I once heard it said that adoption is not for the faint at heart!!! There are so many ups and downs...from emotional highs and lows to situational highs and lows!!
These past two weeks have been rough for sure! Although it is not always easy to remember in the moment--we never lose sight of the fact that ultimately God is in control and none of this takes God by surprise :-)!!! He is our daily strength and the only constant in all of this...He is the same God yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8)!
As shared in an earlier post, two weeks ago brought a whirlwind of an "adventure" trying to get off our I-800 packet. It was only about 4 days total that we had to wait, but 4 days is 4 days...
Short version spoiler of what's next in the post (for those of you who just like the facts)...Due to Tim's job, we were unable to obtain our visas for right now...
Long version:
We then began the journey of compiling everything together to obtain our visas. Monday was the day that was going to work best in Tim's schedule to go get them, so we got everything ready to head to San Fran.
The extra cost in trying to obtain your visas "same day" was about equivalent to gas, wear and tear, and sitting in traffic driving to San Fran, so we decided to go the "same day" route. The catch is you have to turn the paperwork in by noon.
We started our trek to San Fran Monday morning all packed up and ready to go just a little past traffic time, but early enough to make it well before the noon cut off time...
On our drive we started noticing signs saying, "Bay Bridge will be closed August 28-Sept 3." We prayed that we would be able to do same day pick up because having to travel back after a week to pick up the visas would be a nightmare due to the closure of the Bay Bridge!!!
We then hit the Altamont Pass and traffic came to a stand still... ... ... ... ... for a little over an hour we sat in traffic until happening upon a "HazMat" clean up of an accident near the 680 Freeway split. I can tell you that we tried to make the most of our exceptionally LOOOONG time in the car, but it was definitely trying at times!
We finally arrived at the Consulate. Tim and the boys dropped me off while they went to look for a parking spot. I walked in to an incredibly packed office!!! The number on the visa screen was "58" and our number was "173." I knew we were probably going to be here for awhile and definitely miss the noon cut off!! I also knew that our plans of having a nice family day (we pulled Jeremy out of school for this) in San Fran was pretty much going to be squashed!
Thankfully with the help of a super nice security guard, we managed to get a different (lower) number...can't exactly post my secret of getting a different number, but it was a blessing to say the least!!!
After still a long wait (probably would've been a 3+ hour wait otherwise), we got up to the window. May I just pause to say that although we had to wait a long time, our boys (for the most part) were such troopers!!! We are blessed!!!
The lady looked at our forms, left, looked at our forms some more, left, came back, had Tim sign a guarantee that he would not go to China for mission purposes, left, came back, and then proceeded to tell us that due to Tim's job, the Consulate would not issue us the correct visa that we needed. They could only grant him a single entry, short term visa good for one month from the date of issue.
I proceeded to show her all the documents we had stating that we did not know the exact dates that we would be going to China and thus needed a more long term visa. I also stated that we had all the documentation that was asked of us (including a letter from the church) guaranteeing that we are not going for the purpose of missions and the reasons we needed the type of visas we were asking for.
Unfortunately there was nothing we could do, so we had to leave without our visas :-(. I can say that at this point I was a bit mad, confused, frustrated, etc... We knew God would work it all out, but in that moment, it was super hard!!!
So here we are... on to plan B. Our agency is going to try to courier everything for us to the DC office (where our agency has a great working relationship with) and hope that things will fare better for them than they did for us. They were a bit puzzled themselves as they have never encountered that problem.
So, as of now everything is out of our hands and we ask for prayer that the enemy wont have his hand in these documents and this step of the journey, and that we will be able to get the necessary visas that we need!!! We will keep you posted!!!
Although on this "adoption roller coaster" we are at a situational "low," we continue keep our eyes fixed on Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith and praise God for our faith that has grown leaps and bounds through this whole journey!!
Thank you all for your love and prayers!!
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