WE HAVE A NEW BABY NEPHEW!

Welcome Asher! We have a new nephew born to my sister-in-law and her husband, Susanna and Nolan. He is healthy and precious! They live out of state, so we are dying to see him. Fortunately we will see them in 5 weeks at a family wedding!

Sleepy sweet boy

Pops loving his newest grandson

Numbers 6:24 - 26

' "The LORD bless you
and keep you;

the LORD make his face shine upon you
and be gracious to you;

the LORD turn his face toward you
and give you peace." '

BACK TO SCHOOL PICS!

Christina's first day of 10th grade. She is so easy in the morning and gets ready so quick, but still looks as cute as can be!

Matthew's first day of 6th grade. He is a middle schooler now! What a sweetie he is!

Joshua's first day of Pre-K!! He was so excited, he could hardly stand it! Here he is making sure we see his Toy Story backpack.

Okay! Let's go Mom!

This is the "I Can't Wait Face!!"

What a sweet baby face.

He had "homework" for his first day- to bring in a collage of his family. Here he is in the car, ready to roll!

Jacob took this pic of Joshua and I walking in to school.

Waiting to go into his classroom.

Ms. Antmann, his teacher inside the classroom before class begins. Below is the video of Joshua SO excited to go in. This makes me laugh! (you will have to scroll down to the bottom of this page and pause my blog music to hear this, but it is so cute, it will be worth it!)

9 MONTHS WAITING...

We have been waiting 9 months now. That timeline would not be so bad if we were actually hearing of people being matched with children on a regular basis. Since we got on the waiting list, I have only heard of 2 young SN girls being matched and 1 healthy infant girl match on our particular orphanage's group discussion site. Those are not very good numbers. Now, I do know there may be some people adopting from this particular orphanage that may not be on that orphanage's Y*hoo group, who have received referrals. I am sure there are some in other countries as well. But wow! This is just not moving.

Honestly though, I don't really feel very discouraged at heart. In other words, I don't go around feeling down about this at all. I have an awesome family and they keep me so busy and I enjoy every minute of that! I do feel discouraged about the Taiwan program when I check in with any progress it is making, but I don't feel downhearted in general. I just feel more determined to keep our options open and am excited for what God has in store!

We are now seriously discussing opening up a particular new option, of which we feel encouraged. We will keep you posted if and when we move forward with it!

In the meantime, we are making this more than an adoption blog, but a family blog too!

Isaiah 40:31 But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

REGROUP, RETHINK, AND A LITTLE RESEARCH ABOUT OPTIONS

WE ARE CONSIDERING OTHER OPTIONS... CHINA?? FOSTER CARE ADOPTION??

The rumors are that Taiwan is really slowing down and that some families are well passed 3 years waiting. Also the chances of adopting a young (under 5) child without needs is getting slim. (if you are not a young, childless couple.)

After research, we found that there are occasionally young children available through adoption from foster care, if your paper work is ready as soon as they become available. (there is a difference between fostering, fostering to adopt, and adopting from foster care.) In fact I was searching on some sites and found a couple of 3 and 4 year old, healthy, beautiful, African American girls available (I'm sure they'll be snapped up in an instant!). We are very interested in this option.

We are however, struggling with the vision of my original dream and what that means with looking at options. I had a dream about a little Asian girl waiting for me. So, do we wait and wait and hope a little girl will come available, with needs that we can handle? Do we switch to another country and pay more fees to find her? Or did my dream simply lead us on a journey in order to simply open our hearts to adoption?

Some good advice from a few friends said to take steps carefully, and prayerfully and ask God to open doors and/or close doors if needed. So we are thinking to train and get licensed for adoption from foster care. (there are no fees for this), and we will trust God to lead us from there. What do you think??

Meanwhile, we will keep ourselves on the Taiwan waiting list as well.