Our Adoption Story: Fun Times in December, 2014!

We are so blessed for all of the people who have loved on, accepted, and given in many ways to Lena and Will over these past seven months. All during Christmas, I was made even more aware of this through parties at school, knowledge gained from their Sunday School teachers about the Christmas story, and neighbors and friends who had fun events planned for them. It was fun listening to Hope tell Will and Lena all about Santa Clause and Will ask her a 100 questions! Sharing our family traditions with them reminded me how blessed we are as a family. Will's face when the Living Christmas Tree at church lit up was priceless. Lena loved wearing her special Christmas outfits. We had about six countdown to Christmas items going on like Advent calendars, putting pieces of nativity together, etc. Will kept asking when was the snow coming - I kept saying it wasn't but he still kept asking! In fact on Christmas Eve day, he said I can't wait until tomorrow. Out of curiosity I asked him what was going to happen and he said, "It is going to snow!"

December 1st of last year, Andy made a trip to Moldova and first met Will and Lena. The Ministry of Social Protection in Moldova would not release paperwork on Lena. This trip was vital in getting the paperwork. For those of you who walked the adoption journey with us, you know it was very challenging. In fact, our agency who was able to complete adoptions for three families during this window of Moldova reopening adoptions announced recently they were closing their program with Moldova. As far as I know, they are the only agency in the US or any other country who was able to complete any adoptions during this time. I can only guess that our agency made this decision due to the difficulty that they encountered in working with the Moldovan govt. Dossiers were returned to families in the program leaving them with hard decisions to make. Given this, I am even more amazed at how God orchestrated the adoption of Will and Lena and the perseverance of Andy to see it happen! This month more than ever, I think about where they were last year and what their future would have been like without God's intervention. And I am humbled to be a part of His work. This is not to say that the journey is easy; my nerves get frayed, I lose patience, and I constantly fail to surrender but God uses ordinary people with weaknesses and faults. For this, I am grateful! Praise the Lord for His mercies!