We are DONE chasing paper!!!!!

Well friends, we are FINALLY done chasing paper! As of Friday, September 3, 2010 we are DTE. That means "Dossier to Ethiopia", and that is such a beautiful phrase for me to type and read. Sept. 3rd is also my daddy's birthday. A good day all around!

Just got done tracking that ol' FedEx package that contains months of work and about every nitty-gritty detail of our lives thus far. It started out in Indy, traveled through Virginia, New Jersey, Paris and is currently in Dubai, AE with its next stop being . . . Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. WAHOO!!!!

We are praising God and thanking Him for all the people who have come along side us to make this possible. We want to thank you all again too.

Now we wait and pray. Please join us in praying for our children specifically. At least one of them is most certainly alive and living either in the orphanage or in a situation that will lead to them being orphaned or abandoned and placed in the orphanage. We ask for prayers for their safety, health, and that they would somehow sense that a forever mommy and daddy are coming for them very soon.

We also ask that you join us in praying for the birth mother(s). When we began this journey, we assumed that these children would be complete orphans (with both parents deceased). We now know that is not always the case. Sometimes children are abandoned due to extreme poverty, other times, the birth father has died and the birth mother is very ill (often with HIV) and knows she is dying. While tragic beyond words, there is still something very precious in knowing her wishes were granted and she was able to speak final words to the adoptive family and bless her child and know before dying that her child(ren) were safe and loved and okay. We pray that if this is the case with our adoptions, we would have the opportunity to meet and pray with her and have an interpretor to tell us her wishes and reassure her of our committment. Hard stuff.