6 is good!

China sent referrals today for those families logged in through February 15, 2006. This is 6 more days of LID's, which is what they have been averaging for quite awhile. While 10 or 12 days would have been great, we are hoping they keep up at least a 6 day average, which would mean a referral for us in May, 2009. Yea!

P.S. For those of you keeping track, 6 LID's checked off this month means 40 is now our magic number! :)

Paperwork progress

After being fingerprinted in Indy a couple of weeks ago, we waited for our newest copy of the all-important I-171H document. Families adopting internationally can't complete their adoption without this form, and it is the 'big' piece of paperwork that families wait for as they finish up paperwork the first time around. Well, we have had the distinct honor of having been fingerprinted by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security 3 times now, so we are on our third I-171H. We are very approved and very official - 3 times over! Our new fingerprint expiration date is December 12, 2009, so my hope and prayer is that we are good to go!

A Little History.... (Part 1)

Some of you lovely readers may have heard this story a hundred times by now, and to others it might be brand new. Either way, it is part of our story that we hope Audrey will want to hear (or read) over and over some day. This is how we came to be where we are on our adoption journey....

Mark and I have loved being parents for the past 13 years, and we have loved being the parents of two great kids. We always planned on two, we were content with our two, and had no plans to add to our family. God had different plans in mind for us. Mark and I attended a Steven Curtis Chapman concert on December 2, 2004. In addition to sharing his great music, Steven spent time talking about his family's foundation, Shaohannah's Hope, which provides financial assistance to adoptive families. There was also a video with lots of information, and it ended with this scripture:

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

There was no reference given, and I left the concert that night thinking about that verse. I knew I had heard it before, but I did not know where in the Bible it was located. I was struck by the simplicity of it and the directness of it. I did not go home and dig in my Bible to find this verse, but I thought about it off and on over the next month or so, wondering why my mind kept coming back to it.

Our pastor started a Bible study on the book of James in January 2005. I had participated in some of his other studies and thought this sounded interesting. We spent the first day of the class talking about some of the broad themes of the book, and he invited us to open our Bibles to just look through the chapters together. We started in James Chapter 1. I skimmed through the first few verses, turned the page, and there it was. There it was.

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

I felt the strangest sensation come over me and really felt God was saying to me, "Here it is. You wanted to know, so here it is. Now - what are you going to do about it?" I sat there not really knowing what to say, or do, or think. I was trying to hold back tears, not really wanting to explain this experience I just had to a room full of people who, I'm pretty sure, had not shared the experience with me! So, I sat there with my mind racing. Are we supposed to adopt? (Surely not us! We already have two kids. We planned on two kids. We are all set with two kids. Mark is going to think I have lost my mind! Nope, don't think we should adopt.) Are we supposed to donate to Shaohannah's Hope? (We could do that - that would be easy! Sign me up for easy! Yes, that is a good plan and a great way to take care of orphans. We should definitely donate to Shaohannah's Hope.) Ok, God - thanks for the heads up. You have my attention and I will talk to Mark about a donation!

I thought I had it all worked out in my mind in that moment, except my mind wouldn't stop with just a donation and it kept coming back, kept coming back, and kept coming back to adoption - all within the span of about an hour and a half. I raced to call Mark after Bible study ended and I couldn't get my words out fast enough. He did, indeed, think that I had lost my mind, and he was not overly thrilled to hear of my great revelation, especially since he was in the middle of a meeting at work.

I'll share Mark's reaction and more of the story the next time....

Anyone want to race?

Well, we made our way to Indy today to get refingerprinted, after dropping the kids off at a friend's house at 6:30am. We left with plenty of time to spare, until we encountered lots and lots of traffic here. Who knew that the Indy Motor Speedway would be swamped at 9:30 on a Friday morning in September? We had plenty of time to people watch while we were stuck in traffic, and there were a lot of wet motorcycle fan types of people pouring into the speedway. We finally made it to the downtown Indy Citizenship and Immigration office, and we were in and out with no problems. We navigated the pouring rain the whole way home, and were home by noon. It was kind of a dreary day to be traveling, but it was one more necessary baby step forward to bring Audrey home.

Slow and steady....

Referrals for September came out today, covering LID's through February 9th, 2006. Nine more days checked off, which takes our number from 55 LID's down to 46 LID's left. Yea! Nine days is the highest number referred in a year and a half, so that is kind of encouraging. I know it could go back down to something tiny next month, but it is kind of nice while it lasts. We'll take it!

I don't know what I'll feel when we are actually close to receiving our referral - within a month or two. We pray for Audrey and wonder about her, but all we really know how to do is wait and renew paperwork. Speaking of which, we get to go have our USCIS fingerprints done for the third time next week. They are good for 15 months, so surely, surely this will be the last time. Please?