Sorry to keep you all in suspense! Our lawyer went to court on Tuesday and was nearly successful in getting the Kenyan travel order. The only problem was that it had the specific departure date of Dec 1st, our original travel date. We’re planning on leaving early so its safer for Meghan + Gracie and so we could fly home with Deda and Donna (4 extra hands! Woohoo!) on Nov 6th. The other minor glitch was that the magistrate wanted another proof of ownership (“search”) done on Sam’s land that we’re using as collateral. We’re not really sure why though, because the court has had the title in their possession since the last search in 2009. The problem with all this was the tight timeline: Thursday was a Kenyan holiday and we head to Nairobi on Sunday. So that left only Wednesday to get the search done and Friday for Were to go to court!

Things fell right into place though! I called Sam to see if he could rush down to Nakuru to get the search but he was already in Nakuru! So he got that and we delivered it early Friday morning to Were. He went to court at 2:30pm on a “rush” appointment to argue for an earlier leave time and to present the search. He was successful! The magistrate agreed to all terms and we now have the order and are ready for the embassy!

Our appointment at the US Embassy is on Monday at 9:30. Pray that they see the importance of the situation and approve the temporary visitor’s visa for Eden!

Were and his newest assistant!

I’m a little late on the post because Ben was in Rwanda last week and I didn’t have anyone to take my picture.  So…25 weeks!  This has actually been a fun week because Eden and Ben were both able to feel Grace moving this week.  Eden felt her on Tuesday morning right after Eden woke up.  She was very excited and when I told her that Gracie had kicked her she said, “That’s not nice Gracie.  We don’t kick.”  🙂  Eden is such a good first child.

Gracie was as excited as the rest of us when Ben got home on Saturday and she was moving like crazy so Ben was able to feel a couple of thumps as well.  I was measured by one of the doctors here last week and measured 23 cm.  She used a fetoscope to listen to the heartbeat and as soon as she put her ear against it, Gracie gave her a big kick also.  Erin thought it was very funny but was able to hear a clear heartbeat after that.

I’m feeling great although find myself pretty sleepy by the time the kids go to bed if I don’t get a nap in the afternoon.  I had been having some back/leg pain but a minor adjustment to my pillows (suggested by my personal PT, Chrissie) fixed that problem.  The only other complaint comes from the kids as my lap is running out of room for them.  Eden pointed out the other day that there just is not room for 3 babies on my lap anymore! 

It’s been two years since Eden came home, although it feels like she’s been with us forever.  We celebrated her Gotcha Day this year by having some friends over for dinner.  We had 9 adults and 4 kids and I think everyone had fun.  Last year I made Kenyan food to celebrate in the US.  This year we celebrated in Kenya and I made hot dogs, hamburgers and french fries.  Chrissie made a beautiful cake for Eden.  (You can see it in the picture below).  Eden had her hair braided on Saturday and Chrissie even included Eden’s long pigtails in her cake decoration.

We played a slide show of all of the pictures of Eden and it was fun for us to look back over all of the things we’ve done together.  Everyone commented on how small Eden was before she came home and Eden loved seeing her baby pictures.  We made it through cake and were visiting when the power went off.  It made clean up a bit difficult, but everyone pitched in and then headed home by the lights of their cell phones.

I’m looking forward to being home and adding this years events to her Gotcha Day scrapbook!

Our lawyer wasn’t able to move the date to get our travel order (Tuesday, October 18) so we had to reschedule our visa interview.  We are now going to the embassy on October 24 at 9:30am.  Thanks for praying for the process and for a successful meeting!

The time has come to pray like you’ve never prayed before!  On Monday, October 17, we have our visa interview at 9am.  (That’s 2am for most of you, so pray hard before going to bed next Sunday night).

We are still waiting on our travel order- a critical piece of documentation- but hopefully that will be ready next week.  Our lawyer didn’t realize our visa appointment was on the 17th, so he scheduled to hear the verdict on the travel order for Oct. 18.  Please pray with us that he is able to get in to see the magistrate next week, since we can’t go to the interview without it.

Otherwise, we have all of our supporting documents gathered together.  I’ve gone over the information they are looking for countless times, and feel pretty prepared.  The big thing is that they need to know we will return to Kenya.  We obviously plan to come back, since we need to finish Eden’s adoption, so we hope that won’t be an issue.

Last time the visa process seemed easy but we’ve heard that they are more selective with the visas now and the process has changed since we applied for Eden’s two years ago.  Please pray that we will have all of our documents, that the kids will be lovely while we wait and are interviewed and that the consular officer will recognize how important it is that we ALL come home for Gracie to be born .

We will post something as soon as we know!