Finally, some news on the adoption front!!!

I didn't want to make any announcements until our paperwork was all offical... but we have our referrall!

That's right. We know who we're going to bring home to be a part of our family.

THey are sisters. Their names are Woineshet (pronounced winna-shet) and Meaza (pronounced may-ah-zuh.) Woineshet means "unripe grape" in amharac, and Meaza means "aroma." They are beautiful girls, 4 and 5 years old. They look much younger than this; I would have guessed Meaza at 2 or 3 years old like my other girl, and I would have pegged Woineshet at 4. But that's normal for third world countries and conditions involving poverty.

They are said to be very bonded to each other, and good at playing games with other kids. They are on-track developmentally. They have tested negative for all the worrisome diseases. They seem like wonderful girls and we're so excited to bring them home!!

The process from here: our paperwork has been officially submitted to the courts. Probably within 2 or 3 weeks we will hear when our court date is. right now, court dates are being assigned at the end of April; so on that track our court date would come in the middle of may, and then we'd go to pick them up 2-6 weeks later, depending on how long it takes for their visas to be completed. So right now we're looking at a possibility of picking them up in June.

Our agency director, however, has told us that they have trained a new judge who just began taking on some of the caseload yesterday. He's not working a full load yet, but everyone's hoping it means that the wait for court dates will shorten significantly, possibly by a month or two. So it's also possible we could travel much sooner... possibly by mid-late April or early May.


So cross your fingers, pray, etc, for us, that we'll pass court the first time and all will go smoothly for us legally, physically, and emotionally as we take on this huge adventure!