with bated breath

We came into the week hoping for two pieces of good news; a travel date and the receipt of a grant. We still wait for news of the latter, but we did receive news related to a travel date yesterday ... unfortunately, it was not good news.

There has been a personnel change in the Ministry department that oversees international adoptions and we have been told that it will certainly delay all adoptions at this time. We have no timeframe but it seems clear we will absolutely not travel before November, possibly not until December and some families waiting for a travel date will not be going until next year. :(

I cannot describe the sadness and uncertainty that stole over me yesterday; I took down Emerson's pictures and all of my OCD-ish post-it notes with various to-do lists and packing instructions from the fridge. I couldn't bear to take her framed pictures down from our dining room picture wall - she belongs up there, after all - but it had gotten to the point that a request for juice or yogurt ended up with me in tears.

It's amazing how easily children cut to the heart of an issue. When Cade asked me why I was sad and I told him that we had to wait a much longer time to bring home Emerson and that I was worried about her heart, he declared, "Don't worry, momma, I'll ask Santa for a rocket ship and I'll go get Emerson." I wish, sweetie! ^_~

So I'm trying to take it day by day and stop counting down to some unforseen date that just keeps slipping away from me. I hope that I can stay as strong as I pray her heart will. I expect we will miss Macy's birthday or Thanksgiving (assuming we can afford the plane tickets around that time LOL!) but that's a small price to pay.

Now we wait with bated breath on the second piece of news we hope to get this week... it seems we always find out about the grant the first Wednesday in the month so I'm hoping that holds true and we hear something tomorrow. Hopefully it's much happier news! I have an interesting idea for a raffle (well, as interesting as raffles can be anyways heh!) and I would much rather be raising money for another waiting little one than for us. ^_^