Though some days and weeks feel like they might last forever, our adoption journey is still moving quickly.  The 50 day wait for our LOA (Letter of Seeking Confirmation from Adopter) was tough, and I spent most of January thinking it would never come, and was pretty cranky about it.  But now that is has, we are back to the hurry up and wait of more paperwork.  Our agency sent our I-800 (immigration forms for the United States government for Gavin specifically) last week and we are now waiting for that to be approved.  We will also be applying for our Visas soon.  With things going as they are there is a very real possibility we could travel the end of March.  Chinese New Year is next week, but since we are waiting for US approval it shouldn’t slow anything down.

We are anxiously awaiting an updated – our last update – any day.  I am longing to see a face with more color, more chub, and more life than his last update.  I’m hoping to see a video of his development (we asked for one) since we’ve never seen a video of him.  I’m hoping to hear his weight has increased and he will fit perfectly into the clothes I have bought and others have so generously donated to us.  I hope to hear that he is continuing to improve in his gross motor skills.  I’m hoping to hear he received the care package we sent to him, complete with a photo album of his new family.  I’m hoping to hear his nanny’s have told him he has a family coming to take him home forever, and they are preparing his heart for the difficult transition he will have.

His nursery awaits – crib, rocker, clothes, diapers, formula, bottles, toys, books.  We’re preparing for the expected, the unexpected and everything in between.  I assume it will be the unexpected unexpected that will be our reality.  The orphanage behavior we didn’t know about, or a cultural shock to our system that we didn’t anticipate.  And so I’m mentally preparing for survival mode for our time in China, and the first few weeks (months?) after coming home, just like we would with a newborn.  We have read almost every trauma & attachment book we can get our hands on, and watched many DVDs.  We are tying up our loose ends with our commitments so we can focus on him.  We are trying to learn some mandarin (ok, not really, but it’s on my to do list) to communicate with him.  When opening the first page of my new book The Crunch-Time Guide to Parenting Language for Chinese Adoption, it hit me like a ton of bricks that these were the words he was going to need to hear our first moments together.

But perhaps, beyond my wildest dreams, God will bless us with an easy transition, a happy, content baby that understand we are mom and dad, travel mercies, sleep, sleep, and more sleep, siblings at home that embrace their new sibling warmly and lovingly.  I don’t doubt that He can.  But I know that it doesn’t matter.  It doesn’t have to be easy.  He doesn’t call us to a life of comfort, but a life of radical obedience to Him.  We still say yes.  Always, yes.

“A Father to the fatherless, a defender of the widows, is God in his holy dwelling.  God sets the lonely in families, he leads out the prisoners with singing, but the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land.” Psalms 68:5-6