December 16, 2011

We are on our way home!  Yay!

This is my final blog post for awhile.  My goal is to update it once we get home.  But I am a realist.  I know that it is unlikely to happen for the first few days...or so.  Not only are we getting back from a physically, emotionally, spiritually draining trip, but we haven't seen our precious boys and girl for almost three weeks, they are officially on winter vacation, AND it is Christmas time!  

Did I mention the 14 hour time difference/jet lag under which we will be operating? 

To add to all of THAT wonderfulness, we will also be actively working on assimilating/transitioning a very wounded, fragile girl from a foreign country, who has never been in a home or a family, into our middle-class, suburban life in another land with different language, food, smells, sounds....   

Posting on the blog isn't at the top of my priority list.

Many of you have asked how you can help when we get home.  We are so grateful for your kindness and plan on taking advantage of it as much as we can.  However, having gone through this "coming-home-with-adopted-child" thing before and knowing that this time is 1000x more difficult than last time, we (and that's true, David is in on this too) wanted to mention a few things in this final post from China.....

1.  We COVET your prayers for our 26 hours of traveling that we will have to endure to make it back to ORD.  That includes 3 different flights and a combined 7 hours of layovers (mostly in Tokyo).  Josie is nervous around cars.  Need I tell you how she may react to a jumbo jet?

2.  We COVET your prayers for our first week, two weeks, three weeks, four weeks.....at home.  We know we are not the first, nor will we be the last, who have come home with a newly adopted child.  We don't expect special treatment or kid gloves but we know we'll need prayer.

3.  We have lived this crazy, difficult, unexpected, mind-boggling journey in the flesh for the last 17 days.  We have a lot to say about it, but we also don't really want to talk about it.  Is that confusing?!  Please understand if we give you a pat, ambiguous, uninvolved answer that we want to be honest with you but we're still trying to process it all and don't know exactly what to say.  Our adoption journey is not ending, it is only changing locations.  

4.  If you're really interested in some of what's going on in our minds and at our house, read this excellent post by Jen Hatmaker http://jenhatmaker.com/blog/2011/11/02/how-to-be-the-village  Her situation isn't exactly like ours, but you can glean a few good ideas.

5.  Be patient with us and with Josie.  We won't be bringing her out on parade for awhile. She has spent the last two weeks in China with a group of crazy white people who keep getting right in her itty, bitty face and saying, "Hi Josie!  How are you?  Oh, you're so pretty!  What have you been doing today?"  To her it sounds like, "Wah wah, wah wah, wah wah."  And she doesn't know how to respond so she just does crazy things which cause lots of problems.  Be patient.  And pray.  

6.  Don't plan on seeing us out and about for awhile.  We're planning on going into "hunker-down" mode.  We'll surface when:

  A.  the ground thaws 

  B.  we're fluent in Cantonese 

        or

  C.  Josie can handle her new, totally strange world reasonably well

I'll try to post again sometime in the next week.  

Thank you SO MUCH for following our trip, for praying, for writing comments and sending emails.  

I was reminded so often of this story of Moses:  When the Israelites were fighting against Amalek, 

"it turned out that whenever  Moses raised his hands, Israel was winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, Amalek was winning.  

      BUT MOSES' HANDS GOT TIRED.  

So they got a stone and set it under him.  He sat on it and Aaron and Hur 

      HELD UP HIS HANDS,

one on each side.  So 

      HIS HANDS REMAINED STEADY 

until the sun went down.  [They] defeated Amalek and its army in battle."  Exodus 17:11-13

We have been so tired, weary, discouraged, disheartened...Many of you have held us up in prayer and with encouragement to help us remain steady.  

THANK YOU!