Divine Intervention and Prayers of Saints

Good morning!

I hope to post some more pics and a video of Ava at the river later today! She's getting ready for a bath this morning... :)

Long story short if you're just now tuning in... We're having extreme unexpected difficulty in bringing Maia Grace home from China because of government forms and regulations and because of our domestic adoption, which we KNOW was from the Lord!

I wanted to give a quick update on what we need specific prayer for today if you're reading this.

I am in contact today with USCIS (Citizenship and Immigration) in Missouri which just happens to be where our family government document is. This is the document we filed in order to receive US clearance to bring a foreign child into the US and ultimately that will be our ticket to bring Maia out of China. I just happened to land on that number yesterday after getting no where with an automated telphone system at USCIS in Memphis.

Anyway, I spoke with the kindest woman in that office yesterday which was a God-send in this whole saga. She was more than willing to help us and figure things out, which in the world of international adoption, is like a jigsaw puzzle!

Her name is Meredith.

Ben and I filed a document in July called an I-800A. This document is a key component in what is preventing us from moving forward with our China adoption. As it turns out, we are learning that we received possibly false information earlier this summer from the another CIS office telling us that the I-800A was the form we needed to file.

Our agency is telling us that we could have filed an I-600A Advanced Orphan Petition, which is what we have already filed twice before. (They expire and you have to renew.)If we had done this, we would not be encountering so many difficulties with our international process right now.

I just wrote an e-mail to Meredith requesting, ok, pleading that we could go back and file an I-600A instead of the I-800A if that is allowed and in fact, we received faulty information.

If this were to be granted, it would open the door much wider for us to continue in our efforts to bring Maia home in the midst of doing a domestic adoption at the same time.

I believe God put Meredith in my path yesterday, and I just "happened" to call the exact office where our paperwork is in hand! Missouri of all places! It could have still been in Memphis or in Chicago where all I-800As are going right now.

I should hear something back today hopefully. Please pray that this goes through. Ben and I are seriously trying to be honest and do whatever is necessary to bring Maia home and navigate through a boatload of red tape that's a tangled mess right now.

This is where I wait on the Lord. Praise be to God. I know He's with me and He won't forsake me.

Emily