From Ashes to Africa

From Ashes to Africa is the name of the book that Josh and Amy Bottomly wrote about their adoption journey. I ordered it after hearing about it on another blog. I was really curious because their blog was one of the first I had followed when we started all this! Well, I picked it up from the mail last night and couldn't wait to get up this morning first thing to finish it. You should definitely read it too.
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I was just thinking....

I was just thinking that today would be a great day to get our referral. And I actually have several reasons for thinking so. First of all, tonight we will be seeing Brad's parents (whom we don't see that often). After that he and I and some good friends are heading out to Dripping Springs to a winery and restaurant for dinner, and so it could be like a celebration. Also, tomorrow we are going up to Austin with the family for a prolife rally and are planning to go to the Ethiopian restaurant for the 1st time when it is over. So, I was just thinking that today would be a good day....
I think I'll just sit here with my phone and stare at my computer. Just kidding. But seriously, I am sooo distracted!

Guessing and Obsessing

Awesome! If you are an FBI list obsessed checker like myself, you already know that there were 3 referrals today! We are so happy to see some movement here! My kids get so excited every time there is another referral. They just can't wait for ours. I hope they are with us when we get "the call"-they'll love it. This morning I was thinking it may be 2 more months,(and I was very down about this), but now, hmmm, I don't want to be too optimistic, but I think there are 8 people ahead of us with only 2 of them being requests for boys, so... Maybe sooner!
There have been so many to pass court in the last couple months -which is wonderful, but so few referrals. I keep wondering why things have seemed to slow down so much on this end in the past few months. Anybody out there have any idea why?

5 Months and Counting

When we started out (almost a year ago) we thought for sure we would have our referral by now, maybe even be traveling at this point. Well, things have sure changed. Our agency is saying expect to wait six full months. So wait we do! Sometimes patiently, sometimes not. BUT good news, there are LOTS of court dates this week! We are praying so hard that these families will pass and the little ones will get to come home very soon. Wouldn't that be the best Christmas gift?!

The fall in pictures:

Introducing our newest nephew
Rennon "Luke" 10/8/2008

Family vacation

Lalu's birthday

Sabine's 1st day of 1st

Celebrating Brad

Mara's 1st day of school with her girl Sylvie

Getting up to date..

Fall is in full swing around here. (Except for the weather, of course.) Can I use that for an excuse for being such a terrible blogger? Or maybe it is just my facebook obsession that is wasting all my expendable time. That and stocking other people's adoption blogs.

On the adoption front there hasn't been anything new with us. Just waiting. Next week will mark 3 months of waiting, so we will finally be in the 3 -5 month window for our referral! Yea! I can't wait too see that little face! I don't expect it anytime soon though, because it looks like it will probably be closer to 5 months from what I am seeing from other Gladney families recently. We are keeping busy working on our Hague training courses too. We are actually really enjoying some of them!

Some big news - we have a new nephew! An absolutely gorgeous baby boy was born to my little sister and her husband last week. It is so weird, we have about 7 friends who have had or are about to have baby boys this year! This is going to be fun! And wild. And rowdy.