Sunday, April 22, 2012

Care Package

Grace and I picked out a Care Package for Marcus.  I had seen http://redthreadchina.com/ highly recommended on a few other blogs, so we thought we'd give it a try.  It will be pretty awesome if he actually gets it.  Ann (at redthread) translated a letter for us that we wrote to him, it includes a disposable camera with his name so hopefully we will get pictures!! a photo album with our family pics (she put our chinese characters next to our names), and other goodies.  One benefit of having almost every baby product that is sold in the U.S. say "Made in China", is that I am pretty sure I can find this blanket in a local store near us.  From experience, every child needs a back-up blankie! 



Cute conversation earlier this week, Jack (3): "I'm hungry".  Me: "Daddy's getting Chinese Food".  Jack: "Is he going to pick up Marcus?"  Too cute.

Still waiting on our I-800 (Immigration approval for Marcus)....

Friday, April 13, 2012

The Blog begins

The blog begins.  I have been obsessive about reading about other's adoption journeys, so it is finally time to record my own!  We are currently waiting for our I-800 for our little Marcus who is 9 months old.  We received our LOA (Letter from China confirming our match) Thursday, April 5 after 33 days....but who's counting?....the average wait is supposedly 52 days :).  The wait continues....

A little about our family.  We have 3 biological children and decided we wanted one more child to complete our family.  God laid it on our heart to pursue adoption and we are so glad that we have.  Our journey has been filled with ups and downs as many others.  In Sept., we were matched with a son, Samuel, who was one and a half years old.  We were so excited about his arrival, had received our LOA and sent him a care package.  In January, we received the worst news a waiting adopting family could receive - our son had died.  At the time, we had very little information of how or why.  We grieved him deeply and had a memorial service for him.  We learned later that he was hospitalized and had complications with bronchitis-pnemonia.  We have full confidence that he is waiting in heaven for us - that he is a part of our family.  The other day, my eldest daughter prayed in a "pinky prayer", "Thank you, God, for my four brothers."  She will always keep him alive in our hearts.  It strikes me how the initial motivation in adopting is to impact a child - to give him a family.  In Samuel's case, he never knew us here on Earth, we didn't have a chance to impact him here; yet he impacted our family in a huge way.   I can't wait to see the way that Marcus will impact us - it will be more that we could ever imagine.

  
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  Romans 15:13