One Step Closer!

It was a big day at our house! We received the birth certificates for our children, listing us as their parents! We had no idea when they would arrive and actually expected it could be a couple weeks before we got them. So this is an excellent surprise!

There aren't too many steps left in the process. Hopefully, it will just be a few weeks before we get permission to return to Ethiopia and bring them home!

They're Ours!

Soon after I finished my earlier post, I got the call from our social worker that the MOWA letter arrived and we have passed court! As far as Ethiopia is concerned, Asnakech and Alemayehu are officially our children!

Unfortunately, the letter from the court was mis-dated, and that date will need to be corrected before the process moves forward. But the slow down at the Ministry of Women's Affairs (MOWA) will not affect our timeline from now on!

And We Wait...

Thank you for your continued prayers, words of encouragement, and support. We had an amazing trip to Ethiopia! Our kids are kind, smiley, and wonderful! We created a bit of chaos at the care center, while we got to play with about 40 children at the same time. And we had some sweet moments with our children, too. Although our trip was not designed to introduce us to them as their family, we're confident that they figured it out.

Our trip to court was very efficient, and everything went well with the judge, except that not all of the paperwork has been completed by the Ethiopian government yet. We traveled with 5 other families, and the paperwork was not ready for any of us that day. (So far, 2 families have gotten word that it's been completed since we've been home.) After our appointment with the judge, we had a very emotional and very memorable conversation with our kids' birth mom. It was an incredibly humbling experience, but she is a very warm and loving woman, and we're so grateful to have met her!

We have already experienced several times the hurry-up-and-wait nature of adoption, and we are in another waiting time. It was wonderful to meet our kids, but difficult to come home not knowing when we would be able to go back to get them. Nothing can move forward in our process until the paperwork (the MOWA letter) is submitted to the judge in Ethiopia.

Please continue to pray for us...

* for peace as we wait.

• We're desperate for information and desperate for the process to move forward. We trust that God's timing is perfect, but struggle to trust that Ethiopia is operating on His time. =)
• We want the paperwork to be completed quickly, so there is not a further delay in the court process.

* for our kids...

• in Africa... for health and patience as they continue their stay at the care center with even less of an awareness of the process than we have, that their hearts would be ready to receive us, that they would enjoy this time with the friends they've made and with the nannies who care for them, for comfort in the midst of the confusion and grief they experience.
• and for Brianna... as she deals with the frustration of having to wait alongside us and for all she needs as she continues to prepare to share her home, her heart, her stuff, and her parents with a brother and sister she hasn't met yet.

*for all of us to see and experience how God is present with us in the midst of the waiting and what He is doing in and among us - even in the moments when we feel like there's nothing happening at all.