The wait is over--we have a son!

On Wednesday morning, I was praying with my friend Melissa for patience in the midst of this long wait. I mentioned that it had been hard, but that it was at the back of my mind again as I was keeping busy with many other things. It was encouraging to pray together. I then met with two students, and while we were talking, my cell phone rang. I looked at the caller ID, and it was a number from Virgina. My stomach did flip-flops as I knew it was almost certainly our family coordinator! I stepped out to take the call, and was so glad to hear her voice. She said she'd been trying to reach Ben, but he wasn't answering his phone. So, she tried again to conference him in, and when he didn't answer, she asked if I wanted to hear the news by myself. By this time, I knew that she was calling with a referral, so I told her of course Ben wouldn't mind!

She told me she had a referral for us of a beautiful 8-month-old baby boy! Since children aren't released to be adopted internationally in Russia until they're 8 months old, it was a sweet surprise to learn that he was so young. I wasn't near a computer, so I couldn't look at his picture right then, but she proceeded to walk through his medical information and some other details. Ben was meeting with a student, but I quickly called him to tell him our referral had arrived! It was so hard to wait an hour for him to come pick me up. We went straight to our church for a missions conference that started that afternoon. All the way in the car, we talked about what we knew, prayed together for him and for wisdom, and dreamed about our potential son.

As soon as we arrived at church, we raced to our pastor's office to check our email on his computer. We couldn't log on quickly enough! As we waited for his picture to load, we both seemed to be holding our breath....and then, there he was! We both grinned and looked at each other--he was so beautiful! I knew immediately in my heart that this was our son. Without question. We spent a moment reading through the email and prayed together, and then we had to go back to our meeting. I don't have any idea what happened because my mind was certainly elsewhere! Somehow we got back home that night, and printed out copies of his picture to post in our house and carry around with us. Late that night, I emailed all of his medical information to a doctor who specializes in international adoptions. We brought his picture to bed with us, so we could keep looking at this boy who had already captured our hearts. We prayed for him, and wondered how we would ever sleep. Somehow, we did.

The next morning (yesterday), we received a call back from the doctor's nurse, and she scheduled a phone consultation with us for that afternoon. Again, we wondered how we would make it through our meetings at church, but we did. We brought his picture along to show everyone, and also enjoyed our time with other missionaries from our church. God was gracious to allow us to connect in the midst of our concentration problems. :-)

That afternoon, we spoke with our wonderful doctor. He is a Christian who has adopted from Russia himself, and it was such an encouragement. He walked us through all of the medical information we had about our son. He was honest, and gave us possible worst-case scenarios, but also gave us a lot of hope. He gave us a list of suggested questions to ask in order to find out more information. At the end, He prayed with us--so amazing. As soon as we got off the phone, we grabbed a quick dinner and headed to church again for more of the missions conference. We briefly discussed the phone call together late last night, but agreed it would be good to sleep on the decision and pray together since we were both exhausted.

This morning, we woke up and talked more about everything. We both agreed that even though there could be some medical concerns, God had made it clear to both of us that this is our son! No matter what issues might come up, we are confident that God will give us the grace and faith to walk through them together with His provision. We were ecstatic to realize that this was the moment we had been waiting for for so many months!

This morning, we sent in the paperwork to our agency to officially accept our referral and move ahead with the process. Praise the Lord for His goodness in choosing this child just for us to be a part of our family!

We have an appointment date to meet him in Russia on March 19. Right now, we are waiting for our agency to hear back from Russia to make sure that travel date is still correct. In about a week, we should have verification and will begin to book plane tickets and hotel rooms. We will leave a few days before our appointment date, and will only be in Russia for about 3 days. We'll have a total of an hour to see our son, spend a little time with him, and officially accept him as ours. Then, it will be back home for two months while we wait for our court date (hopefully in May). He'll be a year old in June, so we're praying that he'll be home before then.

So many of you have prayed with us for years for God to bring a child into our home. It is incredible to watch that dream coming true before our very eyes. Please pray for the many details that need to come together in the weeks ahead as we prepare for our first trip to Russia.

We are already very proud parents! We wish we could show you his picture here, but we aren't able to until we bring him home permanently. You'll just have to take our word for how adorable he is. How can I already be so in love with a little boy I have yet to meet? Thank you, God, for this gift that is beyond all we could ask or imagine!

The nursery decoration has begun

This weekend, we went to Orlando to visit Ben's dad and brother, who were in town for a convention. Yesterday, they played golf while I got some wonderful time to myself. Included in that time was a three-hour shopping trip to Ikea! I really enjoyed wandering around all alone, stopping to look at whatever interested me. After spending quite a bit of time in the children's section, I finally decided on the bedding for our nursery! I showed it to Ben after the golf game, and he liked it too. I thought I would post it here for those of you who might not be able to see it in person anytime soon:This is the quilt cover. It has lots of brightly colored animals. I just LOVE it!
These are the curtains. I don't know how well you can see the picture, but it has a border of the animals on the bottom, and some cute colorful ties on top.

And lastly, this is the coordinating fabric. We bought the one in the top left corner. I hope to make some pillows, and maybe some hangings for the wall as well. Buying all of this yesterday (along with a new dresser for him!) makes it feel so much more real that our son really will be home soon. I can't wait for him to enjoy his room!

Waiting is my middle name

Many friends have told me that they check this blog often for updates, so I thought it was high time for another post. It's been over a month since our last one, but there is still no news of a referral for our family yet. We continue to trust God in the wait. Thankfully, with all that is happening on campus, time is really flying by and we're enjoying every minute of it!

I called our family coordinator today, just to check in and hear her voice. :-) It was good to touch base and to be reassured that all is well. It sounds like they tend to get referrals in waves, so we're just waiting to ride the next wave. Who knew that adoption could be compared to surfing?!

She did also mention a new prayer request. For our second trip to Russia (when we finalize the adoption), we have to travel on an adoption visa. Last month, that office closed in Moscow, with no explanation or plans to reopen. Huh? Other regions have changed their policy and are allowing families to travel on tourist visas instead, but Nizhny still hasn't changed theirs. So, families who are waiting for court dates won't be allowed to travel until this is resolved. It doesn't affect us directly yet, but it will as time gets closer. And it's a big deal for other families who are waiting to bring their children home. So, please join us in praying that Nizhny will allow tourist visas, and that we'll get news of our son soon. Wouldn't that be a great Valentine's present?