Reunions

We had a wonderful time this past weekend. It was full of joy and happy reunions. On Saturday we drove into Chicago to meet our friends Katie and Karly at Union Station. Their train was only about 20 minutes late (pretty good for Amtrak). Right after meeting with them and sharing our hugs, I took Peyton and Reagan with me to O'Hare airport to pick up Patience and give Pastor Bixby the keys to the Aztek so that he could get around Rockford while he was in town.

Pastor Bixby has been in South Carolina for the past month and a half in a protracted adoption. I say protracted because it has taken longer than we anticipated, but from God's perspective it has taken exactly as long as He intended. I loved watching the girls hug and kiss and enjoy being together again. (By the way, click here for a cute video montage of the girls). Peyton, Reagan and I took Patience with us and we went back into Chicago to meet Lacey, Katie, and Karly. After a late lunch at Ed Debevic's we went to......drum roll please....American Girl Place.

On Monday Lacey had to take Katie and Karly back to the Metra station to get them into Chicago for their train back to Michigan. Somehow they managed to miss the train despite being at the station 45 minutes early. I would explain it, but I don't quite understand it. Consequently, Lacey ended up driving to the Michigan/Indiana border to meet Katie and Karly's mother. Fortunately everyone got home safely.

On the way home, Lacey began to experience some car problems. The van would stop running whenever her foot was taken off the accelerator. We managed to get the van in and it's in good working condition now. Just in time for the transmission to go out (again) on the Aztek. I'm praying that the cost for that will be under warranty. It's unusual to have two vehicles out at the same time (we hadn't picked up the van yet when the Aztek started to malfunction). But God's hand even seemed to be in that, as I had called a rental car company to arrange for Lacey to pick up a car immediately after her work. When Lacey got out of work the car would not even move in reverse. That's a good thing, because when we pushed it out of the spot and I tried to drive it to the shop I only got one mile and it died completely. I'm glad that Lacey didn't get stranded at the side of the road. Instead, the rental car company met Lacey at the school so that she could rent the car.

So what's the lesson there? I don't know what God is trying to teach us with these setbacks, but one thing I know is that He hasn't given us more than we can bear. And 1 Corinthians 10:13 holds true. While it is easy to despair about unexpected vehicle repair bills and the huge inconveniences that we've encountered, I can think of a number of things to be thankful for in the midst of this:

• The van didn't start to malfunction until after we got back from our day in Chicago. It would have been much worse to have seven people stranded in Chicago on a Saturday evening with a vehicle that doesn't work.
• Lacey was able to make it home safely on Monday.
• The traffic heading west around Chicago moved smoothly so that Lacey did not have to take her foot off the accelerator from the Dan Ryan to Rockford. I've never had that happen on a weeknight.
  
• The Aztek didn't break down until Lacey was at work, where she could safely wait for the rental car company to come to her.
• Because the transmission had already been repaired once, I knew where to have it taken and the owner of the shop arranged for the tow truck to pick up the vehicle.
• The Aztek didn't break down while Pastor Bixby was using it. He needed the time to study and God spared him the distraction of trying to figure out what to do with someone else's broken down vehicle.
• The van is working now, and we had the money to get it fixed.
• We had a wonderful weekend with friends.
  

I could go on. It's easy to say "What now?", but knowing so many who are being tested in ways that are much more trying and severe, I simply thank God for the things that He has spared us from.

Adoption Journal

Are you interested in keeping up with our adoption? Recognizing that this is a marathon, not a sprint, I'm going to direct you to our new adoption journal at YouBelong.net. This is an excellent site full of wonderful stories of God's grace. Shannon Brown has done an excellent job in creating this site. Shannon might not know this, but one single car ride with him had a significant influence on my decision to adopt. One day I hope that I'll be able to thank him personally as our two adopted daughters play together.

For those of you that are interested in the adoption process, please visit our journal. There is a subscription service on the journal that allows you to receive e-mail updates every time we create a new post. Thanks for walking with us in this journey.

What's wrong with this picture

We're plodding along with the adoption paperwork. It's a daunting task, but sooner or later we'll finish it all. We haven't completely made up our mind which country we want to adopt from. We started with China. Then the rules changed and we began to read about a long wait times for referrals. When you hear that the current wait for a referral is 14 months after the log in date, that only tells part of the story. The reason that the wait time for referrals is lengthening is that more people are getting in line, but the CCAA (China Center for Adoption Affairs) is sticking with the same number of referrals each month.


Why does that matter? Say that China is allowing for 1,000 foreign adoptions each month. If the wait time for a referral back in September, 2005 was six months, but today those who received their log in date (the term used to describe adoptive parents who have been accepted for adoptions in China) back in October, 2005 are just now receiving their referrals (approximately 15 months), that means that there were 15,000 people in the queue (more or less) back in October, 2005. The real question is how many applicants received their log in date between October 2005 and today (or the date in the future in which we will complete our dossier and submit it for approval). My guess is that it's more than 1000 per month. That means the wait could be much longer. We've considered Vietnam, but the cost is much higher there, and I'm hearing that Vietnam is becoming the new "go to" country in Asia because of some new regulations that are going into effect in China. Sigh. You would think that this decision would be easier.

Anyhow, we have a little bit of time before we commit to a country. In the mean time, Lacey and I went to the Boone County Sheriff's Department yesterday for our fingerprints. This is a necessary step in order to obtain our criminal background check. We showed up prepared, with our camera in hand. The officer was kind enough to let us take pictures to document the procedure. I thought that the funniest part of this little episode was the fact that I left my driver's license at the station (they have since mailed it back to me). That is, until I reviewed the pictures. Take a look at the picture below and see if you can tell me why we might have difficulty getting FBI clearance with these prints. I'm just thankful that we discovered the problem now. It probably will save us months of hassles.