Who is Baby Girl Weinmeister?

Hey all,

We're still here waiting to find out who T's little sister is... We did find out Thursday that all the families ahead of us on the baby girl list are getting referrals right now. Sooo.... that will make us #1!!

We've also received a few updated pictures of our little guy :) He's growing like a weed!! Please keep little T in your prayers... we have yet to see a photo of him smiling. And in the last photo, you could see tear streaks on his sweet little face... I can't even imagine what he's thinking and feeling right now...

Thanks for all your love and support. It means the world to our family.

Love,
Amy & Phil

IT'S A BOY!!!

It actually happened!! 831 days after we first submitted our application to adopt (when we were adopting from Kazakhstan) and 155 days after our dossier was sent to Ethiopia to bring home our two little ones...just as it looked like another week had come and gone...we got a call at 4pm on Friday to tell us that our agency had matched us with a little boy!

We can't share any real details until the court date is completed, so we'll just call him "T" :) He is 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 (birthdates are not well-documented in Ethiopia) and he's a handsome little guy. It is absolutely amazing how much he has already become embedded in our hearts in less than one day. We received a few photos and some basic information about his well-being and his background. What we can share is that he has been through a very tough situation and we can imagine that he's having a hard time at the orphanage right now.

The fact that we received a referral for our son before our daughter was completely unexpected...we have been 1st on the list for a boy and 3rd or 4th on the list for a girl for a while. Since the wait is longer for a girl, the plan was to wait until a girl was available for referral and then to match us up with boy right around the same time. However, our agency decided to go ahead and match us with T on the hope and faith that we will be referred a girl by the end of summer.

It is such a major blessing to finally see the face of one of our children! Of course, this will make the wait that much harder, knowing that T is in an orphanage without the rest of his family.

We will definitely post more details as soon as we are allowed. Until then, there's not much more we can share. That includes photos... :(

Above all, we are counting our blessings and thanking God for continuing to guide us and open doors along the path to adoption. Thank you for all the thoughts and prayers and we will hopefully have another update soon. Please pray for T's situation as well as for his birth mother.

God Bless,
The Weinmeisters

Eek.

Well, It's 1:30 AM and I can't sleep. Yesterday's call has me shaken. Seriously, I'm not a cryer, but the flood gates are now open!! I think I cried 5 or 6 times today... Everything that has to do with adoption sets me off. And of course, I can't seem to tear myself away from the blogs and message boards :) Just wanted to share...

A call...but not the call :)

Amy got a call at home today from our adoption agency. I think that every other conversation we've had with them has been over my cell phone, so Amy was a bit surprised. She actually was thinking that this was THE call...

It turned out that our coordinator needed a copy of a form and nothing more. It was a very hard day for Amy, to say the least. She is so ready to be a mother and this long period of waiting has definitely not been easy. This process can feel like a roller coaster, at times. We don't know our babies' names or faces yet, but we know they're there and waiting to be loved. We just want to go bring them home!

To follow with the roller coaster analogy, things did pick back up! I called our coordinator to see if just maybe the reason for needing the form had something to do with an upcoming match. Well, we're not quite there yet, but things are really moving along! I had called on Friday and was told that we had moved from 7th to 6th on the list for a referral for a young girl. Somehow, after we talked that day, 2 more referrals happened! So we are 4th! And, I was told that another couple is probably going to accept a referral in the next few days, which makes us 3rd! This is a blessing. Like I said, we are ready and we want to start taking care of those babies!

For any of you that don't know our exact referral situation....we are on a few waiting lists. Our request is for one girl and one other child of either gender. The children can be siblings or unrelated. So, we are in a wait list for siblings and, at the same time, one for unrelated children. Since referrals for girls take longer, they would hold off on a referral for a boy until there's a referral for the girl. Another awesome piece of news is that we're already at the front of the wait list for a boy...this whole time we've been thinking that we'd have to wait 2-3 more months for that referral to happen once we were matched with our daughter...so this really could be soon :)

Did I just make that clear as mud? I hope it makes sense.

Thank you for the prayers and the words of support. It truly does mean a lot to us.

God Bless,
Phil & Amy

I had a dream...

Last night I had my first dream that involved specific child ages and genders...

We visited our agency in NC to check in on our progress. When we got there we were told that everyone had to redo their dossiers and that Ethiopia wasn't going to give any referrals for a few months. While we were in the office, we saw two children in a room - a 1 year old girl and a 2 year old girl... Just then, the other Ethiopia coordinator walked by and said "Oh, these two will be the last referrals for a few months... and I'm pretty sure they're yours..." I started crying and scooped up the little one.

A few minutes later, our coordinator came into the room and shut the door. "I'm sorry...." he said, "we had to refer these two out quickly and your paperwork has all been misplaced. We had to go with the next couple on the list."

I couldn't believe it.... Well I could (since the adoption process seems to be full of crazy ups and downs), but that didn't stop me from laying into him about his incompetence (by the way... this IS just a dream... I don't really feel like our coordinator is incompetent... haha). Then I just cried.

Well, that was it... my first dream with ages and genders. Kinda funny my brain chose two girls, since I've pretty much thought it would be one of each... Guess only time will tell :)

Some thoughts...

Tonight I decided to sit down and read back through our blog.... what a trip it's been so far...

I know there are family members out there who are still questioning this decision and may not truly understand our motivation, or may just be frustrated by the wait, or may not agree with our decision to go to Africa. I have to admit this makes me very sad. Though reading back through our blog, I realize we haven't truly adequately expressed all our thoughts and feeling on these topics. It's hard to do in a blog, especially knowing the kind of comments and backlash sharing your true feelings and beliefs can cause (both from those we love and the public at large). Believe me, we've heard many shocking things over the past two years...

I guess I'm writing to try to make this a little more real, a little more personal to those who have these doubts/criticisms.

1. Our decision to adopt - Phil and I both love children. We love all ages, we love all types, we love all races. It breaks our hearts to know there are children in the world who are alone. It breaks our hearts to know there are children who don't have enough to eat, who don't have clean water, and who don't even cry anymore because they know no one is there to answer. Of course I have a biological clock, of course we have the same desires as most couples to mix our genes and see what comes out, of course I want to know what it's like to carry a child. But these personal desires are not enough for me to forget about these orphans. Someday we might have a biological child... or we might not. We believe God put this burden for these children on our hearts and we intend to see this adoption through unless he directs us to do otherwise. It IS hard to wait this long when I've wanted to be a mother all my life.... but even after 2 years of waiting, I don't wish we'd made a different decision.

2. Why International adoption when there are so many children in the US? - We live in the greatest country in the world. Americans have more opportunities than those in third, second, and most other first world countries have ever dreamed of. While our desire would be for all children to experience a safe, stable, loving home, it's just not within our reach to make that a reality. We chose to adopt internationally because we felt that was where the biggest need was. While American orphans are afforded opportunities to go to school (even college), their counterparts in some other nations are lucky to survive to the age of 8. Please understand, we have the utmost respect and admiration for those who foster and adopt from the US. These are just our own, very personal reasons for going overseas.

3. Why Africa? - I'm actually going to address the underlying question here, as we have already addressed the literal question in previous posts. While many have asked this question, truly meaning exactly what they say, it's clear there have been others who are actually questioning our decision to adopt black children. As it would not be PC to ask what they're really wanting to ask, I do understand why they would phrase the question in this manner. However, since they cannot truly ask what they want to, they never actually get the answer they are looking for. Well here it is- children are children. I'm going to admit something here, and this is part of what I was alluding to earlier when I said I wanted to make this more real, I wasn't really open to going to Africa at first. Of course I always knew the orphan situation was the most dire in Africa. I just didn't know if we were equipped to raise black children in the south. We all faced peer pressure in school, so just trying to imagine what it would be like for our kids, who might not ever feel like they really "fit in," scared me. And it still scares me. But when you stop and think about these small things American teens deal with, and you begin to contrast them with the struggles of teenage orphans in Africa, you realize those fears are just excuses. I believe Africa was always God's plan for our family, I was just clinging to my own understanding. I'm not going to claim to know for a fact this was God's plan, but knowing all this, it's not surprising our Kazakh adoption didn't work out. My will just took a year and a half to bend...

4. What if they have HIV/AIDS? First I'll give the logical answer: most orphans don't. They are also tested. To bring an HIV/AIDS orphan into the US you also need a lot of additional documentation, so safeguards are in place. Now I'll give the answer my heart is screaming: we'll deal with it! At least we have access to ARVs in this country that make HIV more of a chronic condition than a fatal one. Better they live in a place where they can be cared for than die in a place where they can't. We know some believe it's "not our fight," but we feel this adoption is God ordained and that he won't give us more than we can handle.

5. Two babies/toddlers at once, are you crazy???? Haha. This one isn't so serious. But I do want to assure all those mothers out there that I'm not floating around in a dream world thinking everyday will be non-stop laughter and hugging (though if you know Phil well, it's kinda hard to believe it WON'T be :) ). We just seem to get a lot of "You'll see when you're parents.." and "just wait...." comments. Yes, ladies. I understand how hard this will be and I'm hoping to have your support rather than "I told you so..." I know I will be exhausted, I know I won't be able to even go to the bathroom on my own- that's why I'm trying to enjoy my sleep and personal space now. Got it? :)

Well, I hope this helped. I know it helped me. And thank you so much to all of those who have shown us unwavering support and love. Our babies are so blessed to have such an amazing support group already in place.

We love you all!

Amy (& Phil)