Philippine group

Dave and I waving to our friends, Andy and Tyler, from good old Okoboji

I joined a Yahoo group specifically for families adopting from the Philippines. I still haven't decided if this was a good idea or not. On the one hand - I love love love reading the stories about the families uniting. There was a beautiful story about how a mother couldn't take her eyes off of her new 1-year old daughter who she was just united with last week. She wrote that she is the most beautiful, and most loving little girl she could have imagined. I can't wait until that day comes for us. Even cooler was the fact that this little girl was from the little children's home in Manila. This is the orphanage that our very good friends, Andy and Tyler, volunteer at, and it is also the orphanage that Louis came from (the little boy we met at our adoption training). My favorite part was knowing that in some way, Andy and Tyler touched this little girl's life. (We also thank our new friends - Andy's parents - for the pictures on today's post!!)I've also been reading updates from a family waiting to be able to pick up their little 1-year old boy from the little children's home.

The reason I'm not sure if it was a good idea to join this group or not is because I also read about the problems people have experienced through their adoption process. I know that it is good to be prepared for whatever may come by reading about other people's experiences, but I also don't want it to feed into my fears about the adoption. The psychologist already assessed that I am a fearful person during our adoption assessment - do I really need more fodder for that?!

Dave and I have decided that we want to make a conscious effort not to be spazzes about this adoption. I don't want to be the nag who continually calls Karin asking for updates, and demanding that they try to push this process to go faster. We understand that the Philippines is completely different from the US, so we can't come at this with an American frame of mind. Americans expect immediate results, and it just doesn't work that way in the Philippines. We completely trust that Karin will give us updates as soon as she receives them - she has told us this numerous times. Our adoption dossier was sent over to the Philippines on Friday, August 3rd. We haven't heard any news that they have received it, but after hearing a story about the Philippine postal service this weekend we are now praying specifically that our dossier moves smoothly through the Philippine postal service and lands on the right desk of the right person at ICAB (the government adoption group for the Philippines).

Our good friend Nikki gave me a great idea last night. She told me that when they were pregnant with Sammy (the cutey-pie in the picture), they prayed specifically for him to be a cuddler, as well as other personality traits. She asked me for things that she could pray for specifically for us. I had never thought about praying this specifically to God for our children! So Dave and I are in the process of making our list and praying over it. Like Aaron and Nikki, we do pray that our child is a cuddler - we are touchy-feely kinds of people! As we think of other specific prayer requests, we will list them.

Thank you for reading along with our blog. It is encouraging to hear that you are reading about our journey with us, and to know that you are thinking of and praying with us!!

What a cutie-baby!! Sam-a-lamb