We're going to Africa!!!!!

Aaahhhh!!!! I'm still in shock. These are how the events played out today and I couldn't wait to share them with you. I'm just sitting here praising Jesus right now! I've been doing my best to put the timing of our trip out of my mind. Still planning, but trying to find that fine line between longing to meet our sweet girl and just handing it over to the Lord DAILY that she will be home in HIS perfect timing.  His hand has been SO apparent in this whole journey (did I just say that AGAIN!?(:), that I really had no doubts that He had it all under control, I would just sometimes "wonder".

Today I had one of those moments of "wondering". I was making the kids lunch. The thought of Tse Tse came to my mind and I just thought to myself "I wonder when we will get that call." Thinking all the while, it could be several months.  And then God spoke to me clearly asking me to call upon him and pray about it....right then! I listened and bowed my head over the leftover ham sandwiches and cried out to God. Just as I finished my prayer (literally, JUST) the phone rang. As I walked over to the phone, I thought to myself "wouldn't that be something if this was our adoption agency calling?" I looked at the caller id and about fell over. IT WAS AAI!!! I'm SERIOUS friends, this was our call!  As I answered, they informed me that they had some good news and we had a court date! I told her what had just happened, and she said she was in just as much shock as we were. Apparently the judge is on "vacation" for 2-3 weeks and typically nothing gets scheduled. She really thought it would be at least 3-4 more weeks until we were even scheduled. Low and behold, she received word from our Ethiopian contact this morning that Tsehaynesh's birth families court date is scheduled for May 25th and we are scheduled for June 1st. Just one short week later...another miracle as most of their court cases had been at least 3-4 weeks apart (birth family & adoptive family)...delaying things even further. So there we have it-we will finally get to meet our precious little one face to face in just a few weeks! We will probably be leaving MI on May 26th and Luke and I will appear before a judge on June 1st, just one day before our 10th anniversary.

 With this excitement comes many other feelings. These next few weeks of preparation will be just plain exhausting. We have lots to do just locating and coordinating all of our donations, not to mention the thought of leaving our three other little ones home for 10 days just breaks my heart. If you are a mother reading this, you know exactly how hard this is (not just physically planning, but emotionally) But thankfully God has provided us with two sets of amazing parents that are willing to take over our parenting duties while we are gone. For that, I'm thankful.  Please keep our family in your prayers over these next few months. Thank you Jesus for bringing us one step closer to our baby girl! And I still haven't eaten that ham sandwich.....maybe that should be next on my list...oh wait, it's almost dinner time now(-: