Counting the Days

As many of you already know, David and I are coming home in February (!) for two weeks. We're looking forward to seeing our families, meeting our new beautiful niece, and seeing some friends we haven't seen in what seems like forever. Even as I'm counting down the days until I get to hug my mama until I cry (or you know, long before I get to actually physically get to her, because I miss my mama), see my little brother(s) and sister, hold that baby and spend some time with my daddy, I'm also reminded of why we're going to the USA in the first place. I'm counting down the days until we bring our children home.

We're going so that we can round up all the documents we need for our home study and while we're there we want to try to raise money for the home study fees. We can cover a lot of the expenses for the home study, but because we're in China it's going to have more fees, mostly because of travel expenses for the social worker. We've been trying to contact as many people as we can find that are located near us. The problem is that the embassies have not updated their lists of home study providers in 10 years and laws for adoption can change within months. The biggest change that has been affecting us is the Hague Convention. Now, it's been inconvenient for us for a number of reasons, but I need you to know that this change is actually an amazing thing for the protection of adopted children and adoptive parents alike.

We've contacted at least 10 home study providers, only 3 are still in the running at all, and two of them are decently expensive. We're looking at another person that is closer to us, so we'll see if that pans out. We're trying to figure out what documents we need so we can figure out what our schedule will look like while we are home for the short 13 days. We're also trying to figure out how to change some of our information. We still have TN drivers licenses, but our permanent address needs to be with one of our parents so that means at least some hours spent at the DMV. We do have one advantage in all of our scheduling needs; we're not working while in the USA, so we can go in when most people can't. The down side will be that we will be jet-lagging probably pretty badly for the first week if experience serves me right. Pray for patience. We will already be in government buildings for far, far too long with my Irish temper, I will need extra patience for this trip!

I have had a lot of emotions when considering this trip; excitement, anxiety, and many others. But I have to remember that all of this is for the purpose of bringing our kids home. It's much like the mantra I had for planning our wedding, "At the end of all of this, I will be married." Except, this time it's, "At the end of all of this I will be a mom!" I don't know what becoming a parent will be like for us. I don't know what things we may encounter as parents or what joys it may hold, but we can't wait.

We were so excited this Christmas that we actually bought several presents that would be good for kids under the age of ten. We've decided to start buying toys and books so that when we finally do get to bring them home, we have things to give them. I realize that parenting is not about things, but this is the one aspect that we can really start now to benefit from later. We already missed at least one Christmas with our kids, and possibly many more depending on their ages. Through our endless to-do list of the adoption process, my mantra will be, "At the end, I will get to bring them home, I will be a mom and it will all be worth it."