Pitter Patter Art

One of the blogs I frequent (ie stalk) is Pitter Patter Art.  This wonderful family is currently waiting for their adoption referral as well.  Every month they have a art giveaway, check it ou by going to the link below:

http://pitterpatterart.wordpress.com/2011/09/16/10-months-waiting-art-giveaway/#comment-6156

Learning the Joy in Patience

The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. ~Psalm 28:7

So, this happens everytime.  I try to go to our blog and instead of typing in thefleenerfamily.blogspot.com, I leave the the off.  Out there is another adorable couple that is also a "Fleener family" with the same blog address as us, without that pesky the.  No big deal, I give them a Fleener nod and go about my way.  Well today their post caught my eye....


28 Weeks and counting!  Only 12 more weeks to go:)

Oh the mixture of emotions I felt while looking at that title.  A few minutes before attempting to go to our blog, I was just sitting at my trusty ole computer looking at adoption blogs and forums and longing to be able to put a date on when we will get to meet our little one.  I admire families in the adoption process who post vacation photos of their family with signs that say "Waiting for YOU", but honestly, I am not strong enough to have the constant reminder that our baby is not here yet.  I praise God that through this time He has been by my side and given me the strength I need and the patience to endure.


I wish we could just skip all the uncomfortable trials, and tears, and waiting waiting waiting that has to occur between today and the day when I finally get to hold my sweet darling in my arms for the first time.  My heart breaks for the family that will go through heartache and loss for my gain and I pray that God will be given all the glory for whatever happens from this moment to "gotcha day." 

Until we meet, my son, know your mommy is praying for you and "Waiting for YOU"  from now until that unknown date that will be in God's perfect timing.

Peace That Transcends All Understanding

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Galatians 5:22,23)

On June 20th I said goodbye to the most wonderful man I ever knew...

my papa, R.B. Patterson, Jr.

Papa taught me so much, but most of all he taught me unconditional love.  He loved our family with such passion and looked past all of our mistakes and flaws and somehow always saw the best parts of us. When I told him that Mike and I were adopting, he squeezed my hand, looked me in eyes, and told me "You are doing so good."  That is a moment I will never forget and will cherish for the rest of my life.

On June 20th I rejoiced knowing that one day I would see my beloved Papa again.  As I leaned down to kiss him one last time I felt the greatest peace, which transcended all understanding, come over me.   You are always in my thoughts, my prayers, and you will never be forgotten. 

Everyday is One Day Closer to You

This is something I have to keep reminding myself.... I want SO BADLY for our adoption to happen on MY timetable, but I have to realize that God is ultimately in control and that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.  So these hiccups that are happening in the paperwork and the weeks that have passed without having control over the process are working together to bring us to our son at the exact moment that God has planned.

May your power be made perfect in my weakness!  I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me!

The neverending journey to recieve USCIS Approval!

So.... it has been exactly three weeks, 3 days and one hour and 15 minutes since we were fingerprinted at the immigration office.  But who is counting?

After several daily trips to the mailbox and what might constitute the stalking of our mailman...

we finally recieved a letter from immigration!!

Was it our approval?  No.  But that is ok, because it was SOMETHING!  I can now "control" the process of collecting a couple more documents and getting them sent in to complete the adjudication, as immigration calls it, of our documents.

So are we one step closer?  I would like to believe so.  There are several new policies and steps being added to the Ethiopian adoption process and I would rather us have to clear up paperwork issues on the front end, rather than in the middle or end.

Thank you family and thank you friends for your continued prayers for our growing family.  As you know, I am not always the most patient person and I know God is using these small "bumps" to help me grow closer to Him!  To God be the glory!

As you know Mike and I are currently in the process of adopting from Ethiopia! We are getting closer everyday to having our adoption paperwork sent off to Ethiopia and then from there we will have need extreme patience and faith in our Soviergn God as we wait anywhere from 6 to 12 months for a referral. We are so blessed to have prayer support from our wonderful friends and family!

Right now there is a lot of fluidity in the process that is required for families who are in the process of adopting from Ethiopia.  A lot of new policies are being created to help make sure each and every adoption is ethical and is in the best interest of the child.  (Which is great!)  However, the biggest changes in regards to Ethiopian adoptions are taking place in the Ministry of Women's Affairs in Ethiopia (MOWA is who processes ALL inter-country adoptions through Ethiopia). Basically adoptions can, and right now appear, to be cut by 90%. To read more about this, follow this link. http://adoption.state.gov/news/ethiopia_alert.html

In 2010, more than 2,500 Ethiopian children were adopted by American families. Should MOWA implement the recent directive as indicated, the number of adoptions from Ethiopia could fall as much as 90%, although the full impact of MOWA’s decision is unknown and cannot be predicted at this time.

How can we help?

PRAY!!! Pray for the children in Ethiopia and for MOWA.  Right now there are over 5 million orphans in Ethiopia who are longing for a loving family!

Also, if you feel led, PLEASE sign this petition to MOWA, by the Joint Council Emergency Campaign for Ethiopian Children:  http://www.gopetition.com/petition/43714.html

Through all of the uncertainty, we thank you all for your continued prayer and praise God for adopting us first!

We hit a Milestone!

Ok... so I have to give a quick shout out to the most FANTASTIC people I have ever met....

The Roberson family is our notary, accountant, friends, neighbors, encourager, coworker, photographer, reference letter writer, maker and bringer of chicken soup when one of us is not feeling well, writer of post it notes so I don't forget things, and most of all, they are our family.

Without them we would be lost in the huge metropolis of Hattiesburg, MS.  I hope they know how grateful we are to have them as friends.

Ok, so now on to our milestone!  Hint:  It includes Mr. Robbie Roberson!

Are you in suspense yet?

We have FINALLY had our last document notarized for our adoption!  Now our large stack of documents are off to the secretary of state office for state seals!  Once we get everything state sealed then the documents are will need to be approved by the US and then our documents are shipped to Ethiopia!

The last step before this all happens, however, is a trip to Metairie, LA to get fingerprinted at the Immigration office.  Our appointment is on April 15th (well acutally Mike's is on the 15th and mine is on the 18th, but we are going to try and sneak me in early!  Pray it will happen! :))

Mike and I decided (ie just me!) that we would make a weekend out of our long trip to Metairie, so we are looking into (ie me again!) camping out in Bayou Seignette State Park and canoeing the dark swamps of Jean Lafitte National Park that weekend. 

More updates are coming soon!   Thanks to all who have been praying and supporting us during this journey!

We are.... ADOPTING!

Ok, so it hasn't been the biggest secret, but yes, we are adopting.  I have been asking everyone I tell to keep our adoption top secret, but yet I have been telling everyone I come into contact about it.  I guess maybe it is because I am excited!  I mean I have a good reason to be, right?

So here is our story...

We had always talked about adoption as a Plan B for our family; however, throughout our marriage God has placed some amazing ministries and people in our paths that have opened our eyes to the reality that adoption doesn't have to be Plan B, it can be Plan A.

In June of 2010, after lots of prayer and discussion, we believed that we had recieved confirmation from God to start our adoption journey.

We have, so far, completed our homestudy and we are currently awaiting an appointment with immigration to get fingerprinted.  After that we will send off a bunch of paperwork to Ethiopia (where we are adopting from) and then the waiting begins for a referral.

So a couple of questions I am sure you are asking yourselves:

Why Adoption?

God continues to show us his divine grace in adopting us into His family and has revealed to us that we, too, could show this same type of love to our children through adoption.  We both feel as if God has led us to adopt as a way to carry out His commands and testify to His love.

Why Ethiopia?

Mike and I have always had a heart from Africa.  Once we began talking about where and with whom we should adopt, it became obvious pretty quickly that it would be from Africa.  We were originally looking into Ukraine or Russia, simply because we have several friends in our community who had also adopted from there, however, the more we talked, the more we felt God was telling us that our baby was going to be from Ethiopia.

How Long Will This Take?

The simple answer is... we do not know.  There is a lot of policy changes happening in Ethiopia right now that can drastically impact the amount of time it will take for families adopting from Ethiopia.  All we can do is pray and believe that God is sovereign and in control. 

So that's our big announcement!  The Fleener Family is Adopting!