What a night. It has been a long week as a dear friend traveled to bring home her sons from Ethiopia. The boys are friends of my adopted sons (they all lived together for four years prior to our adoption). It has been a long haul, but they arrived home with their family tonight!
I spent all night with dry eyes, unlike in Ethiopia where I cried all the time. Smiles, laughter, hugs ruled the night. The joy in my sons' faces, in their friends' faces, was just indescribable. And now I feel the tears starting. Even driving to our friends' home, I just couldn't make myself believe that it was really happening, that we would really see this happen. Even touching them, talking with them, I didn't cry (OK, maybe once, but I hid it fairly well - we all seemed to have this same issue). But now, well, now the tears are ready to come.
You know those times when you know that God is at work, but you just cannot see it or understand it? Yep, this journey has been one of those times, especially the last year and a half for our friends. Much heartache and sadness. And I am so proud of my friends for persevering when it would have been easier to give up. They are my heroes.
God has brought about amazing things. I know that this is now dredging up all that I tried to deal with after my trip to Ethiopia, as well as our impending adoption. There is so much to process. I don't think I will ever be done processing it. But now, now I can let it all down, cry for a while, grateful for what has finally transpired!
On another happy note, we got our appointment for fingerprinting for Immigration today! The way it works - you apply for the petition to adopt an orphan, and once your paperwork has all been processed, you are issued an appointment - and you show up at your time. There really isn't rescheduling or anything. We have to have that all cleared (fingerprinting done and approval from USCIS - Immigration) before we can go to court to adopt our children. Our appointment is in a week and a half!!!!! Usually you have to wait much longer!!!! Whoo-hoo!!!!!!!!
Our other two papers are off to be authenticated by the state of WI, once they are back we have the entire dossier done and will send it by courier to the embassies in Washington DC (the US Embassy and the Ethiopian Embassy). From there it will go directly to our adoption agency and off to Ethiopia. This is all moving very rapidly! Unfortunately the only fly in the ointment is that this also means our deadline for paying fees is coming rapidly too! Good that we can do go to court sooner and get the kids to medical care sooner, but bad in that we had budgeted to have several more months to get all the fees paid! Oops! This is really moving rapidly - note to self - when you ask God to speed things along, look out! So, we are doing a fundraiser this weekend and next weekend (part of the proceeds go to Show Hope - an adoption grant organization), putting in all the hours our employers will pay us for, and whatever we can think of. Praying for God's provision, that He would keep up with the rapid timetable He seems to have us on! LOL!
I know that I just cannot get myself too excited yet, as we could get hung up at any point in the process, but it could be soon! You know how it is when your child is ill, and you just go in to check on them, to reassure yourself that they are OK? Yeah, well, they are still on the other side of the world. Ugh. I just want to know that they got the right medicine, that their conditions are being well managed, that they are well fed and healthy.
Seeing these two boys come home today has really brought home again the reality. Someday soon, that will be us, arriving home with the children. I cannot imagine yet. I know that someday soon I will, but I cannot quite see it yet.
Well, I have to put the last of the items for the fundraiser tomorrow in my bag and then finally get to bed. We have to be up very early tomorrow to get going and get things ready, so our usual time of leaving for church has been moved even earlier!
Love to you all, and what a wonderful, God blessed day this has been!
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