Look at this girl!

She looks like she's keeping a funny secret! We got 4 new pictures with an update on our girlie! She is growing and changing so much before we ever get to squeeze her! She looks very happy in each picture which does my heart good. Oh I want to go get her, and we are so close...yet so far!











I'm loving the little wrinkled nose!

I'll post the other 2 pictures later.  I'm saving my favorite for last ;o).

NVC Cabled!

We have our NVC cable!  Now we're waiting on the Article 5. We could possibly even still fly out in November!  That's all I know for now!

We Have a Case Number!

This is a very small step, but it is still movement, so I will rejoice!  The National Visa Center (NVC) has our adoption petition and we have been given a case number.  The next step is they will send us a .pdf file copy of the approval letter and then it will get "cabled" to China.  So we're a day or two away from one more hurdle.  Then we'll only have three more steps:  Article 5, Travel Approval, & Consulate Appointment!  So close, yet so far away!

I have requested an update on our girlie.  It'll probably take another 2 weeks before we get that though.
In the mean time, I have to be content with some more photo editing ;o)!

Jada

Joshua

This is my sweet nephew, that smiles often yet the cameras usually can't catch him doing it. This Joshua is such a fun guy! To add to it, he's proof that adoption processes really end up with a new little person added to a family. There really is a bright light at the end of the adoption process tunnel! And here is a little light that was even on our homeschool field trip with us last week. WITH us. And one day, our little Jada will be WITH us too, hopefully on another trip to the Louisburg Cider Mill for some fresh apple cider and apple cider donuts...yum! You'll love them sweet pea!

I-800!!!!!

Hmmmmm #2

Okay, this may be totally silly, but I'm thinking I need a picture of "Debbie Downer" from SNL in my living room.  My cousin (thank you Traci!) just commented that we should NOT hang out right now as we'd totally be Debbie Downers together!  Now that's funny stuff, and yet pretty stinkin' profound because I've been really low again, fighting off serious self-pity at the lack of paperwork coming my way.  I am having trouble thinking of any happy thoughts.  My mind attacks all of the imperfections in my children, my husband, my house, and especially myself. 

Something clicked for me though, when I thought of myself as Debbie Downer.  I get to adopt this little girl...this beautiful little girl!  Add to that, I will be leaving the continent and traveling the globe for the first time in my life.  I can't express how exciting that is to me!  We really should be traveling within a few months even if it won't be in 2011.  God is providing in amazing ways, and I do believe He has promised to take care of us even without the 2011 tax credit.  Oh, and I bought the cutest bright pink coat for my Jada last weekend, with a matching hat and mittens! 

I have so much to be thankful for, and really and truly no reason to fret.  And yet, even since I've started typing this, the sadness is creeping in again.  I want to get this little girl and bring her home.  Praise God that the Spirit can intercede for us with groans that words cannot express.

Hmmmm

I've tried twice to post something this evening, once on a blog and once on an adoption forum and it just wouldn't let me.  Am I just not suppose to say anything tonight?!  Is my dark and dreary mood just so bad that God is protecting others from my cynicism and frustration?!!!!!  Sigh.  I thought we had our I-800, but we don't.  Many others got theirs last week.  We didn't.  Why am I surprised?!!!!  Putting questions marks and exclamation points together is one of my favorite things to do these days.  There should be a separate kind of question mark that conveys emphatically questioning frustration. 

Twice recently I've read blogs testifying to God's sovereign, good plans that get played out ONLY after significant waits. 

And as I sit here, my sick-to-my-stomach, sad-longing-self just can't see it.  I know it in my head.  But I can't feel it in my heart, or see it with my eyes, that somehow my little Jada girl needs to wait to come home.  I pray, oh I pray, that this will somehow mold me into the kind of mama who will be long-suffering and understanding of the needs of this sweet girl that we haven't even begun to know.  Right now I feel like I've got a lost child, and they called me and told me they found her.  For some reason she ended up in China and I can't go retrieve her until the paperwork is completed.  I just hope I don't sob and gasp for air when we meet Jada, like I did when we found Adler after losing him in Walt Disney World.  He knew he didn't need to be afraid of me, but Jada might freak out if I act like that!  Okay, so I'm going to take my sore heart and go to bed now.  Jesus, please hold my little girl.