THE CALL....YES THE CALL!!!!!!!

We can't believe that we are already posting "THE POST"..."THE CALL"..."THE REFERRAL"!!!! It still seems so surreal! We find ourselves just looking at each other with big smiles. Today were able to see OUR daughter for the first time, and we fell head over heels for this precious girl! We just have to acknowledge how lucky we are! The average referral wait for our agency right now is about 4-6 months, with most referrals occurring around the sixth month. In the beginning we had hoped for an early referral, but to ensure sanity, we just focused on the sixth month marker and agreed to not even become restless until the seven month mark. As of today we have waited just four days shy of 3 months.

First, we just have to say that no words can adequately describe our joy, the love that we have for this child already, and the deep sense that she was truly meant to find us.

The Call:
Since I (Viv) took the initial call I will provide the details. So Pete recently started his rotation of working graveyard, and today was his day off, so he was sleeping. I also had to work and noticed in the late morning that there was a missed call from the adoption agency, (Pete was also called but he was sleeping and never hears his phone when he is sleeping). After hearing the voicemail I immediately called the adoption director back, thinking there might be something wrong with our paperwork or there was a sudden change in the process that would directly affect us, truly the last thing on my mind was that we were getting our referral. After a good morning greeting I was a bit stunned to hear the director say "we need to conference Pete in before we can go any farther....." which ensued a response that is now a bit blurry, but something to the effect of "does that mean this is THE CALL." After that was clarified, and there were a few giggles and quiet screams, I informed the staff that I needed to leave work immediately for "good reason". The drive to the house seemed to take forever! Once at home I set up the camera(s), yes, there was more than one because there was no way we were going to miss capturing any of this excitement. Anyone who knows about adoption journeys knows how memorable this day is to the family. So I tried to wake Pete up gently, and at first he was really confused as to why I was home and even thought I was joking when I started to explain we got our referral this morning (still half asleep at this point). Once he realized I was serious he jumped out of bed and we immediately headed to the computer, where we talked to our agency on speaker phone and read the referral documents.

Because we won't legally become her parents until we testify at court in Ethiopia we aren't able to release any identifying information on our daughter such as her name, birthdate, the area she is from, or any pictures. However, we can say we fell in love instantly. She is 2 1/2 months old and absolutely precious in every way. Her smile melts our hearts..and we can't wait for the day WE make her smile! After looking over the information we were truly speechless and thankful. Not only is she healthy but the meaning of her name, the date of her birth...already have ties to our journey and family.

This was an amazing day, filled with so much love. We can't wait to see more pictures of our beautiful daughter...hopefully by Christmas or around the first of the year. Now the hard part truly begins...waiting these 3-4 months to hold her in our arms.

“There is only one happiness in this life, to love and be loved.”
 George Sand 

P.S. And we were wondering what to blog about since we just finished 30 topics in 30 days.... ( :