Adoption Update

Anna emailed today and told us that they received the first court document in the mail yesterday. They do not know if the birthmother has received it yet and signed for it, but they will be calling her to find out. We are yet another step closer to getting our baby girl! Thanks for praying--keep it up!!

Nathan and Braylen

Today Braylen got to help Nathan with a project for World History class. He made a presentation on Kazakhstan and Braylen got to be his show and tell. She went to school dressed in her Kazakh dress and hairbows and carried her Kazakh doll. She had a lot of fun and Nathan did an awesome job!! He called tonight and said he got 100 percent!! Woo-hoo Nathan!

The Many Faces of Braylen

Braylen is such a hoot! She doesn't like the camera at all, as you can see above. Hehehe. She loves to show off and when the camera is out, she goes full force. Just thought I'd share!!!

Tractors, Turkeys and Thankfulness

Friday, we spent the day with Mom and Dad. Mom had the usual bountiful spread and it was delicious!! Of course we all ate way too much. While the adult kiddos were napping, Papaw took the little kiddos on an Anderson style tractor and wagon ride. As you can tell by the faces of all, they enjoyed it. Thanks Papaw for letting us catch a snooze after a filling turkey dinner.

Later that evening Dad took us all to Happy Feet. The kids loved it! What a fun day! We have so much to be thankful for!

Thanksgiving with Family

We had a great day at Grandma and Wayne's house today. Braylen loved spending the day with cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents. We had a fantastic meal--thanks mom! Everything was great. The only thing missing was our little Alea! We have a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. Thank you, Lord!

Family Fun

Braylen had so much fun playing with Uncle Scott, Ellen and Madi. It was such a beautiful day they played outside most of the afternoon. I think they successfully wore Uncle Scott out! Thanks for a lot of fun Uncle Scott! We sure wish we could see you more often. We are so thankful for Uncles, Aunts and Cousins!!

Happy Thanksgiving

We have so much to be thankful for this year. First and foremost, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Second for our beautiful girls who have already blessed us so much. Third for friends and family who continue to bless us and lift us up in prayer. Last for our health, job and church. Thank you, Lord for all of these and more!

Well, we have the turkey and the Indian, I guess if you see Brad running around in his pilgrim gear, you'll know Carmen got her wish for a true Thanksgiving picture. Don't hold your breath waiting on that one, just take the two that still think mom's ideas are cute!!!

Check out Braylen's Hair!!

Today Braylen got another haircut. Basically the same as last time except they cut it shorter in the back and framed her face more. She wanted me to put these on the "computer"!!! So, here they are!

Dress Up Bray

Braylen spent her morning changing her clothes! She put on every combination of dress up clothing we own along with many regular clothes! She loves her independance of dressing herself now. Here is one of the poses we took!!!

Our Lil' Turkey

Alea is already for Turkey Day!! Too bad she isn't eating meats yet, guess she'll have to manage with just mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie for this year!!! We love getting new pictures!!!

Weekend in Indy

We drove to Indianapolis on Friday night to meet with Ted and Bev at the Missionary Conference. We had a nice visit with them and enjoyed learning more about their ministry in Taiwan and a little more about Alea. We really like them! They are sweet people with a heart for the kids! We know even more that Alea has been in great hands while waiting for our family.

After meeting with them, we stayed at a hotel and went swimming. Braylen had a lot of fun. Today, we went shopping for Alea's Christmas present from Braylen and then to Papaw and Mamaw Weaver's for Thanksgiving. We had a great weekend!!!

Our Little Thanksgiving Indian

Braylen had a Thanksgiving Feast at school today. Her class were the Indians. Here is what she looked like after the feast! I made her wash her face before nap so it wouldn't rub off on her sheets, but promised we'd take a picture and show everyone!!! Thank you, Lord for our little Thanksgiving girl. We are so thankful to have been blessed with this precious child!

We Have Plane Tickets!!

What a day! I spent from 7:30 a.m. until 4:45 p.m. on the phone and internet trying to get our tickets to Taiwan. Today was a very stressful day for both of us. Braylen was so good today--thank you sweetie!!

Brad's boss gave us a little trouble today. He didn't want him leaving on the 19th of December, wanted him to wait until the 22nd. We could not get tickets for all of us on the 22nd, so mom, Braylen and I decided we would fly out on the 19th and Brad could come on the 23rd. Brad's ticket was going to cost up to 3000 dollars!!!! Finally, Brad's boss said he could leave on the 19th, so when I called to buy his ticket, our travel agent told me that they had mom's ticket, but couldn't get our tickets, that the office in Taipai had cancelled our bookings!!!!!! Long story short, we finally got tickets on the same flight as mom. I can't even begin to tell you all the drama that went on here today.

Anyone who says that adoptive parents do not go through labor is very much mistaken. Praise God we have all have tickets. They were more than we wanted to spend, but with Christmas travel, we feel we did ok on price.

We have nothing but great things to say about our travel agent, Adrienne Mitri from Celebrations International Travel. She specializes in international adoption travel! If you ever need a great agent, give her a call!!

We will leave Chicago on December 19th at 6:50 a.m. We fly to LA and then on to Taipai. The flight from LA to Taipai is 15 hours!!!! We won't talk about that--not looking forward to that trip. We will come home, Lord willing, on December 30th to LA, spend the night and then on to Chicago on December 31st. We will get in to Chicago so late, we plan to stay overnight there and drive home on New Years Day.

Thank you for all your prayers as we were getting our tickets!

Our Little Miracle

Praise the Lord! Alea is soon to be ours forever!!!! The

birthmother came to court with her mother and after a long talk with Anna and the Pastor and his wife, she walked into court and told the judge she wanted us to adopt her baby!!! The judge asked her if she would contest it in the next few weeks and she said no. In 2-3 weeks she has to sign the final paper and then Alea is officially ours!!!!!

After court, the grandmother asked Anna when their church services were. They acted interested in coming to church! This is a very strong Buddhist family and we have been praying for their salvation! We serve a God of Miracles!!!!!!

Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your many prayers, calls, visits, cards and thoughts. We know it is because of all your prayers that we in few weeks will hold our little forever miracle, Alea Tyan-ling Grace Fleck. God is so good!!!!

Please Continue to Pray

This has been a very long, emotional week for us. Today, we hosted our second annual Adoption Sunday at church. It went very well and we feel God used us to promote adoption. We used this time to ask people to pray for us and Alea. Court will be at 9:30 p.m. tomorrow night our time (Monday, Eastern Time). We have friends and family coming over to pray with us during this time.

We talked to Ted Skiles tonight on the phone and he said that he is hopeful, but he doesn't want to build false hope in us. He said that the orphanage's pastor and wife (who have adopted) will be joining Anna at court. They plan to meet early to talk to the birthmother. Please pray that God guides their conversations. I wrote a letter to the birthmother that will be given to her just prior to court. Pray that she will see and understand that adoption is a great thing here in America and that Alea will have a very loving forever family. Ted said the biggest dilema facing this mom is that she was adopted as a child and was considered and outcast in the Buddhist community. They have tried to reassure her that it is not that way in the Christian community and Alea will not deal with those same kinds of things.

Please keep praying! We will give an update when we know something.

Please Remember to Pray for Alea

Please keep our precious Alea in your prayers. Pray that God places her in the home that will be best for her. We told Braylen today there is a chance that Alea will not come to live with us. Braylen was sad. She said, "But we made a crib for her! " We are all praying and ask that you keep us close in your prayers. Pray that God carries us through each day as we wait, worry and wonder.

Dora the Explorer

Our church hosted Trunk or Treat for the community on Halloween night. Braylen dressed up as Dora the Explorer. Pictured above are Dora and Jo Jo (Braylen and Alison) in the trunk and blurry pictures of Dora. Sorry they are blurry--we really need a new digital camera. It really if a fine piece of machinery--it only acts up on Christmases, birthdays, and any other memorable event that can only be captured once in a lifetime! If anyone would like a great deal on this camera--we'd make you one really fast.

Resting in Your Prayers

We want to thank everyone who is praying for us right now. Yesterday morning a good friend of mine called and told me she couldn't sleep from 2-4 a.m. so she prayed for us and Alea during that time. Those were the two hours I was able to sleep. Thank you, Noelle. Our email boxes and answering machine has been full of encouragement and committment of prayers. We have a peace we cannot understand or describe. We know we are being carried by the prayers of others and we will rest in that peace at this time.

Thank you to all who are helping care for Braylen during this emotional time. We are praying for a miracle. We know that God has already made the match and we pray it is us with Alea. Pray that the miracle comes home with us. And that if it doesn't God will help us pick up the pieces.

PLEASE PRAY FERVANTLY!!!

We received a phone call tonight from Ted Skiles, the missionary in charge of our adoption. He informed us that Alea's birthmother is trying to take her back. She has signed officially to relenquish her rights, but she can contest this on our court date on November 14th. If she does not give up her rights at court, she has a month to contest it and no judge in Taiwan would deny her these rights. If she does sign over on court day, she still has 2-3 weeks to change her mind until they receive the official adoption decree.

So, this leaves us not knowing until December if we will indeed be able to adopt Alea. We are to say the least heart broken. We need you to pray. Pray that the Lord's will is done, pray that Alea grows to love and know Jesus Christ so that no matter someday we will meet her, pray for us and our emotional, spiritual and physical endurance, pray for Braylen's heart to be protected during this wrenching time, pray that the mother will realize she cannot mentally and physically care for Alea, pray for Ted, Bev and Anna as they councel with her.

We know God has a plan and we so much desire that his plan is our desire. Please pray that it is! Thank you for your prayers and support. They are needed more now than ever. We have no idea how we will survive this loss if it happens.