Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! We are plowing through the paperwork for homestudy and collecting every penny possible to pay for it as well. Our social worker matched another social worker's price and so that has helped immensely. We have been blessed this Christmas by so many people, but something is still missing - our little girl. We pray she had a wonderful Christmas toddling around on the other side of the world.

We received our India Adoption Process Guidebook from Holt a few days ago. It's a whopping 2" thick, but has been a fascinating read for me. I'm a bit overwhelemed with the paperchase I'm beginning, but I look at it like receiving 6 college syllabi in one week: It doesn't all have to be done right now. However, it helps in the planning and organizing to see the big picture.

It's gotten cold out now and today a librarian told Logan it's a good day to make cookies. So tonight I was tickling Logan's belly and he said, "Hey, belly, you want some cookies? Yes." That was enough for me to get the bowl out. Will's at wrestling and will enjoy a sweet snack upon his return - as will Billy.

A little bit of info.

We got notice from Holt that they approved our application. :) It seemed to take forever, but was only about 2 weeks. How shall I ever endure this process, the oh, so ever patient person that I am? We are now awaiting our India "guidebook" to assist us in the rest of the process. It will be a fascinating read. We are currently "negotiating" fees with our homestudy social worker. Pray for favor for us. We will begin our homestudy as soon as we can save up enough for it - probably middle of December/early January. The agency wants the fees up front, but we can get a head start and begin to answer all the detailed questions and do a bunch of the other paperwork. I didn't want to jump into that until we were approved from Holt.

We're adding to our family!

We have exciting news to share with you! I (Melissa) have had a dream since I was a child of adopting internationally. Billy and I have had this idea in the back of our minds since we were married and always thought it would be "way down the road sometime". However, last spring Tim and Karla Shamala and their 4 precious children came to visit us. They are good friends of ours from college and are missionaries to India. As we talked with them about India and it's people, God began working on our hearts to adopt a girl from there.

After much prayer and research as well as many confirmations, we have begun the process of bringing our daughter home. I have been continually amazed at how God is directing our lives in this way - that He would give us another precious gift - one of His children. I am truly in awe of His love for us.

Adopting from India usually takes 18 months to 2 years - much longer than many other countries. A couple social workers have tried to talk us out of adopting from India because of the wait time and the additional paper work, too, but we know our little one will be worth the wait. Holt International, the angency we are using, helps to operate 3 orphanges in India. We will be receiving a preschool aged girl, likely from one of those orphanges. You can do a search of "BSSK" online and see pictures and a video of one of them. Had Billy and I sat down one day and said, "Hey, let's go ahead and adopt", we would have never been able to decide which country to adopt from. God is continuing to plant in us a love and burden for the people in India. We feel as though we will be bringing a piece of India's "mission field" into our very own home!

We have recently submitted our application to Holt, are awaiting acceptance into the India program and will begin our homestudy in December or January.

Will and Logan are excited about their little sister as well. After Tim & Karla left our home, we began to pray nightly for the "little kids in India that God would provide them all families and mommies and daddies and brothers and sisters." Well, one little girl may not get sisters, but instead two big brothers to protect her - and maybe tease just a bit. They may not completely understand just how long it will take to get her, but Will knows he will be about 8 years old and Logan, 6 . This gives them some perspective.

I will continue to update this blog as we proceed through the process. Please pray with us that the process will go smoothly (it appears to be quite complicated with mass amounts of paperwork), that the finances will be there (God already provided half of our application fee!)and that our daughter remains healthy and protected.

"Children are a heritage of the Lord, they are His reward!" Psalms 127:3