FINALLY!!!!! He is our son!!!

I can't believe I am finally posting these words. Cullen Sinamo Adams is legally and irrevocably our son! After 5 months of waiting from the first time we saw his sweet round face, it is now only a matter of time (short time) before we can leave to bring him home!

The email came today around lunch time. Too say I was not expecting would be an understatement. But there it was..."Congratulations!" I could not breathe. Literally. I could not even read the rest of the email. I was hyperventilating as I launched my self onto Jeff, running around the house and screaming every time I could catch my breath. Only to catapult myself back onto my husband about 5 times as I would pass by! My mother couldn't even understand me because I was hyperventalating so much. I then had to have Jeff confirm that I had read it right...or actually that what I didn't continue to read really was that we had passed court today. It was. He is ours!!!!

So the sad part is that now there is more waiting. The not so sad part is that it is a short wait and a defined wait. It is just a matter of gathering the court papers, having a birth certificate issued and getting him a physical at the US Embassy before we can be assigned a date at the US Embassy that we will travel to Ethiopia for and bring him home. The most likely scenario is that we will be traveling towards the end of the year (or -hopefully not- into January of 2010). We are hoping to hear news of travel soon...but realistically it will probably be a few weeks before we are sure of our travel dates. We will keep you posted!

And I will close by saying thank you! We have so much to be Thankful for this year (like all years) but we are especially thankful to everyone for their prayers and support. I never thought this day would come. I didn't think I would make it emotionally. But I did. But we did. And finally he is ours! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!

It is Nov 23rd in Ethiopia Already...

So I am posting now because I know tomorrow will be a super hard day for me (especially since we are likely to not get any news for multiple days on the outcome of our case).

It is Nov 23rd in Ethiopia already. Actually it is exactly 5:45 am right now. The courts will be opening in a few short hours I would imagine. Cullen's mother should be in Addis already (hopefully she is in Addis) to attend the hearing. I am praying for the judges, for his mother (well I have been praying for her for a long time and I continue to), for our agency representatives, for our son, for our emotional well being.

It is time. We have waited. I have been broken. We have been lifted up. I have been angry. We have had hope. I have doubt. We have been diligent. We have ached and cried.

But still, we have love. It is time for our son to be home.

Please pray with us.

Tessa Grows Up

The baby quilt my mom made for Tessa.

And finally some pictures of her big girl room! We moved her into her big girl bed a few months ago, but wanted to wait to share photos until her room was a little closer to being done. The big thing we were waiting on was her new quilt that my mom made for her! Finally after much hard work from my mom...it is finished and Tessa slept beneath it for the first time on Monday night! She LOVES it and so do we! Thanks Mom for yet another beautiful quilt! Your talent always amazes me (as well as your ability to put up with all my crazy requests and my particular personality)!!! So, without further ado...Tessa's new and improved big girl room!

=

New quilt and antique bed we had refinished.

The antique dresser we had refinished to match her bed.

And finally the big girl asleep under her new quilt!

Photos of Cullens room to come soon I promise! I want to at least have the wall hanging my mom did hung....

Pirated...Adoption, Orphans and Trusting God

So, yesterday...Sunday, November 8th 2009...was Orphan Sunday. I have been wanting to post something meaningful in response/about this, but when I read my good friend Bethany's post, I knew I would not be able to say it any better. She really articulated so well what I know to be true and how I feel about these things...Adoption, Orphans, and Trusting God. So please read it, and more importantly, TAKE ACTION.

I feel like a broken record sometimes asking: "What are you called to do?" "What is your something?" "Make your moment of grace happen." But I really feel like we all need that push, that constant reminder. Our lives are so busy and often times even full. There is no reason to move beyond your comfort zone. But if there is one thing that should move most anyone...it is the cry of the orphan. Or the cry of 143 million (143,000,000) of them.

And I am more guilty of this then most any of you. Even for adoption...we were one of those families who had "talked about and considered" adoption. But would we really have taken the leap if God had not reminded us not-so-gently about this seed he had planted in our hearts? It was not a comfortable step to take...it often still isn't. But there is no doubt in my mind that this is what we are called to do. My new question is always what ELSE can I do? Now I just need some more "pushes." Especially as our life is just about to get even more full with a second child at home.

So this is just another little push from your annoying little friend Brooke. What are you moved to do? Trust in God and DO IT.

Click on this link: http://hutchisonadoption.blogspot.com/2009/11/adoption-orphans-and-trusting-god.html

I am alive....

So last week was almost more than I could take. I finally have the wherewithal to sit down and post.

So what happened? Well as you know, the short of the long of it is that our court date was postponed (yet again) from Oct 22nd to November 23. We were hopefully all weekend that we had passed as we had not heard word from our agency. But when I called them on the Monday after our Thursday court date, they had just gotten word from their staff in ET that our date was postponed. I literally could not breath when the words came out of her mouth. The week before had been a tough one as we had learned some additional medical information about Cullen that means he will likely have to have a minor surgery when he gets home. Which we were hopeing would be in about 6 weeks. But instead we got news that once again, we would continue to wait to bring our son home.

The reason for the postponement was apparently that the "dockets were too full" and that they just did not get to our agencies cases that day. This was made all the more bitter by the fact that we had heard of other families with other agencies that had passed court on Oct 22nd. For some reason our agencies (and some others) cases were the ones pushed back. Why were the "dockets too full?" Well each fall the ET courts shut down for an undisclosed amount of time (typically about 6 weeks). Randomly and with out notice, about a month before the closure this year, the Ministry of Women's Affairs in ET (another government body that ins involved in processing paperwork for adoption cases) shut down for 2 weeks for training. All cases during htis time had to then be pushed back, starting the backlog. Then, the courts closed about 2 weeks after that for approximately 6 weeks. Our first court date was supposed to be the first week the courts were reopened, BUT the courts decided not to reopen as scheduled and stayed closed for training for an additional 2 weeks. And so additional backlog. Backlog from the closure and then more backlog for the delayed reopening. And a new court date for us of Oct 22nd. A date that apparently had too many cases scheduled due to all of these backlogs.

The good news in all of this is that we were actually given a future date (i.e. our court date was rescheduled rather than being postponed indefinitely). Often if your case is not heard, you then wait again to be assigned another date...which can take who knows how long. And then once you have the date you have to wait for it. Fortunately for us we were given a definite timeline and a spot in line. Without a scheduled date it is totally random how they seem to assign court dates.

So here I am comming out of my fog. Now it is less than 3 weeks to our 3rd try at a court date. Not great but better than the 4 weeks when we first heard. I really thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown last week. I am running out of the emotional wherewithal to continue to have to sit and wait with my hands tied to bring my son home. I want to be the one responding to and waking up to comfort him when he cries in the middle of the night. I want to start nursing him. I want him to start attaching to me and Jeff and Tessa, not random caregivers. I want to hold him in my arms and kiss his face.

Well at least I can start to prepare for the fact that there is basically no possibility now that he will be home for Christmas. Maybe January.

In the larger scheme of things, this wait is short...but for us, and for speedy ET adoptions, it is WAY TOO LONG. You can only understand if you have BTDT, but trust me, it is WAY TOO LONG.