Friday, July 19, 2013

Approved!

I spoke with our agent at USCIS yesterday
and she said our I600 was
APPROVED
on July 12th!!!

YAY!

For those of you who aren't working on adoption
paperwork in your spare time,
an I600 gives us
permission to bring Tobias into the States!
We already had permission to bring an "orphan"
into America, now we have permission to bring our
son specifically!!

SO, all he needs is a Passport,
his Visa,
and he's ready!

Sounds simple right???
Not quite.

It sounds so so simple in our minds as well.
Here is what the next few months will
hopefully look like.
Things can change very quickly though!

Didier will go back to Congo and
schedule a trip to Kinshasa.
He will bring Tobi to a place called
"Love Beyond Borders"
transition home.

We are now working with them to complete the adoption.
They have a home there to take care of the
children while they work on getting his
passport and visa.

They will get the passport, get an appointment for
The Embassy, then the Embassy will start what is called a 
"field investigation."
 This is where we really need to be in prayer.

They physically travel to Lubumbashi where the orphanage
is and do an investigation.
They make sure that documents and a bunch
of other stuff is correct and legitimate.

They do a group of investigations all at once
and I've HEARD that they
will be traveling to Lubumbashi in
AUGUST!!!

This. Would. Be. AWESOME.
With all the delays that we've had,
we really have stopped counting on a specific
time period.
BUT.
If they did Tobi's interviews and investigations
in August....
that would mean he'd have his visa soon after that!

SO,
please pray with us that it happens that way!

Once they are done with the investigation,
and stamp his passport with his
approved Visa...
we get to go to Africa
and pick up our son!!!!

The bittersweet part of all this is that
it looks like we will NOT be traveling
to Lubumbashi where he has lived
for over a year.
We won't get to see Didier's family and those
that have helped care for Tobi while he
was there.
We won't see the church and participate
in worship with them on Sunday.

But.
This is about Tobias right now.
And we get to meet him,
hold him,
and keep him!

It will probably also be a better situation
for our children back home.
I believe we will be able to communicate with them
more in Kinshasa.
We'll see if that's true!

So we're excited and anxious as ever to meet Tobias.
And let me share something real quick.

I think about our son's beautiful
dark skin all the time.
Ever since I was young, I have just LOVED
African American's skin!
As a young, immature teenager,
my best friend and I would always talk about how
we would one day adopt
a black child because they were so 
darn cute.

Well, we watched "42" last night.
It's the story of Jackie Robinson.
I confessed to my husband that I honestly
try to forget about the past of our country and the
other countries that treated
their people with dark skin like they were animals.


Then, when things started to change,
they would recognize African Americans as
"human",
but FAR from equal.
I was thinking about how we would one day
explain to Tobias how people that looked like
him used to be treated in such a
terrible, inhumane way.

THEN, I thought of how it must have been
for parents back then.
How do you explain to your child that
God created all of us equal,
but the majority of the world doesn't see
it that way???
Ugh.

I'm so thankful to not have lived through those days.
And I weep for those that had to.
Gosh, could Jackie Robinson's grandparents even
COMPREHEND white people
WILLINGLY adopting black children???
I'm so glad that we've made it that far
as a country.
But the CHURCH should have been there
LONG ago!

Anyway.
That's just a little of what has been on my heart.
All children, regardless of their
ethnicity or skin color,
need parents.
There are millions that need rescuing.
But I really look forward to the stares.
I look forward to people glancing twice as they see
our 3 kids with light skin,
walking with our son who stands out with
his chocolate brown face and wide white eyes.
 Every stare and every question is an
opportunity to share WHY we adopt.

Now.
If we could only get him home....

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