Domestic Adoption

Well, it has been a while since I have given an adoption update because so much has been changing.  There have been some big decisions to make in the past few weeks.  The precious little baby boy from Ukraine that we had been praying about and our agency has searched for has been taken off of international waiting lists because of the change in laws prohibiting the adoption of children under 5, with only a few severe special needs as exceptions.  Because we were planning on adopting a child under 3, the Ukraine is no longer an option for us.  This has been a sad realization, as there are many needy babies.

We have prayed and researched international adoption from over 20 different countries and we either did not meet the country requirements or they did not meet our requirements. We still want to rescue an orphan, but we have changed our focus closer to home.  We are now redoing our homestudy for a domestic adoption.  One day we would love to bring a child out of an orphanage again, but for this season we believe God has closed those doors for a good reason and opened our hearts to a baby here in the US.  We are requesting a child of any race except Caucasian.  Kayla has recently learned her colors and tells me that she is black and I am white.  I had hoped for many years before she was even aware of the difference in color.  This adds to the joy we are feeling at the opportunity to adopt a child with darker skin.  Having a multi cultural/racial family has been a desire of ours since bringing Kayla home.  We are also requesting a baby if possible; a personal desire of mine has been to have one more baby.  A drug exposed baby or baby with a special need are also on our list of desires.  We want to bring home a child that is not easy to place in a family.  These changes are huge and God has been giving us wisdom, grace, and joy even as we let go of some of our own plans and embrace the direction that God is giving us.