Delectable Thought

First a very Happy Day to John Owen Thurman. He's three today and it's been an incredible three year journey with him. My life has never been the same. There have been hair-pulling days and days full of joy, but I love being his mom and being a part of his life. He calls birthdays Happy Days! So let's all be happy today in celebration of his day! We received fifteen new photos of Melaku yesterday. This is almost unheard of and was a sweet blessing from the Lord. We feel very blessed to be receiving all the information that we have. Today we received word that he has been taken for his second medicals!! Woo-hoo! There is still one test that is not in country, but they feel that in two weeks he'll have that test and his second medicals will be complete. And then...our case can be submitted to court. Speaking of court---they reopen OCTOBER 5TH! Yay! That's very soon (at least when I think about waiting and waiting for months, one more month doesn...

We. Got. A. Referral! Last Wednesday I received a call from our case manager asking if I had a few minutes to talk. My first thought was is this more bad news or is this a referral. She then said, "I want to talk to you about a little boy." I said, "I want you to! Talk to me!" And now our journey has taken a new turn---a wonderful new turn! He is precious! His eyes are really big and BROWN! I've seen those eyes a thousand times before and now I can look at them and the face that goes with them. He's little and young---much younger than we thought he'd be. We were sure we'd get a toddler, but NOPE he's a baby. So we're digging out our cloth diapers and all the baby clothes we packed away! Yay! The process now is to wait for his second medicals which have been ordered by our agency. We are told that this can take a few weeks to a few months, so PRAY, PRAY, PRAY that it happens quickly. Our case CANNOT be submitted to court until we ...

Slow. That's how I would describe our wait for a referral. Very slow. Every week we get an update from our agency and it seems that more things keep happening in Ethiopia to slow things down even more. I won't list all the things that have happened, except for the most recent which is the sudden death of the Prime Minister of Ethiopia. This is big (or so our agency is telling us). We have been asked to pray for the stability of Ethiopia and to pray that policies concerning inter country adoption aren't negatively influenced. Many people ask about our adoption and we feel so loved when they do. We are encouraged that people are praying for us and truly interested in our journey. We are coming up on one year on the waiting list for a referral. This means that it's been one year since our paperwork (a.k.a. dossier) arrived in Ethiopia. We know that God is faithful and He can work through all the issues and seeming turmoil. If we're honest...(and I usually am...