r & r

Our lives are about to change - or so we've been told.

So, Andy and I decided to take a little vacation, just the two of us, one last time before Lucy comes along. Any future trips will include the three of us, at least for awhile until she gets fully acclimated and secure in her new home and new life. We debated several options for our little get-away and finally decided to go with the most cost-effective...my parent's beach pad. But cheap and the beach ain't bad! Thanks, mom and dad for letting us enjoy your place.

We took off last Wednesday afternoon. 

First things being first, we stopped at an ice cream/produce stand that my parents have been raving about.

They found it on the way back from the beach one day and told us we had to check it out.

 They were right!

  It is adorable.

There's our fun get-away car in the background.

I had a good time with my camera.

Andy had a good time with some cherry vanilla, double-chocolate ice cream (multitasking, of course).

Our time at the beach was spent bike-riding, jogging, playing mini-golf, taking walks on the beach, watching cheesy movies and eating really well. I never get tired of spending time with this man!

Monday morning, we cleaned up, packed up and headed to Topsail Beach to top off our vacation with friends.

Our time there included beaching it, of course.

Playing a fierce game of Nerts.

Oh, and eating. Lots and lots of eating.

Everything was just so perfect. So relaxing. (despite Tropical Storm Beryl raining on our Wednesday parade).

But, it's good to be home. And it's good to be one week closer to getting our Goose. Not much of an update other than an email I received from our agency rep this morning:

"I expect to have your LOA within the next week to two weeks."

That sounds like forever away and so soon all at the same time. I'm definitely looking forward to being able to post that update!

happy birthday Goose

Andy's brother says if you love something, you give it a nickname.

For us, Lucy's nickname started out as Lucy Goosey. Then Gucille (as in Lucille with some Goose mixed in). And now it's simply "Goose". That's what we call her.

And apparently, we have one silly goose on our hands.

Who likes to collect rocks. And trash?

It's pretty great that in two of the photos we've received, she has something on her head and is being, well, a little goofy.

She'll have no trouble fitting in.

Happy Birthday to our sweet and silly Lucy Hope. We long to be with you today more than ever but are entrusting you to the One who's weaving our lives together. Never again will you spend another birthday without a family to call your own.

for this child...

I prayed.
1 Samuel 1:27

Wow. That's the best way I know how to describe our shower this past weekend. First of all, it was our shower. Or I should say Lucy's shower. It gets me all misty-eyed just thinking about that. Over the weekend, as I've reflected on our journey to this point, I'm reminded that it's been a better path than I ever could have paved myself. I looked at Andy during the concert on Friday and whispered, "this is so much better." God's plan is always, always better.

So, I know it's the pictures everyone is interested in. Here are some highlights of our special, special day:

 

These ladies and Courtney (not pictured) did a wonderful, thoughtful job. It showed in every little detail just how much they love our Lucy already. Thank you!

The shower invite requested that guests bring a children's book for Lucy in lieu of a card. We received 56 books total and just LOVED this idea! Most of them were personalized with a sweet message to us or Lucy. Believe it or not, we did not get a single duplicate!

what a weekend

It started out with a Third Day concert. And as if that wasn't enough to encourage my heart, we just "happened" to bump into some very special friends there. Again.

But that wasn't all God had in store for the night. About an hour and a half into the concert, I checked my email via my cell (yes, I'm addicted but I figure I'm not the only one who does this). There was a message from our agency titled "Update". No way. There it was - new measurements and 3 pictures of our sweetie. Who is quite silly, I might add. This was a serious answer to prayer! We'd given up hope on getting anything from her orphanage until we traveled. You'd think I would have learned my lesson last weekend.

And the icing on the cake was a beautiful shower on Saturday given by some very kind and generous, sweet and thoughtful, beautiful and talented friends who went above and beyond! It was all absolutely more than we deserved. Here's a quick picture of all the "goods" that we were so generously given. I'm working on a separate post altogether for the shower. More pictures to come later!

The lesson? He's in control. His plans are better than ours. He's always on time.

PS I'm saving the new pictures for a birthday post on Tuesday so you'll have to check back then :)

Dear Sheryl:

Attached are pictures of your package to li ya min ,ya min will get your gifts and a fresh cake on her birthday ,I have requested party pictures for you ,so hope the orphanage staff will share some after ya min`s birthday ,love,Ann

I just love the little pink dog. Exactly what I would have picked for our little Ya Min. Ann really does a great job, even if the orphanage won't send any photos - I so appreciate her service!

AND, I decided to call USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) to find out if our I-800A, Supplement 3 had been approved yet. Well, it HAS! This is an answer to prayer. It's not LOA but it's certainly an important piece of the process that we can't do without. To explain, it's a document we need which approves us to adopt a child older than what our original home study states. There was a little anxiety around it a few weeks ago because USCIS sent back our request and said they wanted a new home study done in order to approve us (we're talking about 3 months difference in age here!). This was going to be a lot more time and money and I just didn't have the emotional energy to go back and redo it all. Well, as of May 15th, it's been approved. Just one more reason to breath a little easier.

We're headed into a fun-filled weekend of being "showered" by some special friends. I so wanted to be able to relax and enjoy it, knowing that everything was moving along. Now I can, thanks to His faithfulness!

Psalm 115:1
1 Not to us, O LORD, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness.

out of translation

Last week was tough. It started to sink in that we probably won't get any updates on Lucy before we travel. Seems that her orphanage has a track record for not sharing info with families. Since I couldn't find out anything about her, I decided to start digging about her orphanage. After all, this will be an important piece of her story and I just needed to know something more about her life to help get me through this LOA wait.

After hours of online searching, I was able to connect with several families who have adopted from Qing Yuan City and found out there are actually 3 different orphanages in her city! One lady I found had adopted an older girl who is still in touch with her nanny in Qing Yuan. But, this nanny is affiliated with one of the other orphanages - not Lucy's. Then this family put me in touch with another lady, an American, who works for one of the orphanages. Again, the wrong one. This lady had another American friend who worked at one of the other ones in the city but still, not the right one! Then, finally, I found 3 other families who seem to have adopted from Lucy's orphanage. They sent me some photos of it and I'm pretty sure it's the one. I feel reasonably confident because, in the background of some of these photos, are toy shelves trimmed in pink - just like the one Lucy is sitting on in one of her referral photos! That was pretty cool.

So, now we at least have some pictures of what we believe to be her orphanage and know some families whose little ones also came from there. We are pretty sure Lucy is at a Half the Sky Orphanage. You can click on the link to their site if you care to learn what that's all about.

I had hoped to post on Mother's Day yesterday but our internet was down at home. I had prayed all week for some sort of Mother's Day blessing to make the day a little easier - either an update on Lucy or our paperwork. After Friday came and went, I had given up on receiving any type of news. But, on Sunday of all days, I received an email from our agency that our dossier (all the paperwork we had sent) was finally "out of translation". This is HUGE because it puts us one step closer to getting our LOA! Basically, all of the information on us has been translated from English to Chinese and we should be just a few weeks away from getting our LOA. After that, it should be 8-10 weeks to travel! As always, there can be things that change this time frame but we are grateful to see progress.

We so appreciate your continued prayers for us and our daughter. And we're still praying the Lord would move in the orphanage director's heart to send us some pictures and/or an update. God is able and we trust Him to do what is in her best interest. Either way, we're getting closer!

no photos or updates :(

Dear Sheryl :

The orphanage did not share any pictures ,sorry ,love,Ann

 

(this came on Friday - so sad - will keep trying - would love your prayers!)

2 months down: an adoption update

It's been a full 2 months since we were sent sweet Lucy's referral file. The first month went by really quickly, with all of the celebrating we did. The second month went by pretty quickly as well, but I started feeling the pains of the LOA wait. I can only imagine this third month will feel quite long. We're still being told the wait for LOA is about 3-4 months from PA. Our PA was on March 6th. I'm hopeful that we're halfway through???

So, what next? We've been getting a lot of questions about when we will travel to get her. If we only knew! My best guess at this point is August or September. Of course, a speedier than usual LOA would help hurry things along. And of course, other things can come up that may slow us down. It's in the Lord's hands and His timing is perfect. Would you join us in prayer for the following requests in the meantime ?

1. That Lucy will continue to be healthy, happy and well-cared for.
2. That the Lord would be preparing her heart for us and ours for her.
3. That we would get some updated pictures and information soon. We're dying to know how she's doing these days. The last information we have is from November.
4. That our LOA would come on the shorter end of the the 3-4 month estimate. While you're at it, go ahead and pray it would actually come before then :)
5. That our I-800A Supplement 3 issue would be resolved (we had a hiccup with some paperwork since she will be a few months older than our original home study said we were approved for - we had said up to 24 months. She'll be about 28 months by the time we get her.)

I'm having mixed emotions coming into May. It's another Mother's Day without my daughter and she turns 2 on the 22nd. It just seems like we ought to be together! On the other hand, we have the great hope of being united with her soon. That helps.

Please just pray for us and her!