documents back and fingerprints rescheduled and other big news

Well, I guess CIS didn't know they were closed December 26 when they sent us that notice! So our fingerprints are rescheduled for January 7. It doesn't set us back any because I am sure our homestudy is still in some pile on a shelf in someone's office. I am hoping it is a very efficient, merciful someone so that we will quickly know if we need no corrections to our homestudy or even none!

Also, the UPS woman brought all of our beautiful documents yesterday, authenticated by the Chinese Consulate in Houston. They came back!! I see great beauty in perfectly executed paperwork, in some weird way. So now we have everything ready for our dossier, except the paper from CIS.

Okay, so the big news is...we have decided to homeschool Jake and Landon next semester and hopefully beyond. Who knows what child #4 will bring, but I am hopeful it will work out even after she gets home. It has been a very long, God-led path to this journey. I can't call it a destination because I have come to realize that there is no destination in this life. We never arrive or get settled and I have made an effort to stop saying "well, maybe one day when..." All we have is today.

Basically, they were doing well in a really great school with lovely teachers and I still thought constantly about keeping them home. Even though when they first started school I was so happy to be alone for once! As they get older, I see that time is so short. I can't get these years back and we were in a cycle of get up at 6am, school, get home at 3pm, homework, piano practice (or lesson), soccer or gymnastics, chores, pehaps some free play or a friend over, dinner, bed. And by 3pm I'm tired anyway! We were missing the best of each other.

Maybe more later once we start. I am terrified and excited, but I know it will be okay. As I cleaned out their backpacks last week, I found these two things I had to share.



From Jake (age 9):
"Three Wishes"
1. Give poor people in China homes
2. For all kids in the world to have food.
3. That cancer had a cure.

From Landon (age 7):
"Thanksgiving"
I'm thankful for my friends, family, food and water, school. Grandparents too. My teachers, friends, Thanksgiving, Christmas and other holidays! I'm thankful for my house and classroom. I am thankful for shelter and you should be too.


Psalm 127:3-5
Sons are a heritage from the Lord, children are a reward from Him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one's youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them.

Logged in at CIS

So, we just found out this week that we are logged in at CIS, which is US immigration. We need their approval to adopt a child from another country. Our date is 12/5, and people have been waiting about 90 days for that approval. But the process is relatively new, and I have seen people waiting 150 days, or 59. This approval is the final piece of our paperwork! We are hoping to be matched between now and then, but that timing is another unknown piece of the puzzle. In this part of the process we also have to be fingerprinted by the FBI again, just in case we've done anything since October. It really pays to be an upstanding citizen since birth in this process. Our fingerprint appointments are at 9am on December 26. How CONVENIENT. I'm rolling my eyes as I type...

My mom got chemo yesterday, which is great, since last week her white count was so low she couldn't get it. Fluid still gone, which is great!!

FedEx woes

So got a call from FedEx. Yes, my heart was pounding...I'm thinking they will say, we are so sorry but our truck ran over your documents. No, not that bad. But the Houston Consulate no longer accepts FedEx deliveries. Huh?!! So they have to send all of our papers back to us and I have to re-send them via UPS. Have you seen Australia? (the very long Baz Luhrmann movie that is) I keep thinking of our papers saying "I sing you home to me" Please, please come back to me, papers.

My mom and I took Lilla to see the Nutcracker at the Fox Theater on Friday. She loved it (well, for about 30 minutes) and wants to know when she can be in it.




Also, here's a cute picture from our 3rd annual Garage Nativity Play. We had about 20 neighborhood kids. So cute! It was very nice to focus on God coming to earth so early in the season, as opposed to trying to just squeeze him in the last Sunday of advent.



Check out this verse that I have been pondering.

"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you." John 15:9 Whoa. That is Jesus talking there. I think that means he loves us as much as God loves him. Jesus loves us as much as God loves him, his one and only son, a very part of him. Well, himself actually. THAT is what Christmas is about. God's love for us. Jesus loving us so much that he humbled himself and became a helpless baby, confined to a human body for a time so that we might know him.

Yea for mom

I'm sure my mom is so thrilled with me sharing all about her weight gains and losses but I have to share again--she has lost about 25 pounds of fluid in the past week or so! Praise God! FINALLY something worked. Lilla has been praying and praying about this and sometimes it is really nice to have a clear answer--and the one you wanted too.

Adoption news: All of our documents (except the one we are waiting for from US immigration) are at the Chinese Consulate in Houston getting their final stamps! It was very hard to seal them in the FedEx envelope and send them. Like mailing a child. Well, maybe more like a pet. But still, I labored long on them and they are precious and irreplacable! FedEx, don't lose them.

I just read this "The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Luke 4:18 Jesus reading from Isaiah

Do you ever think of yourself as a poor, blind, oppressed prisoner? I don't usually, since I have a great house, I can see and I live in a free country. But I realized today as I read that, I sometimes am. Maybe more on that later.


Do you like the snowflakes?