Had to share...

Cute photo of Baby Boy holding pictures of us!

Update Time....

     Well, we've been moving along on our paperwork!  With everything turned in that we could possibly turn in, we've heard that our Home Study is completed and approved.  Now we are waiting on it to be finalized and sent out!  Yeah!!

     The Home Study (which we had to re-do) is the really important piece of the puzzle for us to get a court date in Uganda.  We schedule a time to go before the judge and tell him that we want to take care of our little Baby Boy.

     Once we find out the court date, that will determine when we need to buy our plane tickets to be on our way to Uganda.  Unfortunately the Ugandan courts close early for the holidays, so we will not be able to get a court date this year.  We know we will have to wait until 2013, but our hope would be to get a court date as soon as they open back up again. *Please Pray for God to work a miracle to get us scheduled soon*

     We know we will be spending this Christmas without our son in our arms, but we are looking forward to next Christmas with hopefully our little one smiling right along with us in our Christmas photos!

(Name changed to Baby for privacy purposes)

     Baby Boy is doing well.  We've gotten a few updates saying that he seems to be in good health.  He is smiling, rolling over, grasping objects, and talking baby talk!  We are sad to be missing these important "first's."  But we know we will have several more "first's" with him once he comes home.

     Our little one (and he IS a tiny one) has been given a birthdate, and we are looking forward to seeing what God's purposes are in allowing him to be given this special date.  We mourn the loss of not ever knowing his true birthdate, but GOD knows!  He knows the exact day, He knows the exact time, He knows the exactly place.  It's wonderful to have the realization that however much we care for our son, God cares for him MORE.  God has a purpose and plan for his life that we can't even imagine.  We are so privileged to be his parents and have the opportunity to raise him and see where God is going to take him!

     As our time to meet our son draws near, it seems to become more and more real.  We hold many reservations still, because we know that anything can happen (we've been through it before), and Baby Boy may not be in God's plan for us.  But to see us SO much closer than we have been before makes it all seem like this will really happen!

     The other day I bought paint to paint his room a light green shade.  I will be rocking him to sleep in a "creamy cilantro" room.  We still need to paint it, and we will update you on photos as his room will go from dark "Dallas Cowboys Blue" to his new and more calming color.

(The room is not much right now, but hopefully with a little work it will look more like a nursery)

     I also just bought him his first pair of shoes!  They were on sale and cute.  We're not sure if they will fit him or not, but just having them gives a me a little dose of hope!

     We have also been very blessed with the wonderful support from all of our new friends here in California.  It is great to hear how excited they are for our adoption, and it definitely rubs off on us.  There are even plans for a baby shower!  Having such wonderful friends who we've known for such a short amount of time would not be possible apart from the common bond we have of our faith in Christ.  He truly does draw us together as family!

     As we get ready to celebrate Thanksgiving next week, I want to be thankful for all God has brought us through to this point.  Our adoption journey has not been easy nor smooth, but it has been a growing experience for us.  We have learned so much perseverance through trials, patience, and God's faithfulness to us!  God truly deserves our Thanks!

The journey to our little one in pictures

We've had an amazing time preparing for our little one!

We had so much fun telling our family about him:

They are going to kill me for posting this!  Little did they know that I was secretly capturing them while we video chatted and told them about our referral:

(Please don't hate me, family!)

Telling our friends about him:

(They are all looking at pictures of him)

Doing TONS of paperwork:

(Sent off huge stack of it today!)

Getting fingerprinted:

And even celebrating his 6-month birthday:

(Name and photo has been blocked to protect privacy)

We also got to send him a care package!!

Does anything look familiar in that picture?  Remember this post about Mr. Elephant?

That was over two years ago.  We have saved him all this time, waiting to be delivered to our little one.  He slept with us several nights, and has plenty "scent" on him now!

It brings my heart joy and nervous excitement to think that This IS It!  Mr. Elephant has left our care and is now in the care of our little one!!  (Melting heart)

God has blessed us so much!  We got our list of required paperwork last Saturday.  We set ourselves a goal of one week.  And today, just short of one week, I mailed off a majority of the paperwork!  WooHoo!  That's crazy fast! (In comparison, when we were brand new and starting this process, the first time we gathered the paperwork took Four Months).

We still have a few more things to accomplish and collect, but we are on our way to bringing little Baby Boy home!

Big News.....

We have a referral!!!

Yes, it is a big surprise to us!

We had put everything on hold, we were working hard on getting moved in to our new house, and we weren't expecting anything big to happen anytime soon.

Remember how I said last time that God is ALWAYS ON TIME?  He is!!

Here is what happened a couple of weeks ago:

(From my journal entry on Sept. 18th)

We had exciting news yesterday!  There was plenty planned for the day... our household goods were arriving from overseas.  We were so busy unpacking that I didn't realize I had missed a call from our agency.

Later in the evening, after the movers were gone, I was getting ready to go to a meeting when I got...THE CALL.

It was totally out of the blue, and not who I expected to call.  Our Uganda agency director, who we had left things open with when we lost our first referral at the beginning of this year, said she had information on the little boy from Uganda.

OK--switch gears--let me get Mark on the phone too!

We listened as our director told us his name....(We'll call him Baby Boy for now).  I love it.  She said they had completed the investigation, and he was indeed available for adoption.  She also said they want to place him quickly.

Wow!  We like quick!  After all our time waiting... "quick" sounds pretty good right now!  She said that he is sick right now with a cough, and is not in a place where he can get proper medical care.  It is a very poor part of Kampala.  As she described his symptoms, it didn't sound like anything too serious.
...

Our agency director told us she would send us pictures and more info to look at, and we could get back to her.  I had to leave for my meeting, so I told Mark he was NOT allowed to look at anything while I was gone.  

On the drive there I went back and forth on wanting to think about everything that was about to happen, but at the same time not wanting to think about it because I didn't want to arrive at the meeting in a ball of tears (plus I had mascara on).  I told myself, "Keep your emotions at bay, and think about things when you get home."  Needless to say, the meeting was difficult.

When I arrived home, we opened up the email.  What we saw was tiny Baby Boy, at three months old.  In some pictures, looking sick.  In others, more alive and alert.  There was even video!  We saw him have the cutest yawn. (Melt my heart!)

(I had to share!  Can't show you his face yet, though.)

Seeing his face for the first time, I can't help but still be a little cautious, because Mark and I have been through our fair share of heartbreak.  But there is something inside me that is saying...

HE IS OUR SON!

I am trying to get a grip on God's timing of this all.  We had just decided to put the DRC adoption on hold.  We were seriously considering starting the domestic adoption process.  I researched many agencies, but we had been prevented from taking any steps until we moved into our house.  We waiting to move forward until we had the house things taken care of, until our shipment arrived.  We didn't want to schedule a home study visit when our home had nothing in it!

So the day arrives to get our things--yesterday.  I was actually ready to submit some applications just yesterday, as soon as we received our things.

God placed that phone call JUST IN TIME.

There couldn't have been a more perfect time to hear about Baby Boy.  Too early, and we wouldn't have our stuff and wouldn't be ready to make any decisions.  Too late, and we would have already applied elsewhere and probably already sent in some fees.  

I have no idea of what the timing of Baby Boy's adoption will look like, but it's perfect timing that our immigration paperwork is still good for Uganda!  Really, all we need to re-work is our home study and dossier.

Baby Boy home by Christmas?.... That would be a miracle!

(OK, I had a little fun with this one!)

Things that went through my head: "I might be a mom in a couple of months!  Yikes!"  I thought about all the wonderful people who have prayed for us along the way and stood with us--"Oh, how excited they will be!"  I thought about all that needs to get done in the next couple of months.  And I thought about Baby Boy, waiting.

I felt peace when I prayed about adopting him.  I felt like, "How could we say no to him?  He needs a family.  He needs care.  We have a huge house and lots of love to give.  How can we ignore his needs?"  Mark said, "I can't think of ANY reason why we shouldn't adopt him!"  How can we know his situation and leave him like that?  Then how can we still claim that we are loving our "neighbor"?  Baby Boy is my "neighbor."  And I pray one day he will be my brother in Christ.

I thought about how this is not about us.  It's not about the Struska's gaining a new member of the household.  It's about God being glorified, and about meeting the needs of a little baby boy, that He has placed in our lives.  This is really what testifies to God... God takes us, a weird American couple, and brings us together with a little baby boy half-way across the world in Uganda, a baby boy that He has sovereignly been watching over!  

He binds strangers together.  He takes our weaknesses and shows His strength in us.  He enables us to love a child that we did not give birth to, who doesn't look like us, who comes from such a different culture.  This is how it is meant to be.  This is parenting.  Laying down my selfishness for the sake of loving another, my child.  I pray that I become less, and Christ becomes more in me!

----

So that is how we found out about our little surprise.  Baby Boy is now about 6 months old.  Our agency was in Uganda last week and they are happy to report that he is all better now.  He is no longer sick and looks healthy.  We hope to be receiving updated photos of him in the next couple of weeks.

The amazing thing is that God has given us so much grace in one the most tedious processes... paperwork!  We have TONS of paperwork to do, but things are moving along quickly and easily.  I don't want to say that too soon, because I know we will hit a big snag, like, tomorrow!  But for all the extra time it took to do paperwork while living overseas, I feel like this process is so much different.

When I think about all the obstacles we had trying to adopt while living overseas, somehow it seems to make sense now, knowing that we just had to wait until our Baby Boy was born and ready for us!

----

I know this post is very long, so I will leave you will some prayer points:
    
    -Pray for Baby Boy.  Pray for his health, for his safety, for his heart to be ready to love us and accept us.
    
    -Pray for us.  Pray that our hearts would be ready to love and accept him.
    
    -Pray for our paperwork to move quickly.
    
    -Pray for our marriage, that we would have love a patience with each other as we have very stressful days.
    
    -Pray for our home study agency and our adoption agency that they would make wise decisions, efficient decisions, and be free from corruption or compromise.
    
    -Pray for the Ugandan officials who will be judging our case, that we would have a judge who is favorable towards international adoption.

Thank you all so much for  your prayer and support!!!

What a crazy summer it has been

Dear Friends and Family and Random Blog Readers,

I apologize for being so absent!  I know, it's been a long time since I posted!  A lot has happened in the past few months.

How can I sum this up?  As I said before... Adoption is a Roller Coaster!

OK, a little background.  Earlier this summer, we started hearing about problems with our agency.  Serious problems.  Yeah, the wait was taking FOREVER... yeah, people are bound to complain about this or that... but the things we started hearing were unbelievable!  Soon enough, the agency admitted there were problems.

What kind of problems are serious enough to cause so much concern?

Well, the in-country staff seem to no longer have the best interest of the children in mind.  Unethical practices surfaced.  There were cases of embezzling money, so less money would go to the care of the children.  Faking documents.  Lying about ages, the existence of siblings, and lying to the children about what adoption really meant.  Kidnapping children.  Yeah... let's just say that the coordinator is now in jail.  

  

Disclaimer: I have not personally verified all information.  I can only trust the things that I have been hearing from other adoptive parents, combined with responses I have personally gotten from the agency.  Someone else in the program may have a completely different experience.

OK, so you have to understand that there are no guarantees that things will go 100% smooth, and 100% ethical in international adoption, especially with new programs in Africa.  

The fact is, corruption does exist in the DRC.

Good agencies are trying their best to insure they conduct ethical practices as much as possible.  Checks need to be in place to make sure everyone is acting honestly.  And sadly, our agency wasn't doing much checking.  I don't want to mention what happens as a result of this. 

If you are involved in international adoption, please ask your agency what they are doing to ensure their program is ethical.  How many times per year do the staff travel to the country to make sure things are happening correctly?

Other red flags... Can they give you a break-down of where the fees are going?  Can they prove their orphan support expenses?  Do they have receipts?

These are answers that we were not getting from our agency.  Now, recently, the agency has been making some changes to the program that seem to be helping.  I sure hope they can turn things around.  However, concerns still exist, therefore... 

We have decided to put our DRC adoption ON HOLD.  We cannot move forward with this agency at this point.

Yes, we know, that this complicates things.  We know that our home study is set to expire, as well as our immigration approval.  If we are not comfortable moving forward, then we will gladly risk the money and headache to re-do these things at a later time, so that we do not violate our consciences.  We DO NOT want to be involved in anything illegal or unethical!

OK, so what's next for us?

First of all we need to close on the house we are trying to buy now that we have moved to California.

Next, we are looking into the possibility of pursuing domestic adoption.  This means we are matched with woman in the United States who is about to give birth and is looking to place her child for adoption.  We would be able to bring a newborn baby home from the hospital, and there is the potential that the program will move a lot quicker than our current DRC program.  We are excited about this possibility.  We know there are many babies who need homes (especially African-American babies) and we are open to accepting and loving a little one into our family.

We are still working on finding the right agency to help us pursue this possibility.  That brings us to the paperwork.

Paperwork!

Already as it stands, we are needing to update our Home Study.  We have moved countries, moved homes, and it's been about a year since it was completed.  It is a good time to refocus and decide what we want to update.  We are looking for a Home Study agency who will helps us write a domestic home study as well as have the capability to write an international home study.

What about Africa?

We still hold Africa in our hearts.  We are not saying no to adopting from Africa, but we might be saying not now.

Strange Update: earlier this summer we got an email from our Uganda agency out of the blue.  

We were told that our Sweet Pea's mother had returned to the baby home with her daughter and was wanting to place her for adoption now.  WHAT!?  We thought that chapter was closed!  The agency was traveling to Uganda in July and would find out if this is a possibility again.

I have to say, my heart skipped a beat!  I love that little girl and want so badly to care for her if she needs a mamma.  But I am now cautious, knowing that until paperwork is completely ready, there is no guarantee that it will go through.  

I just heard from the agency today.  Baby girl is not ready to be adopted, and it would be a very difficult process to complete.  It is not worth the risk, and we are sad to see this is the case.

However... while in Uganda, the agency found another baby who is a possibility for our family!  Talk about the roller coaster!  Up, down, up down!  They still have to collect more information on the situation, and find out if it will go through easily.  We didn't expect to be adopting from Uganda again!  And we are still not sure we will.  Possibilities are one thing, but completed paperwork is another.

So, can we ask for your prayers?  We need wisdom to make the right the decisions.  I just read on another blog today... God is Always, Always, ALWAYS on time!  So I have to trust that the reason it has taken us almost three years to this point is because God is working to place the child or children that are meant to be a part of our family at JUST THE RIGHT TIME!

Honestly, at times, I am completely at wit's end.  I am ready to give up.  This process is too painful.  This process is too long.  I cannot handle any more.  How do I keep faith in the middle of all of this?  I guess, it takes just clinging to God in full dependence on Him.  Trusting, that He has a plan for us.  Following what we believe to be His will.  We have an adversary that wants us to give up and give in.  I do not want him to win. 

I am thankful that Christ has overcome!

Created For Care Retreat report

I am a little behind on posting about my amazing adoption retreat, Created For Care.  We've been busy getting settled into our new temporary home for the next two months.  But I need to share finally about this wonderful experience!

This was one of the most amazing retreats I have EVER been on!  I can't even really put into words how over 400 women, almost all strangers to each other, can end up becoming best friends over one weekend!  

There was something unique about this retreat.  Every woman was different, but we all shared the same heart for God and for orphans.  It immediately put us all on common ground.  It was not odd to walk up to a new person during the weekend, introduce yourself, and then start talking about where you are adopting from and which agency you are using.  Not only that, within a matter or minutes, you might even be sharing some of the deepest struggles you have with this new friend, feeling relieved in a sense that there is finally someone who "gets it."  The thing is... there were 400 other women there who "got it"!  

There is no need to explain what an I-600A is or a I-171H, or define "dossier" or "USCIS."  They ALL knew!  We could just talk freely about the processes we were going through... some in the waiting phase, some in learning how to attach to their newly welcomed child.  There were women there adopting from all over... Ethiopia, The DRC, China, Korea, Uganda, Ukraine, Russia, Colombia, and many from even the USA.  Between the 400+ of us, we represented homes for around 1,100 children!  That is amazing!

I made some great friends, from the people I met on Facebook and ended up rooming with,

(Missing Ellen in this pic!)

to people I just sat at the table with for breakfast, lunch or dinner.  

I realized that I am among several families who have also been through difficult losses of referrals or countries closing down.  I am NOT ALONE.  And that is one thing that made this retreat so special.  With the overwhelming support from others, you no longer feel alone.

As I have heard several people mention already, this retreat taught us a lot about raising our children, but even more so, taught us so much about God's love for us.  We met with God in very real ways, we worshiped Him, with listened to Him, we submitted to Him.  I believe a part of it began with the setting.

The retreat was at the beautiful Lake Lanier Resort in northern Georgia.  This is truly an oasis!  

It was a lush, green resort, surrounded by forest and a beautiful lake.  

The lodging was built as a cozy and comfortable forest lodge.  

The view out our balcony was so relaxing and peaceful.

Next I have to say that I think this was the MOST well-put-together retreat I have EVER been to!  The Created For Care team was amazing!  Throughout the whole weekend there were tables set up to sell items supporting and representing many adoption and orphan-care organizations.  

Cute t-shirts, magazine-bead necklaces from Africa, baby blankets, cook books, Ethiopian coffee, you name it!  One of the best parts was the endless supply of food!  We had snacks available during the whole conference.  There were these huge bins with around 12 different kinds of candy that you could just grab as you walk by.  There was fruit, crackers, cheese, muffins, brownies, cookies, etc.  There were coolers too where you could go by and grab as many drinks as you wanted, water or sodas or juice, etc.  The meals were excellent!  We had a taco bar the first night with all the toppings you would want!  The next night we had grilled salmon, grilled chicken, green beans, mixed rice, rolls, salad, etc.  We even had a popcorn and movie night/pajama party!  

(C4C team doing a rendition of Ice Ice Baby!)

In addition to the food, our sessions were well-planned out.  The main sessions included excellent speakers and a very blessed and God-exalting worship band.  How they put all of this together... I don't know!  But everything was done in a way to really bless all the women who attended.  And I indeed felt blessed!

The sessions were great.  We learned about attachment, about our identity in Christ, reclaiming our child's story, parenting transracial children, calling forth the treasure in our children, and God's message for us as women.  I have to say that from the first session Friday night, probably when we first worshiped together in song with everyone, the tears started flowing and didn't stop until the weekend was over and we were driving away!  I don't think a single person walked away with dry eyes!

The Lord was teaching me personally several things over the weekend, but maybe that can wait until another post.  If I ever get a chance to go to another one of the Created For Care retreats, I will definitely be there!

Every body needs a little break sometime

Well, I haven't posted an update lately, and I'll tell you why...

I found that constantly checking in on the progress of things is stressful!  It was getting to be too much, and kept me worrying.  So, I have decided to take a break from a lot of the adoption reading, research, blog reading, checking-in with my agency etc.

Since the last time I posted, things have calmed down, and it has given me more peace.  In reality, everything will happen in God's timing whether I check in on things every week or not.

We are in the waiting phase.  Waiting for a referral, and we are several months away from that.  So there is no point in stressing over it now!

Now that I have gotten that out of the way....

I have to tell you about a really exciting thing coming up.  I am going to the Created For Care adoption retreat in Georgia!

I had heard about the retreat when it first started last year.  Then they had one in January, and now, the timing works out perfectly for me to go to this one in March!  I registered for this retreat before I decided on my little adoption sabbatical, so I knew it was coming.  I am really excited, and I am ready to dig right in to all sorts of good information too!

I think what I am most excited about is being around other adoption mothers who understand what I am going through.  It is hard because I do not know many people over here who have adopted.  And I will soon be surrounded by over 400 women who all have adoption on their hearts!  I think it is just the kind of retreat I need right now!

As far as updates, I cannot tell you where we are on the list because I haven't checked.  I probably won't check for at least the next couple months as well.  Unless our agency contacts me, or we all of the sudden hear that we get a referral, I won't have any new news for you.  Right now, I think I like it this way.  Maybe a couple of months down the road I will not like it so much, and I will be checking in, but for now this is what is good for me.

So, in case you were thinking about asking how things are going, I can tell you that I honestly do not know.  Thanks for asking and thinking about us up to this point, but we are looking forward to the break for the next couple of months.

Plus, we have a move to plan for!  We will be moving to California this summer.  That is enough to think about right now!