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Kim & I on the morning before court

First, let me apologize for being so negligent in blogging of late.  Having returned from Ethiopia with some health issues (now resolved) and my continued battle with insomnia, I have just not been clear headed enough.  However, with Father’s Day just around the corner, I thought it would be fitting to post an adoption update.

Our trip to Ethiopia was amazing, but something of a whirlwind.  We were really encouraged to find that a few other adoptive families were staying at our hotel.  They became (and remain) friends, enjoying each others company & supporting each other during the days in country.  We cannot overstate how great it was hanging out with people who just “get it”.

In order for the adoption to be completed legally in Ethiopia, three things had to happen: the child’s birth family/guardian had to appear in court to assure the process was legitimate; we had to show up in court & makes statements about our commitment to the child; the Ethiopian Ministry of Women’s Affairs needed to release a letter approving the adoption.  When we arrived at court, we learned that step one had been completed the week before.  We proceeded (as a group!) to do step two.  Unfortunately, the judge told us that our letter from MOWA had not yet arrived.

We were then able to meet Micah for the first time and spend a couple of days with him.  He is the most amazing, affectionate and wildly active little 3 year old in the world!  The first day we spent 2.5 hours with him & slept for 7 hours that night!  For my insomniac ways, that is UNHEARD OF!  It was a magical few days where we fell in love with him even more than we thought possible.  Sadly, we had to say goodbye, trying to explain that we would be back.

Yesterday (now back in Canada), we received the phone call that step three was completed.  We heard the words we have been longing to hear: “He is yours!”  The adoption is now absolutely complete & final from a legal perspective.  All that remains is for our file to be sent to the Canadian Consulate in Kenya, where they will release a travel visa for Micah to come home.  We are hoping we will be bringing him home no later than September (but it could be much longer).

With the final stages nearing completion, we are now hitting the last stage of our fund raising.  Our original goal was $20,000 to cover a portion of our costs.  We are SO blessed to have already raised around $13,000!  Since we started (nearly 5 years ago), the costs for adoption have went way up, but feel that we can keep our goal at only the remaining $7000, as we have had more time to save for the extra costs.  If you are interested in helping out, please visit Adopt-A-Pixel or contact me for more details.

More details to follow soon.  Thanks to everyone who has prayed, given & encouraged us in this long process.  It’s almost done!

Tags: Adoption

This entry was posted on Friday, June 17th, 2011 at 10:42 am and is filed under Adoption. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.