NOOOOOOOO!!!

That is me screaming. I am also crying tears of helplessness and frustration. I know to hang in there, be patient, trust, have faith, but tonight I just want to cry. Scared and a little disheartened tonight. Boo to not-so-good-news-emails.

8 Months

Today is 8 months on the waitlist. I'm not quite as excited as I was last month. I think it's because of the email I read yesterday stating the average wait is now at 9 months. Boo! I shouldn't have convinced myself that December was THE month. It's okay - I know she's close. Patience, patience, patience.

Our Other Little Girl

Back in June, as I was reading my favorite adoption blogs, I came across a post about sponsoring a child from a care point in Ethiopia called Kind Hearts (Children's HopeChest). I immediately emailed a wonderful woman named Karen Wistrom (http://www.family-from-afar.blogspot.com/) and asked to sponsor a child. Her blog is a must read! She, along with 16 others, just visited the care points in Ethiopia and personally delivered care packages that sponsors sent to her for the children. The stories on her blog about the trip will make your heart swell with all kinds of emotions so get your tissues.

Waiting for a picture of a child we were going to be sponsoring was a lot like our waiting for the referral for our daughter! I stalked my email inbox like a crazy woman. And finally one day I see the email caption "Firtuna - Ethiopian Sponsor Child". I seriously screamed in excitement. And then I saw her picture . . .


Look at that sweet little face. She looked so sad to me and I just wanted to scoop her up and tell her how special she is. We have her picture on display in our house and we talk about her everyday as we pray for her. Koen includes her in his prayers and it goes something like this: "and thank you for our two little girls in Eefiopia - my little sister and our other little girl".

Today I received another picture of Firtuna taken as she was holding the pictures of us I sent in her care package. I just love this picture. I want to hug her and smother her with kisses!

There are still children to sponsor so if you feel that tug on your heart like I did please go to Karen's blog. I can't describe how it feels to have this other little girl across the world holding my picture knowing that I care about her. My hope is when we travel to Ethiopia for our daughter we can meet Firtuna in person and I can lay those smooches on her!

SEVEN Months!

Yay! Today we have been waiting seven months for a referral! While waiting has not been fun I am so excited to be nearing the average 8 month wait time! We are a lot closer to getting that referral call today than we were last month, or the month before that. Yay!

Joys and Sorrows

November is a tough month for me emotionally; a month in which I celebrate the birthday of one of my children and mourn the death of my other.

We had a wonderful day celebrating Koen's 4th birthday on November 3rd. His birthday party was at the planetarium and he was surrounded by all his friends and family. All 75 of us. I know - crazy. Who knew a 4 year old could have so many friends?


How cute is he?! Love him!

Then November 6th rolls around and I can barely breathe; the ache in my heart is unbearable.


My joy and my sorrow. No one ever promised one without the other.

(My birthday is also in November - the 27th. And I think my husband has something special planned for us. My husband - another joy.)

SIX MONTHS!

Today marks six months on the wait list! I can't believe it! The average wait is 8 months . . . oh my goodness - that's 2 more months! I check the Gladney FBI list at least 3 times a day making myself crazy - it's not moving! On this unofficial list we are number 15 overall, 7th for girl/either gender from 0 to 24 months, and 2nd for a girl 13 to 24 months.

Maybe I should start Christmas shopping to keep my mind off the wait :)

Five Months!

Five months on the wait list!

And since it has been a year since we started our adoption we have to start redoing a lot of the paperwork. I had my physical today, got refingerprinted for the FBI as required for State Licensing (not same as CIS), sent in forms for criminal clearance and child abuse history clearance, sent a check for an updated home study to be performed, and started working on our financial statement. Frank and Jamie also got refingerprinted today. Time to take a deep breath and just tackle it as it comes. I was stressing at the thought of having to redo the paperwork that expired after a year but I must say it's not that bad.

Check back with me when I have to reapply for CIS fingerprints though. Who knew some fingerprints cannot be read? I have fingerprints - I can see them myself. How can they be unreadable? That's a story for another time - a story I will tell in about 3 months when I have to reapply. A process that cost us almost 6 months of our adoption journey. Just thinking about it makes me want to cry so I will not think about it until I absolutely have to. Until then I will continue to stalk blogs and daydream about that referral call!

One Year Ago Today

One year ago on this very day Frank and I were on vacation in Cape May, NJ with Koen. It was this day we decided to start our adoption from Ethiopia. This was also the day we met a couple who were on vacation with their daughter Hannah. Hannah was from Ethiopia and was united with her forever family 2 months prior.

Frank and I started discussing adopting from Ethiopia several months after we lost our daughter Sophia on November 6, 2008. Each month we would revisit the idea of adoption but the pain of losing Sophia was still unbearable for me. I couldn't even look at another baby without running away in tears. But on the day we met Hannah - I took one look at her and I did cry but these tears were different. I knew I was ready; Frank new I was ready. We went back to our hotel room, got online and got started. I remember that day like it was yesterday. Thank you Hannah - my little divine intervention.

So here's what we've been up to this past year:

September 2009 - Cape May NJ
Dutch Wonderland season passholders . . .

Our new puppy - Lulu . . .

October 2009 - carving pretty cool looking pumpkins . . .

Dressed up for Halloween looking like the cutest Peter Pan ever . . .

Went apple picking . . .

November 2009 - my boys baked an awesome chocolate cake for my birthday . . .

November 3, 2009 - celebrated Koen's 3rd birthday . . .

December 2009 - it wasn't easy but we made our first gingerbread house together . . .

Celebrated Christmas . . .

Celebrated Hanukkah . . .

January 2010 - Went to the Baltimore Aquarium and B&O Railroad . . .

February 2010 - Built snow people with best friends . . .

March 2010 - Took some ice skating lessons . . .

April 2010 - Easter bunny hid Koen's basket in his tent . . .

May 2010 - Celebrated Frank's birthday in Times Square, New York . . .

New York has some really good Ethiopian restaurants . . .

June 2010 - Did a little surfing at Franklin Institute, Philadelphia PA . . .

Flew some helicoptors at the aviation museum . . .

Vacationed at Cape May - love Cape May! . . .

July 2010 - rode this real scary roller coaster at the Apple Dumpling Festival . . .

July 4, 2010 - Koen's first sparkler . . .

Made our own Hershey chocolate bars at Chocolate World . . .

Held a baby chick at Chery Crest Adventure Farm . . .

August 2010 - Fed hungry goat at Lake Tobias Wildlife Preserve . . .

Took rides on daddy shoulders at the Poconos with great friends . . .

September 8, 2010 - Koen's first day of preschool . . .

And so much more! We'll keep on keeping busy until we bring our brown-eyed girl home from Ethiopia and then I guess it gets crazy busy!

August Conference Call

Each month Gladney has a conference call. These conference calls are made to keep adoptive parents up-to-date on what is going on in Ethiopia: average wait times for referrals, court dates and travel times; a monthly topic; and Q & A session. I always look forward to listening to this call hoping the wait time decreases. Well, this month the average wait for a referral is now 8 months. I wanted to cry. When we started our adoption almost 12 months ago I really thought we would have her home by this September.

I don't know why this wait is bothering me so much lately. It's not as if I don't have a million things to keep me busy. Koen is getting ready to start pre-school in a week. I have been reading and racking up my CEUs thinking about going to work part time at St. Joe's critical care unit (very part time - don't want to go crazy). And when Frank is home we squeeze every minute of daddy-time out of him that we can get.

I just want to see her face. This adoption is like the longest pregnancy ever.

Four Months

Today we have been on the waitlist for 4 months! So hard to believe!

Next month it will be one year since we started our adoption. Last year when we started the process with Gladney the average wait time for a referral was 4 months. When we got on the waitlist in April the average wait was 5 months. Then a month went by and the average wait became 5 1/2 months. Another month on the waitlist goes by and the average wait became 6 months. So now today marks 4 months waiting and the average wait is 7 months. It's all good. I will continue to be patient; continue to stalk the Gladney FBI list; and continue loving what I already have been blessed with.

Speaking of stalking the unofficial waitlist (Gladney Ethiopia FBI), we are 20th on this list of waiting families and 10th for those of us waiting for a girl/either gender from the age zero up to 24 months. This is an unofficial waitlist but it gives waiting families the opportunity to meet other families who are going through the same process. It's so exciting to read about other referrals and then to follow the family as they bring their child/children home from Ethiopia. So thank you Grace for the FBI list!! Love it!

Heaven and Ethiopia.

Koen just loves to go to "mommy's gym" because there is this great Kid's Court where kids can climb, bounce, run and play with a million different toys. It was here Koen met a cute little girl named Sofia. As we were in the car on the way home he was talking about his new friend Sofia. This conversation led to our angel Sophia and how she is in heaven and I miss her. Koen says "It's ok mommy, when she's done in heaven you can get her back." He then goes on to say "Then we can go to Eefiopia and get the other baby and then you will have two babies. I'm not a baby anymore. I'm three and a half."

God blessed me with an amazing little boy; a gift I'm thankful for everyday.

I'm not afraid of my blog.

We started our adoption in September 2009. I immediately wanted to start a blog and track every move we made in this adoption - kind of like some women keep a pregnancy journal. Until recently all I have been able to do is stalk everyone elses blogs. I thought maybe I felt inadequate to keep a blog that would want people to keep coming back to read what I had to say, but then realized that's not the purpose of this blog - though followers would be nice :)

I have figured our where this fear is coming from. I have been holding myself back from getting too excited about bringing our daughter home. What if it doesn't happen?

Two years ago I was very excited about bringing our daughter home. I was pregnant with a healthy baby girl. I daydreamed about what she would look like; would she have my eyes; would she look like her older brother. The day I found out I was having a girl I ran to the closest Gymboree store and bought her whole wardrobe for her first six months of life; the cutest outfits I had ever seen. I was so excited.

I gave birth to Sophia Elaine and she was still. I never saw the color of her eyes. She did in fact look like her older, little brother. She never wore any of the clothes I bought her. I held her for a day before the funeral home came for her. My pastor held my hands, prayed and cried with me. God had different plans for Sophia.

A year and a half later I want to feel as if I'm 3 months pregnant (3 months on the waiting list as of July 22). I want it to feel real. I want to know I am going to bring this daughter home. I want to tell everyone "we're expecting!" What if it doesn't happen?

I have to get over it. All I have is today. And today I want to start sharing my excitement about this little girl I have been daydreaming about. I'm pretty sure she will have my eyes - they're brown.

Afraid to Blog

I visit my blog daily and sometimes more, but I can't seem to start. I follow other blogs and get excited at each new post yet can't seem to post on my own. I'm afraid to blog. Why? Maybe tomorrow.

My New Blog

I love my new blog. Mandy designed it for me and she is wonderful. Until now I have been jotting everything down on random pieces of paper keeping track of our adoption journey. Really, there was not alot to report unless you wanted to hear about how overwhelmed I was with paperwork and excitement.

How cute is this blog?!