River

Christmas 2014 Jason and I put a deposit down on a gift for each other, a Christmas gift for our family.  We had talked about this special gift before, even before we were married.  I had dreamt of this for as long as I can remember.
In April 2007, before I was married or even dating Jason,  I spent 9 weeks in Mombasa Kenya, at The Dickson Children's Home (see their projects here), a wonderful orphanage run by an amazing couple, Ria from Holland and Matheka, a native to Mombasa.  My time here was something I will treasure for the rest of my life.  I thought I would go back year after year to see these beautiful children grow up, to be a bigger part of their lives, but I have not.   I remember going to an Internet cafe one afternoon, shortly after being there, and looking into adopting a Kenyan orphan.  Unfortunately, it wasn't and still isn't really an option to adopt from Kenya as an American.  Regardless, these kids will always have a piece of my heart.
Then I met Jason and 3 years later we were married!  We talked about having kids and plenty of dogs. One year after our marriage we had Lucia.  After having our special girl we weren't sure we wanted to have other kids. We were so happy with our little family but we decided it would be wonderful to give Lu a sibling!  When Lucia was about 6 months old we attended a local adoption meeting to learn more about adoption- domestic and international. We then decided to try to have another one biologically and it obviously worked as now we have Scout!

Now here we are, a little family of 4- a special girl named Lucia and her amazing sister Scout plus some dogs.  We usually have things under control-ha!...Meaning, we can do the 1 parent to 1 child dealeo, fit in a pretty typical sized car-well sort of, live comfortably in a modest 3 bedroom home, and walk our 2 dogs along side the double stroller.  However, we both felt something or someone was tugging at our heart...  There seemed to be something wanting to make more space in our hearts, our home, our family.  We would talk about another child and let it go, then talk about it some more.   I continued to research adoption- a burning flame I could not seem to put out.  Then we decided another child was what we wanted to do! We talked about getting pregnant again but I felt adoption was a part of my plan, part of God's plan for me, for us. We searched online for several months on different agencies and programs, not fully committed but the dream was becoming more real.  I had hopes of adopting a precious girl from Africa.  Jason dreamt of having a son.  Things that were important in our decision making: having a program that moved as quickly as possible (not waiting years for a match), not requiring both parents to travel, able to adopt a child younger than Scout and using a trustworthy, reliable agency.  Jason also pointed out that I had my two girls, it was time for a son.  How could I not agree?  With all our preferences, we decided on adopting a boy from China!  So...our Christmas gift to each other, almost 16 months ago, was the gift of another child.  We put down a deposit and committed to adopting a little Chinese boy through a wonderful place called the Chinese Children Adoption International CCAI, a local agency and the biggest agency (over 10K adopted) for adopting Chinese children in the US.
Paperwork, home study meetings, required parenting classes, more paperwork, proving to the US and Chinese government that we are worthy parents (despite some of Jason's late teen, early adulthood shenanigans/minor record!-ok, I'm not perfect either #memphis).  Anyway, we THANKFULLY, maybe by the grace of God, made it through the process and on March 7th our file was complete and approved.

We now had to wait, wait for a file of a little boy to be presented for our review.  Mid April Jason received a call about a little boy named Jian Le Hua, he was just shy of turning 2.

  The last update the agency had received was about a year old so we weren't really certain how this little guy was doing- mentally and physically.  We had a doctor review his file and he too preferred more current information.  Without an updated document, a video or updated pictures, we were hesitant to be matched.  We only had 4 days to make a decision-updates or not.  The next day I was walking with Lucia and the dogs (Scout was at school) and had just gotten to a park, it was a beautiful sunny, warm day.  I heard a new email ding on my phone and there it was- CCAI had just sent me an email saying they had received current updates!  I read his updated development progress, sounded great and a quite similar to another little monkey in our house :).  I then quickly searched for the pictures and video.  I saw one picture and knew, I knew I wanted to say yes!!!  I shared the pictures and news with Lucia and took a picture of us to show our little boy when he arrives.

It felt so good, so right, feeling this way! I texted Jason right away and told him to meet me at the park.  We both agreed-he was the one.  Here he is!

the picture that captured my heart!

 Now we must continue to do more paperwork and wait for files to be filed.  In 3-5 months (there will be about a 10 day notice prior to departure) Jason will travel to China for 16 days, to pick up our son.  We are so excited for him to be a part of our family!  We are going to name him River.  

River Butch Dawkins, born April 7th, 2014. 

River's middle name- my daddy Butch, whom I'm so honored to call my dad.

River,  We already love you and we have been praying for you to join our family.  You have two very excited sisters awaiting your arrival and we hope you aren't allergic to dogs!  Your daddy will be picking you up in a few months and when you get back to us we will never let go!