Updates galore!

Hello friends!
Thanks for sticking with us. Is there maybe 2 or 3 out there still following along? If not I will just keep this going to document our journey. First and foremost so thankful God is in control of this crazy journey of life. He sure knows how to throw in the twists and turns. We just hang on for dear life and watch Him work!

We have gotten 2 updates on our little Ladybug since last time I blogged. One right before Valentines day saying she was doing well and has only grown a smidgen. She is definitely our littlest so far!

We finished up our Home study and began working on some fundraisers and then it was time to ask for a cake to be sent to Abby for her 2nd birthday! Now for those of you who do not know, when you ask for a cake to be sent you do not get to choose the cake. You are just very grateful that they get them a cake. We have an amazing contact lady through our agency that does a beautiful job getting packages to our sweetheart. This is our first one sent. We simply just asked for a cake. They send normally 5 pics back to you from the party, we got 15! Yes we were in heaven watching our youngest enjoy cake! And she LOVED it! Not even exaggerating! We giggled at the size of the cake compared to her!

 It is so very pretty. They have a way of making cakes there that just stun you! I think it is the prettiest toddler birthday cake I have ever seen! I do not know what it says on top. Maybe Happy birthday and her Ch*nese name. But here is the picture we just giggled at....

It is bigger than she is! Not even kidding! But the girl loves that cake and put it away! Course she shared with her friends too!

Love how she is licking her fork. Take a look at that plate. She had a pretty good size piece when she started. I think Vickie might have to have her as her taste tester when she gets home! We truly enjoyed celebrating in this manner. We also celebrated here at home, praying that she knew she was loved!

We cannot wait for her next birthday to celebrate all together! We are crazy about our little sweetheart! We have been asking God to protect her and prepare her for our family and also asking for a little bit of joy in these updates. 

Our family has been through some tough changes the last few months. One son is off to start his career and calling on his life. It has been a very tough few months but we are so proud of him!!! Very thankful that God is protecting him in this endeavor. I would love to share with all of you about this but for his safety I cannot do that here. Just please pray for our youngest and his new journey. If you knew what he was doing you would be just as proud of him as we are! 

So as our family adjusts to changes we began more paperwork for the adoption. We have sent off our I800A which is asking our government for permission to find our family suitable to adopt our sweetheart. We would love your prayers in this part of the journey. This is a lot of waiting and praying in this stage on our part. We want them to approve us and we want them to do it quickly because there are always deadlines looming. An important one is coming up for us. Please keep our family in your prayers. In the mean time we are gathering our last bit of paperwork (Thank you JESUS! Feels as if we have been paper pregnant FOREVER.) to complete our Dossier (the 13 pieces of very important paper that will be sent to Ch*na to capture exactly what our family looks like) as we wait on the I800A approval. Stay tuned this ride just keeps going! 

While we wait, it was time to ask for another update on our sweetheart since that one back in February. So while sending off our I800A we also asked our agency to update us on how our Ladybug was doing! They are great about doing this. They got in touch with her SWI (Social Welfare Institution) or you would call it her orphanage, to answer another round of questions from her family! I love asking these questions because they give us insight into her daily life and her personality. So we began the wait for a response. YES more than half of the adoption you spend waiting on one thing our another. These waits are normally pretty good. They did not disappoint! This time 2 more pics and a video!!! We were so excited about the video! But the pics stole our heart!

Here she is working a puzzle. We got video of this and let me tell you what. this girl is SO smart!! They keep telling us she is just the sweetest little thing. I see glimpses of that here and there. But this, this right here did me in!

This is the first time we have seen her smile! Oh how it melts my heart! I just get giddy every time I look at it! Our prayers have been answered in this one single picture of our little Ladybug! She is still the tiniest thing but oh how we are crazy about her!! Asking God to do mighty things to get her home and then through her life! Praying we are worthy enough to be her parents! 

List of prayer requests for us:

Please pray for our family if we come to mind. 

Pray for Abby and her heart to be prepared for us. 

Pray for Tommy and his safety on the journey God has him on. 

Pray that the I800A approval goes smooth and quickly

Pray that God will continue to show up and show off in every area of this adoption and our lives!!

Pray for His continued provision through out this journey. (there is a link to our gofundme page on the side of this blog if you feel led to share with anyone)

Pray that we will not loose sight of His face during all of this.

Thank you for following along with us on this journey (if you are still with us thank you SO much). I promise to update more often! We love that you are watching God unfold His plan for us. His ways are not our ways and His ways are better than we could every hope for our imagine!

Trusting the One who is writing this story!

Lots of love and Ladybugs :)

We have a daughter! Part 2

After getting our girls file in our email and waiting patiently for Bud to get home, we opened up what would change our lives!

We began looking over her file and talking and praying. Our girl was in jeopardy of her file being sent back to Ch*na so we needed to make a decision on all this information given whether God was telling us she was ours or not. The file could be sent back any day and without putting it on hold or locking it in there may be no way to find her again. So we took the weekend, seemed like a very long weekend to me, to decide. At first we discussed in full but then we just needed time on our own and then together and then again on our own to see what God was saying. By Sunday night I was sure she was ours. My beloved however needed more time. He left for work Sunday afternoon and my heart was heavy. I just pleaded with God to speak to his heart and make it clear what His Will was. I truly felt the spiritual battle going on in my heart. Bud promised to pray and just seek what it was the Lord was telling him. I gave him the time needed.

Monday morning rolled around and I needed to get some professionals to take a look at her file. I needed to know what we would be dealing with if/when she was ours. So I got on the phone to specialists and then close friends who had friends with medical knowledge. The weird thing was I didn't care to much about what they said in making this decision. I knew in my heart she was ours. I did care however for their opinion on how we would take care of her when we got home. People always told me that once you know the child is yours, the special need won't matter, and won't be what you see. They were right!!

I got a few answers from some medical personnel, but the info I needed from our local children's hospital was not forthcoming quickly. We knew we were in a time crunch to decide but we were trusting God in all this. Bud was still undecided, lots of things on his heart. By Tuesday morning I just said "Honey what is God telling you?" He asked what it took to lock her file in, I said we needed to decide first if she was ours! That was his way of saying, "Honey I think she is ours." So we called our agency and said please put her on hold while we gather (even more) paperwork for her LOI (Letter of Intent) to adopt her. The clock began to tick quickly we had 72 hours to be sure AND to gather all this paperwork.

Being that we are towards the end of our Home Study there was a few things left to do that we hadn't done yet because of timing. But now all of a sudden those things needed to be done within 72 hours. One place we needed copies of something, their computers were down. Then we called our dr's to see if we could get our medical's and found out (without a prior letter from them) that the practice had disbursed! Just as we thought "OK, maybe she isn't ours" our agency called and said that since we were healthy adults that we just needed a letter signed saying that and could get the medical later, as well as a letter to replace the one needed from the place that the computers were down. Just like that God made the impossible POSSIBLE! Oh how he loves us! I stayed up till late that night filling out these pages of paperwork in order NOT to loose our daughter. Sent them to our Case Worker and fell into bed tired but at peace. I would have to wait till the next morning to see if I had done it right!

Email in my inbox Wednesday morning said "We have sent off your LOI for this sweet little girl" now to wait for PA (pre-approval) from Ch*na saying it was OK to move forward with this adoption and that yes indeed she was our girl! Agency said 2 weeks, so we settled in! We weren't in a hurry but knew waiting was just part of this whole thing. You always seem to hurry and wait. We had another Home Study visit the following Wednesday and spoke with our Social Worker about the waiting. She had recently adopted and said it took the full two weeks to get her PA back, and not to be anxious. I thanked her for her knowledge and her help along the way! We truly are blessed with an amazing Agency and Social Worker for our Home Study! Many of you who have adopted in our area have had the same Social Worker so you know what I mean! She is simply heaven sent! Grateful for her!

The following day I was at a sweet friends house doing what I love to do every week, and Bud was at work driving his long drive home. He happened to call me and asked if I had gotten an email. I said "No, should I've?" He said "You better check your email then call me back." I said "OK? is everything alright?" He said "Just go check!" So I hung up but before I could get to the email I had a voice mail. I clicked on the voice mail and the sweetest voice on the other end of the line said words that would change my life forever and bring me to my knees in tears and praise! My caseworker said "Hi Tammy I just wanted to let you know we have received your PA from Ch*na!! Congratulations you have a daughter!!

I was in tears, I could NOT stop crying! I had prayed for this day for 10 years and just like that they said YES! We knew God had already said Yes but we had to get through her country's list of qualifications! I called Bud (still in tears) he couldn't read his email because he was driving. So of course when he answered he was concerned. He asked, "What happened? Is everything ok?" with anxiety in his voice I could tell he was concerned. I mustered the words through tears and sobs "We have PA!" and the reaction from my husband was priceless! His step of faith just one week prior allowing God to do whatever it was He asked of us, came back with a "THANK YOU JESUS" from my husbands lips as loud as he could! He was so happy and giddy and just kept repeating those words. See what happens when you follow His will! He was not able to be home that night but we celebrated with joy here and Chinese food!!

So without further anticipation and with much joy, may I introduce you to the newest member of our family! Waiting for us to finish all this paperwork and to bring her home!! Our second daughter and our fourth child......Our Ladybug Abigail Hannah.......

 Abby!!!!

The journey has only begun! Please join us in celebrating our good God and all He has planned for us! Praise Him with us for our littlest sweetheart!! We are smitten! We have found out she LOVES music and is very shy and quiet. Once she gets to know you they tell us she is a happy girl. She loves it when people smile and doesn't like it when people are serious! I can live with that! We are a pretty happy family! Sounds to me like she is going to fit right in!!! And Abby makes 6 Tatertots!!! We would love it if you would walk this journey with us! Oh what great things The Lord has planned! Don't miss it!! 

Totally blessed and feeling very thankful!

Lots of love and Ladybugs :)

The Journey Begins!!!!!!!

Boy have I been waiting to say that for a LONG time!

I can announce with such joy and happiness that our adoption journey has begun! I have been praying and asking God for a long time to open doors and show us His Will to lead us down His path! He never ceases to amaze me! Things didn't go as we thought they should in the beginning because...well God didn't want us to go that way. So after prayer and much investigation we have followed His path and are moving full steam ahead with this adoption!!

I love that after 10 years of waiting and praying and watching. God picks the perfect time to say "Go"! This journey will not be without turmoil or frustration. But I know that the end will far outweigh everything we will face in the journey! We literally will hold His promises in our arms! To say we are excited is an understatement! We are over the moon!!

Our application has been sent in, a few fee's have been paid. We have done some preliminary paperwork and it gives us great joy to share with you an adoption term we have learned over the years because now our Homestudy begins! We are.....

which simply means we will begin gathering all the paperwork necessary (and its a LOT) to bring our daughter home to her forever family! God has not revealed who she is to us yet but we will be sure to share that with you as soon as we are able to. There are rules and all! But we are so giddy rules aren't bothering us at all! So come along with us on our journey to bring home our Ladybug!! We are in love with her already and do not even know her yet!! So thankful again for God's timing! Pay attention you never know what He may be asking you to do! No matter what it is just "Do Something!"

Join us on our journey as "baby" makes 6!

Lots of Love and Ladybugs!! :)

The Tarter Family!