HURRY UP...........

In a world where everyone is in a HURRY, we find ourselves in that circle. As everyone else who has gone through the international adoption process, you find yourselves in a HURRY UP and WAIT mode. You rush and hurry up to get your commitment papers in for the child that has captured your heart. Then you hurry up to get documents completed for your home study and then you wait for the completed  package. After you get that back, you hurry up and submit your I-600 form and then you WAIT for your figure printing appointment. Once you have that, then you get your figure prints done and then Wait again. But while you are waiting you continue to complete the rest of the paperwork and have EVERYTHING notarized. Then you submit all your paperwork to your rep. to see if it will pass the test for correctness and wait. If there is a mistake, you do that document over again and re-submit and wait again. Then when you think you have everything done and your “Golden Ticket” comes in, you look at the dates of all your documents and you notice that some of them may be older than the required time frame from the time they were notarized to when you will have your SDA appointment, so you have to HURRY UP and get them re-done and re-submitted for approval. Once everything is done and ready, you take them down to have them Apostilled, then you can hurry up and get them sent to your adopting country and WAIT for your SDA appointment.

During all of this mass frantic paperwork chasing you are trying to put together everything else. Who is going to watch the kids, what bills do I need to pre-pay or set up other arrangements, who is going to watch the house, will my work let me off for that long and so on and so on……… All of this is a hurry up for you need it done but it is also a wait for your are not sure when. But when the day comes and you receive your SDA appointment date, you only have a few days so it is back to the turbo charged HURRY UP. You hurry up to get all of this done and then you hurry up to get in country to wait for your appointment. Then you hurry up to get to your region to wait to see your child. Then for a few days you are in a hurry up mode to get more paperwork completed and then you wait for your court date. When that day comes you hurry up to get to the court only to wait, since we all know all courts are running behind.  But when the court is over and you have been granted your petition to adopt your child you are over joyed.

Now comes the hard part, you have been in a hurry and wait mode for 7-9 months and now that it seems like you are almost done and ready to head home you have more time to WAIT. The 10 day waiting period is a major WAIT. It seems to be as long as the whole process you have done already. Its only 10 days, but it seems to be like 10 months. But the day comes when it is over and then you hurry up to get the last few documents so you can pick-up your child and hurry up to the capital so you can have their medical done and then off to the embassy for their visa and then you wait for your flights home. The day comes to fly home and you hurry up to the airport to wait in line for security, then you hurry up to your terminal to wait for the boarding time and then finally you are on your way home. Once you arrive at your airport you hurry up and get off the plane to wait at customs.

With all of this HURRY UP and WAIT you learn that you need patience. We have come to the LORD many times during this process with prayer. For it was GOD that had set us on this journey and it was His words that kept us going. Hebrews 10:36 For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise; and James 1: 3-4 Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Before you submit to do anything you should always bring it before the LORD and he shall direct you path. We have no doubt that God has set us out on this journey for it has been by His strength only that we have been able to continue this adoption journey. We praise God for his mercy and grace in our lives to allow us to adopt this sweet boy so he can have a forever family, ours and HIS.

Right now we are in the middle of the 10 day waiting period, so we are almost to the last phase of the HURRY UP AND WAIT.

                                                             Really, more pictures