Adoption Update

We have been in waiting mode for 6 weeks now. We have filed for USCIS approval been fingerprinted and waiting for the paper in the mail. UGH I hate waiting. (sigh) Once we have it we will send it to the agency and they will get it sealed and our dossier will be complete and able to be sent to China. We did not make the 6 month date from our pre-approval, so our agency asked for an extension, we are waiting to hear back on that. Anyhow back to our little guys story. Phoebe began an all out prayer attack on her parents, but I confess I was an easy target. Dan was much more stubborn but Phoebe never gave up. She prayed at every meal, every bedtime for God to change Dads' heart and let us adopt again. After awhile she just started talking about her little brother, when he get's home we will do this.....he will need such and such....he needs toys...bedding, picking things out she was sure he would need, like, have to have and then she started naming him, try saying no when your "son" has a name and is talked about as if he is part of the family. In October Dan agreed to think about it. SUCCESS!!!! I was looking on an agency website at the waiting child list and saw his face and knew he was my boy. The problem was he was in China and we have never qualified to adopt from there before. So I called the agency about a sibling set I had seen from another country and she was talking and I shared how it had to be a boy and she asked if we would consider China and I told her we didn't qualify and then she explained how the requirements had changed for waiting children and not to give up. So I requested his file and prayed that Dan would be open and willing. He is soooooo cute I can't wait to share his picture but not until his referral is official. When we inquired about him the agency told us that we only had a week before his file would be sent back, ugh no pressure. We knew he was ours so I started the pre-approval paperwork and submitted it on the last day they had his file. On November 20 we received email notification that we were approved. We were so happy and started thinking about his name and working on getting the process started. We have actually not shared much of anything about it , our oldest son was announcing their first baby was due and we didn't want to interfere with their news and baby joy. We are very excited and looking toward the day that we can go to bring him home....but as it is with international adoption...hurry up and wait. We are still deciding on the name, Dan has one which is Ezra, the girls want Boaz, and I want William, so for now we call him any of those names. It gets a little confusing and sometimes people ask "how many are you adopting?" just one; but not sure which name so on any given day it's different.