20 months and 10 days...

Time is a-flyin' these days, I tell you! Sorry for the long lapse in blogging. I literally have about six drafts of blog posts buried in my blog that were all good ideas for posts but never got completed. And now those posts are outdated so I'll just move onto the present, I guess.

On the adoption front - since approval we have waited one year, eight months and 10 days. This is getting very exciting. If I let myself really think about it I get butterflies in my tummy and am overwhelmed with impatience! So my m.o. these days is to stay busy, continue to allow brief thoughts about my baby(ies) every day so I can pray for them, keep reading my adoption books but otherwise just keep my mind to other things. It's when I think about holding my child and daydream about what it's going to be like that I want to burst with emotional anticipation. It's like being a child on the night before Christmas when you feel so excited because you JUST_CAN_NOT_WAIT for morning to come! You want it to be morning NOW!

I just received an email from another woman on my online adoption group. She said she just heard that ICAB (adoption board) is currently working on matching applicants from the third quarter of 2008. Because I can be a bit air-headed sometimes, I initially thought that referred to us but then Andrey reminded me that that refers to those approved in July to September 2008. We were approved in December 2008. Oh well. Still though, we are closer than ever and it is exciting to me to be past the 20 month mark. I have heard of lots of families getting matched in the 20-something months. Anything is possible! Besides, we just recently sent in a letter to ICAB with a family update and some recent photos and revised medical checklists that gave, what I felt like was, LOTS of room to choose from in the numerous conditions/challenges we are willing to take on. C'mon!! This has got to affect something!

To be honest, lately the wait has not been too bad at all. I am enjoying the present so much these days that I'm fine to wait a few more months (I hope it's only a few more months!). We have traveled quite a bit since April. We've been to the US, India, Northern Philippines and Hong Kong. I plan to go to Davao, Mindanao (Southern Philippines) next month to work at a busy clinic for about 10 days. Then it is possible we'll take a short furlough in October as Andrey has a very small window for which he can be away. He is crazy busy with work between now and the start of 2011. He has work trips planned to Manila, Bangkok and DC all before the end of the year.

I'll end with sharing something I received recently that was VERY encouraging. While in Luzon at Abundant Grace Maternity Clinic I joined the staff for the their weekly devotional/prayer time. We went around the group and prayed for each person. When it was my turn, two midwives had words of encouragement received from the Holy Spirit for me about our children. The first was a picture of Jesus holding Andrey and I in one hand and our child(ren) in the other. The impression was, we are not yet together but Jesus is holding each one of us securely in his hands while we wait. The second word was that Jesus is very near to our child, caring tenderly for them and bonding with them in place of us (and in place of their birth parents).

When I heard this I started crying because I have prayed exactly this numerous times. It was Jesus encouraging my heart that what I have prayed and asked for, he is doing. I wrote those prayers in this post and this post. He really is answering our prayers and it's so nice to be reminded of that.