2 Years Ago Today...

Two years ago today we officially embarked on this adoption journey. At that time we were excited at the prospect that we could potentially have our new daughter home with us by years end. That wasn't to be. Now however, we're excited once again because in 39 days we will be meeting Olivia for the first time! Bryan, Emily and I will be flying down to Guatemala on April 6th and Olivia will come to stay with us at the hotel while we're there.

Meanwhile, we're scurrying to learn some Spanish! Hopefully we'll learn enough to be able to communicate with her and not scare her off!


We're learning a little bit more about what will be required of us after the June Court hearing (where hopefully it will be decided that Olivia is "adoptable"). There will be a lot more paperwork to do on our part, potentially more visit trips and one in particular where we will be observed (with Olivia) for an undetermined period of time by a social worker and a psychologist to see if we are the right family for her. And oh yes...... more waiting.

So, as we have been since the first day we saw her picture, we are committed to this child and will jump through all the hoops they ask us to. Guatemala...here we come!

This Was a GOOD Day!

Well, our prayers have been answered, praise the Lord! Today's court appearance went very well.

First and foremost, Olivia will be able to stay with her foster family!!! We're actually thankful that she has the chicken pox, it helped with the judge's decision to keep her with the family! Isn't God's timing amazing?

Secondly, he ordered that there be one more attempt at finding someone in her birth family before he would grant us a Certificate of Abandonment (CoA). We assumed they were going to do this. This means, they have until June to locate them. The next court date is in June, (not sure the date yet). If no one is found by that time, the judge will then declare Olivia as "adoptable" and grant the CoA. From that point the case will be turned over to the CNA and they will process it from there.

The other awesome thing is, that we've been given the greenlight to go to Guatemala and visit her!!! FINALLY!!! We're hoping to go either in March or April, we haven't pinned it down yet. We're so thrilled! We finally get to meet our little girl after almost 2 years of waiting!

This is really the beginning of our process and we have a long way to go before she comes home, but we are ready to do what we need to, to make that happen. Today was a huge hurdle and with God in control, we cleared it.

Thank you for all your prayers, keep 'em comin', we're not done yet!

Yes, today was a GOOD day.

Olivia Goes to Court on Friday

To update our post from yesterday. Olivia will be presented to the Court tomorrow, chicken pox and all. We've been told that our former attorney Mr. Gallo (who has not been on our case for about a year), will be taking her and presenting our case, not our current attorney, Beyla who has been preparing for almost a year for this appearance.

Anyway, apparently the following will be decided at this hearing:

That the case will immediately proceed to an abandonment ~OR~ they will once again continue the search for the birth mother.

Also, that Olivia will be able to stay with her current foster family through the duration of the process ~OR~ that she will be removed from that home and put into an orphanage. (This could really happen, and would be devastating to her.)

We are praying that obviously we get the go-ahead for the abandonment and that she's able to stay where she is. We also pray the judge is compassionate and will make the right decision.

Olivia needs all the prayers we can get right now!

We will post again once we know the outcome.

Prayers Please

Today we found out that Olivia is sick with the chickenpox. I feel so bad, because we should be there for her, poor little thing. We do know she's being well cared for though, which is a comfort to us as well as to her, I'm sure.

So, after finding this out and feeling sad that we can't be with her to nurse her back to health, we got another email from Lymaris, our agency director stating:

" ...I wanted to let you know that after my last email, I got an email from your previous attorney saying that he had gotten a citation to present her (Olivia) within 48 hours. It seems the CNA is going over all the registered cases and so I immediately called Beyla (current attorney) to ask what we need to do...She is trying to talk to the CNA head person today and hopes to have some guidance later on today as to what they want and what we should do. This is where I will really need your prayers, that this is not an attempt to move her to an orphanage and that it is merely their verification of the existence of the child, etc... However - I do not want to get ahead of myself although I am worried, and of course the timing could not be worse with her sickness and all. I will be getting back to you as soon as I have some concrete info..."

It sounds like this may be a very big deal or no big deal. If you would, please pray very hard for the latter to be the case. If they have to take Olivia out to meet with officials while she's so sick, I'm very concerned. If they don't take her out to meet with officials because she is sick, could be even worse. Our hope is that this is just part of a verification process and that they don't use this as an attempt to take her away from the foster family.

Anyway, not the best news. Hopefully we'll get more info soon. Thanks everyone for your on-going prayers and support!

Our Attorney DID Meet With the CNA Yesterday

We got a phone call from our agency director, Lymaris this afternoon to let us know that our attorney, Beyla did indeed have her meeting with the CNA yesterday. (For those of you not familiar with the "CNA", it's the name for the Guatemalan Central Authority on Adoptions. The part of their government that took over adoptions down there a year ago when the government took control of the process.) Our case had been registered with them last year (as were all cases still in process), but since our case is such a tough one, Beyla thought it best to start by introducing them to our case and get their "blessing" right up front, before proceeding to the Court, who could potentially tell her to turn around and get the CNA approval anyway.

The report was that the meeting went well and this first step was successfully completed. The next step will be presenting before a judge.

When this happens, we have some specific things we need prayer for.

• First, that this takes place quickly. We hope to hear of a court date soon.
  
• Second, that we get a judge with compassion and a heart for these children.
  
• Third, that Olivia will be able to stay with her foster family until the completion of the adoption. Apparently there's a real possibility that she could be removed from that home and put into a hogar (orphanage). That would not be acceptable!
  
• And fourth, in an abandonment situation, before the court will grant a Certificate of Abandonment (COA) which allows the adoption to proceed, there must be a search for a relative who might be willing to take the child in. Lymaris said this mandatory search, could take as long as 6 months. However, Beyla is prepared to show the judge the year-and-a-half long search that different people have done on our behalf to no avail with the hopes that the judge will "credit" our case with that previous search time, so their search won't drag out for months.

We're thankful to pass this hurdle as the CNA could have shut the adoption down completely at Tuesday's meeting, but they didn't. We believe Olivia will come home to us and we pray that what has to happen to get her here from this point on, will go quickly and smoothly. That said, these things rarely go quickly or smoothly with Guatemalan adoptions these days, we know we still have a journey ahead of us, but she is SO worth it!

Our Attorney to Meet With CNA Tuesday Morning!

Our agency director, Lymaris emailed today with these recent pictures and to tell us: "Beyla will be at the CNA tomorrow morning. What she is expecting to get out of the meeting is a favorable ruling/green light of sorts from CNA which will weigh heavier on her case before the court. I pray for doors to open wide for Olivia tomorrow!"

This is the first step in the right direction and apparently a very big and important step. Please pray that she indeed does get in to see the people she's scheduled to see and that the meeting is very successful!

We'll post again when we hear what transpired.

Congratulations to the Huff family who just brought their son Otoniel home from Guatemala yesterday! (Otoniel was Olivia's foster brother for the last year.)

Still No News...But We've Got Birthday Pictures!

We just received these pictures that Olivia's foster family took of her birthday party last month. She's opening the gifts we sent down to her.

She's showing her "diploma" from Vacation Bible School! Too cute!