Tuesday, December 5, 2006

WE LEAVE TOMORROW!!! Actually, we meet to leave the hotel in just seven hours. (That’s 5:30 a.m. Wednesday, local time, or 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Indiana time.) We are ready to come home!

This morning we did the famous “Red Couch” pictures. Most adoptive families have their children’s pictures taken on a red velvet couch at the White Swan Hotel, where we are staying. Like thousands before them, our group of ten children posed, some more cooperatively than others, for their turn. Kristen, who is usually more than happy to pose for the camera, must have decided she didn’t like sharing the limelight.

We took a photo of our travel group in front of the waterfall, which might sound routine for adoptions here in China. But in reality, it was profound. In this photo are ten children whose lives are totally different than they were just nine days earlier. Tomorrow they will leave their homeland. They are going HOME. To a place where they will bask in love and attention and nurturing that all children should have. In this photo are parents, grandparents, and a sister. People whose lives are also altered forever by their experience of adoption. We’ve learned how much you can love someone you’ve never met, and then love them even more when you hold them. The picture doesn’t include all the other parents, grandparents, brothers (Andrew and Davis!) and sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles who wait at home to meet their loved one. Their lives will be changed, enriched and blessed, too. It’s an amazing thing.

Later in the afternoon, we went to the American Consulate for the final step of the adoption process. There we took an oath that everything we said or wrote concerning the adoption was true. We received our children’s Visas to travel to the U.S., and a package to give to Immigration at our port of entry into the U.S. (ours will be Detroit). When Kristen touches the ground there, and the officer processes her paperwork, she’ll be an official citizen of the U.S. Today there were about forty families finishing our adoption journeys at the Consulate. The numbers you hear vary a bit, but by all accounts there were at least 10,000 international adoptions of children from China to other countries.

I am overwhelmed by witnessing families being brought together. Various factors might have brought our children to the orphanages where they lived just nine days ago. But God had a plan for each one of them.

For I know the plan I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11

That’s how good God is. We have been so blessed to be part of His plan.

We want to thank our boys, Andrew and Davis, for having such big hearts. They have been excited and willing from the beginning to share their hearts, their home and their parents with a new sister. They have endured their mother’s obsessive planning for over a year, and have managed (somehow!) without us for two weeks. We are SO READY to hold them in our arms again! We are very proud of both of them.

We can’t begin to think where we would be without our parents. They shared in our excitement and planning for Kristen. Most importantly, they took care of Andrew and Davis while we’ve been away for two weeks. How blessed we are to have both sets of parents living nearby, and for our boys to be excited about staying a week with each of them. Our hearts could rest knowing our boys are secure and loved.

Many thanks to all our friends who have supported us not just on this trip, but for the past fifteen months. You have lifted us up in prayer, which is the greatest gift. You have celebrated with us each step of the way, and we can’t wait to introduce you to the newest member of the Thompson family!

Speaking of meeting Kristen ~ you probably heard us say that we’ll be met at the airport on Wednesday by just the boys and grandparents. As soon as we get past jet lag and get a chance to spend some time as a family, we’ll start getting out with Kristen. From there we’ll just have to follow her lead!

So in one sense, we are at the end of our journey TO Kristen. But we know we are just beginning our life as a family of five. We will post an update under the “We’re Home” section sometime in the next week, and then once a month for the next five months or so.

Feeling Blessed in China,

Suzanne, Monte and Kristen