Here we go!

Well...the day has finally come!  As I write this,we have one hour before my parents come to take us to the airport.  This past week has been such a jumble of emotions and they just seem to intensify every day until today, where I'm at the point that I'm kind of useless and don't even know what to do with myself.

There is the obvious excitement that we are finally at this point and that in less than 24 hours, we will be meeting and playing with our girls in person.  It still seems quite unreal and like I'm in a dream fog...which is a bit like running through knee deep jello!  On the flip side, I'm quite nervous as well.  I feel a bit like a pregnant mama heading into labor.  I REALLY want this to happen, but the unknowns are still there...how much will this hurt?  Will everyone be OK?  What will my baby be like?  Throw in a few extra questions for this scenario...will my child be willing to look at me or let me hold/hug her?  Will I be able to communicate and bond with my children?  What will I say to my 7 year old child that I'm just now meeting for the 1st time? And the list goes on...  On top of those emotions are the bittersweet feelings of saying goodbye to our 3 girls here for almost a week.  We will miss them greatly, even though we know they're in the best of hands with Grandma, Grandpa, and the occasional "friend" reinforcements.  As I was putting Livie to nap today, I had a hard time explaining to her how much I would miss her while we are gone.  I cried when she wrapped her arms tightly around my neck and said, "I'll miss you too, Muder". :)

Maybe this ride is like one of those spinning rides...like a Tilt-A-Whirl.  It's fun and you want to be on the ride, but your stomach is definitely doing somersaults with all the spinning. :)

This is just another opportunity to remember that God is in control of all of these details as well.  He sees and knows everything in our hearts, in the hearts of Chelley and Naika, in the hearts of Maria, Annika, and Livie as this momentous occasion take place.  Never once has he left us on our own and that is true this week too. 

For those of you that haven't gotten other facebook or in-person updates this week, this has been a week of AMAZING and encouraging connections.  God has been pouring on the blessings with such frequency that it's made my head spin.  To make a long story short, we've made the following connections with people important to our adoption journey this week...

-- One of my closest college friends "just happens" to be good friends with one of the other 2 families that we are traveling with in Haiti this week.  So, we've been able to email and chat with each other as we've made the preparations for this trip.  We'll meet them in Port Au Prince in the morning as we all prepare to meet our kids for the first time.

--Those 2 families invited me to a facebook group for families that are adopting or have adopted from GLA.   Within minutes of being on that group, I was messaged by one of the other moms.  This family is in the process of adoption twin 1 year old boys from GLA but they have also been financially sponsoring Chelley for a long time.  Their whole family has been praying for Chelley (and her little sister) that she would have a family soon and we were the answer to their prayers.  She said her kids were so excited to see our pictures and know that we are Chelley's new family!  OK...tears much?!

--The next day, that mom that has been sponsoring Chelley introduced me on facebook to another mom who brought home her daughter from GLA about 6 months ago.  The girl they adopted just happened to be one of Chelley's best friends and had been really concerned about Chelley's well being after she left the orphanage.  Now, that mom has shown that little girl pictures of us and can reassure her that Chelley will have her forever family soon.  I've got some pictures on my iPod that I can show Chelley of her friend to let Chelley know that she is doing well with her forever family.  Precious.

--And then to top it off, someone else from the group messaged me and said that they have 3 adopted kids from Haiti (one from our orphanage just recently) and that they live in Iowa.  She mentioned that she has relatives in Rochester and when I asked their names, I found out that her relatives are a fellow homeschooling family in our church that has been incredibly supportive of our adoption.  WOW!

So, if those were last week's surprises that God had for us, I can't wait to see what he has in store for this week.  I need to wrap this up so that we can head to the airport.  Thank you in advance for all of your prayers...we'll share updates as we are able throughout the week.  I apologize for any typos but I don't have time to go back and proofread.  I'm sure you'll understand.

Here we go...!