October Numbers

The courts are now open & as predicted, we saw a big jump in our numbers this month! We are THRILLED to say the least! :) (did i explain last time that the Ethiopian courts are closed for rainy season in Aug. & Sept.? part of doing business with at 3rd world country. can't explain it, but there's something about that fact that i appreciate...it puts me in my place in my fast paced life.) Anyway, to the point:

29 for boys

46 for girls

Matt & I both agreed that there's something extra special about actually being in the 20s on one of the lists. Our agency said that once you reach the 10s (i know there's really no such thing but you get me) a referral can come any time, so to be in the 20s feels close! Now, to be fair, the boys list has moved a lot slower than the girls (11 spots to the 23 spots for the girls in the last 5 months.) We will probably sit in this 20s spot for a while...I even have a feeling that the girls list will catch up to the boys in these next few months. So exciting!!

A fun fact that another adopting dad put on twitter the other day is that Gladney (the agency most people in this area use) is now referring to NWA as "little Ethiopia." They're counting 57 of their [gladney] families in the area that either have an Ethiopian child or are waiting on theirs. Of course, we'd make 58, & I'm sure there are a few more of us [non-gladney] families not being counted. I can't tell you how thankful we are about this. We are over-joyed that the Lord brought us to Ethiopia knowing that there would be a loving community for our family to turn to for support. This group is amazing! I'm grateful to the moms who have opened up their homes & scheduled play groups for us to connect. I'm inspired every time I go - inspired by the beauty in the kids (both adopted & birthed) & the spirits of the moms.

Last, I wanted to post a couple of pictures. (i have big thoughts of doing all kinds of posts with pics to liven things up but just never make it around to it. for example, i really want to do a post showing pics of my beautiful nieces! one of these days :)

to put in the nursery. got at Lewis Lighting in Benton (at a bit of a deal unbeknownst to me. :) LOVE.

found at a thrift sore while shopping for a client. honestly, i feel like the pic doesn't do it justice. it's reversible. 3/4 length sleeves. & $5! i obviously have no idea if i'll even need it, but i have 10 friends giving birth from now to april. i figure surely it will work for one of us! & again it was $5. :)

September Numbers

Well, I know I never posted in August (I've been swamped with work, which I won't complain about :)...but, honestly, when I found out our new numbers I was glad. They will look better now (aka: we hardly moved.) So, drum roll please:

34 for boys

55 for girls

Really, we are okay with whatever movement we see. There are lots of complicated factors that go into it all, & I don't pretend to understand them. Most importantly, we trust that the Lord's provision is over it all, so the numbers really don't even matter. We will get Baby Baxter whenever he or she is ready for us. :)

Our case manager also told us that our dossier (collection of all the paperwork) has been sent to Ethiopia. This really doesn't mean a whole lot, just another step down in the process.

Other fun news: I fell in love with a fabric that I saw back in July from a fabric store in Little Rock. It's a little pricier than what I would have liked, but I wanted to do a boxed type of baby bumper anyway & think my mom & I have figured out a way to use it economically. I had been going back & forth with all these ideas about decorating the nursery for a while (basically since June when we got on the wait list & I allowed myself to start thinking about it. :) Well, week before last, I bit the bullet. The fabric store was having a store-wide sale, so after some brainstorming with Pam, I bought what I needed for the bumper. I'm pretty sure my mom is scared to death as I will be piecemealing the rest, but again, I have LOTS of ideas! :) FYI, I have decided to decorate the nursery gender neutral. Because I don't want to count on any referrals as definite until we pass court, I'm basically looking at 4-6 weeks to get everything that is needed for Baby Baxter...and that's in between 2 trips to Africa, so you can see where my dilemma is in all of this. (To interpret some adoption lingo, the baby we are matched with, or referred, only becomes 100% ours after we "pass" court. That is where the birth family gives up their legal rights & a judge signs guardianship over to Matt & I. This will occur during our first trip over.)

Since it's now almost the end of the month, hopefully I'll be posting some new numbers again soon!

New Numbers

We got our July waitlist numbers last week... I don't know why my clip art from the last post isn't showing up anymore. I guess that's what i get for trying to be fancy. :) We moved up 5 slots on the girl list to 64 & 3 slots on the boy's to 37. We have no idea if this is a normal range to jump or not...it hasn't even been 3 weeks. We are hopeful that we will see even bigger movement when it's actually a full 4 weeks but who knows! We'll take what we can get & have faith in the Lord's timing.

I have no idea if anybody will ever read these posts or not, but I wanted to post this link if only for myself to remember when it comes our time to travel to Ethiopia & meet/pick-up our baby. I don't think that i'll be able to "prep" myself enough for what we will see & feel. I can only imagine that it will be nice to have someone else's thoughts to help me process that part of the journey. Without further ado, meet Andrea of Babe of My Heart & her thoughts.

In case you are wondering, I came to Andrea's blog by way of Kristi who I regularly stock at We Love Our Lucy Lane. Both of them have adopted through the same agency we are using. I would encourage anyone who is interested to visit Kristi's blog. She is a great advocate for the orphan...especially Ethiopian ones. :) She often posts pictures of her adopted daughter & adopting friends with their kids. I would love for you to look & see one of the reasons why we fell in love with these kiddos!

Happy to be Waiting...Who knew?

Well, upon getting on the coveted waitlist, we are starting a blog. Several friends have asked me to start one to keep them up to date on what's going on with our adoption, and my sweet husband knew i would never take the time to sit down & make one had already made one for me. :) With that said, I'm also going to add a caveat for the music selections that i didn't pick...(I'm actually typing while it's on mute, but I think Matt is trying to send me subliminal messages. :)

After much waiting on my second set of FBI fingerprints results & much calling to check on the progress of those prints (like 2x a week,) our dossier has FINALLY been approved! We are officially on AGCI's Waitlist!! Although there is just one big list, they assign you different numbers based on gender & siblings. So, we get 2 different numbers as we are open to both a boy or a girl.

GIRL:

BOY:

(humor me with the clip art people...i am new to the blog world & don't know where to go for things like this! ;)

Although, it seems like there is a big gap, our case manager was quick to assure us that the wait time is equal for both boy or girl (8-10 months before a referral) & that it would still be a "toss up" as to which gender we would actually get.

For anyone who knows me well, they know patience is not my strong point, and to say that i am ecstatic to wait sounds unbelievable even to me. But it's SO true! Not only am i excited to know that i'm done with all the confusing & time-consuming paperwork, but I now am letting myself move on to what I really love...decorating the nursery!!! I have lots of little ideas floating around in my head, and of course, the planner in me is hugely struggling on how to put together a gender specific room when we'll really only have about 6 weeks from the time we will know for sure who are baby is till the time we bring him/her home! Oh, the things the Lord is going to teach me through this waiting!! :)