an adoption video

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It takes a minute to start once you hit play but it is an amazing video of 3 boys getting adopted...  so incredibly touching.  It made me think of sweet Tess and what she must have felt when she was told she has a new family and then shown our pictures.  These beautiful, brave children have had to adapt and persevere through the unthinkable. Each little one forced to make sense of all this in their own way...

Tess getting pictures of us!!

We were told we could send Tess a photo album of our family.  We filled this little book with pictures and labeled ourselves.  We also included all the photos we had of Tess up to that time so she could begin to see herself with us.  We wrote her letters that I hope some has translated for her, telling her how much she is already loved and how we can't wait to be together.  Can you just imagine what this all must feel like to her?....

BUY A GOAT !?@#$!!

I found a great way to help these beautiful children...instead of giving more "stuff" next time you need to give a gift, buy a goat or some chickens in someone's honor!!  World vision will deliver the animals to the family in need.  They can eat from these animals as well as sell the milk and eggs to buy grains.  I just did this today for my friend Joan who's birthday is this weekend.  I'm sure it will be the greatest gift she gets...knowing that she has helped in some small way.  www.wvus.org

go to the "livestock" donation and click...

Never a dull moment...

Just when you think things are scheduled...we got an email saying they made a mistake on our court date...It is one week later on July 29th !  This after I lined up Jeff's mom to stay with the boys the week of July 16-26th, and booked our flights to Addis and confirmed our Hotel reservations!! I think I'm becoming very a professional problem solver...

I immediately got on the phone and pleaded my case... Our fantastic case worker was able to get us put back on the schedule for a July 22nd court date!!  God is good!  It saved me 2 days of phone calls rescheduling all our reservations!!

...the something that I can do!

I have been struggling with finding perspective on our amazing lives as I learn about the devastating circumstances in Africa.  People living with virtually nothing, most are lucky to get 1 meal a day, children dying of starvation every 7 seconds and Aids continuing to wipe out an entire generation.  These are real lives, souls, loving mothers helplessly watching their children suffer.

Jeff and I teach our kids about giving. We donate, sponsor 15 kids through World Vision, took a mission trip to Mexico to  work at an orphanage and we pray...yet it does not feel like enough.  We are learning more about Africa everyday.  It is our daughters birth country. We are forever tied to it.  

I now stop and think twice about what we spend money on.  That extra $10.00 could feed a child for a week.  And yet we drive our SUV's and go to Starbucks. I'm trying to find the balance between enjoying what we have been blessed with and all that we have learned on this amazing journey.

"now then, stand still and see the great thing the Lord is about to do before your eyes" 1Samuel 12:26

We passed our court hearing today!!

Thank you all for your prayers...they worked!!!  We are now Tess's official parents and are listed on her birth certifcate!  Everything went well with our hearing in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.  Our case worker in Addis had our power of attorney and went to court on our behalf.  Everything in Tess's file was fine and our adoption was approved!

Now we can focus on organizing our trip.  We are scheduled to leave on July 16th!! So much to do!

I'm so excited right now!!  I wish I could hug you all!!!

INTRODUCING...TESS JONAS !!!!

Time to Pray !!

2 more days until our court date...PLEASE SAY A PRAYER.

It looks like everything is in order, but they have been having problems with blackouts due to the drought.  This could cause some delays as the offices have no electricity to run. We've been told to bring flashlights and batteries when we travel there!! 

The drought is causing many problems due to crop failure...especially food shortages. Please pray for these sweet kids that don't have enough food.  Pray that God sends much needed rain!!

We Got Our Visa!!

Today we received notice that we were approved for a Visa 37 which approves us to adopt an Ethiopian child ages 5 - 10 years old!!  This is what we needed to go to court this Friday...so very good news.

We are out at our ranch and everyday we talk about what it will be like when we are back here in August with 4 kids, one of whom doesn't speak english!  How incredible it will be to see the world through her eyes!  Everything will be so new and exciting.  Things we've done hundreds of times will suddenly be new-even to us!!

I continue to read about Ethiopia, it's people and rich history.  I attached a photo of a typical house out in the country.   And I continue to learn a few Ethiopian Amharic words so I can talk to Tess.  ENAT means mom and EWEDESHALO means I love you.

A Better Day!!

Sorry about that...I never entered my blog yesterday.  We got some bad news about our approval in Addis.  The American Embassy in Addis still had not received our approval from the National Visa Center, which needed to get approval from the US Customs and Immigration Service.  The big deal is that we go to court next Friday and could not pass court without this approval.

So I spent 2 hours on the phone trying to track down who dropped the ball.  Try getting through to a US government agency over the phone...Good Luck!!

The good news is I finally got through and they were able to solve the problem and get a cable sent.  My caseworker now took over and is making sure everything is in order for court in Addis next week.

Thank goodness we leave today for our ranch in Utah!!  I need a little R & R after that roller coaster ride!! 

a bad day

Ethiopian To Do List

 My day yesterday was spent emailing back and forth with an adoption travel agent.  We need special tickets since we may have to make changes on our dates depending on court stuff.  Also, we will be returning with an extra child who has an ethiopian passport...it gets a bit confusing...

And so, as you can imagine our trip "to do list" is jam packed with things we need to do as we now have a count down...

We started by getting the "recommended vaccines" off our list.  We read over the long, scary list from the CDC (center for disease control) and called the "travel Doctor".  He's such a sweet old man who only does travel vaccines for all over the world.  Our hit list looked like this...

-Yellow Fever (hurt the most)

-polio booster

-Hep A ( 2 shots)

-Heb B ( 3 shots)

-Meningoccocal

-typhoid

and we're taking prescriptions for Malaria, CIPRO and a Zpack in case of bloody diarrhea!!

I guess we're good to go!!  I'm glad to have that off our list!!

"I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you"

John 14:18

YEEAAHH!!! We got our court date!!

June 20th!!  circle it and pray, pray, pray that we make it through our court hearing on the first try!!  We are so excited!!  It really makes things seem so soon!!-time  to plan our trip.  If we pass court then our embassy date is the Tuesday 5 weeks after, which is July 22!!  I can now tell the travel agency that we need to be in Addis on July 20th! 

You can't believe how many things are falling into place reaffirming that our journey is God driven!!  I keep receiving affirmations time after time!!  I have been reading the most beautiful testimonials from families that have already taken this journey and are home with their sweet child.  It's so encouraging and exciting that we were also chosen to be blessed in this way!

I will post Tess's picture after we pass our court hearing next week!!

Tess got our photo album!

Any day that we get news on Tess is a great day!!  Today we received photos of Tess holding the little photo album we sent her of our family.  We were told we could send some family pictures so we put together an album and here it is in her hands half way around the world!!  I hope it wont be too long until I can post these photos to share with all of you!! The most important thing is that our little girl now has pictures of her new mom and dad and brothers and sister!!  I like that she'll be familiar with our faces when we get there.  

Christine's High School Graduation May 31, 2008

Meanwhile...life at home goes on .  We had a great weekend celebrating Christine's graduation from JSerra Catholic High School.  It was a beautiful ceremony and she couldn't be happier.  Now we are focusing on getting Tess here before we take Christine to SMU in Dallas!  Never a dull moment.  I hope the girls have a few weeks together before Christine leaves for college.  Next week...Bennett graduates from Jr. High...

latest court news...

Our case worker has informed us that all our documents were submitted to the Ethiopian court on May 29th.  This means that we will now be assigned a court hearing to approve our adoption.  We have sent over a power of attorney to our Ethiopian rep to go to court on our behalf to finalize Tess's adoption.  Once we get court approval, they tell me we will travel 7-10 days after to go get her!  Pray that we get a court date in June like our case worker thinks...that would mean travel in July!!

I have been following,  ok obsessed with, 

 adoption blogs, and have read so many where it takes 3 or more tries to get through the court approval.  I just pray we get through on the first go round!!