Time lines

Since I was a little girl I pictured my family coming together through both biology and adoption. In January of 2010 God started letting Dan and I know the time had come to pursue our daughter through adoption. Our youngest was 6 months old. That was the year that my new year's resolution was to not get pregnant. We laughed at the irony of what God was calling us to, but He is a God with a sense of humor.

So we started searching for agencies. We asked friends who had adopted. We called places we found online. We received mail with information. We looked into both domestic and international. We decided that fostering wasn't a fit for our family. After praying it through we also crossed off domestic at that time. We narrowed it down to which agency was the best fit for us. Then within that we saw clearly that God was leading us to Ethiopia.

So we sent in our application, and soon we were approved. So it began. We paperchased for about 8 months. We celebrated when we mailed all that paperwork to our agency. I loved paperchasing. It was a to do list. I love having a list. Stuff I can do. It feels like you are moving.

Our dossier was sent to Ethiopia on November 11, 2010. And the wait began. When we started the wait time was 7-11 months, and at that time it was going down. We were number 31 on the list for an infant girl. We waited 2 years for our referral. At that point we had been number 1 on the list for 22 weeks. Finally, our family coordinator called. She told us that there just were no baby girls available. She asked if we'd be willing to take a child who was 19 months.

We talked and decided that if this is the child God has for us then we will rejoice for her. Even if it wasn't our plan. About the time we accepted our referral the courts in Ethiopia decided to change the way they did things...again. The new changes said you had to have a positive letter from MOWCYA (ministry of women children and youth affairs) before they would issue you a court date. When we received our referral it was about 6-12 weeks to be issued a court date. We waited and finally were given the date of January 15 for a MOWCYA letter to be written. We had really hoped she could be home by then, but we were thankful for a timeline. At that point the courts said they would issue a date within 2 weeks of our letter being written. So we packed our bags. We prepared to have to get our kids to a friends and leave with a very short turn around. We were so excited.

January 15 came and went with no letter. A few weeks later we were told that MOWCYA wrote us a negative letter. They said we did not have updated financial statements. We did. It was their error. So they gave us a new date of February 18. Again the days came and went into March with no news. On March 6 they gave us a new date of March 8. No reason. Just to give us a new date. March 8 came and praise the Lord we were issued a positive letter. Most people had been getting their court date that day. We did not. So we waited all the next week.

Thursday March 14 we were told that the court in Ethiopia has lost our file. Our coordinator said we should still get a date in a day or two. That Friday the file was still lost. We had to wait until Monday to hear if we got a court date. The next Monday the court found our file, but the power was out in some parts of Addis so they couldn't assign us a court date.

While we are praising God for his blessings. I can't help but feel a little like we are moving two steps forward and one step back. It is hard not to play the comparison game. I just keep trusting God has a big picture plan that exceeds my right now mentality. He is faithful to complete all good works he starts. I look forward to posting the next steps on our timeline. Because at this point next up should be meeting our daughter!