Photos from my January Trip

As previously promised, some photos from my trip!  Sorry they took so long!!!  Enjoy!

Catrina with some of her many friends at the Orphanage :-)

You may recognize Sunday (the guy on the left), as he is Nadelta's little brother...the guy on the right is actually a photo-bomber!  HA!

Gotta love Little Stanley!  ...and another photo bomber...what is with these kids?!  :-D

SO well behaved!  Mme. S runs a tight ship!  :)

The art of self-amusement

She would be SO embarassed I put this here, but I couldn't resist!  How cute is she?!

Puzzling...  :-)

Making Valentine's Day Cards

Some things are universal.  Teenage girls love dressing up and doing photo shoots!

One of the many times I was seranaded with a trash guitar!  Gotta love the creativity behind it!

Who wouldn't just fall in love with this sweet little gal?!

Finally, some long awaited movement!

As I'm sure you are aware, we were pretty down after my last visit to Haiti.  It was so hard to hear that after 8 1/2 months, our file hadn't even been started!  Yikes! 

Last week, at long last we were able to get in touch with our lawyer (praise God for Facebook!).  She had some meetings on Friday (for which many of you joined us in prayer...THANK YOU!) and we found out today that our dossier is at the Presidential Palace awaiting dispensation.  Praise God!  Please rejoice with us today and continue to pray!

Home Safe & Sound

I returned home safely last weekend and while I managed to stay healthy in Haiti, managed to catch a stomach virus back in the States...irony?  I believe I also may have mentioned in my last post that the Wi-fi was down on the Wesleyan Compound, so while I could log on to check emails, I didn't feel comfortable stealing the Edmonds' computer for too long.  All that said, all apologies for my delay in posts!

I had a great trip!  It was so nice to "get my hands dirty" and actually accomplish some things on this trip.  Unfortunately mission team work was the only thing I managed to accomplish.  We did finally hear from our lawyer that the IBESR hasn't even started processing our dossier.  This was heartbreaking for me! 

Even so, at least I had a great time visiting with Catrina!  It is amazing to me how much we have bonded and somehow this trip seemed so much different than any previous...

Of course she's growing up and changing (I definitely saw some improvements in her attitude at the orphanage...Praise God!), but it was something more...  It was almost like this was the first time we were family.  I was not just her special visitor, but her family.  That was definitely awesome!  I also got to hang out with her friends a little more than I have in past trips and spend some quality time with Mme. S.  All good stuff! 

Upon my return I was musing that we have less than 22 months to get her home!  For Haiti, that is NOT a long time...however a dear friend of ours made the encouraging comment that "God created all of existence in 7 days...I think he can handle 22 months."  :-)  Yes He can!  Just as our adoption process began, I am once again reminded of the words of Chirst:  "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." (Matthew 19:26)  Yes they are!

Still Praying & Playing

Oops...just found that this had never posted from January 29.  The curse of unreliable internet access:


Happy Tuesday!!!

No news yet, but I had a great weekend with Catrina!  I was also able to get her Friday through Sunday, then again yesterday afternoon.  For the most part we just hung out, did some crafts, etc.  We had a great time just being together!

Yesterday was the championship soccor match between Extollo (the Haitians building the Orhpan Village) and Lemonade (the Haitians building the new hospital).  It was SO much fun!  There was a Haitian band and we all marched down to the Salene for the match.  Extollo won, but it was tons of fun for all!  Including Catrina!

Last night I had the opportunity to chat with Pastor Dan (the Missions Director for the Caribbean) and found that he has actually spoke with our lawyer.  Hopefully he's going to be able to give her a call to see if he can: 1-establish a liason for us to call to get regular updates and 2-find out where we are in the process.  Please keep this in your prayers!  I am holding out hope that God will accomplish both of these and that we will find out that we are out of IBESR while I'm here this week.  In such a case, the next time we come to Haiti just might be for a court date.  What a blessing that would be!

One other prayer request.  We have a friend Nancy who is in the process of trying to become a missionary to La Gonave.  Please pray that all the pieces will come together to make this desire a reality if it's God's will.  Please also pray for peace for her regardless of which way it goes.

PS.  I'll post photos when I return!!!  :-)

Back in Haiti!

Merry Christmas!!!  Happy New Year!!!

I sincerely apologize for the lag in posts...we have had absolutely no progress or news since our last trip.  Christmas was particularly hard with obviously one empty seat at our table and a whole in our hearts that can only be filled in Haiti.  God carried us through and we continue to trust that He is going to bring our sweet girl home in His time!

I am back in Haiti and back on the island of La Gonave as of last night.  I'm here for a mission trip and conveniently getting to see my girl each night!  What could be better?

Unfortunately not only did we not get to meet with our lawyer on the way in, but she has appatenly fallen off the grid.  She's proven to be unresponsive with all attempts to contact her...we are praying that God will move her to work on our adoption, and also praying specifically that our dossier (formal application) will come out of IBESR while I'm here.  God has always proven to make big things happen while I'm here in Haiti and I'm praying boldly and expecting this trip will be no different. 

Please join us in our prayers!

Hard Goodbyes

We've been very blessed with a great visit this time!  We knocked out most of the legal stuff we had to get taken care of the first day and have gotten to just spend some good time with Catrina getting to work on bonding since Saturday.  It's kind of sad when you think about it...we spent 3 days trying to get out here and it will take us 2 days to get back....we got to vsit with Catrina a total of 4 days.  Somehow that math is not my favorite...  :-)  We are SO looking forward to that day that we get to take her with us, as these goodbyes get harder each time!  Praying that day is soon!

Please keep us in your prayers tonight as today is the last time we get to see Catrina before we head back.  This afternoon will be our last goodbye for this trip.  We also want to convey to her how important it is that she is well-behaved while we aren't here.

Praising God in all storms!

Hi All,

I'm going to have to keep this short as we have very limited internet access on the island and I don't want to hog all the bandwidth.

We arrived safely on the island (only by God's Hand!) on Friday evening.  What a blessing to see the Edmonds and their smiling, familiar faces!  Arrving at the Edmonds is always like arriving home.  Praise God for this precious mission family always willing to accept us in their home!

Saturday morning, the weather had cleared and we went to the orphanage to meet with Mme. S to chat, get the full story of where we are, and see where we go from here.  Much to our surprise, when we arrived at the orphanage, Catrina, her birth mother, and her sister were awaiting us.  We were able to sit down with them all and Mt. Ives to discuss our situation.  Within an hour, we had worked through our situation and established the following:
-Catrina owed Mme. S an apology, which Mme. S gladly accepted
-Mme. S was happy to take Catrina back at the orphanage, with a transition period of Catrina spending the weekend with us, then returning to the orphanage on Sunday evening
-Catrina's birth family is welcome to visit Catrina, but they are NOT to take Catrina from the orphanage
-Should future incidents occur, the birth family will go straight to Mme. S first

This is really the very best situation we could have hoped for!  Apparently while we were waiting out Hurricane Sandy on the mainland, God was also calming this storm in the hearts of each person involved.  Now we are back to waiting on the birth father, which the birth family now understands the full importance of.

Prasing God for peace and resolution!  (Also praising Him for giving us the words to say as we discussed everything.  There is no doubt in my mind that we couldn't have managed any of this without Him.)  Praying for Him to burden the birth father's heart to do the things he needs to do for us to move forward.