And we're off!!

I doubt that I'll blog tomorrow, so I'm covering this base now.

We leave for China in less than 36 hours.  And guestimating that we're going to sleep in the next 2 hrs...  its like almost less than 24 hours.  Whoa.

Who ever thought this day would really come???  I was thinking the other day that we were so lucky to meet our son in September and be able to anticipate him coming so soon!  We were so lucky to recieve our LOA on December 29 and according to everything we'd been told it was at the most going to be 14 weeks from LOA.  That's 3.5 months.

We're picking up our son nearly 5 months after our LOA.  Whoa.  No wonder it feels like forever!  Normal time to travel isn't so long but Chinese New Year and another holiday in our province slowed down our processing times for major documents.  And then a change in our agencies schedules pushed us back 4 more weeks.  It has been nearly 8 months since we first saw our sweet boy's face!

8 months! That's like a whole pregnancy, and to think that we officially started this process 6 months before that!  And first began pursuing adoption 5 months before that...  for those of you that have been waiting with us - this is it.

Our bags are packed.  We have double/triple and tomorrow we will quadruple check everything.  And then we're off.  Leaving on a really big plane for a really long flight to a really big country we have never been to, to pick up and love on a little boy we have been dreaming about for months.

I want to think that I will blog, but lets face it - I probably won't.

So for tonight and the next few weeks, possibly months - bye!!

Pray for us, so many things - any and all that you can think of, pray that for us because wow - big trip, we need lots of prayers!!

Love you all and Thank you for your love and support!!!

Remembering and moving on.....

In all that is going on around us right now, it is hard for me to blaze past tomorrow without remembering what the day is for us.  It was on May 2, 2013 (just 1 month after our sweet Doron's birth) that I was suffering my 7th miscarriage.  Losing Isaiah was difficult, he was by far the longest pregnancy I had ever carried and still lost, and because of a tumultuous pregnancy we had spent the 5 weeks we had known of his existence getting to know his little body inside of me.

Isaiah Michael 9 weeks gestation

You can read about Isaiah's pregnancy here and his memorial service here.  I remember those few days between losing him and his service on May 4 as a sort of limbo I lived in.  It was the world of grief that I knew from previous losses that I would come out of but I didn't know when or how.  I just knew that somehow Jesus had always carried us through and he would only continue to do so.

Isaiah came as a surprise, halting and interupting our adoption plans.  We had seen him as an answer to prayer as to what we should do when we didn't know where to go. And when we lost him, it gave us more time to think and prepare.  We had made the decision to wait until Isaiah's due date before pursuing adoption any further.  I never wanted to replace a child I'd lost with a new child.  I wanted to be for sure that I had 100% grieved Isaiah's loss before we moved forward with bringing another child into our home.  

For months I would rock Zemirah to sleep and wonder when I would get to hold Isaiah and rock him to sleep.  I mourned him, long and hard.  His due date came and went and still I would have to remind myself that Isaiah was never coming to my arms this side of heaven.  It is strange the way grief can grip you.  It holds on to your heart and while slipping into the shadows it will alert that it is still there at the most inoportune times.  I would sit and wonder about the child we would adopt someday and in my mind say "When I can rock Isaiah..."  

As time passed eventually I stopped thinking about rocking Isaiah.  I stopped wondering what he would have looked like or smelled like.  I stopped picturing him in my arms.  By this time we were ready to move on with our adoption from China, and finally we are ready. 

It was a few months ago when I realized that when I rock Zemirah to sleep, or just sit in my rocking chair while she falls asleep by herself, I wonder what life will be like when Doron is in my arms.  I remember Isaiah but he is not who I yearn for anymore.  My heart has healed and I am ready and willing, excited, to bring home a different little boy, one who has his own dreams and passions, one uniquely created to be himself.  No strings attached.  No previous agenda.  Doron for who Doron is.  

Someday all my children will play together in heaven, our 8 babies who have gone before us and the 3 we have here on earth.  I can't imagine what it will be like, but it will be a beautiful day.