Happy Birthday Sweet Boy!

Yesterday our boy turned 4. It was so bittersweet. It was good to know this is his last birthday without a family, but sad that we couldn't celebrate it all together. But, without going into too much detail in a public forum, we were able to hear his sweet voice and see his sweet face. I may have almost ugly cried when I heard him say "I love you Mama." There was no greater moment in our adoption so far and we are so thankful. He speaks more English than we were expecting. His nannies at the orphanage seem amazingly dedicated to easing his transition.

We feel like we are getting so close to having him home. We are waiting on on our "Letter of Approval" from the Chinese government--if timelines stay about the same, we should have this around June 15-at this point the ball really gets rolling again with paperwork.

In the meantime, we are rapidly approaching our Both Hands project date. Some of you will be getting letters in the mail explaining this further. We are so excited to be helping a sweet older woman while fundraising for our adoption. We will be helping her work on her home with painting, staining, and landscaping on June 13. We have already had some donations to our account for this, and we are so amazed and humbled-thank you to those who have donated!
Our goals for this fundraiser (besides the obvious raising funds for our adoption) are to help this woman with some needed home repairs and show our children and others how good it is to help others and to bring more awareness to adoption and just have an overall great day serving and talking and laughing. This project is an amazing opportunity for us and we know we will look back on it feeling proud of the job we did, but in all honesty, this project is a lot of work--so anyone in our area willing to help with the planning and day of service, please let us know!!

Please continue to pray for our boy. We are so thankful for the care he is receiving and pray that it continues to be good until we can get to him. Pray for our paperwork to be processed quickly and without problem. Thank you all for your love and support. We are getting closer!!

--Sarah