I-797C? I thought we were awaiting an I-171H!

Well it finally came! Yes,it came last week in the mail, that long awaited envelope from the Department of Homeland Security, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. I had tears in my eyes! :-) And, although it was a different number form than we expected, it was correct! We've been approved to adopt 2 children from Taiwan! It even came with a note of congratulations! That was unexpected. The paperwork from USCIS does not make it seem like the type of agency that would congratulate people.

“Give thanks to the LORD, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done.”- 1 Chronicles 16:8

Face to Face Interview and Learning Along the Way

A face to face interview with a U.S. Immigrations officer sure sounds official and intimidating. Since my second set of finger prints were rejected I was notified by phone on Oct. 31 that I would need to have the “Face to Face Interview”. It was nice of them to call, since they’d scheduled my appointment for the following week at 11 AM. on my son, Daniel’s, 7th birthday! I was super glad I could go to the nearby field office and did not have to go into the main office that is hours away!

It was an adventurous morning for me in more ways than one. What if they asked some question I couldn’t answer? What if the police department had mixed up someone else’s record for mine? What if I couldn’t find the place--after having been there twice I wouldn’t think that would be a problem, but maybe I knew something. . .

Just as I left the house I looked on line to get the directions and of course I could not find the right page and ended up leaving later than anticipated with just an extra 5 minutes to spare. So when I passed the exit I knew I was in trouble! When I got off the next exit to turn around and realized I was on a one way street heading downtown--I knew I was in REAL TROUBLE! It was at this point I should have paid more attention to that “still, small, voice” For that voice kept reminding me that this was all in God’s hand and His plans and NO plan forged against His plan can win. Well that OTHER voice kept telling me, “you are going to be so late, you are going to miss the appointment, they are going to reject the petition, you are going to be entangled in some legal battle for failing to report. . .” My very bright, now 7 year old son, quickly informed me when he heard the story that, " that VOICE was Satan." Wish I’d realized it sooner.

So after a few frantic and rather rude calls home to Tim, to try and find the phone number, so I could at least be responsible and call and tell why I was a no-show, I found myself at a main intersection leading to the highway! I took the turn to the south, forgetting I’d already passed my exit, and just as I got REALLY mad at myself, I realized I was right on the road I should have exited onto! All the dumb mistakes in between had gotten me to the right place! Now I’m not advocating for dumb mistakes in life. But isn’t nice to know the God we serve can get us to where he wants us to be despite ourselves. I am so thankful to Him!

The interview went fine. I arrived at 11:02. The immigrations officer was very official and very nice and chatted with me a while after taking my sworn testimony about the criminal offenses I did not commit. So hopefully we are one step closer to our I171H and permission to bring 2 orphans into the country to adopt!

I'll keep you posted and you try to listen to that "still, small voice." Hope you do better at it than I.

An Imaginary Phone Call

The other night, my Mom and I were discussing how odd it would be to talk to the kids on the phone before we meet them. I'm really not a phone person, and I wasn't sure I liked the idea. I realized though, that my parents will call while they are in Taiwan, and won't I want to say hello to my new brother and sister then? So, I imagined a phone conversation in my limited Mandarin. It goes like this:

Ni hao. (hello)
Wo shi ni de jie jie. (I am your big sister)
Wo jiao Annie. (my name is Annie)
Wo ai ni. (I love you)
Zai Jian (good bye)

Now I need to learn how to say "come home soon" . . .

And pronounce the words well enough that someone other than my mother can understand me. . .

Change Jars

A week or so ago, when I (Rebecca) made the long pilgrimage from school to home for fall break, I had among my books and clothing a lone used cell phone and a full change jar. What turned out to be a very full change jar - it was an all time high for amounts in a change jar. This was due to an incredibly generous friend, Holly, who saved all her change over the summer, a mysterious $20 bill that showed up on my desk belonging to neither my roommate nor myself, laundry no longer consuming my few quarters, and guests at the inn I work at actually leaving me tips. The normal yield of my jar is, oh, maybe $5 at the most, so this was an exciting event. Mom just emailed me today, however, and informed me that a friend of hers has broken my change jar record. This is one record I am happy to have broken!

Before fall break, I had been feeling incredibly impatient about this whole adoption business. I wanted a little brother and sister, drat it! My impatience has slowly become less, due to a number of things. One is a freshman named Lauren. Her family has adopted two children already, and are in the middle of adopting a third. We met the day she saw me wearing my adoption t-shirt, with ‘big sister’ in Chinese characters on the front. “What’s your shirt say?” she asked. “Big sister,” I said, and one thing led to another. It’s funny how quickly it becomes obvious that others adopting understand the emotions and concerns so much better than others. Now we commiserate about paperwork problems, feeling out of the loop because we are away at college, and laugh about what the recent swarm of lady bugs might mean for our families... Other than that, life at college remains the same, adoption-wise: I save my change, pray for The Call, and hope for generous tips at work.

Agency Changes

A couple of weeks ago our Faithful Adoption agency worker emailed to say she was stepping down from coordinating our program due to some health issues. I felt bad, both for her and for us. I liked her a lot. She is a home school mom of 4 and one is a little girl they adopted at age 4. So I felt that we had much in common.

Our new agency worker, Olga, got in touch with us and had some unexpected news. Cathwell, the orphanage we thought it most likely to get our referral from, did not have ANY paperwork on us! Only our photo album, which they were not doing anything with! So we have filled out their application and our home study agency has graciously sent yet another notarized copy of our home study to Faithful. So hopefully some time this week all that will get to Cathwell in Taiwan! The good news is that they told Olga they would take into consideration the fact that we have had our album there since March. Who knows, maybe we will hear from them soon! We all feel even this seeming “error” is part of God’s plan and his timing to get “our” children to us. Keep the faith!

Count it all joy!

“So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need
to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive
what he has promised.”
- Hebrews 10:35-36

I really felt encouraged by this verse the other day. We’ve had 3 minor “paperwork” snafus this week. My first set of fingerprints got rejected and when I went to have them retaken they said it looked like the 2nd set would be rejected as well. (apparently I have grainy fingers or something!). If they are rejected again I will have to take a trip to meet with the Immigrations Officer in person with certified letters from the localities where I have lived stating that I have no criminal record! Dana needs to get a bunch more paperwork certified. We need all this stuff so we can get our I171-H, which allows us to adopt an orphan from another country. And to top it off our agency changed their mailing address and some different letters etc. may not have gotten to them! Oh well, Annie and I thought the initial paperwork was a little too easy!!

Now if we get a referral, there will be all kinds of paperwork to do. But of course I’d love to get a referral anyway!

We keep praying and each day I am encouraged by the Lord that everything is in His plan and I just need to wait on Him.

. . . as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress. . .psalm 123:2

Sandwich Artists

Last Saturday was our subsale. We had fun creating a "100 foot sub"


Daniel did a great job.


Mom and Daniel together


Hard at work


Jonathan putting on tomatos (which he hates)


Say Cheese!


Annie, Daniel, Jonathan and Tim


Dad and Tim working together


The "official" Sandwich Artist (as a former Subway "sandwich artist", I was the "resident expert")


Jonathan was our master sales man. He wasn't afraid to approach anyone.