Names!

For those of you who were wondering what we were going to name the boys...we have picked out Joshua and Jeremiah. Joshua will be the two year old's name, and Jeremiah the three to four year old's name. We are not sure exactly what their middle names will be yet, but we are thinking of using family names from both of our families!!! We received a video in the mail on Monday that was taken by the agency director's husband. He did such a wonderful job!!! The boys are playing ball at the orphanage and also playing with a xylophone! They both look happy and they are absolutely adorable! Jeremiah looks a bit shy, but this was only his first week at the orphanage, so he is still in the adjustment phase. Joshua has been there for a little over one month and has put on one pound!!! He looks like a different child in comparison to the pictures I received when he was first placed in the orphanage. In the first set of pictures, he made no expressions except for looking very sad. Now he is full of expressions and seems so happy. Our paperwork is currently in DC getting its final authentication and next week it should be on its way to Ethiopia. Once there, it will be translated and submitted to court. We are currently looking at a timeline of getting the boys in March or April, but anything can happen, so we must pray!!!! Thanks for taking the time to read our blog!!!

Our First Post

Noe and I officially began our adoption journey in April of 2009, but our journey actually began when we married. We have talked about adoption since we met!!! Adoption is something I have always felt that I have been called to do. Of course, since Noe was born in Guatemala, we were led to adopt from Guatemala first. However, at this time Guat. is closed and they are no longer processing adoptions here in the U.S. We spent almost a week talking to lawyers here in the U.S. and in Guatemala, but we were still unable to adopt even though this country is Noe's country of citizenship. Actually, we were told that we could adopt a baby from there, but we would have to go and live with the child for two years. The Lord was obviously leading us in another direction, perhaps on the other side of the world! In May, we attended an adoption picnic in Danville that was hosted by Adoption Assistance, who we chose to conduct our home study. There we were able to see children from Taiwan, Ethiopia, Guatemala, China, and Korea.  There were also children that were adopted domestically there.  Our hearts were led to Ethiopia for various reasons. First of all, there is a huge need in this country. Children are abandoned because their parents are ill or impoverished and can no longer care for them.  Secondly, there are lots of children available and the wait was not long at all. We were ready to start our family and did not want to wait two years.  Lastly, the children are just beautiful, and the culture is so easy to fall in love with.  We spent a few nights just looking up the children online (those already adopted)...just thinking how beautiful they were!   This was it! So we started our home study, researched agencies, and here we are now. It's really too late to go into all the details, paperwork, etc. that we had to go through to get to this point.  However, let me tell you that it was INTENSE (but well well worth it of course!!! :)  Now we have officially accepted the referrals of two boys, ages two and four.  They are brothers! They are absolutely adorable!!!! More to come later!