Enjoying summer

Not much new here on the adoption front. We are still waiting to hear when our fingerprinting appointment is. We've gotten two letters in the mail from the USCIS, and each time, my heart beat goes a little faster to see if it is our fingerprint appt. Each time, it was just a confirmation that they got our application and paperwork. They are pretty efficient, huh, telling us twice that they got our paperwork? At least we know we sent it to the right address, though. We're going to a wedding this weekend, so on the way we are stopping by the secretary of state to get most of our paperwork authenticated. It will feel good to have that step of the paperchase almost done.

Here's a picture of the kids (with cousins and friend) at the pet parade on the 4th.

Home study done!

We sent off our homestudy and I-800A application to immigration last Wednesday, finally. It took longer than expected for our homestudy to be reviewed, so we are back on track with our initially expected timeline. Next we wait for our fingerprint appointment, where we get to drive to the Portland immigration office to get our fingerprints taken for a FBI background check (even though we already had an FBI background check for our homestudy). We really aren't criminals!!!

Last Friday, Hannah had her first dance recital. She did great doing a ballet dance as Tinkerbell, a tap dance as Minnie Mouse, and a dance with Joel as Beauty and the Beast. They did great, I was so proud of them! Joel was the only brother dancing. Everyone else was Dads or a boyfriend.



We also went to the beach a couple weeks ago with April's side of the family, so here's some pictures from that weekend.

First care package and good news

First of all, the good news. We are officially not criminals!!! Our homestudy background checks came back yesterday, which was faster than we expected (We had to wait 5 1/2 weeks, instead of the expected 8 to 9 weeks). Now our agency just needs to check the homestudy and then we will file with immigration. One step (out of a million steps) closer to our son!!!

We sent our first care package to Josiah on Monday. We decided to send this one on our own, instead of using a service, so hopefully it will get to him. We have no way of knowing if he gets it. When it is his birthday in October, we will probably use a service to send him a cake, but for this one we thought it would be more fun to pick out the items ourselves. David and I slept with the little dog for a few nights to help get our scent on it, maybe help with attachment???

Last day skiing of the season

We went up to the mountain on Sunday to go skiing for one last time. Had fun watching some "pond skimming," where people ski or board down a hill and skim across a pond of icy cold water, usually sinking into the water. The kids thought this was so fun (to watch!). Now we are on to warmer weather and will have to make the switch to water skiing.

Fun hiking day

We went to Smith Rock today to go for a hike that is normally to difficult to bring Joel and Hannah since Joel and Hannah are at Disneyland this weekend with their Nana and Grandpa. It was fun to do something with just Olivia, since we don't get to do that very often. She ate up all the attention.

Pre-approved!

We found out late last night that we have been pre-approved by China to adopt Josiah. This pre-approval is way faster than we expected (usually they take anywhere from 2 weeks to a month). Now we have to hurry up and get our paperwork finished! Best case scenario, we are hoping to travel at the earliest next January or February.

Here we go again!

We have been discussing the possibility of either having another child naturally or adopting again over the last four months. Last week (Thursday), we decided that we have a clear answer from God that it is part of His desire for us to adopt again. We also agreed that we have the personalities, family structure, exterior resources, and financial resources necessary to provide a loving home for an adopted child. Our Father calls us to care for the widows and orphans (James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.) As our hearts are already for the Chinese people, we have a clear understanding of the process, and there is a huge need we decided on another child from China. A boy this time… you know, to even out the female/male ratio. So over the weekend we reviewed some files of children with special needs. A couple piqued our interest and we requested more information. However last night around 10:30 we received an email file of a boy with cleft lip and palate who buried himself into our hearts. (I found out later that while I was checking my email, April was praying that we would have a clear answer to finding our son) After that, we calmed down and we prayed some more… then started to realize that this child was probably already “locked in” with someone else due to time differences, his minor special needs, and crazy good looks/personality. But we asked her to try and see if he was available anyways. 12:30 last night we got an email reporting that she had locked his file for us (meaning that he is ours). So… we have officially found our future son, Josiah. Here he is!