Steps of Faith

Today is National Adoption Day, and November is National Adoption Month. For those of you who do not know, our family is in the process of an international adoption. This week, completely coincidently, a big milestone in our adoption process took place. Our dossier was logged in China. The process to this point has been fairly bureaucratic. Our home study and dossier involved paperwork, interviews, doctor's visits, webinars and more paperwork. This week when the official letter came I felt pregnant again.

Here's our journey in a nutshell. We talked about adoption when we married. Two of our own and then adopt. We had two. Surprise #3 came pretty quickly after. We put adoption to the side. We brought it up again. We started talking to an agency. Before submitting our application we felt God might be pulling us another way. We hosted a child through Safe Families. We realized we still had a heart for adoption. We approached another agency. A year and a half later, here we are. And now we wait.

If you ask me how I feel, I would answer, "I don't know." Having a log in date did make my pulse race. There was panic and elation. We have really tried to keep our expectations limited. This week at the library I checked out 'The Odd Life of Timothy Green.' We sat down to watch it last night and I didn't know much about the story line. I was a perfect movie for where we were as a family in our process. The story is about a couple at an adoption center telling their story. They are unable to conceive a child but are miraculously given the child of their dreams, Timothy, for a short time. Timothy is different, having leaves on his legs. As parents, they make mistakes, they learn about themselves, they protect Timothy, they make mistakes upon their mistakes, they hover and they learn their dream child does not act as they expect. They are parents. We choked back tears. Okay, I let a few spill. I left the film comforted.

I didn't know what personality my children would have when they were born (and they are all very different). We adjusted as a family. That's what I expect. That's part of being in a family. And I'll make mistakes. Probably mistakes upon mistakes. I pray for our son and for my family and for us together.

I'm sure that there will be questions and comments. My friend Laury has some great insights on being respectful. (Unfortunately or fortunately, we field them now. Three times this week someone has asked if my two youngest girlios are twins. Umm. No.) Laury has gone through the process more than once and seeing her family regularly encourages me.

As I write this 'Happy Birthday' is playing in Chinese for the 50th time (because my girlios love the cd and know how to hit the repeat button), and my daughter just showed me a picture of the Great Wall of China she painted.

And we all move forward.