The Land of Hand

We spent Friday night and Saturday in Birmingham, AL attending a training and informational meeting put on by the IAC (International Adoption Clinic).  The purpose of the meeting was to acquaint you with who the IAC is and how they can help equip you for your trip to pick up your child and what they can do once you have your child home.  The day was spent hearing from a pediatrician, a developmental specialist and a social worker.  All of these ladies have adopted children from China themselves.  They let us know that they are ready to help with any and all physical, emotional and developmental needs our child may have.  It was very comforting to know that we have the IAC in our corner to help our child develop into the whole person that God created him to be. 

Karla met with us before the meeting and let us know that we will most likely be traveling in January 2007 due to timing of the paperwork being approved in China which she said will be sometime in September.  Then the process will take 3 months before we will get travel approval.  This was a little bit of a let down since we really hoped to have Joshua home before Christmas.  I just wish we could have him home with us one month sooner. 

Pray that God will move that paperwork through at a record pace and we’ll have him home before Christmas.  What a way to celebrate the birth of our Lord than with the homecoming of our son and his new birth into our family.  Just as God has grafted us into His family through Jesus, Julie and I can’t wait to graft Joshua into our lives and family.

China requires a letter that states your intent to adopt the child and how you intend to nurture and provide support for them.  We have sent that off and hopefully in a couple of weeks we will have pre-approval to adopt.

We are at the end of the Homestudy process as well and will give the final documents to our social worker in the next day or two.