We have our last appointment with the social work tomorrow.  Then she needs to write up a report and get it back to us so we can get is apostilled (along with other paperwork).  We then need to get our fingerprint appointment.  It is very important to have this done before we move in a few weeks as we will only have a temporary home for the first few months, which means if things don't get finished now, we will have to put things on hold for a few months.  Please pray for things to move quickly and the timing to all work out.  Also, please pray for calmness during this crazy time (new jobs, moving, finishing paperwork, selling our house, etc.).  Thank you!!!

A couple of requests for today.  Tonight we will go to the dinner reception in Portland for previous adoptive familes from Bulgaria and the government officials who have traveled from Bulgaria to meet with the agency officials here.  The Bulgarian delegation is equivalent to people in our presidents cabinet (although a much smaller country of course).  We feel honored that we have been invited to this event, as I think only one other prospective family from our agency will be there.  Let's pray that we may get to meet them (and not say/do something embarassing)!

As our friend Natalie mentioned to us last night, it's pretty miraculous that we decided to adopt, decided on international adoption, and decided on Bulgaria and then this visit from the officials is taking place at JUST the right time!  They don't make this trip often, if ever, so the timing of all this is just a miracle.  Talk about encouragement!

Ok the other thing you can continually pray for is our patience.  We've sent our materials and now we wait.  It's no longer in our hands and while we know our agency and the government agencies are working on things...its hard to just wait and know there is nothing you can do to speed things up.  This is very hard for both of us but will be a continual thing we must endure throughout this entire process.

Our home study information has arrived and we are feeling very overwhelmed.  So much we have to fill out.  So many classes we have to take.  So many reference letters we need request.  So many trips to difference agencies we need to make.  So many things we need to ask other people to take the time to do for us.  And when it's over...we need to do it all over again for our dossier.   Obviously we aren't regretting our decision but we could use prayer for the following:

 - dealing with the stress and time commitment associated with completing this packet
 - battling the depression we started feeling about the daunting process