked that. Also, the
English pronunciation is very southern (we are in South GA you know!)
Jay actually gave her this name last Christmas on our long car ride from AR to GA. He has pretty much named the other ones so I think he did pretty good.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
We're offically "expecting!"
With great joy and excitement, Avery, Ally, and Annalyse announce the adoption of their little sister...
ASHLEI MEI!
For many of you , this will be the first time you've heard anything about this! So, here's our story....
For many years now we have been thinking/talking and praying about adopting a child from China. Over the course of the last 4 months we know that God is telling us, "it's time!" Let me say that we were thinking this would be something we would do in maybe 4-5 years, so this is defiantly in God's time line not ours. The Lord has confirmed this to us in so many ways, really too many to list here. We are excited, scared, and elated all in one! Here's how the process works:
We have been approved by our agency (American World Adoption). Next we will begin a homestudy process and gather many documents that China requires (birth certificates, marriage cert, passports, physicals, background checks, etc....). This process should take about 6 months to compete. Once we have everything together (our "dossier") it will be sent to Houston to be translated to Chinese and then sent to China.
Then, we wait for our "referral" or, ASHLEI MEI! We'll receive pictures and updated health information. We are requesting a girl,(very few boys available in China) 0-2 years old. This is the hardest part, waiting for the referral. It could take anywhere from 3-24 months~!
After we receive her referral, we'll travel to China for 10-14 days. Jay and I will go without the girls, and we'll get Ashlei about 48 hours after arriving in China. The remainder of the trip will be spent bonding, sightseeing, and getting the China end of our paperwork done. As soon as her feet hit US soil, she'll be an American citizen! Jay is really hoping to travel next summer because the Olympics are in China! We'll see!!!
Please keep us in your DAILY prayers as we begin this journey. This will prove to be the biggest faith journey our marriage has been through in the last 8 years! We are so humbled that God would choose our family to experience adoption as a way to build our family. He has adopted us as His children and we are in awe if His love for us and for Ashlei. Our desire is that HE get all the Glory and that this is not about us at all.
Now, GET READY FOR THE RIDE AS WE GO GET ASHELI MEI!!!
ASHLEI MEI!
For many of you , this will be the first time you've heard anything about this! So, here's our story....
For many years now we have been thinking/talking and praying about adopting a child from China. Over the course of the last 4 months we know that God is telling us, "it's time!" Let me say that we were thinking this would be something we would do in maybe 4-5 years, so this is defiantly in God's time line not ours. The Lord has confirmed this to us in so many ways, really too many to list here. We are excited, scared, and elated all in one! Here's how the process works:
We have been approved by our agency (American World Adoption). Next we will begin a homestudy process and gather many documents that China requires (birth certificates, marriage cert, passports, physicals, background checks, etc....). This process should take about 6 months to compete. Once we have everything together (our "dossier") it will be sent to Houston to be translated to Chinese and then sent to China.
Then, we wait for our "referral" or, ASHLEI MEI! We'll receive pictures and updated health information. We are requesting a girl,(very few boys available in China) 0-2 years old. This is the hardest part, waiting for the referral. It could take anywhere from 3-24 months~!
After we receive her referral, we'll travel to China for 10-14 days. Jay and I will go without the girls, and we'll get Ashlei about 48 hours after arriving in China. The remainder of the trip will be spent bonding, sightseeing, and getting the China end of our paperwork done. As soon as her feet hit US soil, she'll be an American citizen! Jay is really hoping to travel next summer because the Olympics are in China! We'll see!!!
Please keep us in your DAILY prayers as we begin this journey. This will prove to be the biggest faith journey our marriage has been through in the last 8 years! We are so humbled that God would choose our family to experience adoption as a way to build our family. He has adopted us as His children and we are in awe if His love for us and for Ashlei. Our desire is that HE get all the Glory and that this is not about us at all.
Now, GET READY FOR THE RIDE AS WE GO GET ASHELI MEI!!!
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
WE ARE APPROVED!
We got the call today at 2:20pm!!! Our application was approved and our JOURNEY HAS BEGUN!!!! We're waiting for the homestudy packet and more info on SN.!!!!
Thank you Jesus!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thank you Jesus!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Update
AWAA called this morning with a few ?'s about our app. 1.) what kind of surgery did Jay have for his car wreck in 1995. 2.) Our intrest in special needs.
Melissa said our file was going for review and should be processed/we should hear, in about 5-10 days. Hopefully sooner than later!
Melissa said our file was going for review and should be processed/we should hear, in about 5-10 days. Hopefully sooner than later!
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Application
We submitted our application online to AWAA last night. We should hear something soon, or at least we HOPE to hear something SOON. God spoke to me this morning about powerful prayers of faithful servants. It was exactly what I needed to hear. We are praying in FAITH!
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Dr. Evans
Yesterday we met with the girls Dr to discuss some fo the SN that AWAA sent to us. He was full of great info and we learned a lot. We should be sending off the application Wednesday! Yipee!
Saturday, May 5, 2007
China Peaches
Thursday I had lunch with a few moms that have adopted from China that live in the area. Kim W. goes to our church and she invited me. They came home with Lia about 18 months ago. It was a great time, and I got to hold some pretty precious little girls! All total there are about 125 families in this group that live all over GA. They call themselves the "China Peaches" (a play on GA peach for all you non-GA people:) Some families are already home with their children and some are still waiting for referrals. We can;t wait to get to know these families better!
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