My Sunshine Has Come!

It's been a while since I've even looked at my blog. many wonder what happened? We went through the devastating loss of our first adopted child. She was found to have a severe special need which were not approved nor equip to handle. We found out 2 days before we were to travel to Ethiopia to bring her home. While our entire family was shook by this, we sought God and we found peace. God allowed us to love her and to advocate for this precious child. Though it was painful, I'm honored that God chose us because the reward was great! Shortly after the Ethiopian courts decided that the child would be better suited with another family and that we could adopt again, we were referred another precious baby girl! A few weeks before this referral, I had this overwhelming feeling of light and peace. I wrote in my journal that the next child would be as bright as the sun and light up our lives with joy. So to my surprise when we got the call and were told that the child's name meant She is like the sun, I felt as if it were a sign from God that every thing's gonna be alright!

We traveled in January and stayed thru the beginning of March. It was a blessing to stay through court and embassy! The time in country with our daughter was an opportunity of a lifetime. I truly felt like I was at home, most people were welcoming and hospitable. We met friends for life during our stay. I did have a few sick spells but nothing some cipro, and gentamiacin drops couldn't help;-) Now we are home with all of our children finally under one roof! After 3 long years our sunshine has come...Tsehay Justice is with us forever!

Thanks a Bunch!

Thanks a bunch to those of you who showed your care and concern through your posts. Your prayers are valuable to me. Yes, we did go through a rough patch on the adoption road but things are looking up now! I thank God for His grace, love and mercy and I hope to post in more detail soon. Blessings to you all...Happy Thanksgiving!!!

I Just Want To Hold Her

I just want to hold her, kiss her, and tell her how much I love her. Tomorrow will make 7 weeks since we received our referral and still we have no word of a court date! I'm not even going to front like I'm not irritated by this part of the process. It was different when I was waiting to find out who my daughter was but now that I know, I have to be with her! This feeling is almost primal...animalistic...instinct. To know your child is on another continent and you are dependent on the efficiency and diligence of someone else to unite you, is a very helpless feeling that makes me want to beat my chest and ROARRRR! Whew, but then my spirit man says to pray, make your request known unto God, cry out to the one who knows the beginning from the end...He is the only one who can bring you peace Toni. OK Lord I release it all to you, I trust in your perfect timing. We found out that there are now two court dates instead of one. The first, is for the birth relatives to give consent to the judge for the adoption. The second is where we are expected to appear in court to give our consent to adopt. From what we hear that initially trip will be about 3-4 days and the next trip is the embassy/visa appointment which is 5-7 days, and then we get to bring her home! Until then I'll channel my stress into pre-packing. A co-worker of my husbands lend us those space vac bags, so we can start packing up some of the things we will need to take on our trip. Keep us in your prayers. Blessings!

Time to Bond

Here's a pic of one of the coolest gifts that I've received in a long time. Well it's not actually my gift, it's a gift for my baby girl. A good friend of mine and fellow adoptive mommy sent these books on behalf of her 1 year old daughter (these happen to be her favorite); "Please baby please" and "whose toes are those". I love them and I know my daughter will too! Reading these beautiful books to her will just give the two of us valuable time to bond. I actually think the little girl in "please baby please" resembles my daughter, minus the hair...my girl only has a few downy feathers for hair, for now:-) We're still awaiting word of a court date keep us in your prayer please, thank you.

For The Glory Of Love

My husband and I got our travel vaccines the day after we got the call for our referral. We went to a local travel clinic. It was a pretty cool experience, the walls had world map murals on them and there were corners of the clinic set up with vintage luggage...very cool. So we both got the typhoid, yellow fever, Hep A&B, and Tetanus. OUCH IE! OMG it felt like my arm was going to fall off. They said that there may be a possibility that we may feel a little fluish, but I wasn't worried about that, I was still flying high off of the day before. Well how about later that evening I felt flush, not quite like myself. Hubby made me go to bed early just to get some rest because I was a little sleep deprived. I felt worse and worse until I found myself taking cold and flu medicine that didn't quite alleviate the symptoms. I was seriously ill! I had almost every symptom that the discharge paper said I would have plus some! One night I realized that I had a tender lump under my armpit. It was so painful that I couldn't put my arm down I had to sleep with it above my head:-( I finally went to the doctor and she said that it was a moderate reaction to the vaccines. A week later I started to re-coop. Wow, I had to be the small percentage of people that gets sick, right!?!? I guess that was the exchange for labor...HA! It's all for the glory of love and I would do it all again . Oh yeah I have to go back for the next round of HEP and this time I'm getting the meningitis. I sure hope this time around isn't as dramatic. As far as the adoption goes, we are awaiting word of our court date. You may already know that Ethiopia is now requiring adoptive parents to appear in court along with a birth relative, so we will be traveling for that. I've heard that the court date usually comes 4-6 weeks after referral, so we are almost four weeks in...soon before courts close for the rainy season, please Lord! So for know we are contacting travel agents and inquiring about the journey ahead. The good thing is the kids are out for SUMMER VACATION, so our travels won't interfere with school. There are some really nice families that are ET now and they offered to bring back pictures of my sweet peach...Oh I can't wait! In the mean time for fun I'm filling her armoire with the cutest close, shoes, and let's not forget about accessories! Tomorrow my family and I are going to visit our two favorite Habesha girls. It's always a joy to hang out with fellow adoptive families. I can't wait until my baby girl completes the trio. I just thank my Father (God) for His many blessings. He is truly good!

PS: I saw this poster somewhere and I thought it was funny but true. Just know that the tears are more often tears of joy:-)

We Got The Call!!!

Wow I know it's late, but I'm finally winding down from this whirlwind of a day. I'm going to take these last few minutes before I go to sleep to say..."We got the call"! This morning or should I say yesterday morning around 11:19am Ashley called with the news of an 8month old precious baby girl. After what seems like a life time of waiting it's finally my turn to post good news. She's as pretty as a peach...literally she has a round face with juicy cheeks and a brown sugar complexion with peachy undertones. I guess I will have to break out the headband because she doesn't really have any hair just a couple of downy feathers. I can't wait to send the acceptance paperwork off and get to waiting for my COURT DATE...which I hope and pray will come very soon. Tomorrow or shall I say today we're off to the travel clinic to get the vaccinations the we need to travel to Ethiopia. God is soooooo good. His mercy endures forever. The day when not one person in my house mentioned "the call" or fixated on a referral is the day the call came. I'll give you more on the details of the scene and how it all played out at a later date. Blessings to all of you who prayed and believed with us, please continue to keep us lifted in prayer as we walk out the remainder of this journey. Thank you!

Holding at #1

This is me with my nephew/godson on South Beach. The Hubs and I needed an infant parenting refresher, so we took our 3 chickadeez plus our nephew with us for a day out. It was like riding a bike! I think we're going to do just fine when our turn comes around. We're still holding at #1 on the wait list for an infant girl. Last week there was a referral for a 26 month old boy, the family only waited 3months, can you believe that! We are going on 16 months of waiting, I guess anything worth having is worth waiting for, my precious baby is definitely worth waiting for. I pray that the wait ends this week...I hope you will pray for us. We are selling a nice sofa and 2 bookcases to make room for baby. It will be replaced with a crib an armoir and a few other nursery pieces. If you are interested check out Craig's list or email me @ TFchain@aol.com. The sofa is beige micro fiber with 2 multi color pillows, reds...($250) the bookcases are black-brown from Ikea, ($90) everything is like new! Pass it on to anyone you know that may be interested let me know. I can't wait to start putting everything together for the baby's room, it'll help me with this WAIT! Hopefully the next time I post I'll have more exciting news. Until then....