T stinkin A's !!!

It has been over a year since we first saw Kira's beautiful smile.

We did not expect to weather the storms we did during this paper chase for her. We did not expect to wait close to 15 months to bring her home.

This wasn't are first ride at the rodeo, but it was a wild one. Just as we were about to get our golden ticket from immigration, God opened a door and asked us to walk through it.

China started a new, fantastic program called Special Focus. Families would now be able to bring home 2 children at one time, if one of the children was a special focus child.

Well, as it would be....I had fallen hard for a little boy with Thalassemia. His eyes just cut through me. He reminded me so much of our sweet Sophia. I knew the road he was walking and what his future held being an orphan with such a medical issue. I told Bart that he was meant to be ours. And without hesitation, he agreed.

So, we called our agency and asked to be the little guys parents. We dotted all of our I's and crossed all of our T's and were given approval from China to adopt Hudson also.

We were crazy happy.

Then, we received news from our home study agency...different one then our kids agency...that our social worker had denied us approval for our son.

Her reasons were that she," could not imagine having this many children herself." We were shocked, sad and angry.

After talking with our placement agency, we decided to fight our social workers denial. How could her personal feelings keep us from bringing our son home if we met all of the qualifications of 2 agencies, immigration and China?

It was game on.

There were a few months of heavy prayer, many tears, intensive personal scrutiny of our beliefs, life style, and competence as parents of a large family. And a lot of guilt over having to put things on hold for Kira while we fought for Hudson.

But, as usual, God had it all covered. We won our appeal and were granted approval for Hudson.

And, in just a few weeks...Kira and Hudson will meet their crazy, loving forever family.

And I pray that each day God helps me to prove that social worker wrong... that large families are a blessing, not a burden.