Booked, Shot, & Waiting

Sounds kind of like a crime was committed and someone was put in jail.  Hardly, at least not in the Hallgarth household.  Flights are booked, shots for immunizations have been given, and now we are waiting.

We received notification of our travel approval by the Chinese government on March 15 and since then everything has been a whirlwind.  We've spoken with administration and teachers at Valley Christian Academy and Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy about the possibility of the kids missing school.  Sheryl and I have wavered back and forth between taking all three kids and leaving all three kids at home with Sheryl's mom here at the house.  We finally decided to leave them at home.  Then, we finally decided to take them - still wondering the entire time if we had made the correct decision.  We have spent a lot of time praying about this entire adoption process and we are now certain that we will never have this opportunity again to take all three of our biological children to China to experience another culture as a family and experience the adoption of their younger sister.  Both schools and all of the teachers have been wonderful and very supportive and encouraging about taking the kids to China.  So, two weeks ago flights were booked for the family into and out of China.  The adoption agency (Family Adoption Consultants) will take care of all of the in-country travel, sightseeing, and appointments to complete the adoption.  

We leave out of Cleveland on Wednesday, April 14, 2010 at 6am and will arrive in Beijing on Thursday, April 15 at 2:30pm.  I sure hope everyone has a lot of kindness and patience left in ther hearts on April 15th.  We'll sightsee in Beijing on Friday and Saturday and fly from Beijing to Hangzhou, China (near Shanghai) on Sunday, April 18.  We will receive Grace on Monday, April 19 and she will then be ours.  We will have paperwork and a series of appointments with more sightseeing sprinkled in between until Friday, April 23.  We will then fly from Hangzhou to Guangzhou (near the Hong Kong area) and be in Guangzhou from the 23rd of April until the 30th.  Grace will have a medical exam, TB test, and more appointments and paperwork for us to complete.  The six of us will then return home via Guangzhou to Beijing to Washington Dulles to Cleveland.  Due to the time change, we will return home on the 30th of April even though we are leaving China on the 30th of April.

The last four weeks have flown by.  We have tried to enjoy the time and process as well as our last month together with just the five of us.  I can't say we've always done a great job.  Our "to do" list has grown immensely over the past month and we have slowly seen in shrink over the last week or two.  In less than seven days we will be on an airplane heading for Beijing with a new adventure and a new chapter in our life to begin.  Only God knows why He took us on this track and the impact that it will have on our lives and others over the years to come.  There's still some apprehension and occasional fear about this decision to adopt.  Sometimes we even think that we're just plain crazy.  We're starting to get to the age that people will probably ask us if we are the parents or the grandparents.  I don't feel old enough to think of myself as a grandparent but some of our friends are now moving into that stage of their lives.  It really doesn't matter.  We know that we are proceeding in a direction that God has led us.  I never would have agreed to this even five years ago.  It's amazing how God can change a person's life (and a family's life) if we just let Him.  His ways and His leading are typically not the "path of least resistance" but it is the path of greatest return and greatest joy.  Still scarey? - Yes.  But the rewards are well worth the risks.  My 401(k) may have suffered a loss over the past two years but the rewards from this adoption are treasures that can never diminish or be taken away.  Adoption is definitely not for everyone.  It's been a lot of work and has tried our patience at times.  What kind of reward will you some day get from your "investments"?

We will attempt to post updates and photos to this site while we are in China but we don't know what type of access we will have to the internet.  Only time will tell.  Please continue to keep the six of us (now including Grace) in your prayers over the next 3-4 weeks.