Family Album

Nola's hogar director e-mailed early in the week and asked for pictures of the family.  I looked through recent pics and sent several.  On Thursday, we received an e-mail titled "Family Album".  I opened it to find the sweetest surprise.  The message said that Nola is so excited about her new family!  There were also pictures of her sitting on the floor making a family album.  The director said she has shown the album to everyone.

 

We have been so blessed to have our little girl placed in a home where she is loved.  The director and his wife are doing their best to see that Nola's transition from their family to ours will be as smooth as possible.  Thank you Lord!!

We're Getting Closer!!

Last week we received our Empathy notification!  After several messages back and forth, we have our Empathy time scheduled.  We leave Saturday, April 27.  We plan to go to the hogar on Saturday afternoon for a visit with Nola and again on Sunday before we meet at the CNA on Monday morning where Nola will then be able to come with us to stay for a supervised two weeks.  Mark will have to go home after that but Maria and I will stay for another week.  After the two week period, the Social worker who interviews us will write a report and present it to the head of CNA for a formal approval.  That process should take about a week and a half and then the case will proceed to a family court. The family court time frame is the most uncertain.  Some families have had approval after about a week and some have had to wait closer to eight weeks.  For now my focus is on Nola and the time we will get to spend with her and finally get to know her.  We have missed out on so much and we'll never get that time back but we know we are one of the fortunate families.  Our daughter's coming home.  So many families have heard the news that their child will never come home to them.  I can't imagine the pain.  We're going to cherish every minute we have with our little girl during our visit and when we get home, we'll be waiting not so patiently for the day when we get to go back and bring her home with us and finally be all together as a family.
Thank you all for your prayers and please continue praying for the families who are still waiting to hear news on their cases.  This has been a long 5 and 1/2 years but some families have waited even longer.  I pray that all of the families waiting will be united with the child they love.