The Time is Now!

I am beyond excited to share (if you don't already know) that we will be traveling NEXT WEEK to go get our Little C! That's right, we have finally gotten our notice to travel!

I've been waiting since December to write a new blog post! There were lots of random things to talk about, but I know how disappointing it is to see a blog post with no new news! lol! Plus, we've been quite busy with Christmas events, tackling projects pre-adoption, and just keeping up with plain ol' life.

This whole process has taken much longer than I had expected. Well, maybe not completely, but there was always this hope that we would be different and things would move along a little faster. As you know, that did not happen, but now that the day is here, it's almost hard to believe! I feel like I still have so much to accomplish before we leave, even though I've known for months that this day was almost here.

The best part about the last few months is what I have learned about the adoption world. Even though it is quite the emotional journey, the adoption community is strong and so helpful! Facebook can be annoying at times, but because of it I have made numerous new friends and have joined a couple "support" type groups for Philippines adoption recently. These have become invaluable, both for learning new things and for my sanity! They are encouraging, reassuring, and all give such great advice. I hope I can pass along some valuable information someday too to others.

We have also spent a lot of time as a family the last couple months. Christmas was a busy busy time of travel and projects, all which kept us in close quarters. We traveled down to visit my extended family and Godmother in Iowa, then came home to a couple parties with friends, and doing a boy's room make-over. I was so pleased that we FINALLY have gotten the boy's room done! It made me breathe a little better and made me feel like things were in some way finally falling into place. Caleb is over the moon about his new room and "bonk" beds. The room makes me smile every time I look in. It is such a "boy's room" - Love it! Still have a couple finishing touches I'd like to finish before we leave next week, like curtains and a mattress for Little C! But nothing that will take too much time. I've even managed to organize their closet and dresser already!

Ok, ok, sorry - I'm sure most of you are reading this and are thinking "really Mara!?! we just want to know what the timeline is next week!!!"  So without further ado, here are our plans...

We leave on Thursday for Manila. It will be about 13 hours to Tokyo, a short layover, and then another 4 hours to Manila. We will stay a couple days in Manila to sight-see. While there, we are planning to meet with a Mother and older brother of a friend Caleb has made recently at Karate! This was quite the connection to make and we are excited to spend some time with them in Manila and learn more about the area that is the main city/island of the Philippines.

After the short visit in Manila, we will head to Davao where Little C has lived all his life. We then plan to also sight-see here for a couple days before our first day at the orphanage. We want to learn more about the land he has been living in. Meet some of the people and take in his culture. We will learn about the orphanage and meet Little C for the first time probably around the following Wednesday from when we leave. The next day he will most likely come with us to our hotel, where we will start our time as a Forever Family! We will spend about 4 low-key days in our hotel area and then we will need to head back to Manila. In Manila we will have our final interview with ICAB and get all of Little C's paperwork. The next day we fly back to the US, do our best to recover from jet-lag, and continue our time as a family in OUR OWN HOME. As much as I'm excited to see the Philippines, I think I'm looking forward to the end part the best... the part where Little C is finally HOME. 

We will continue to update you the next few weeks the best we can. Keep checking in. I may not be able to get the posts to Facebook, if that is where you check, so try to at least check directly with the blog periodically. Thank you for all of your continued support and prayers! We would not be in this place without all of you!

Could you please pray for a couple things in the next few weeks?
*Calm minds, hearts, and attitudes
*Safety in travel
*Communication (we are told Little C knows some basic english...)
*Attachment process

You are all the best!

In Christ~
Mara