Why China?

Why China?  How did we get to China?  I mean, really it's out of left field for us.  China?  Really?  Trust me when I say that there are times that I am not sure exactly how this all came to be or if I really understand that at some point in time I am going to be getting on a plane and going to China.

I love Haiti in so many ways.  And I tried really hard to make our next adoption a Haitian one.  (I don't want Haiti to just be a "sending place."  I want it to be a part of our lives.  And adding another country into the mix concerned me.  How would we keep meaningful connections in more than one foreign country?)  But door after door kept shutting.  We aren't old enough.  And as of last spring when we first started thinking about another adoption, most places in Haiti weren't taking anyone who wasn't 35.  I did find one agency who was advocating for a little boy who was HIV positive but there was a lot of  upfront expense for something that involved a fair amount of risk.  (The adoption not the HIV part.  We are pretty sure we are up for HIV but that's another story.)  So we looked at other options (other countries/domestic) but never settled on anything.  Then D's grandma got sick and passed away.  Then my dad got sick.  We looked at a couple of other options in Haiti, people who felt confident they could get us approved for a special needs child.  (They had 3 kiddos who we were really interested in.)  Then that "yes" quickly turned into "no" as the orphanage changed their minds on accepting us due to our ages.  So back to the drawing board.  Then my dad died and we really weren't in a place to make any decisions despite having a very reputable agency/orphanage in Haiti say they would work with us.

I've always liked to peruse the online photolistings like Rainbow Kids and Reece's Rainbow.  That has been especially true since this spring as we were fairly certain we would be looking at a child with special needs.  I generally ignored pretty much everything related to Asia on those sites as I just didn't think we would ever go there.  (I wasn't even sure we qualified for China based on their income requirements and many of the other Asian countries are pretty expensive.)  And then, in the middle of November, there was a little girl who was missing an arm on Rainbow Kids.  I'm not sure why but I was interested.  D agreed to ask for more info which we did.  She was placed with another family a few days later but it really got our toes in the water in terms of Chinese adoption.  The more we started looking, the more it seemed like a good fit.  The timeline was right.  The cost was right.  And after talking with the staff from the situation that piqued our interest, we learned that we did qualify.  While we were looking at the file of this little girl, I happened to get online to check out reviews of the agency who had her file and was contacted by a woman who encouraged me to join another online group devoted to advocating for China's waiting children.  I did and was amazed.  There were hundreds of photos and a forum full of current information on the process.  That pretty much sealed the deal.

Zeke was not actually among their waiting child photos.  But through this advocacy site, I started connecting to other advocacy sites including those managed by different agencies.  Zeke was being advocated for by his agencies, BAAS.

It's been an exciting last few days.   We hope you'll continue to pray for us and Zeke as we wait.  We have always prayed that God would bind the hearts of our kids to our hearts while we wait.  I'm not sure how often we will get pictures or updates and we know for certain that we will not be visiting him before the adoption is final.  Those little things work magic on a Mama heart.  Would you pray that even without those things he would grow in our hearts?  And that his heart would be healed from the grief and trauma which may have marked his early years and will most definitely mark his transition home?  Would you pray for our finances?  Adoption is not an inexpensive proposition.  We have money set aside but we would like to not drain our savings account.  Even doing that, I think we would still be short.  And would you pray for our kids?  Pray that they would be ready to love Zeke, that God would again press hearts together and grow relationships.

Believing that God is already at work...