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...!
Monday, May 20, 2013
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
WE'RE GOING TO HAITI!!
We're filled with joy that God answered our desperate prayers and the prayers of so many friends and family and is indeed allowing us to go to meet our sweet girls in Haiti NEXT WEEK!! The U.S. Embassy in Haiti confirmed this morning that we can have our necessary appointment there next week and so all systems are a go for us to leave in just 6 short days!
We'll leave from Rochester in the afternoon on Monday, May 20th and fly to Chicago and then to Miami. We have a "short" overnight layover in Miami and then get on a plane first thing in the morning on Tuesday, May 21st bound for Port Au Prince. We'll be on that flight with 2 other families from the US that are also adopting from our orphanage and will also be preparing to meet their children for the first time. It'll be great to get to experience all of this with 2 other couples that are at the same stage in the process.
We arrive in Port Au Prince at 8:40 am (7:40 am CDT) and someone from the orphanage will come to pick us up, along with the other 2 couples. I believe that the orphanage is about 1 1/2 hours from Port Au Prince. I have no idea what will happen when we do finally get to the orphanage but I assume that within a fairly short time of arriving at GLA (God's Littlest Angels orphanage), we'll FINALLY be able to meet, hug, kiss, talk to, and try not to cry all over Chelley and Naika. We can't even begin to imagine what that will be like but we've heard that it won't feel real. I heard this week that even years from now, those first moments with them will feel like they were all a dream, like we weren't really even there but just imagining it. Regardless of how it feels, it WILL BE real and we'll be that much closer to being able to bring them home.
While we are in Haiti, we'll be staying in the guest house at the orphanage. We will spend most, if not all, of Wednesday the 22nd back in Port Au Prince at our US Embassy appointment and waiting to appear and sign paperwork in the Haitian courts. On Thursday, the 23rd, we'll have a brief trip and appearance in front of a local judge near the orphanage. In between those trips, we'll spend every possible minute with Chelley and Naika, although they will need to stick to their usual schedule as much as possible and we'll need to respect that for their sakes. As you can imagine, this is very difficult for them and the more we disrupt their routines, the more trouble they'll have when we leave. We want to soak up our time with them but also join the orphanage staff in protecting their hearts through this process. Bottom line, this really isn't about us, as much as it feels like it could and should be. This is about those girls that are about to have their world turned upside down and that need us to protect and nurture their hearts in the process. More about that later...
Then on Friday, May 24th, the moment will come when we'll need to say goodbye to those girls that have already planted themselves so deeply in our hearts. God has spared me from dwelling on that moment and I know He'll provide the grace and comfort we need in that moment to be able to do what we need to do. Countless other parents and children have done this very thing and have lived to tell about it, so I know we will too. We do covet prayers for every aspect of our trip, but especially for this moment that is bound to be very difficult and painful. We know that God is with us every step of the way, every minute, and that He is the God Who Sees. He sees ALL of our needs and provides abundantly for us out of His endless grace.
We will fly out of Port Au Prince on Friday afternoon, with a stop in Ft. Lauderdale, FL and then an overnight in Chicago before arriving back in Rochester on Saturday morning, May 25th. Then another round of waiting begins, as we wait another 3-6 months for the rest of the Haitian legal process to finish it's course before we get word that we can go to pick up Chelley and Naika and bring them home.
And so....the adventure continues...
Monday, May 13, 2013
Adoption Adventure Land -- An Experience We'll Never Forget
In previous conversations, I've compared our adoption journey to a roller coaster. On closer inspection, it's more like an entire amusement park which I've fondly dubbed Adoption Adventure Land. We've been living at this amusement park for 2 years now and we're currently on the most breathtaking ride yet. We hopped on this particular ride on September 10, 2012, when we received word that 2 more little girls, Chelley and Naika, would be joining our family. Prior to that, we'd been on the Paperwork Tilt-a-Whirl and had gone several laps on the Fundraising Go-Kart track and those had their own unique moments of joy and anxiety. This Referral Roller Coaster was definitely our favorite and was cruising along nicely, until it suddenly broke. We were left hanging upside down on one of those corkscrew turns for 7 months. No one could really tell us when the ride would be fixed, or even if anyone was even attempting to fix it.
On April 24th, 2013 I was ready to release my safety buckle and hope for the best. I just wanted off. this. ride. All of a sudden, on April 25th, the roller coaster started moving again and we were instantly transported to one of the highest points we'd experienced thus far. We could see for miles and were just so happy to be moving again that we didn't really mind the craziness of the ride. Of course, everyone knows that what goes up must come down and so we came cruising down the hill and coasted while waiting for our travel dates. Almost 2 weeks later, we received travel dates that were less than 2 weeks away! Could we go to Haiti to meet our girls May 21st through the 24th? Um, YES, sign us up!! And so we swept up to the top again, our stomachs in our throats but big smiles on our faces!!
Now, we're cruising around another hairpin turn, holding on for dear life and waiting to be told that the U.S. Embassy in Haiti can see us next week and that we will indeed be able to get off this ride and go meet our girls in 8 days! We've had plane tickets on hold since Wednesday, May 8th but haven't been able to purchase them without US Embassy confirmation of our appointment. I'm getting a little lightheaded from holding my breath around this curve and really hope that we just have one last high tomorrow before coasting in to a stop in Haiti next week. Staying on this ride of ups and downs and twists and turns for another few weeks seems like an eternity, even though I know we will survive it if we have to.
There are certainly more rides for us to experience in this adventure before we'll be able to leave the park together with our whole family. We don't know yet what those rides will look like or what fears and joys they will spark in our hearts along the way. All I know is that when this is all said and done, I'm going to look for a nice, boring merry-go-round somewhere!
On April 24th, 2013 I was ready to release my safety buckle and hope for the best. I just wanted off. this. ride. All of a sudden, on April 25th, the roller coaster started moving again and we were instantly transported to one of the highest points we'd experienced thus far. We could see for miles and were just so happy to be moving again that we didn't really mind the craziness of the ride. Of course, everyone knows that what goes up must come down and so we came cruising down the hill and coasted while waiting for our travel dates. Almost 2 weeks later, we received travel dates that were less than 2 weeks away! Could we go to Haiti to meet our girls May 21st through the 24th? Um, YES, sign us up!! And so we swept up to the top again, our stomachs in our throats but big smiles on our faces!!
Now, we're cruising around another hairpin turn, holding on for dear life and waiting to be told that the U.S. Embassy in Haiti can see us next week and that we will indeed be able to get off this ride and go meet our girls in 8 days! We've had plane tickets on hold since Wednesday, May 8th but haven't been able to purchase them without US Embassy confirmation of our appointment. I'm getting a little lightheaded from holding my breath around this curve and really hope that we just have one last high tomorrow before coasting in to a stop in Haiti next week. Staying on this ride of ups and downs and twists and turns for another few weeks seems like an eternity, even though I know we will survive it if we have to.
There are certainly more rides for us to experience in this adventure before we'll be able to leave the park together with our whole family. We don't know yet what those rides will look like or what fears and joys they will spark in our hearts along the way. All I know is that when this is all said and done, I'm going to look for a nice, boring merry-go-round somewhere!
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