Waiting and Paperwork are the Names of the Game!

We have just begun this adventure and I am quickly learning that waiting plays a BIG part in adoption. I find myself checking the Waiting Child Photolisting several times daily and since we've contacted Holt and submitted our application, I find myself stalking my e-mail inbox hourly waiting for a new update.

Knowing that my child is out there, somewhere, waiting for her mommy and daddy to come get her makes me want to speed this whole thing up. "Wait for the Lord; Be strong, and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord." Psalm 27:14 I am praying that my heart can have courage AND that I can wait for the Lord in this.

Michael and I have been knocking some of this paperwork out and we had to fill out a "Medical Conditions Checklist" indicating which conditions we are open to. Let me first say that that list breaks my heart. Everything from HIV/AIDS to autism, missing organs to asthma. As I was choosing which conditions we are open to accepting, I was praying that every child with every condition on that list would have a mommy and a daddy to love on them. I sat there with several tabs open on the computer and googled (yep, that is a verb now) medical conditions that I can't even begin to pronounce. As I sat there clicking those little circle buttons (my computer programmer-hubby informed me they are called "radio buttons") my heart was breaking for those kids whose medical conditions are a huge barrier in them being adopted, but I thought "God didn't guarantee us healthy, whole children when I carried my boys". We finished the list and I felt wiped-out. One step closer.

It's all part of the process and at the end of this long tunnel, there will be a baby: our baby. God, protect our baby girl until You deliver her to us.

Here is a bit of the paperwork that has to be completed and there will be lots more where that came from. ~paula