Y’all!

Elizabeth is officially our daughter! 

Yep, it’s true!  On Saturday night, we received scanned copies of all of the original legal paperwork that names us as Elizabeth’s parents.  The moment I saw her name with “Allison” attached to it was beyond exciting and completely surreal.  In fact, all of this is surreal.  The travel plans and “ohmygosh this is it” conversations… after the crazy past few years, it’s all almost out-of-body.  And I am left in awe of the greatness of our God who has worked every detail of our journey out for His glory.

So, what’s next?  The next big step is to request our embassy appointment.  Pray that the embassy would respond quickly to our facilitator’s request for our appointment and that the appointment would be soon!  We’ve been told that the soonest our embassy appointment could probably be is October 23rd.  Pray for this!  We’d be traveling to DRC for this appointment… and to meet Elizabeth!!  This means that, theoretically speaking, we could have our daughter in our arms in just over three weeks.  Holy moly.  After our embassy appointment, we will most likely be returning to the States for a few weeks until we can return back to Kinshasa to bring her home for good.  Now, I’m trying not to cling too tightly to this possible date because it really is the best case scenario, but I also know that our God is not confined by dates or timelines.  {Speaking of dates and timelines, keep praying that our fingerprint situation would be worked out asap!  We cannot obtain a visa for Elizabeth if we don’t have updated fingerprints, so we need USCIS to have an unbelievably fast turnaround with scheduling our date for fingerprinting and then approving our prints.}

And Elizabeth?  Our sweet little daughter (!) is about to have her first flight!  This week or next week, she’ll be flown across the country to the capital city, Kinshasa, where she will stay until we bring her home.  During her time in Kinshasa, she’ll be living in the orphanage that our organization is heavily involved with and that a local pastor helps run.  Pray along with us for Elizabeth’s safety in travel (the flights across Congo are notoriously dangerous) and for her little heart as she is moved from the only home she has ever known in the mountains of eastern Congo to this transitional orphanage in the capital city.

As we marvel at Elizabeth’s signed adoption decree, we are grateful that God is the same today as He was on the day Rwanda closed our adoption file.  The journey has been straight up nuts, but God’s sovereignty, love, and grace has never once wavered.  God alone has done this.  May He be praised.