Viaje de Amor

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Tuesday-Thankful #6

I am thankful that God is in control of it all, no matter the outcome!

Monday, November 5, 2012

Upon getting our mail today easily became my thankful moment of the day...we received our extension from Immigration for our adoption. We have until June 2014. Praying that our adoption will be complete by then. The thought in the back of my head...will it really be complete? Only God knows. Is our daughter even born yet? They have also approved our age extension to go from 0-4 years. Praying for some news soon. they are supposed to be meeting sometime this month.

Sunday-Thankful #4

Tonight (Sunday) we gathered at our church to stuff boxes for Operation Christmas Child. We probably had around 80 people, young and old, stuffing boxes. We stuffed over 550 boxes. What a blessing it was to see so many gathered together to send things to children around the world that have so little. I was amazed as I went to select a stuffed animal or doll on the top of my box it was as if ..."it was the one I knew I was to send". I am thankful for God's people, my church family, to have their hearts softened to the needs of others around the world. What a GOD THING that we were even able to do this on Orphan Sunday (we were supposed to do it this past Wed). Had we done it then, we would have only had teens and youth leaders stuffing. Thank you God for being in control of all things! What a blessing it was to my. I hope those of you that were there were blessed as well.

Saturday, November 3, 2012

Thankful #3

I am thankful for a warm house, electricity and all my needs being met? With the hurricane that came through and took out our power for a few days and now this cold, it makes me extra thankful that it is all back on! With all of this it makes me think of our little one as well and sending up an extra prayer for her that her needs are being met as well. I know I can't dwell on this too much knowing that there may be many needs that she has that can't be met. Lord, care for our little one through others around her! Please let her feel your love.

Friday, November 2, 2012

Being Thankful #1 & 2

As we are coming into a season where it is good to be reminded that we are to give thanks for all things I am challenging myself to post somethings that I am thankful for each day until Thanksgiving. I may even be able to have some guest's that want to share what they are thankful for! I am starting a day late (it is so hard to believe that it is November 2nd already) so I am going to post #1 & #2 both today even though I thought of yesterday but didn't get a chance to post it!

Nov. 1

Giving Thanks #1 Thankful that I live in a country that I am able to openly praise my Lord. As I prepared for Sunday's worship time last night, I was so thankful for the chance to gather with others to praise my savior!

Nov. 2

Giving Thanks #2 Thankful that I have a wonderful husband that loves me for who I am and is such a Godly example to me!

Where are we in the Adoption Process?

We wrote a post titled What is the Process? that outlined our process for adoption for a child from Honduras through Living Hope Adoption Agency. Here is our journey in the process, so far:

We decided to adopt (see Our Journey to Adoption)
We discussed where we would adopt from (see Why Honduras?) and the age and gender of the child we were hoping to adopt (see Boy or Girl?).
We submitted the application for adoption with Living Hope Adoption Agency. (Feb. 3, 2011)
By the grace of God we submitted the contract to Living Hope in early February. (see Hurdles) - Feb. 7, 2011
We began the courses and each night was spent in front of the computer learning about the issues related to adoption. (see Back to School) - Feb. 24, 2011
We pulled together all of the documentation for our Dossier (see Time to do the paperwork!) - Mar. 3, 2011
We completed the Home Study with our Agency (see The Office Interview and 5-6, Pick up Sticks) - Mar. 28, 2011
Preliminary immigration paperwork is sent to the US government Citizenship and Immigration Services. (see In the Mail) - Apr. 13, 2011
We traveled to Philadelphia to get our "Biometrics" (AKA - fingerprinting) done. - May 25, 2011
We have received USCIS Approval - June 13, 2011
Our psychological evaluation is completed. (see A New Step, All "Psych"-ed Out, Dossier On The Way) - June 14, 2011
Our Dossier needs to go to Harrisburg (see On To Harrisburg) then to New York (see New York, New York!, Back From New York) for review.
Our Dossier gets finalized and sent to the Honduran government for translation and approval. (See Paperwork Goes International) - Aug. 19, 2011
Our Dossier needs to be translated. (See Translated!) - Oct. 17, 2011
Our Dossier was reviewed by IHNFA (see Sooner Rather than Later?) - March 14, 2012
We had to complete more paperwork to have our Dossier approved (see More Paperwork, Off to Harrisburg, and New York, New York) - March 29, 2012
Our Dossier was approved by IHNFA. (see Happy & Heavy Heart) - June 1, 2012
We were assigned a "wait number" (see We Have a Number) - June 18, 2012
We received a "referral" to adopt two children from the Dirección de Niñez Adolescencia y Familia (DINAF). (see 5...4...3...YES!) - June 6, 2016
The next step is for us to travel to Honduras. We will be in Honduras for about 5 days to work through the finalization process for the adoption and with the US Consulate for our son and daughter's US citizenship. (see 1st Trip is on the Calendar)
We will make a second trip to Honduras for an undetermined length of time to pick up our son and daughter, finalize the process and bring them home. (see A Date to Sign!)

Yet to be done:

Once we return home, we will have a series of post-placement reports that need to be completed.