Are we making the right choice?

I think with any big decision you start to question yourself.  Should I really be doing this?  Did I make the right choice?

As you can imagine - making the decision to adopt was NO different for us.  We wondered if we should have chosen a different country, held off a little bit all together, etc.

THEN THESE CAME....

I participate in a postcard exchange group called Postcrossing.  Basically, it is a site that serves as an international hub for people across the globe to write postcards to one another.  I have my email address in my profile so people can write to me if they'd like to swap.  I honestly couldn't tell you the last time I got an email from this - it hasn't been recent - until the morning of Saturday, 12/19/15.

This is what came across on my email.



God...is that you...or some crazy coincidence?!

Then, that same night, we were opening Christmas gifts with my mom.  She told me she'd been to a fair trade store in downtown Birmingham and saw something she thought I'd like. Her words were, "I know it isn't your colors - but I thought you could hang it over your desk."

....and here is what she got me.



The cross is made of rolled paper and as I started turning it and looking at the writing on the paper - I noticed something.  This writing looks familiar.



Can you tell what that is?  Yep, it is from India.  My mom had purchased this weeks before - weeks before she knew anything about what we thinking and discussing.

Then, a few days later, we were still talking about this cross.  My mom makes mention that she purchased it on 12/8/15....12/8/15 is the day we clicked the "request information" link on the COTW website.  That was the day we made the first real step towards putting our adoption in to motion - which she had no idea about.


They say God works in mysterious ways, right?  Looks to me like he's working through email and a little paper cross at the moment.

To India With Love

Adoption is a word that has been discussed a lot throughout my 8 year marriage to my husband, John.  Heck, between the two of us we have (7) immediate family members who were adopted.  It's always been in (and on) our hearts but stayed as a faint knocking rather than an open door.

In the past 7 years - we have had (2) high risk/scary pregnancies that brought us our (2) perfect little boys,  and more troubles than we can count just getting pregnant at all.  After our (2) boys, who are currently 6 & 2, we still had that lingering feeling that our little family of (4) just wasn't quite complete. 

We went back to those adoption conversations and really started asking ourselves, "Is it time?  Do we quit talking about this and finally take the next step?"  We decided the answer was yes.  

We were on a family vacation to Disney World at the time, but decided when we got back home we wanted to start researching.  We spend several late nights looking at domestic vs. international adoption, various countries, requirements, etc, etc....I was completely OVERWHELMED at the amount of information out there.  

We decided we'd start local.  We reached out to our local Catholic Social Services office for information on domestic adoption (which they were not accepting families), and also Children of the World.  COTW is a local international adoption agency currently placing children from China, India as well as domestically.  

On 12/8/15 - we requested information from COTW.  What came to us was an immediate download packet that we scoured over from cover to cover.  That, of course, left us with more questions than we started with.  

John and I set an appointment with COTW director, Pat Lee, on 12/17/15 to discuss everything that had been floating around our brains for weeks.  Two hours later - we walked out of her office knowing the newest member of our family would be joining us from India.  We discussed several different options, but always went back to India.  That night, God placed the country of India on our hearts.

The next morning, on 12/18/15, I filled out our first "piece of paper", our pre-application, and hit the submit button.  I took a picture of the screen and texted it to John - it was official....We were adopting from India!