Today has been a roller coaster of emotions for me!  It started with a text this morning that we have been approved by EE's DAP (the department that has to approve our application before we can get permission to come over to pursue our adoption).  Since I wasn't expecting ANY news until Thursday at the earliest, this was a WONDERFUL surprise!!!  I finally felt like we are getting somewhere!!!!  It's been FIVE weeks and ONE day since we have been submitted, but 6 and 1/2 weeks since the paperwork left our hands.  It has now been LONGER that they've had our paperwork in country than it took for us to get the whole "she-bang" started and completed.  It is a classic case of "hurry up and wait."  Frustration mounts.

I know that the Lord can do anything.  I know that often He does the impossible.  I know this because I watched it happen for the first 6 weeks of this process (see posts from 6 weeks ago and earlier!) among many other times.  I also know that there are lots of times when I pray my guts out and He chooses to answer in a way that is different than what I was praying would happen.  I also know that God will not be manipulated by me.  But I also know that His Word tells us that "the fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much" (yes, I'm so old that I memorized that from the King James Version).  I know there HAS to be AT LEAST ONE "righteous man" (or woman) praying for us and I'd like to think that I might be included in that category at least some of the time.

So, tonight I'm praying that we will be able to have a travel date that will allow us enough time in June to get over there, have our hearing, meet and HUG our son and assure him that we will be coming back for him at the soonest opportunity we have.  We have heard that the 10 day waiting period is NEVER waived...and they probably won't even ask for it to be, so we have accepted that and know that we will be going back after the summer to get him.  But my Mother's heart is LONGING to get to establish a relationship with him, to KNOW him and to be KNOWN by him.  For him to SEE us and not just IMAGINE us.  For us to be able to connect with him.  To become Facebook friends so we can "talk" to one another while we're apart.  For him to try to "get" what being a part of a family is going to be like.  To show him pictures of his family, siblings & his cousins & grandparents & our friends who are longing (some almost as desperately as his mother!) to meet him and welcome him into our world!! 

But I'm also praying for the grace to handle whatever it is the Lord decides.  I want my response to be that of a woman "of noble character" that Proverbs says "is worth far more than rubies."