Questions, Questions, Questions

So many questions. Now that our first travel date is in sight so many, many questions are running around in my head. Some of them are questions that others who have the joy of being parents to an adopted little one could answer for us, like …

How long can we expect it take him to start speaking English? And what is the best way to communicate with him during the time when he is transitioning between languages?

What health problems should we expect in a child from his country? Parasites? Lice? Malnutrition? All of the above, plus a few more?

What physical needs do the orphanages have that we could enlist our church family to help us meet?

What about institutional behaviors? What should we expect?

What local resources can you suggest for post-adoption care?

What will the travel be like? What challenges should I be prepared for when travelling halfway around the world with a child who most likely has never even been outside his orphanage?

And some, only God knows the answers to, like…

How will we adjust as a family? What challenges will we face?

How much hurt is A.J. holding in his little heart? How can we help him heal?

How severe is his lung disease? How much medical treatment will he need once he is home?

Is he healthy? Safe?

What is his personality? What things does he like and what does he absolutely hate?

How will A.J. fit into the loud, busy, physical, exciting place that is the Jak Shack?

If you know me well, you know that I do NOT like things to be uncertain. I like being in control of things in my life and knowing what to expect. I plan things way in advance, make checklists, and have routines for almost everything. I like to have a plan, a back-up plan, and a contingency plan in place for everything.

That is one of the (many) things God has been working on me about during this adoption. He has asked me again and again to turn the control over to Him. I have slowly started to trust that He has the answers to the questions even if I do not.

 And I have learned that sometimes the answers to the questions don’t even matter. If we knew in advance all of the challenges that we would face in travelling the path that God has laid out for us, would we still chose to follow Him? Or would we say “No thanks God, that is just going to be too hard. We’re not interested.” Sometimes it is better to not know all of the answers and just trust that God has it covered!  It can be SO hard to do, but it is SO worth it.

Prayer Requests:

A very good friend of ours had an accident and amputated three of his fingers. They were able to save one of the three and did a modified amputation on the others. Please pray for him and his children who were with him when the accident occurred.

That our dossier processing will go quickly and we will get our travel dates soon!

Happy Birthday A.J.!

Today is A.J. 's 4th birthday!

This is a bittersweet day for us. We hoped that we would be able to celebrate this birthday with him here in Texas. That we would be able to give him a party and celebrate his life the same way we do for our other children's birthdays. Cake, presents, streamers, balloons, the works. I am praying that his day will be recognized in some small way in his orphanage, even if it is very small.

Your 5th birthday is going to be amazing A.J.! Momma is probably going to spoil you rotten trying to make up for all of the birthdays that you spent alone. Huge cake? Check. Too many presents? Check. Lots of family to celebrate with? Check. Pinata? Check. Pony? Hmmm, maybe not. :-) Lots of hugs, kisses and love? Double, triple check.

Happy birthday A.J.! We love you!

Chrissie's Legacy

Some of you may not know how God got ahold of our hearts and started us on this adoption journey in the first place. Our friend Lorraine shared that story on her blog today as they remember the anniversary of the month their daughter Chrissie spent fighting for her life in the ICU before she went home to live with Jesus. We never got a chance to meet Chrissie in person, but she is a HUGE part of the reason we are adopting. Lorraine shared about her family's vision of Chrissie hunting for orphans in heaven a while back and I smiled when I read it because I imagined Chrissie tapping Jesus on the shoulder and saying "You see that one in Eastern Europe? He's supposed to go home with the Jakubauskas Family and be a little Texan like me!"

I know it took a lot of courage for the Patterson family to open their hearts and lives to share Chrissie's story (and the rest of their lives) with the world, and God has used their family and their precious daughter in some wonderful ways. Will you join me in praying for the Patterson's as they go through this difficult time?

A little update...

I have been hoping to have some kind of exciting news to post here, but nothing earth shattering has been happening. We are waiting for the next big step in the process which will be receiving our official referral from the Ministry of Justice and then our travel dates for our first trip. Rush around to get everything done and then wait - that seems to be the theme in adoption! :-)

If you look at the fund raising thermometer to the right you may notice that it has been reset. We were amazingly blessed to be able to save the funds that we need to finish paying our agency fees which is a HUGE step. Now we need to start working on raising and saving the funds we will need for our travel for the first trip, AJ's medical exam and visa, our travel for the second trip, AJ's travel home, and then all of the post-adoption reports and paperwork that will be required. Several things have happened that are going to make our final expenses much more than we expected. First, our social worker has informed us that she is going to require an additional fee for the "extra" work that she had to do for our dossier (although she did not do anything out of the ordinary for an international adoption homestudy) and we are anticipating that she will end up charging us a higher fee for the post-adoption visits than we initially thought as well. That issue, added to the fact that we will be travelling during the most expensive time of the year has put us behind in our funding. We really thought that we were going to be fully funded with the funds we had, but the increase in expenses and some recent minor emergencies at home that have cut into our savings have put us in the position of having to ask for help again. We appreciate your prayers that God will provide the funds that we need. He has provided EVERYTHING we have needed so far and we are confident that He will provide this time as well!

Best mail ever!!

Yesterday I had a post ready to go about our frustration with waiting for our answer from USCIS, but I never got a chance to post it. Probably because God knew what was going to be waiting in our mailbox!

We got our approval notice in the mail from USCIS today!!

We are excited beyond belief. Those of you who have been following our journey know how much of a miracle this is. Now I am driving our social worker and agency crazy trying to get the last few documents we need from them so that we can send our dossier to Bulgaria. We need to have our Texas background checks redone this week and have our doctor resign our medical clearance forms (because both of these documents have to be done within 6 months of the dossier) and then we will pay an exorbitant amount of money to mail this HUGE package of documents. We are praying that we will be able to get everything signed and apostilled so that we can mail it on Friday.

So now what??
- Dossier submitted to Bulgarian agency
- Dossier translated, authenticated and submitted to the Ministry of Justice (MOJ)
-We are registered as an adoptive family
- Verbal referral issued
- Written referral issued
- Travel dates!!! (It will probably be about 2 months before we find out what our travel dates will be)

After our first trip
- Submit I-800 to the National Visa Center
- Visa sent to the US Embassy in Bulgaria
- Provisional visa filed
- Article 5 letter issued
- Visa/Article 5 letter translated and authenticated
- All documents sent to the MOJ
- Case submitted to the court system
- Court date!!
- 7 day wait for court to become final
- New birth certificate issued
- 10 day wait for birth certificate to become final
- Travel to Bulgaria to bring AJ home!! (Not sure how long the second stage of the process will take)

I am still amazed at how many steps are in each stage of the process and how much time, effort, and love has to go into  preparing everything. At the beginning of our adoption were were told that we would have to make the decision to adopt over and over again throughout the process and now I understand why. There have been many times when it would have been easy to throw in the towel. We had to consciously decide to continue to fight to bring our little guy home. I think the hardest part of the paperwork process is done now.

Keep praying for AJ to stay healthy and for us to have the funds we need at exactly the right time.