So Sorry!

Oh my. I just checked our blog to see what Phil's last post was... I am so sorry we just left everyone hanging like that!! Anyway, here's the news...... We've changed countries to ETHIOPIA and now we're adopting TWO!!! There's quite a long story behind the switch, but basically here's what happened:

As many of you know, our motivation to begin our family through adoption is to give a child (now children!) in an impoverished country a home. Our first thoughts were of Russia, because the two main people who brought adoption to the forefront of our minds were connected to Russian adoption. As we got into the process, we found that Russia (and Ukraine) couldn't handle the number of families interested in adopting their orphans. The truly sad part is that there ARE orphans in these countries. The government just can't process families quickly enough.

We then moved on to Kazakhstan. Unfortunately the Kazakhstan officials also became overloaded as families who were trying to adopt from China, Russia, and Ukraine, spilled over into the Kaz program.

While we were waiting for our docs to be processed for Kaz, Phil began reading a book by Vernon Brewer, who had spoken at our church a few months back. His book, "Children of Hope", is about the millions of African children who have been abandoned to fend completely for themselves after watching their parents die of HIV/AIDS. (You actually can get the book for free- just pay shipping- by visiting his website http://www.worldhelp.org/). Phil's heart was broken for the children of Africa. He then read John Ortberg's book "If You Want to Walk on Water, You've Got to Get Out of the Boat" and was inspired to pray continuously that God might provide a way for us to help the orphans in Africa. This probably should have been a clue to us that God might want us adopting from Africa, but we just kept on with Kaz. A bunch of other amazing things happened shortly after, all connected to Phil's desire to help orphans in Africa.

Meanwhile, our docs were still at a standstill with Kaz. One night in November, Phil asked me if I thought maybe we should consider changing to Ethiopia (one of only 2 African countries that allow American adoptions). At first I was hesitant. We had been waiting SO LONG already, and starting the process over was certainly not what I wanted to do! But I told him I'd pray about it, which I did. The next day I picked up "Children of Hope".... That night Phil had his answer- LET'S GO TO AFRICA!! We also both felt we would LOVE to adopt 2 while we were there. We would have considered two from Kaz, but the cost would have been astronomical (around $65,000), but we can adopt two from Africa for slightly less than adopting 1 from Kaz!

So we're back in the paper-chase phase (though, we actually should be ready to send our docs off this week! ). After spending a year and a half in the adoption process already, we're a little gun-shy with guessing when we'll meet our two little ones. But if all goes well, we should have a referral sometime before next summer, and we should travel by late fall '09. Oh, and we're expecting either a girl and a boy or 2 girls under 3 1/2 years old :)

So, again, I apologize for the month-long teaser on our news. I think Phil just wanted to make sure he had adequate time to blog about such a huge change! Thank you all so much for following along with us and supporting us with your prayers!

Love, Amy & Phil