The adventure began a year ago when we went to a "Renewing the Family" conference. We took our camper and low and behold the other campers surrounding us had all adopted. One was in the process of adopting from Liberia, West Africa. They began to tell us the history of that country and our interest was piqued! As we came home my husband and I began to pray about the possibility. We have a 7 year old lonely only. A social butterfly to boot! I'm sorry but I have a limited capacity for Polly Pockets!!! She is an amazingly creative, inventive, adventurous ball of life. But there are some life skills that only children never learn and we were feeling the need to fill in some of those gaps.
We had bought some property to build on but with the construction costs, that house just kept getting smaller and smaller. Out of the blue someone called and wanted to buy our property just after we began to pray for God to show us the way. We knew we would need a bigger place. So we sold the property and found a house that was perfect. We postponed our home study till we were moved into the new house and had sold our other. In February we were set to start the process again, but in March we found out my mothers cancer was back. We battled with the decision to postpone again. We waited and asked friends their opinions. Many who have adopted said the process is such a long one to go ahead and proceed and if at the time of referral you don't feel you can move forward, we could always postpone at that point. I would hate to be in the middle of getting my children and then not be available to my parents when they needed me.
So our I600A is submitted, fingerprints done, home study will be completed next week when our social worker gets back from vacation and then we will wait for our I171 approval letter. I am hearing our INS office is taking 3-5 months for that.
In the meantime, as we have now committed several thousand dollars and realize this is really happening, we are mourning the lose of an only child. We are treasuring her and every little moment we have with her. I wonder if other birth mothers feel that way with additions they bring into the family. She will make a great sister. We are looking at 2-3 possible siblings ages 4-7. But then we will wait to see what God has for us when referral time happens. For now we wait, research and wait some more.