The roller coaster adoption ride

I know some of you have been waiting patiently while I work up the drive to post again. A lot has been going on just, unfortunately, nothing having to do with our adoption. Let me reword that: Nothing good (from our earthly perspective) has been going on with our adoption. We found out, sadly, that the baby girl we were hoping might one day be ours will not be. This means that the transitional home is completely full and no new children will be brought in until, maybe, this week (since five families have just picked up their little ones!) Once new children are brought in, it takes weeks (at least three, I know) to get paperwork processed/tests done for a referral. With nine months looming on Saturday and us still number two on the list, this was sad news at several different levels. I feel sad about it, to be honest. However, I am also renewed in knowing that God is good and His timing is perfect. Nothing could do more to renew this resolve as Theresa Van Wetten's post from Ethiopia today. While so many pieces might not fit together at the end of our journey to our little girl as did with the Van Wettens , I know they do up in God's master puzzle, and I will rest in that tonight.

I feel thrilled for those picking up their children today in Ethiopia and I feel thrilled for the others that passed court. I also feel sad for the Caldwells, who did not pass court. Once again, the roller coaster of adoption.

Speaking of other families, I wanted to let you all know that the Weimer family needs some major help. In three weeks they want to go pick up their newest three family members (after adopting another sibling group of three less than a year ago!) and still need $19,000. If you feel you can help, please go visit their blog and donate. They are amazing and need the body to come together.

Speaking of money, I just found out tonight our homestudy expires in two days. Surprise, surprise, a new cost to get it renewed :) Sorry, that was slightly sadistic, but you know, when it rains, it pours. And God has been so faithful. I really still have no doubt He will provide, just fleshly Danielle could have done without that added cost!

Lastly, I wanted to share with you two pics from an end-of-the-season night on the boat with good friends from church and memories from two weekends ago when my mom and dad took the boys to the Dunes for a weekend of camping. I still haven't gotten this weekend's little excursion to Chicago downloaded! Maybe this weekend I'll get caught up with those! I truly have the best parents on the face of the planet. Enjoy.

To all of you on pins and needles...

This has not been an easy couple of weeks. Life has been busy so that I'm not just sitting at home waiting for the phone to ring, but at the same time, the constant thoughts of, "Today could be the day! Duni could be calling us at any moment!" start to run you down after awhile. So, today I got some answers that take the edge off. They bring up a wide range of emotions--what's new with adoption?--and I wanted to share them with all of you.

First of all, as I suspected, we're no longer number one in line. This, of course, is because of the loss of Forrest's precious baby girl that died from pneumonia. The World Health Organization states that pneumonia is the single biggest killer of children under the age of five worldwide. And a research study from 2004 states that undernutrition is an underlying cause of childhood deaths associated with illnesses such as pneumonia, malaria, and others. As I talked about after Joner's little Julia died, even though it is painful, I am so thankful to be a part of something that allows me to not be numbed by the statistics of "millions dying in Africa." These precious little girls represent so many others, and yet are deeply personal and individual. Two families (and more!) are grieving intensely for them. We are so sad for Hillary and Jacob and Jessica and Jason, but we are happy as well--that the Joners are now waiting to pick up their two little ones, the Forrests will be at that place very soon, and the rest of us realize that there are more to statistics then numbers .

We also found out from our monthly conference call with America World that there will be a lull with referrals over the next few weeks. The transitional home is at capacity and until families pick up their kiddos, there is no room to bring new little (or big!) ones in. This, of course, means that we will most definitely have to pay the $4000 or so in extra fees. We're planning on this, anyway (although we really don't know how to plan!) People can still give to our Lifesong for Orphans account and we're going to do one last push with our t-shirts and we'll just tackle the rest little by little. I know the Lord will provide in His way! This lull means that we shouldn't expect to hear anything the rest of this month. This is disappointing (obviously!) but it also helps me to know where we're at and not get my hopes up unneccesarily.

And that leads me to the last piece of information. Apparently, having said what I said about nothing happening the rest of the month, here are the notes Karen took from the conference call yesterday regarding two baby girls in the transitional home:

One child was extremely malnourished and she was not able to be referred yet. Another one doesn’t have paperwork ready; we have to assure she’s adoptable (a true orphan).

Do you see why this news makes yesterday an emotional roller coaster? If these children make it through...one of them will be part of our forever family! Of course, there are so many ifs, but it sure gives us reasons to pray fervently and hope. Kole and I had a discussion, specifically, about the malnourished little girl in the orphanage right now. I was telling him about what this could mean--that this little baby could be his little sister--and even if it wasn't, here was a precious baby girl that needs our prayers...and Kole, my precious, sensitive Kole, started getting emotional. We prayed right then and there for this little one that could be ours, but, no matter what, is a child of God and needs people fighting for her. I don't think I will ever forget this moment as I held Kole in my arms and we prayed for a little child around the world.

So, that's a lot to process, isn't it? Thanks for your continued prayers. This weekend is going to be full and wonderful--the boys camping with Grandma and Grandad, Karl and his brother up in Michigan helping his mom move, and me running my first 5K, having dinner and watching a musical with my best friend, dancing and participating in the Feast of Tabernacles celebration at her church...whew! I get excited just thinking about it. And here's something else that got me excited during yesterday's emotional day--look what came in the mail (don't the girl colors look AMAZING?!?):

Praise and Prayer

Hey everybody. Life here is....complicated. We have some wonderful praises to report--our garage sale was a huge success. We made around $720.00!!! Thanks, largely, to those who donated items. Almost all of our bigger stuff sold, which really helped. A lot of clothes sold, too, but I have TONS more. That's why we're going to do it again in the spring. The only bad news about the garage sale came after the event when I dropped a table on my big toe and couldn't pull it together, calling Karl to come home from church to help me. He asked if I did it on purpose so I didn't have to carry everything in by myself ( :) ) It would have been tempting, but I assured him the pain wasn't worth it. The good news is that I have my first 5K this coming weekend and I ran this morning for the first time since the incident, and it felt fine. Whew! Speaking of running, my amazing sister Alyssa ran her first marathon this weekend in Buenos Ayres (she's a missionary in Paraguay) and finished strong! I'm SO proud of her. She started running minis about six years ago, which was amazing in itself, but now she just, once again, outdid herself. Maybe one day we'll run a 10K together...but I think that will be my highest goal in the running department.

Now for the really horrible news. We had another AWAA family lose their baby girl over the weekend. The Forrests were looking forward to picking up their two little children before Christmas and now, because of pneumonia, their little Etsegenet, is dancing with little Julia Joner in heaven. This is, of course, devastating. The Forrests have posted a beautiful hymn on their blog that so shows their hearts. Please be praying for them.

Also, I have not posted about last week's letter we received from America World telling of a significant fee increase. If we do not receive our referral before November 1st, fees will be increasing over $4000.00. If we do get our referral, we will still need to pay around fifteen hundred dollars in increased fees (I'm not sure the exact amount), but this was, of course, hard news to hear. While the significant fee increases are cause for struggles with anxiety, I am not feeling overwhelmed. God has been so good throughout this adoption process, and I KNOW He will continue to meet our needs. Do I know what that will look like? No. Will we be paying off this adoption longer than I had hoped? Maybe. But do I know that God is fully capable of accomplishing His will no matter the circumstances? Absolutely. Many people ask how it is possible for America World to do this since we signed a contact a year ago with other fees in place. From a legal angle, I think I remember that the contract said that awaa has the right to change the fees at any time. However, I'm not really thinking about it from that angle. The things I know are that Duni and the people at America World care about children. They have made personal sacrifices to work there. They work hard and believe in what they're doing. They believe, largely because of the growing program and the food/goods crisis around the world, that this is the only way to keep things going at the quality standard at which it's currently runnng. A significant fee increase is the only way to maintain their high standards. And because the money largely goes towards the orphan care over in Ethiopia, I fully understand and trust in what they've decided.

Blessings to you all. Please be in prayer for the Forrests, the families that are waiting to hear about passing court so they can pick up their little ones, those waiting to travel, all the adoptive families that are trying to plan for this fee increase in the midst of economic turmoil worldwide, and our precious little ones in Ethiopia.

A mouse escapade

This weird picture was captured while talking via Skype to my precious sister in Paraguay. Karl was driving home from a wedding rehearsal around 10 p.m. and a mouse peaked out from under the couch several times to see what I was doing. Well, I pride myself in not being a "girly girl" so I like being able to handle spiders, bugs, crickets, toads, etc. With the exception of spiders in my bedroom (I don't like thinking about them dropping down on me while I sleep), no big deal. Mice, on the other hand, freak me out. I think I don't like how they surprise me and I don't know where they're going to run. I feel the absolute necessity to get my feet off the ground--literally. And some small screaming is usually involved as well. So, that's what I'm doing here in this picture crouching in my chair as Fiefel runs around in my living room. I'm such a wimp.

Garage sale plans are going well. My precious friend Shelley is pulling through as well as my Paraguay trip/St. Mark friend Linda. Thanks, guys. I'm excited to see what's going to happen (and I'm excited to get all this extra stuff we don't need out of our house!) I actually told Karl the other night, "I think the amount of clothes we have in this house is probably a sin." And I believe it. Speaking of that...

Last month I talked about a study I was doing about poverty called Hope Lives. Today, following Shelley's lead, I thought it would be really neat to get some people to do it with me via the Internet. So, I know of a couple of interested parties via my adoption yahoo group and wanted to do a shout out here as well. If you're interested in starting this 5 week study with us, get the book and let me know. I'll probably have a weekly blog about it where we can discuss the reflection questions...I'm not really sure, but I like the idea of discussing with others the topic of poverty, getting to use some of my stagnant English teaching abilities, and being moved to action (hopefully!) with some friends on a crucial topic.

Goodnight to you all. May your homes be safe and mouse-free.

GARAGE SALE ANNOUNCEMENT (and happy eight months of waiting)

So, I'm done dragging my feet. We're going to go ahead and have a garage sale next weekend. That's right, on October 10 and 11, the Blacks will be doing a garage sale to help bring home our little girl. I have been dragging my feet for months as last time I put the effort into a garage sale I made $29.00. (Yes, that decimal point is in the right place). I vowed never to do one again, but as airfare is not getting any cheaper, and we want to do our part to stay as close to debt free as possible, the garage sale will go on. And, yes, it's in typical Danielle fashion--at the last minute.

One of the reasons I finally made the final decision to hold this garage sale has to do with what I've been doing almost all day. Today has been a wonderful, crazy day of organizing--something I thrive on--to get warm clothes of the right size in the boy's drawers, as well as mine. Since Karl usually wears t-shirts year round, I don't have to do much for him :) I just took a picture and sent it to my sibs (except Alyssa-she'll hear about it here or when I skype her) of two huge, full bins of the "favorite clothes" I'm not selling and am instead keeping on hand hoping that one day (hint, hint) my precious kids will have some cousins on the Lugbill side. It may be awhile, but the clothes can wait. The other clothes--and I think there's hundreds of items that are also cute, just not as many from Old Navy and Gap--will become garage sale fodder (did I say that right?!?) next weekend at our extravaganza. Okay, really it's more like our "How-crazy-am-I-knowing-that-I'll -put-much-more-effort-into-this-than-I-will-probably-get-back-out Garage Sale." There is hope, though. I mean, I really don't have to do too much to beat last year's net gain. And I have TONS more cute clothes than last time since I took the big step of getting rid of most of Owen's clothes ages 0-2 years with the exception of pjs and some other unisex items for precious girl. I'm hoping Karl can pull some stuff out of that basement of ours, too. AND, I could use you, oh faithful blog readers that live in the same area's, help. (Wow. Please let me know about the grammatical errors in this post, Melissa.)

SO, CALLING ALL HOOSIERS THAT HAVE BEEN PLANNING A GOODWILL/SALVATION ARMY RUN BUT HAVEN'T GOTTEN AROUND TO IT. IF YOU WANT TO DONATE TO A GOOD CAUSE (OTHER THAN THE SALVATION ARMY/GOODWILL), PLEASE DROP OFF ANYTHING WORTH SELLING, AS WELL AS THINGS THAT AREN'T--YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAY--TO THE BLACK HOUSE THIS WEEK. WE WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE ANYTHING THAT YOU CAN SCROUNGE UP. YOU'RE WELCOME, OF COURSE, TO PUT PRICES ON THINGS, BUT I WOULD IMAGINE, IT WOULD BE EASIER FOR YOU TO JUST BRING STUFF OVER (BY THE TRUCKLOAD, IF YOU WANT :) ) AND MY FAITHFUL FRIEND SHELLEY AND I (DID YOU HEAR THAT, SHELLEY?) WILL SPEND THE WEEK MARKING ITEMS.

Any details/questions can be posted on the comments of this blog, or you can call or e-mail me if you have that information. Who knows, maybe our refferal will come smack dab in the middle of all the chaos (I'm still hoping for tomorrow....) Let's see how well last minute things can be pulled off!

Thanks, everyone. I hope you enjoyed the beautiful fall day. I wish I could be having hot apple cider with you right now.

P.S. Our name for our little Ethiopian princess has been decided--but you won't find out (if you don't know already) until we get our referral. Something else to look forward to (and keep you reading.....:)