Referral Story

.....June 17^th started out just like any other day.  I (Sheldon) went to work in the morning, and had a normal morning.    Hilary went out to run some errands, and saw a relatively cheap water bottle that was similar to water bottles we had bought months earlier as part of a “Water for Ethiopia” fundraiser.  She contemplated purchasing just one, but thought, maybe we’d eventually get 2 children so that they could have matching water bottles to ours.  Little did she know.....

At about 12:15 pm, while on lunch, I received a call from Dawn at Adoption Options.  She made a comment about some paperwork that she had just received (honestly I don’t have a clue what she said that day), and that she was looking beautiful pictures on her computer... It was then that I realized what it was that she was saying.  I don’t even remember what I said after that moment, but that I kept saying something over and over again (maybe my co-worker at the time remembersJ).  She told me that she was looking at 2 beautiful girls....  We had been referred 2 girls, and they were siblings, ages 1.5 yrs old, and 3.5 yrs old. 

I don’t actually remember any more of the conversation, but I was completely shell shocked.   I told/asked my boss, whether it was ok for me to leave for the rest of the day, and I think she just said, of course.  I’m not sure I would’ve been much use at work the rest of that day.  I spent about 2 hours trying to get a hold of Hilary, and by the time I finally got a hold of her, I had received 4 emails with the pertinent information about the girls in them.  I told Hilary that she should come on over and pick me up, that I was quitting for the day.  She was a bit clued out as to why I was coming home so early, and it was at that time that she asked whether we had received a referral.  I said yes, Hilary screamed so loud, our dog peed on the floor and ran for the kennel.  Hopefully it all wasn’t too traumatic for him J.  Hilary did not want to receive any more information because we both figured she would get in an accident with that much excitement J.  Between the time I called, and she got to where I work (approximately 15 minutes), I caved and looked at the most beautiful sad faces I’ve ever seen.

Once she showed up, she insisted that we wait until we got home again to see the pictures, and read through the information we had received.  Once home, we sat together on the couch, prayed, started up my computer (keep in mind that Hilary still thinks there’s only one child coming home), and had a look at the pictures of the oldest girl, as well as viewed some of the documentation.  Once we had done a quick review of the older girl’s file, I said “And here is the 2^nd child....”, and we both lost it.  We are both so very thankful that God has provided us with these 2 miracles.  While we understand that these children are not legally ours yet, we are so looking forward to that day when we can legally call these girls our own.

Once our emotions settled down a bit, we decided that we had to show both sets of parents the pictures of our soon to be daughters.  I quickly saved the documents onto a memory stick, and we headed out to Staples to print a copy of the pictures for each set of grandparents.  While we were on our way to Hilary’s parents, we called Hilary’s sister who had just landed out of town for a little vacation, and told her.  We told Hilary’s parents (who just happened to both be home when we got over there), and of course, there were again lots of tears.  Finally, we began the ½ hour drive to my parents to give them the news.  I think they suspected something when we showed up in the driveway.  We gave them the news, and interestingly enough my sister, and her family showed up shortly afterwards, so they could receive the news as well.  Hilary needed to be back home for some responsibilities that she had already committed to, so we headed back to Winnipeg, and spent virtually the entire trip on the phone (that phone bill was huge J).  Over the next few days and weeks, the reality of the situation has started to sink in, and we are just as overjoyed.

The next step after accepting the referral was to wait for the courts to grant us a date.  We had originally hoped we might be able to receive that date before the courts closed at the beginning of August, but unfortunately that was not to be, and so we are currently waiting for a court date.  Hopefully we will receive a date over the next week or two, and we can start making plans to travel to Ethiopia to see our girls.  We expect to travel at or around the end of October, and hope to be able to spend our 10^th wedding anniversary in Ethiopia.

Thank you again to all who have supported us in this adoption process.  We will try and post here as frequently as we can with updates, and stories relating to our adoption, and hopefully sooner rather than later we will post stories of our girls, and how they are adjusting to the Canadian life.