Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young – a place near your altar, O Lord Almighty, my King and my God.  Blessed are those who dwell in your house…

Psalm 84:3-4

After dinner language lessons taught by Becca.

And… be still my heart… Michael can say “Sparrow” and if you ask him,

“Where is Sparrow?”

He runs to the refrigerator and points to her picture!

We heard today from our caseworker at Lifeline that we have received our

Pre-Approval to adopt Sparrow!

We are so excited!

We will continue on through the process now, hoping to be able to travel during 2014.

We were first drawn to this precious 8 year old little girl in November, but at that time we were told her file was spoken for.  Our caseworker called us in December to let us know that her file was available and after praying together as a family, we believed we were supposed to pursue adopting her.

Did I mention that we are all quite excited?

*Smile*

Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make known among the nations what he has done, and proclaim that his name is exalted.  Sing to the Lord, for he has done glorious things, let this be known to all the world.

Isaiah 12:4-5

We are learning as we go how the process to adopt a child from China works.
So many details to attend to…
Sometimes people ask me questions about what is next,
or how something works,
and I have to admit that I just don’t know yet!

We have prepared our I800A to go to US Immigration,
and now this week have some exciting news to share!
We are also planning to submit to China our Letter of Intent,
asking permission to be matched with a particular little girl.
We are not able to share anything else with you at this time,
but I am thinking of her as
“Sparrow.”
Do you know the song?

I sing because I’m happy,
I sing because I’m free,
His eye is on the sparrow,
and I know He watches me

It is so obvious that his hand is on this whole process of adoption and that he truly does watch over these little ones. Some good friends of ours recently shared with us, just as I have shared with you today, that they were so excited because they believed that they knew which precious child they were supposed to adopt from China. Just like today, they were not able to share any other information with us at that time. She hoped that they would be able to get back to us in a few weeks. Well, we prayed for them and waited and did not hear anything. Then came all the business of Christmas and we still did not hear anything. As we progressed in our own journey through this process, we sat down a little over a week ago to look over the lists of precious children available for adoption from China. We asked the “big” kids to join us and we hoped that the Lord would speak to us if one of the faces we saw was the little brother or sister to join our family. We made a short list of names to pray over. This last week, I checked back on each of these children and we were so happy to see that one little girl had been matched with a family! We had been drawn to her and prayed for her, but felt no disappointment – only happiness for her. Today as I reviewed some emails, I realized that our friends had emailed us 11 days ago and I had missed it! The email shared more information about the little girl that they are now pre-approved to adopt, including a picture – and it was the same little one who we had been so happy for when we saw that she now had a family! Isn’t that special that the Lord would lead us to pray for our friends’ new daughter?

A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows,
is God in his holy dwelling.
God sets the lonely in families…
Psalm 68:5-6

Today we spent over $100 to procure documentation that we are not criminals at the local or national level. I am ok with that ~ we want these precious children that are eligible for adoption going to safe homes and families!

 Here is what I am worried about…

I apparently have “difficult” fingerprints.

 After visiting the Douglas County Sheriff to get (blank) copies of our local criminal histories, the officer downtown at the Omaha Police Department had to roll some of my prints 4 and 5 times, and the computer still said that they were not good enough! They have been submitted along with Jason’s to the State Patrol in Lincoln to have a National Criminal/FBI History Check done ~ but they could be deemed unreadable or rejected.

 Will pray with us that God will smooth over this potential bump in our adoption process? If they are rejected and have to be rerolled, it could add weeks to our home study process.

 Thank you!!

The king’s heart is like channels of water in the hand of the Lord;

He turns it wherever He wishes.

Proverbs 21:1

 Only 12-18 months left to go!

 This would have us traveling to China sometime late 2014, or hopefully by early 2015. We have learned from our adoption journey with Michael, that often these “suggested timelines” are not always an accurate description of what will really happen, but this is what Lifeline Children’s Services says is reasonable to expect. This next year to year and a half will involve some reading, education on international adoption and attachment issues, physicals for the whole family, fingerprints and background checks, coordinating 2 different adoption agencies, and lots and lots of forms. I know that some of you reading know much better than we do what lies ahead, but for some of you, this may be a helpful description of the future.

We appreciate you walking along side of us in this new adventure…we are excited to see what God has in store!

 We have been quite encouraged by this verse shared on a blog by the name of There’s No Place Like Home …

 Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west.

Isaiah 43:5