Leaving on a jet plane....AND more photos!

I have to start out this post with some of the beautiful pictures we just received of Lily at the end of last week! (they are letting her hair grow out after having kept it nearly shaved for months! :)

I just can't believe we are almost there and will soon be holding this precious little girl - we will be a family!

Well, it has come to this....my last post before I head out to board a plane that will take us half way around the world to meet our daughter in China.  And it's now less than 24 hrs away!!  It is surreal to say the least. This journey has certainly had it's ups and downs and major life changes all throughout the process and now we are just hours away from the ultimate end goal of this process...traveling to China and bringing home our little girl. When we leave here tomorrow morning things will never be the same in this house again.

I have spent much of the last week preparing to leave, of course, and also preparing my kids for school. We have been so incredibly busy that I don't think I have had a lot of time to think about being away from the 3 youngest kiddos for more than 2 weeks. I have only ever left them for a long weekend and by the end of that I was so ready to get back home to them!  I know it will give us the much needed time to bond with Lily and just spend getting to know her and letting her get to know us.  I am sure we will make great use of FaceTime and Skype while we are in China! 

This past Friday we also received our TA (invitation to travel from China) hard copy that we will take with us to China to get our girl. It was a cool moment for us....

In addition to receiving our TA, packing for the trip, preparing the house and the 3 kiddos we will leave behind, we have also spent much time in prayer as we prepare our hearts for this final part of the journey to Liliana.  For us it is the critical part of this journey without a doubt. This was God's calling on our lives and without constant seeking of His guidance through this process we could easily get off track and make this entire process harder than it needs to be - for all of us!
That is why this Sunday at our church meant so much to us - our pastor called us up in front of the congregation during service so that the church could pray over us and Lily for the journey ahead.  It was such an emotional morning in general and I definitely had a little bit of sadness as I knew this was the last Sunday I would worship with this family for a few weeks. Feeling their love and prayers so strongly was the PERFECT send off and food for my spirit!

Well, I guess that about wraps it up.  My head is swimming with so many thoughts and my heart with so many emotions right now that is is super hard to concentrate on anything.

Please keep us in your prayers and check back here over the next 2 weeks as I hope to continue updating this blog while we are away.

Our count down is about to be complete!!!

Love,
Derek and Jessica

Travel dates, updated pics and packing for Lily!

As many already know we received our travel dates last week!  We leave for China on August 27, 2014...I can hardly even believe it is really almost time to meet our daughter :)

This last week has really been a whirlwind of activity around here as you might imagine.  We have been doing lots of planning and preparing to leave behind 3 of our kiddos for 2 weeks. As well as, preparing the cat care, the dog care and preparing for school to start the day before we leave...Whew!
It has been exciting to pack up Lily's suitcase - which is by the way the ONLY one I have yet to even start packing.  Just to put the clothing in there that she will be wearing with us in about 2 weeks is so fun.  I am sure that I have over packed, but it is so difficult to know what to take since I am not 100% sure what size she is. I have packed 12 month sizes to a size 2t. Hopefully something in there will fit! I plan to give the orphanage whatever clothes won't work for her when we go to visit there a couple of days after getting her. I am both excited and sad about seeing the place she called home this past year of her young life.

For other traveling families' references I have taken pictures and will list them below of what I packed for the trip to China to get our toddler. I have been compiling lists on Pinterest and other sources to make sure I am covering everything that I will need.

 I packed 2 pairs of close toed shoes for Lily. One is a a slip one style soft sole shoe and the other pair is a standard pair of Stride Rite gym shoes. I also packed a plastic bib that easily wipes off, some stacking cups for playing with in the bathtub and in the hotel room, a book to read that I had personalized with Lily's name and a 2nd copy of the photo album I made and sent to her at the orphanage. I also brought 2 little stuffed animals - a pink poodle that looks like our dog and a panda bear that the boys got for her. And 2 dolls - one is a cute little doll she was given at the adoption shower and the other is a doll I purchased 3 years ago. That doll's name is "Ling" and she speaks several Mandarin Chinese/English phrases - she is just so cute. It is apparently now a collector's item since it is no longer made and cost at least 3 times what I paid for it...man, I am glad I bought Ling way back in the beginning! :) Also pictured here is a ladybug sippy cup, some Honest Company "Healing Balm" and a t-shirt I had made for her with a ladybug and her name embroidered on the front.  

In this picture I have some diapers for her (I am taking about a dozen and will buy more there if I need them), about half a dozen pull-ups, a small backpack that I had her name embroidered on and a water purifier/filter for use in our hotel rooms, etc.  I didn't actually mean to put the medication in the picture. I will talk about those in another post!

Clothing: I packed 5 sundresses with matching "bloomers", 2 rompers, 1 pair of shorts, 1 pair of pants, 1 skirt/shirt/cardigan outfit, 1 additional cardi to match the other outfits, 3 footed zip up sleepers and about 10 flower headbands. I also threw a pair of sandals in that match most of her outfits in case I end up being able to put her in those. 

I also packed other things later on that are not pictured and they are:

-Swim diapers

- 2 bathing suits

- baby wipes

- a blanket

- goldfish crackers

- toddler "puffs"

- raisins

 And finally for the flight home and her first step onto American soil I am bringing a couple of patriotic outfits! I have them in two different sizes since I wasn't sure what would work best for her. :)

I will be sure to document all the other things that I am taking on this trip in later posts (like when I finally get around to packing the other bags!).  I found these types of lists and blogs such a help to me in preparing to travel to get Lily and I really want to help others, as well.

Okay, and finally I received today from our guide, Zhou, new pics of Lily from this weekend!  She isn't smiling, but I know we will change that soon! :)

It's lunch time....Lily is sitting closest to the camera. 

Lily and another little friend playing. 

We found out that we are traveling with 3 other families total. 1 family will be breaking off from the group when we head out to get our babies as their child is in another province and another orphanage. The rest of us all have babied waiting for us at Lily's orphanage so we will be traveling together the entire 2 weeks. One of them will even be on our flight leaving from Chicago and flying into Beijing so we will truly be with them our entire trip :) 

(Gabby kissing the picture of her baby sister!)

Well, the countdown is definitely on and we are 8 days away from leaving to get our baby girl!

Love,

Jess

We have our TA!!!

We have been waiting almost 5 loooooong weeks now for our TA (travel approval) so we can finally go get our daughter. I feel like I have been dying a very slow death over these last few weeks (seriously!). In a move of desperation I decided to call my agency and speak with my rep so I could just get it off my chest more less. As soon as she got on the phone I basically started crying to her that I didn't know how much longer I could do this (Of course I can do this as long as I need to, but she "gets" it!!) and that I just needed her to talk me off the ledge so to speak.
After I got done whining to her she calmly said that she was actually getting ready to call me and tell me that she had some news: "We got word that your TA has been approved"! I could hardly believe my ears!

My agencies on staff Chinese director had actually made a call the night before to the CCCWA (China's children's welfare authority) to inquire about our TA.  Knowing we were coming up on the longest wait time they really ever see they feared maybe something could have gone wrong and wanted to be sure they had record of our file. Apparently they had actually approved our TA already but for whatever reason the paperwork had not yet been mailed out to our agency (really?! UGH!!!).  They told Zhou that it would be mailed this week (please let that mean tomorrow!!!).

So we don't actually have a TA physically in our possession, but we are approved and we WILL be moving forward very very soon :)

Next steps? Well, once we have the physical TA our agency will call the US Embassy in China and set up Lily's visa appointment so that she can come home with us to the US. Since after the adoption is complete in China she will no longer have Chinese citizenship and she will be an American citizen she will have to also get her visa in order to get back to her new home with us in America.
We don't have any way of knowing what appointments they have available or when they will be able to get us in, but our agency says they will be asking for the next available appointment.  As soon as we get that information (we are praying that will be by early next week) we will know exactly when we are leaving for China and begin booking our trip!

Please continue to pray with us that Liliana stays well and we are able to get to her quickly.  My heart just breaks to think about each night she continues to spend there without her mom and dad. This past Saturday, August 2nd, marked the first full year that she has spent in the orphanage. How amazing and merciful to know it will be her first and last - I wish there was some way to help her understand she has a home and family and they will be coming for her within weeks!

This journey has been incredibly difficult and taxing in many physical, mental, emotional and monetary ways. Of course, it is worth every single thing we "endure" to get to Lily and we will soon see the full fruits of this. Whatever God has called us to do He will bless. I pray that I can continue to lean into him and not keep trying to take back control of this process. It makes it so much easier and better in the end - hard thing to do for a "type A" personality that just needs to make sure everything works out the way it's supposed to - ha!

"Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS."For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."  ~Matthew 29-30

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

    neither are your ways my ways,”

declares the Lord.

9 

"As the heavens are higher than the earth,

    so are my ways higher than your ways

    and my thoughts than your thoughts." ~Isaiah 55:8-9

Both of the above scriptures were from our sermon at Rivertree Church this past Sunday. They couldn't have been more timely for us and we really felt like God was speaking directly to us. Praise the Lord for His living word!!!

With love, 
Jessica (and family) 

Two little girls....sisters

Still waiting on our TA.....I can hardly believe I am even typing that. It hurts to the core to watch each day slip away and feel no closer to getting to our daughter. It has felt like nearly every turn since getting her referral has taken longer than expected and often hits snags that even surprise our agency.  I don't understand why this is happening, but I do trust that God is in control  I am trying so hard to remind myself constantly of this. As each day passes it does get harder and harder. I just want to get to my little girl so badly and patience has never been a virtue of mine.....perhaps God wants me to work on that?!

In addition to the TA from China we have been waiting on our update finger print receipt to arrive and our visas for travel. We were so excited to receive our visas via FedEx on Wednesday!  With all the craziness going on with the State Department issuing visas we were unsure if it would hold up the issuance of ours for any reason.  Our friends were in China picking up their two little boys when this break down happened and they had been stranded unable to come back home for several extra days. Praise God they did make it back safely with their boys and to their 4 other waiting little ones :)

I am praying that my next entry will be one to tell you that we have a TA and announcing our departure date, God willing!

I do have a short story that I really do want to share with you all though and to have it written down for the future.
The story starts back in the year 2000. We were fairly new to our church (then called the Milford Vineyard - now Rivertree). Derek and I had been married about 4 years and had recently lost his father, Gene. That loss had prompted us to try to get started on a family of our own, but months were going by and I was still not getting pregnant.  We had gone up front of our church for prayer and our pastor (Steve Caperton) prayed for us and for our ability to start a family. He told us that while he was praying over us God gave him a distinct scene of two little girls playing together. They were toddler aged girls. Of course, Derek and I were excited and thought that he might have even been seeing twins in our near future!
About a month or two later we did become pregnant and in Oct. 2001 we had our first - a healthy baby BOY! We were thrilled, but had not forgotten about the vision the Lord had given to Pastor Steve. A couple of years later we had another boy and then 3 years after that we were pregnant again. On my third pregnancy during the first time they listened to the baby's heartbeat they thought they perhaps they were hearing two! They made me an appointment to go to another location later that day to get an ultrasound and see if there were indeed two babies. My mind raced and I recalled how 9 years earlier Pastor Steve had been given a vision of two little girls playing.  I thought this must be it and I am now pregnant with our twin girls!  I wasn't sure how I felt about that since I was already nervous about adding just a 3rd child and I kept thinking how difficult it would be to carry twins - even my single pregnancies had not been easy on me.
Well, the ultrasound showed one baby - no twins. Months later we would find out that this baby was also a boy. After the birth of this baby it was apparent that I would not be bearing any more children biologically and I did often think about the vision that Pastor Steve had shared with us that day many years before. I tried to make sense of the vision or word he got for us so many times. I thought he must have misinterpreted or maybe God was telling me that I wold have girls for grandchildren way down the road. That is the thing though you just can't try to make sense of what God is doing in your life. Our brains just can't begin to imagine the path he has laid out before us and it rarely "makes sense".  God goes beyond all that we could orchestrate or imagine on our own....thank goodness!

Fast forward to 2011 and Derek and I begin the process to adopt a little girl from China. We had only ever thought of adopting one child so this being a way that we would ever see two little girls in our family never crossed our minds.  During that process we are interrupted (a Divine intervention I would say! :) and were blessed with our first daughter, Gabrielle Elaina born in February of 2012.

Now nearly 2 and a half years later we will be bringing our second little girl home in just weeks and she is nearly the same age as our first girl!  Why did our pastor see 2 little girls (toddlers) that day when God gave him a vision for us?  How could any of us possibly have understood that 14 years later that vision would become a reality?  We couldn't have! There is no way that our human mind could have dreamed up such a perfect path. I dreamed of it one way and God new better. He had a plan for two little girls that were yet not even a twinkle in their birth mother's eyes so many years ago. He knew the plan he had for their lives. A plan to prosper them and not to harm them, a plan to give them a hope and a future - says Jeremiah 29 verse 11. In his infinite wisdom and love for all of us he weaves our lives' stories together and if we are able to listen to His voice and follow the path he has laid before us it will be exactly what it was meant to be. Of course this isn't what I ever dreamed it would be 14 years ago when Pastor Steve prayed for us. I think of how many things had to fall just so into place and how easily we could have turned away from what God had for us and for our little girls. I praise God everyday that he helped me to stay out of the way of myself when I needed to. That in many instances I didn't listen so he worked things out (many that were very painful) so that in the end we could let go of what we thought we wanted and embrace the ultimate gift that he had waiting for us that we could have never imagined! I wouldn't have wanted it to end up any other way - even if there was no way myself 14 years ago would have known that! All the joy, blessings, success, pain, disappointment, losses, letting go and rebuilding that took place in our lives over the last 14 years prepared us for exactly where we are today. And to be the parents of 5 amazing children; 3 brothers and 2 sisters and that my friends is worth much more than anything we ever may have felt like we were "giving" up or losing along the way. When we allow him to work God has a way of doing that :)

Thank you for reading and your continued prayers for our family and of course our little Liliana!

Love. 

Jessy