I read a quote today on a adoptin yahoo group and wanted to share it with every one...it's Beautiful!

Adopting a Child won't change the World, But for that Child, The World will Change!"


Beautiful!

A new phase....

Well, it's been awhile since I've updated.
We do have some new news in our adoption journey. From the beginning Brian and I have discussed a special needs adoption, but ruled it out every time. I have a good friend who was just recently matched w/her daughter, who has cleft lip/CP. After seeing her picture our hearts MELTED!!! Brian immediately told me to start researching and get more information on this condition. This had to be God's prompting, because this is so not Brian! After gathering information we decided this was definitely for us! We knew just what we had to do.....So, on 12/01/09 our Medical Checklist has been turned in to the waiting child department of our agency. We now wait to be matched with our beautiful daughter, who will complete the Ashworth Family.
Alli Ashworth, we can't wait to finally met you and have you home with us, where you belong!!! We love you already!

Amazed at being a Mommy

Well, not much has been happening with the adoption process right now. We are in the waiting stage of things...which gets long and hard!
I thank God everyday for the 3 wonderful blessings He has already given to Brian and I. They grow up SO fast, and sometimes it makes me so sad. I love and enjoy every new stage my babies enter, but when I think back when they truly were babies it makes me realize how much time has went by.
I'm very eager to get our new daughter home and start our life with her, but I try hard not to be SO focused on that, that I take for granted to 3 blessings I have here with me now.
Last night Brian put the kids to bed and said the prayers w/them while I was putting BrayLee {my 4mth old great niece that is staying w/us for a little while} to bed. When I was finally done bathing, feeding and rocking her to sleep he told me BaiLee wanted me to pray w/him also. I went up stairs and all 3 of them were fast asleep. I had to wake each of them up just to tell them I love them. I just sat there looking at them, rubbing their little faces, amazed at the fact that God chose me to be their mommy. What an awesome gift and responsibility. My oldest is about to be 10 years old, and even to this day sometimes when I hear them call me "mama" or "mommy" I stop and think "Wow, I'm a Mommy!!!" I love my children so much and pray that I take time to slow down and really enjoy the times that are so special with them. Being a Mommy is amazing.

We GOT IT!

I'm a happy woman tonight! I've checked my e~mail on and off all day, expecting to hear some news about our Dossier being logged in with the CCAA {Chinese Center of Adoption Affairs}. I finally stoped checking expecting one from our agency, and thats when I got it! I was thrilled to open my inbox to see YOUR DOSSIER HAS BEEN RECEIVED BY THE CCAA!! I called Brian so excited to tel him this good news. In the email it said we can expect to be logged in w/the CCAA within the next 3 weeks, and officially have our LID.
Well let me tell you how GREAT my God is! I happened to check my e~mail about an hour or two later and there was another e~mail from my agency. I opened this up to read CONGRATULATIONS YOU NOW HAVE A LID!!! The CCAA has already logged us in! So here it is
8-11-09
I could not believe what I was reading. Never did I expect to receive our LID so fast! But that's just how My God works! We are now believing Him to continue to knock our socks off!
Now we will wait [hopefully not long!!] to be matched with our beautiful daughter!!!

Happy Day...

I'm sitting here at my computer all emotional, and for those of you who know me well, that's rare! I just checked my e~mail and our agency just informed us that our Dossier was mailed to China yesterday afternoon. They should recieve it within the next 3 days and hand deliver it to the CCAA {Chinese Adoption folks}. There they will process everything and send us our LID {log in date} This will be the day we start our countdown to bring our daughter home. It's the official time we start "waiting". I'm so at peace {for now} about our wait and just don't think we have a really long time. My Faith is big and I'm trusting God!
I can't believe I cried when I read the e~mail. Don't get me wrong I KNEW I would be excited...but never expected to cry.
Continue to pray for our family as we wait to bring our daughter HOME!
{Graci picked flowers for her again today while waiting to pick the boys up from school. She always gets things for "sissy". I've got to get something to start keeping all the treasures we collect for our sweet girl!)
Looking forward to my next exciting e~mail......our LID!!!!
God Bless you guys!

It's in the mail...

We have completed our Dossier and I mailed it to our agency today!! The post office says they shoud recieve it in 1~2 days. They will send it through review and it should be mailed to China with in the next 10-~12 days and we will have our LID {log in date}. I was so excited to FINALLY have that thing in the mail today!!
Thanks for following our blog...hope to have more posted soon! :D

We are so blessed....

Brian and I hosted a spaghetti lunch fundraiser after church last Sunday morning. Boy were we ever blessed by our church family. We truly felt scripture come alive..."Bear ye one anothers burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." Galatians 6:2 We watched as many of our church family memebers helped bear the finacial burden of our adoption. They ralleyed beside us and supported us more then we expected. It really did my heart good to feel so much support and love from everyone...if you helped, a HUGE Thank you and God Bless you from us!!! We raised $1084!! BaiLee, Ethan and Graci were great helpers.

We are also selling Dominos Pizza Cards as one of our fundraisers. Friday July 3rd our family stood outside of the Harveys near our house and sold our cards. We were once again Blessed and saw the good side of so many people. We were given many congrats, encouraging words and much support from total strangers. There is still so much good in a corrupt world. Brian and I raised $450 that saturday. BaiLee stood on one side of the doors with Brian as I stood on the other. BaiLee grabbed the attention of many, many ladies! :D Brian said several of them said they could not deny those beautiful blue eyes and those gorgeous curls....I must say they have great taste, because he is a GREAT looking young man, with the heart to match!

All of our paper work is back and ready to be sent in....as soon as we have collected all the funds needed, we will send it off. I'm praying it will be in the mail this week.

Thank you to each of you who are supporting us. Rather it be finacially or through your prayers...You are helping make this journey easier. God Bless each of you.....and remember to pray for the orphans today!

A step closer to LID!!!

I'm so excited! We got our 1-797C form in the mail today!! This is our Approval Notice from the Department of Homeland Security for us to adopt a child from another Country!!! The final piece of paper we need to complete our Dossier and send our paper work over to China and FINALLY get our LID {log in Date}. I'm so excited!!!!
Our agency tells us this is a step to celebrate....I feel an overnight trip to Granny & Grumpy's coming on for 3 little Ashworths!!!! :D

Well, well, I checked the mail....

Well guess what was in the mail today?!?! Brian's passport!!!! Why am I so excited? It came back 2 weeks early!!! :D Hopefully mine will be in next week. {I got mine a week after he did}

Just thought I would share some of my excitment. We were told it would take at least 4 weeks, but possibly 6. I kept saying "Hopefully it will be back sooner than that!" Power in our words!!!!

:D

Things are moving.....

I'm so excited. I just got an e~mail from our agency. Our home study report has been approved and is on it's way to us, priority mail!!! {better request UPS next time! ;) }

They have also sent in the request to have our fingerprints done for our I800A forms!!!! This is one of our last steps in preparing our Dossier!!!! :D I'm so excited to see light at the end of the tunnel.....but keep reminding myself that once this is done, we enter another tunnel; The wait for our daughter!

I have such a peace from God about our wait time. Maybe I'm fooling myself, maybe I'm not...but I don't see us waiting as long as the projected time! My God is so bigger than anything we can imagine and I'm going to trust in Him!!!! I claim a year, maybe year and a half....I know some of you are probably laughing, but I will speak those things that are not, as though they are, and will remember there are power in our words!!! :D

So today, I choose to celebrate this step in our process!!!!!!! :D Thank you Lord!

The start of something Amazing....

Welcome to our blog! I hope this site helps keep you guys informed on our adoption journey!

We have been asked many questions about our adoption, so let me share a small piece our story.

From the time Brian and I got married I have always expressed an interest in adoption, it's always been in my heart. Brian, well he was never as convinced as I was. 10 years have gone by and we now have 3 of the 4 children Brian has always wanted. From the time our family started he has always wanted 2 boys and 2 girls.

Several months ago we started talking back and forth about adoption. This started to re~stir something that had been deep in my spirit. Brian and I decided to start praying about this burden and see where God would take it. A few months had gone by when Brian came to me and told me he knew he could do this, and so we began......(There are lots more details and confirmations we experienced, but I'll leave those out...my hands would fall off if I typed that much!)

January o9 we sent our Adoption Application off. What a process this has been! Wow at the paper work! The start of things was a nightmare! Our septic inspection failed! The first estimate I got for a repair was $6,000.00!!! I knew this was going just about bring things to a stop. We prayed and prayed...well I think Brian prayed while I cried! But once again our God came through. We were able to get the septic fixed rather than replaced and that saved us a LOAD! God is soooo good!! The guys at the county decided they were going to be a thorn in my side and remembered they failed my well inspection also....are you kidding me?!?! Apparently when you build your home you don't have to put a cement slab around your well, you only need that if you want a passed inspection at a later date?!?! Make sense to you??? hmmmm I got that taken care of, with out the cement slab, but let me tell you, that inspector left something to be desired!!!

Our home study went great. Our social worker was one of the nicest ladies. She was so easy to talk too! I did not mind the "talks" but Brian said he felt like he was visiting a psychiatrist! lol I was actually looking forward to the visit Mrs. Patricia came to our house. I was eager for her to met our babies. That was fun! The boys got out their bearded dragon, slick. Graci got out her guinea pig, Darby, and they all had fun stories to share about our dogs! I was glad the kids were comfortable with her.

We have all our papers notarized and certified by both Ms Lola AND the Secretary of State. Once our passports come in (my picture was horrible by the way) we can get our fingerprints done for our I800A forms and then send everything to the Chinese Embassy to be Authenticated and we are done w/our Dossier!!!! WE ARE ALMOST THERE!!!!! YAY! I can't believe I have actually done all of it on my own! (I'm sure Brian can't believe it either!!! ) I'm sure it would have went much faster had we paid someone to do it for us, but you gotta do what you gotta do, right?

We've been asked a lot how old she will be, if she is born...etc. Well, my guess is YES she is born! We have requested (in our adoption petition that goes to China) and said that we will accept a daughter anywhere from birth-48 months (4 years), but are requesting she be close to Graci's age at the time we get her. Graci is SO excited about being a big sister, and talks about her all the time. She can even show you on a globe where China is and says "This is where my little sister lives right now!" The boys are both excited too and talk to us a lot about everything.

I hope this gives you guys a little insight on where we are in our process! We are excited about sharing this experience with each of you. Please keep our family in your prayers. We know that God is not going to call us to do something that He is not going to equip us for....so we are truly trusting in Him for every need throughout this journey!

Thanks for taking time to read......