Still waiting...

We have been home for 2 weeks now and still no word about our next trip to bring Amaya home. The next trip is centered around a meeting with the U.S. Embassy in Addis, which for Bethany, happens every other Tuesday. There is one coming up on November 23rd and we have heard from some families we traveled with the end of October that they have tentatively been assigned this date. They still have not received confirmation and many of these families will be leaving next Wednesday! We are hoping when these families receive travel confirmation, then we will receive our tentative date. We are hoping for Tuesday, December 7th, which means we would leave Wednesday, December 1st, less than three weeks away! Please pray with us that we receive confirmation of this date in the next week (or even today!). Even though we have heard from many families that this trip is usually scheduled with short notice, that doesn't make the wait time any easier. This has definitely been the hardest part of this whole process, having spent time with our little girl, knowing she is now legally our daughter, but still not knowing when we will bring her home.

We did receive some very exciting and surprising news yesterday from our social worker. Someone made an anonymous and very generous donation toward our adoption! We will probably never know who this is, but we are praising God for their kindness and generosity. We have truly been blessed by family and friends through their support from the very beginning when we decided to begin the adoption process. We can't thank everyone enough for the sacrifices they have made to help us bring our little girl home. And especially to the family that gave of their financial resources...THANK YOU!!

Back from Ethiopia!

Many of you already know, but WE PASSED COURT!! Amaya is officially our daughter!! Thank you so much for your prayers! We had an amazing trip. We spent the first 4 days in Tanzania visiting missionaries who work for Children of Promise which is a child sponsorship program. On Saturday, they took us on a safari through Tarangire National Park. It was really amazing! We saw so many animals including zebras, elephants, giraffes, wildebeests, warthogs, and even a few cheetahs. Here are just a few pictures. The first is of a Baobob tree and yes, Ryan and I are inside it. These trees are massive and were all throughout the park.

On Monday, we flew up to Ethiopia. Tuesday morning we visited the orphanage and met Amaya for the first time! It was very emotional to see our little girl after receiving many pictures and updates about her for the past few months. She came easily to both of us but she was quite shy most of the day. We saw her every day of our trip for a couple of hours each day. It was so exciting to see how she warmed up to us as the week went on and even called me "Ema" (which means Mama in Amharic) the last day we were there. Here are some pictures of our beautiful daughter! Please pray with us that it won't be too long before we travel back to bring her home, we are hoping for the beginning of December.

Prayer Requests for our Upcoming Trip!

Well, Thursday is almost here and that is when we leave for our court trip to Ethiopia! We are very excited about visiting missionary friends in Tanzania, going on a safari, and most of all meeting our little girl, Amaya. However, in the midst of the excitement in preparing to leave, we are also fighting to stay healthy. Last Thursday I got the stomach flu and today I'm finally starting to feel like myself again. Yesterday, Logan showed signs of getting it. He seems to be doing a lot better than I did, but he is not eating well. Please pray that he gets well before we leave. The last thing I want to do is leave my sick baby while we travel halfway across the world. Also, pray that Ryan does not get this flu. I can't imagine traveling on a plane and being away from home feeling the way I felt this past weekend. We have had so many people say they are praying for this trip and we appreciate that so much! Here are some more prayer requests and we look forward to telling you all about our trip when we return!

~Pray for our time spent with Amaya, that she would feel comfortable with us and that we would create a bond with her that we will not lose as we wait for our next trip to bring her home.

~Pray that we will pass court. We will know whether we pass or not immediately after the court hearing.

~Pray that Logan will be healthy and do well with his Aunt and Uncle and Grandma and Grandpa.

~Pray for Ryan and I to have peace while we are away from Logan and also as we leave Amaya to return home.

October!

We finally made it to October! We got the call in August that our court date for the adoption was scheduled for October 27th and it is getting so close! Last Friday we received an update on Amaya and she is doing very well. We love to see new pictures of her, and it is encouraging to see the progress she makes... and her beautiful smile! We are still hoping and praying for her to be home with us before the end of the year. We have been working on getting her room ready and I've included some pictures below. The first is of a play kitchen I bought at a garage sale for $15! It even came with many accessories like plastic dishes, silverware, and play food. Thank you for your continued prayers for safe travels, Logan, and our time spent with Amaya...only 18 days until we leave...

End of Summer trip to Michigan!

I am so excited for Fall! It is definitely my favorite season. The only drawback is that Winter will follow. Last week we went on a trip up to South Haven, Michigan and rented a house near Lake Michigan. We went with with our good friends Brian and Jenn, and Adam and Renee who also have little boys of their own: Brady is 21 months and Jackson is 6 months. It was so fun to have them all together! We had a great time and except for a couple of days of cooler weather, it was a great trip to end our Summer! Enjoy the pics!

Court Date!

We got the call last Thursday from our social worker letting us know our court hearing will be on Wednesday October 27th! We were thrilled since we were expecting it to be in November. She told us we need to arrive on Monday and we can leave any day after Wednesday. We are planning on leaving Thursday, October 21st and returning the following Saturday, October 30th. We will actually be flying into Tanzania on Friday, Oct. 22nd to visit some friends of ours who are missionaries there, then we'll be flying up to Ethiopia on Monday. We are not able to visit the orphanage on the weekends, so the earliest we can see Amaya would be Monday. We have heard that we should be able to visit with her each day for about 2-3 hours. I know it is going to be awful returning home without her, but we pray the time will pass quickly before our next trip. Here are some prayer requests as we approach this first trip:

~ Pray the court date does not change! Our social worker said to try to get airline tickets that we will be able to change just in case something comes up and our court date needs changed. Pray that nothing comes up!

~Pray we pass court the first time! It is not uncommon to fail court 1 or 2 times because of missing paperwork or other minor legalities. We will not have to travel again if we fail to pass court the first time, but we do not want to have any delays in getting Amaya home!

~Logan- Okay, so this is more of a prayer request for me. I am so excited to travel to meet our little girl but as we are planning our trip, I get very sad thinking about leaving Logan for so long. Pray I will be at peace about leaving him and that he would do well with family and friends. We know he will be spoiled rotten!

~Meeting Amaya! Pray that she would come to us without fear and hesitation, especially Ryan. As we have listened to others' stories of meeting their children, it seems they have a difficult time bonding with the Father. We are praying that Amaya gets comfortable around us and that we do not lose the bond we make with her over the 4-5 weeks before our next trip.

Thank you all so much for your prayers! We appreciate it!

Baby Brother!

No, Logan is not going to have a baby brother....Logan is going to BE the baby brother! About 4 weeks ago we received a referral for a 16 month old girl from Ethiopia! We were told that when we activated our adoption things would mover fairly quickly and they certainly did. We have received several pictures of her and she is beautiful. We're not allowed to post pictures of her until we bring her home so you will just have to trust us. :-) We submitted the acceptance paperwork in mid-July, and we received an email just last week that the adoption agency has officially filed for a court date. We are looking at the last week of October or early November, and hope to hear in a couple of weeks. After the court date, we'll travel home and then wait 4-6 weeks to return to Ethiopia to pick her up and hopefully have her home by Christmas.