Details, details!

For everyone who can't wait to hear more...here's the story of our referral!

We had everything set up with Corrie, our social worker, that she was going to call Aaron and tell that she had a referral for us. He was then going to contact me, and we were going to figure out a way to be together to get all the information.

A little before 2:00 on Friday afternoon I got this call at work:
"Hi Katie, this is Corrie from CHS, I can't seem to get ahold of Aaron and I have a referral to tell you about."
I got her phone number and told her we'd call back within a half hour.
I called home. No answer.
Called Aaron's cell phone. No answer.
Called Aaron's cell again. No answer. At this point I decided I was going to call his cell until he picked up.
Started dialing Aaron's cell AGAIN - the other line at work rang and it was Aaron. Apparently he was on his work line or something ridiculous like that. :)

Anyway, I left work, got home, and Aaron and I both got on a phone and called Corrie back to get all the info from his office. Obviously she is a girl, her given name is Mimi, and she currently weighs 11 pounds. We got a little bit more info, and then Corrie said "her picture will take your breath away." I was thinking "you are the social worker, you have to say that." And then we got the email with her picture and we knew she was right - Mimi is ADORABLE. You just have to smile when you look at her, she is such a cutie. And she has these big huge beautiful brown eyes...

Then the phone calls started to friends and family - except most of Aaron's family since we were going to see them the next day and we decided to tell them in person. It was a blast. Perhaps the most fun part of the day was that Jen and I had planned a surprise BBQ party for Aaron on Friday night - a party before his band played at Beaners. As word got around that we got our referral, our BBQ turned into a little celebration! We are so blessed by our family and friends...we received some cards and a few gifts and TONS of hugs. AND, my brother and his roommate showed up as an EXTRA surprise!! It was so much fun.I took this picture of the cake upside down - that's why it looks a little funny. :)

Also - We haven't decided on a name yet! We'll let you know!

IT'S A GIRL!

Aaron and I are SO EXCITED to announce that we received a referral yesterday for a baby girl! She is 4 months old - birthday is January 8th. She is absolutely adorable. We can't post a picture online until she is legally ours, but we both think she is one of the cutest babies we've seen. I'll post more later about how we got the call and all that, but, I just wanted to let you all know our happy news. Bring on the pink!

we're #1

There as lots of activity on the CHS forum yesterday....we are now the #1 family waiting for an infant! Stay tuned...

no big news...

But there is a little update. Not necessarily good, time will tell.

We got an update from our agency, I think it was last week, regarding referrals and such things. Here it is: In Ethiopia the courts close for several weeks in the months of August and September due to the rainy season. Because of that, our agency is expecting that referrals given out during the month of May will likely make it through court before the closure. Referrals given out June 1 and later are not expected to make it through court before closure.

So, in a nutshell, if we get our referral in the next 24 days we will LIKELY be traveling late summer/early fall to get our child. Of course, it could happen that we would get a referral and we would not make it through court (for whatever reason). If that happened we would have to wait until courts re-open in September in order for the child to legally become ours, which would put us traveling late 2008. I like the former option better. But I'm trying to mentally prepare for the latter. (I think that bugs Aaron, ha!)

I've heard pre-adoptive parents say "It feels like this will never happen" and I never knew what they meant. Well, I do now. It seriously feels like it will NEVER happen! I know that it will, and that God has His own timing to things, and that His timing is perfect. He is never early and never late. If only I could line up more with Him on this one, it would make things a bit easier. I guess now is a good time to focus on 2 Corinthians 4:17-18..."For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us a glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." Oh to constantly have an eternal perspective on life...it sure puts things in the right perspective.

Later!

Jumpy

It's the last day of April, and still no referral! I can't believe it's going to be MAY when this finally happens. I was telling my friend Mary today that I am just ready to be done with this phase of waiting and move on to the next. Of course, the next phase will have its own challenges, but it will be shorter and just DIFFERENT.

Aaron and I contacted our social worker this week and we have a plan for how she is going to contact us with a referral. The plan is she is going to call Aaron first, and then he is going to call me and we're going to meet up to get all the details together. I was hoping she'd slip some kind of time frame in there, but, no such luck of course! Needless to say I jump each time the phone rings.

I also stopped by the library this week and picked up a few baby name books since we aren't set on any names yet. We are planning on keeping part of our baby's Ethiopian name, so it's hard to pick an American name to go with another unknown name. We can keep the library books for a month AND renew them, so we'd better have a referral by then! We're taking any suggestions you'd like to give, especially for girl names. :)

In other news...Macdaddy Music had a record number of sales for the month of April! So that's exciting.

Last weekend Aaron's mom, sister, and our niece Peyton came up to do some bridesmaid dress shopping for Jesse and Jodi's wedding. It was fun to have some time with the girls; if you want to see any pictures of the dresses we picked (I know, you are all DYING to) you can check it out here on Aimee's blog. Jodi's having all the bridesmaids wear different dresses in the same color (a navy blue - it's really pretty) and we had a fun time trying on different styles.

We went to a murder mystery dinner theater thing last Saturday with Aaron's brothers, my sister, and, of course Jodi. We had a great time, here are a couple pictures.
Hopefully the next time I post it'll be referral news, but, as I've been saying, I won't hold my breath.

Another concert plug

Posted by Aaron:

Just a quick note to let those of you in the area who are interested know...

My band (amp 11) has a show at Beaners here in Duluth Friday, May 9th @ 8:00pm. There's a $5 cover charge and there will be a couple of other bands playing as well. We're opening the night and will play about a half hour or so. The last show we had there was packed and went well - thanks to those of you who came out!

For details on Beaners - check out www.beanerscentral.com

If haven't already checked out some of our music and you care to you can hear some at www.myspace.com/amp11music

It'd be great to have as many of you who are able to be there!

We're getting close!

I'm convinced that it can't be too much longer before we get our referral! As you can see, we're #10 on the unofficial list. However, 6 of the waiting families before us are waiting for siblings, which puts us as the #4 family waiting for a single infant! FOUR! Crazy. It's been a couple weeks since the last batch of referrals were handed out, so I'm hoping we'll hear something in the next 2 weeks. I guess one can never know for sure, but, here's hoping!
As a side note, about a month or so ago I asked Aaron when he thought we'd get a referral and he said "April 29" without looking at a calendar or anything. So, we'll see.....!!!