It's here! It's here! It's here!

We are so VERY excited to announce that we have (finally) received our referral for Josue and Mbo.  What this means is that we have their medical information and their pictures, and we can officially move forward towards adopting them!  We're looking at anywhere between 3-6 months and they'll be home!  We won't be posting any pictures on this site or on Facebook until after they're home, but if you're a close family member or friend, please send me your email (or address) and I'd be happy to forward one to you!  Yay!

Latest email from our adoption specialist

I had an email this morning that contained both very concerning and very exciting news.  The exciting news is that, after weeks of waiting on tenderhooks, we should have our referral any time!  We expected to have them weeks ago, but unfortunately, the Congo lawyer didn't get them done for whatever reason.  Things in the Congo just flat out don't go according to plan!

The concerning news is that my five year old daughter, half a world away, has shoved something up her nose... and apparently needs surgery to get it out!  It sounds like a fairly minor problem- kids stick things up their nose all the time.  But do they usually need surgery?  And not just surgery, but surgery in the Congo? And not just surgery in the Congo, but surgery in the Congo without their mommy?!  So obviously, I'm a little nervous about this, especially as our adoption worker doesn't have ANY details yet about what it is that she stuck up her nose, how detailed (read dangerous) the surgery is, or when she'll know more!  And I'm concerned, of course, about the safety of the procedure and more importantly, the accessibility of medication should there be an infection after the surgery!

Pray, please.  Pray that God will be with His daughter as she goes through a scary procedure without a mommy or daddy to comfort her.  Pray that He will guide the doctor's hand as he removes this object.  Pray that He will work miracles to bring our children home soon and safely.  And pray that He will give peace and comfort and love to Josue and Mbo as they sit 8,500 miles away from the people who love them.

Referrals coming soon....

We're waiting to receive our referral information on our kids, and I'm going nuts waiting to see their beautiful faces!!  I got an email from our social worker, Claire, letting me know their info would be ready by around the end of the week (which would have been yesterday).  Unfortunately, we didn't get it yesterday, and I'm having trouble focusing on much else!

While we won't be posting their pictures on here until after they're home for safety and confidentiality reasons, if you're a friend or relative that wants to see their beautiful faces when we have pictures, email me.  Should everything go quickly and well, hopefully Josue and Mbo will be home in August! (Apparently Claire got her name wrong before, and it's Mbo, not Nbo)

I'm just so very, very excited to "meet" my kids!  It's been a long time coming!

On a completely unrelated but (not even close to) equally exciting news, Ryan is graduating today!!!  He'll be getting his MBA through Northwest Nazarene today.  So very proud of that man.

Keep your fingers crossed for us that our referral comes through soon!

News from the Hanson home

We are very happy to let you all know we were offered a potential match with a beautiful (so I'm told) little five year old girl named Nbo. Should everything work out the way we hope, Nbo and Josue will be ours in the next three to six months! Like Josue, we don't know much about Nbo, other than she is between the ages of five and six, and we don't know how to pronounce her name! We should receive their profiles soon, including family history and medical information. I'm not sure how much we will share on this blog, to be honest. But what we can share, we will, and I can't wait to show you all pictures of my newest beautiful babies.

Fundraising has been going pretty well, and we have so very much appreciated all the support from our friends and family. This week, Ryan turned thirty, and we asked that people donate $30 to celebrate and help us bring home our kids. That brought in over six hundred dollars, for which we are extremely grateful. Anyone that wants to contribute can donate through our adoption fundraiser page through a fantastic non-profit called Adopt Together, which makes donations tax deductible. That site is http://adopttogether.org/thehansons

One of the amazing things we've been doing to prepare for our adoption is visiting a church in Boise made up of African refugees, called New Heart International Church. In fact, the pastor is from the Congo, as is a large percentage of the congregation. It's been so very cool to meet so many wonderful people there, and we look forward to growing those relationships. I'm excited to think of what a fabulous experience this will be, not only for our Congo kids, but for all of us American grown as well! We haven't been able to visit as often as we'd like, mostly due to Ryan's schedule. He's graduating with his master's degree in a few weeks, and this last bit of coursework is a killer! I'm so very, very proud of him, though. He's worked so hard and so long, and soon, it will all be over!

I'll leave you all with a couple of pictures of my beautiful kids on Easter. I love their (not so little) faces!

Birthday Fundraiser

Completely forgot to post this to our blog, but for my birthday yesterday, Jess and I ran a fundraiser "$30 from 30 on my 30th". I hit the big 3-o yesterday, and 13 people donated, either on our fundraiser site (http://adopttogether.org/thehansons/) or with a check in the mail. We are so blessed that people are willing to support our adoption process through prayer and giving. It is a humbling experience and we are just so blessed!

We will have some other updates soon! God bless the little children of this world who need loving caring homes and all the people who help in anyway that they can!

Sad Day

We found out today that one of our potential matches, Aristria (3), is no longer available for us to adopt her. She has either gone home to her parents or is being adopted by another family. I'm sure I don't have to tell you how sad this makes us- it goes without saying, right? But I am also happy for her, that she is on her way to being out of the orphanage forever.

We're grieving today. There was a time, a few years ago, that we were in the process of adopting a little girl and it didn't work out. We had a name, pictures, information about her. And when we didn't adopt her, it broke my heart. I felt like I'd lost a child. Thinking about her, even now, I hurt deep inside. This is not quite like this. We don't have a picture of Ari or any information about her. Just a name and an age. Where losing Maria felt like a miscarriage in a lot of ways (the loss of an actual child), this is more like finding out we were never pregnant to begin with. There's an ache in my chest that won't go away.

Josue is still available for us, and we plan to move forward with his adoption. In the meantime, the staff in the Congo will be looking for a second child for us, another little girl. While we will be thrilled when this comes, and while we know Aristria was obviously not meant to be a part of our family, it still aches.

We only had a name. But that's enough to make me miss her.

Long Overdue Update

Early this month, we received news of a potential match with two kids in the Congo. We don't know much about them, but we do know that there is a little girl, Aristria (3) and a boy, Josue (6) that might become members of our family. They are not siblings (yet), and Ari lives in an orphanage while Josh lives with a nun. Let me tell you, this was very exciting news.

For those of you wondering what a potential match is, I'll do my best to lay it out, from what I know. Before we get an official referral (match), the kids have to be tested for several medical conditions and the lawyers have to do a social history and make sure the kids are officially (by US definition) orphans. But that takes money. Before they will go forward with any of that, they need a $7000 retainer from us that will pay for that stuff as well as the orphanage fees, etc. etc. etc.

Once all that is done, we receive an official referral, and our Congo lawyer works towards legally adopting them on our behalf in the DRC, for a lovely fee of $10,000. So essentially, before we can move forward, we need to have a full $17,000. Fortunately, we actually have $10K of that.

But it's hard, because the longer we wait to test the kids, the longer it will be before we can bring them home. Right now, we're (hopefully) looking at July/August, but at this point, we have no idea when we'll be able to go. We're diligently working to fundraise, but it's a lot of money. We also have to come up with the money to travel, which will be another $6-8,000. Eeesh.

I'll admit, I've been grieving lately. While we're here, living this rich life, with food in our stomachs and access to clean water and great healthcare, our kids are living in the Congo. I'm really struggling. This whole process has taken so much longer than I thought it would. We were so hopeful that our kids would be home by this time. And we really don't know how long it will be at this point. At this point, I don't even have a picture of my children.

It's hard, being paperwork pregnant. Since we started this process, we've had friends get pregnant and give birth. And more friends have gotten pregnant and will give birth before we ever meet ours. And while I am honestly, wholeheartedly excited for them, it hurts too. Knowing that we have children out there and not being able to bring them home NOW.

It's been a long process, but we are hopeful that things will move more smoothly from here on out. Out of $40,000, we've already raised $25,000. And that's a pretty big accomplishment, right there. The rest will come.

Thank you all for your support so far. We appreciate it more than you can know.

Jess