She grew in our hearts.

Due to popular demand, my blog is finally up and running!  Most of you reading this know that we blogged during our trip to China to bring home Tai and this will be Alice's story.  Our little family of 3 is about to grow and we are all oh so very happy!  I guess since this is my first post, I should tell our story from the beginning.

Our journey to Alice actually started many years ago.  In early 2007, Jason and I decided that adoption was the way we wanted to grow our family (this is another story for another day).  We knew instantly that our daughter was in China.  The minute our hearts were open to this, we never looked back.  People ask us ALL the time, Why China?  The answer to that is simple....because that is where our daughter is!  We submitted our paperwork to China in June 2007.  We requested a healthy baby girl.  We decided at that time that we would name her Alice, after my grandmother.  My grandmother was spunky, funny, sweet, and I adored her.  We had a very special relationship and I loved her dearly.  Many tears were shed and prayers were said for our sweet Alice on the other side of the world.  We bought many little treasures for her (clothes, toys, bedding, dolls, etc.)  Although we had never seen her and suspected she wasn't even born yet, we knew we loved her so very much.  But alas, the wait grew and grew and grew.  We were told it would be over 2 years before we would be matched.  Our hearts were so heavy with this news.  We knew we couldn't wait that long to be parents.  Jason and I already knew we were parents - we just needed a baby to love.  So we decided to start another adoption from Vietnam while we waited for our Alice.  We would adopt another little girl and name her Vivian.  We would someday have 2 princess's.  This is another story for another time... but long story short.. Vietnam shut down.  This greatly saddened us.  And so we started to look at the Waiting Child list from China.  For those of you that know our story, then you know about our AMAZING son Tai!!! He was a dream come true and the missing link in our family.  He has brought us so much joy!  Tai came home from China in February 2010.  He has brought laughter, joy, and sunshine into our lives.  But when we left China, we knew in our hearts that we would be back.  We left there and said we would be back to get our Alice.   We knew at that time that our journey was not over.  Our hearts still ached for her.  And so here we are,  many years later,  and our Alice is finally ready to come home!!  We need to go get her!!!!!!!!  Hang on sweet baby girl, your mama and baba are coming!  This little girl truly did grow in our hearts!

We still wonder about our little Vivian.  We have a feeling that this is not the end of her story.  Someday... maybe someday.....Is she out there?????

The question that Jason and I get daily is - When do you get to go get her? or Why does it take so long? If only I had the answer to that myself!  Adoption is not for the faint of heart.  We have learned more about patience than we ever thought possible.  We have learned that so much is out of our control.  It is all in God's timing.  I think my next blog post will be about this long and awful process.

For  now, our hearts ache and we long to hold that precious little girl in our arms.  Tai longs for his sister.  Bless his heart, he has been so patient.  We know this must be so confusing for him.  He is going to be the best big brother in the world!

Thank you for taking this journey with us!