The dresser! ...and the room:)

Alright... here is the dresser as we received it from my parents! It was mine and then my sisters and I'm sure it was an older persons before that because there was some 1970's olive green paint about 4 coats down! My brother and I stripped the paint and began HAND SANDING after I broke my dad's sander 2 minutes into the job...shhhh.

I put on about 5 coats of this dark stain and really worried that it wouldn't look good. However after 2 clear sealer coats, it looked really nice!

So after 3 trips out to Granite Falls, $60 in supplies and about 15 hours of stripping, sanding, staining, sealing and papering and hardwaring knobs, Kepler has a very nice dresser with A LOT of sentimental value:) I also included a shot of his room so far!

We are getting closer folks! This part of the wait is so much more fun because I have tasks to do to prepare for him!

I have also been reading two amazing adoption books: Attaching in Adoption and Toddler Adoption, the Weavers Craft. I highly recommend them for anyone who is adopting!

THE call!

We got the call at 3:55 this afternoon! We have been matched! I was driving into our parking lot at home when I recognized the number on my ringing phone. I answered trying to be calm thinking that they could just be needing something from us. I asked, "Do you have a referral for us?" and the sweet lady at the agency, Tami replied, "Yes I do!". I turned off the car and my mind went a million different directions as I tried to figure out the best way to hear this information. I wanted to be with Amos but he was still at work. I told Tami, "I'll drive to his work! I'll be there in a half hour!" But she said she had to leave at 5:00. Traffic could be bad and I decided I was in no condition to drive! I was shaking and out of words when Tami told me she could put Amos on a conference call with us and then email us the pictures and records. I ran upstairs and opened the email while Amos did the same at work. We saw the face of the sweetest little 11 month old boy I've ever laid eyes on! He is sitting in a little plastic chair and he is not sure if he likes the camera or not!
He is healthy and we are full of joy at the thought of bringing him home into the Kallen family! I can't post names or pictures yet but I assure you, Baby Kallen is on his way!
We will officially say yes tomorrow in a conference call and then send off some paperwork and $5000. We will wait for our court date and then I will make travel plans to be in Ethiopia for the court hearing. This is usually about 2-3 months from now. I will get to meet him and see him for a little bit before I have to return home. We have to wait about 3 weeks and then I travel with my sister to pick him up and bring him home!
I have never felt this much joy before. The only thing that will top this is holding him for the first time and then stepping off that plane with him and having Amos see him for the first time.
Thanks for your prayers everyone! Continue to pray because we have TONS to accomplish in the next few months!

A little change

Okay, a little change is happening. I have been thinking about this the last couple of days and finally got a chance to run it past Amos and he was okay with it. We are officially changing our request to be matched with a child 9-16 months old to a child that is 0-16 months old. I think our age bracket before was too narrow, possibly making children that may be available not eligible to be matched with us. As it stood before if a child became available that was 6 months old, they would not call us because we asked for a child at least 3 months older than that.
I was thinking about our old age bracket and thought about the 2 trip rule. Due to the 2 trip rule, our child will be about 4-5 months older when we bring them home than we originally thought with the 1 trip rule. I think this wider, age window MAY help us get matched more quickly and help our child be closer to our target age spectrum when they arrive home in the US.

Three plus months in line

Hi Readers,

We are 3 1/2 months into our wait for a referral. While I'm anxious, it feels really exciting knowing that we could get a call any day! For those of you just tuning in now, the average wait time for a referral is 4-6 months. I HOPE we are somewhere in that margin and not beyond it!
We had our agency phone meeting about our referral and travel. The list of things I have to do before, during and after travel is so daunting. Amos read over it with WIDE eyes. I am a bit worried too but at this point I feel like I would walk through fire if it lead to us bringing our baby home. It looks like my sister will be traveling with me for the second trip. I am so thankful for this as I know I'll be exhausted and required to do many important things at the Ethiopian court and US embassy. I need her brain to help me through my list WHILE adjusting to being a mommy in a 3rd world country.
Another hurdle we will need to overcome is the finances. When we say yes to our referral, we will need to send $5,300 with our answer to get things going in Ethiopia. After that we need to by the plane ticket ($1000-1400) and book a room at the guest house ($1000). This is more than we have in our savings account now but I know God will be faithful and he will help us be creative with our finances to make this next step.
We received a little booklet of Amharic words to practice before the trip! I love this. I plan to make some flash cards to learn some words for the meeting of our little one on the first trip! An Ethiopian mom at my school is very excited to help me with this:)
Lets hope and pray for finances to fall into place and a referral call soon!
For now,
Dehna hunu (good-bye)

Creeping Closer!

Hi Everyone!
Our dossier has been in Ethiopia for 2 months now! That means we are 2 months into our 4-6 month wait! This feels good.
I started school today. I was thinking about how good this year is going to be on my drive into work. God has blessed my school. I have a wonderful class and wonderful teacher team that I can leave when I need to hop a plane to Africa. It's all been arranged and set up for me to be a mommy! It's fun to think that sometime this year, we will get a phone call saying that they have a baby for us. We've never gotten this far! The anticipation and excitement of it all is great.
This fall brings school, Cross Training (with my 9-11 year olds), Safe Families, Kid's Church and regular coffee breaks with my friend. Winter is on it's way which means the holidays are right around the corner. This year is going to fly by and somewhere in the middle of it we get a baby!!! I haven't posted any pics in a while so I added this one of Amo and I at Ruby Beach:)
A couple things I'm learning to value: delegation, trust and surrender.

Doing okay...

Hello faithful friends who check this blog! You have no idea how much it means to me that you haven't given up an interest in our adoption!
So our dossier has been in Ethiopia for a little over 5 weeks now. We don't expect to hear that we have a referral for another few months but one can hope that something goes faster than expected right? ...especially since EVERYTHING has gone much slower than expected and thought possible up to this point.
Today was a bit happy and a bit sad. My friend boarded a plane today for Ethiopia to pick up her little boy. I am very happy for her but super...I guess 'jealous' is the word. I don't want to hear any encouragement such as "everything happens when it's supposed to" or "God's timing is perfect". I just might strangle the next person to say that. I know it's true. And it will happen when it happens but I don't want to hear it anymore. This friend of mine started the adoption process a year and a half after us. One thing is for sure: nothing in the adoption world is fair. There is not a single file line and it isn't a turn taking deal. Another friend of mine has been waiting over 3 years. I guess it's a lot like life. Some people completely sail through and others have to claw their way along while getting hit with baseball bats.
Another thing that is killing me: the 212 lady friends of mine that are pregnant. People have had babies already that were nowhere near pregnant when we started our process! This is nuts! It should be harder and take longer to grow a human being than get one that is in need.
Anywho... I probably should say that I am very happy for all my adoptive parent friends and mommies to be. Congrats to everyone! I just needed to rant a little:)

More Good News!

Hi Everyone!
I have to go back in time a week or so to bring you up to speed:) After our dossier arrived at our agency in Oregon we were notified that we were missing our rental lease. I looked at that paperwork for 2 years and didn't see that we needed to include 3 notarized, certified copies of our lease. I saw that you needed to include a copy of the deed to your house but we don't own so I skipped that part. Ooops. I guess one little thing like that isn't too bad considering everything else looked great! To make a long story shorter, we got our stuff off and heard this week that our dossier was shipped via DHL to Ethiopia. I got a tracking number and tracked it from Oregon to Ohio to Germany to Belgium and (drum roll...) finally it arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia yesterday!!!
So now we wait for the orphanage board to match us with our baby!!! Can you feel my excitement?!