Where we're at....

We've gotten back all but three documents from the Chinese consulate in Houston. (MY fault...read the directions from our agency wrong and had to have our Birth Cert. and Marriage lic. State certified). I sent them overnight to Houston yesterday and we should have them next week. As SOON as it comes back, it'll be overnighted to AWAA and IF we can get it to them by Wednesday, we'll be DTC on June 6th!!!

Did you read that right? Let me say it again......

WE"LL BE DTC ON JUNE 6th!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So please please pray that we have our documents from the Consulate by next Tuesday! If not, we'll send it in and it will go out on the 13th.

(for those not familiar with the terms, DTC means "Documents to China" and it's the LAST step here in the US before referral!!! It's a HUGE deal!!)

Unknown Timeline

Per Kate's request, here's a general idea of a timeline. We've been on our agency's "interested families" list for the Waiting Child Program since July 2007. At that time there were between 80-100 families on that list. Even though we were no where near being paper ready, we knew we were going SN, so we added our name. The agency is currently telling families to expect a wait of anywhere from 8-14months on that list. Now that we are paper ready, and have been on the list for 10 months, it solely depends on what children the agency receives, and if any of those children match the criteria we said we were open too. Just so you know, we are open to a female, age 0-36 months, with specific special needs (we listed several we were comfortable with, too long to list or go into.) For a GREAT blog about "why special needs?" you can check out this family that returned with their child a few weeks ago.

So where does that put us? Honestly, ONLY THE LORD KNOWS. We're asking the Lord to allow us to travel to China in 2008. We've been praying that all along. We know that the staff at AWAA pray over each child and fervently seek the Lord when deciding what family to call for what child. Every time we get an email that they've gotten a new "list," we pray that the Lord would write our name on their hearts and as soon as they see our Ashley, they'll know without a doubt she belongs with us. We totally trust them and the process, which is so rare in adoption agencies these days.

Hope that makes a little sense. You can pray with us that we'll see her face this year. That we'll be able to bring her home and put this part of the process behind us....because we know after we bring her home, a whole new process will begin!!!!

My Dream....

Just documenting this to see if any of it has truth in the future....
Last night I had a dream about our referral call....Melissa called and told us she had a little girl for us to look at....her name was Mei Fu Pei (not even sure this is even how to spell that). When I asked her how old she was, she said, "she's a BABY!! 10 months old!!" I was so so so excited!! In my dream we were eating at a restaurant and we immediately left to go to a computer to see her pictures....unfortunately I woke up so I didn;t dream about what she looked like :(

On the paper chase front, we sent our 797 off to TX to be authenticated and we when get it back (next week), we'll be able to send our entire dossier off to AWAA to be sent to CHINA!!! We're having a big party that day!!

Check back soon!

GUESS WHAT CAME TODAY!!!!!!

Our 171H!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The girls and I drove all the way out to the ballfield to show daddy! This is the LAST bit of paperchasing we had to do and it's DONE!!!

Jay mailed all our docs (minus the 171H that will go early next week) to the Houston Consulate on Monday. Once we get those back and get our 171H authenticated, we'll send off our dossier to AWAA and be officially DONE with the paperchase!!!!

We are SO SO thrilled!!! Thank you Jesus!!!

We're COMING ASHLEY!!!!!!!!!!!

Not Complete

Saturday morning is a special time when we all have "family snuggle" in mama and daddy's bed. Yesterday, as daddy was calling everyone to come in, he said, "time for family snuggle!!!" Ally (who is 3 mind you) says in a loud voice," Daddy we can't have a family snuggle because our whole family is not here. Baby Ashley is not here so we are not a whole family."

Oh, the wisdom and the faith of my precious three year old!! Thank you God for making this a walk of faith of our entire family, even the little ones! Ashley we are not complete without YOU!

FOUR Weeks and Counting...

It's now been 4 weeks since our fingerprinting. Please pray with us that we'll recieve our approval this week. We know that the Lord is in control. Also, the transmission on our van looks like it went out today. (yeah, the day's pretty much sucked. I know, I hate that word, but it's the truth.) My husband's first words to me were, "this didn;t surprise God" as I tearfully called the tow truck. We have the cash to fix it. In our adoption savings. As Satan tries to thwart what God has set aside and provided for Ashley, please pray that we would be wise to his attack. He (Satan) would like nothing more than for us to believe that God won;t provide and try to get us to use that money for somehting other than what we know God has given us.

get your tissues...

This is a family that is with our agency, AWAA. Denise just returned from China today..and this video is so amazing! Maggie Mae is so cute! She was also a SN adoption, she has a repaired VSD of her heart...it's amazing what China considers a special need!!