Update

We made it through Christmas through a variety of coping mechanisms: be busy; eat a lot; enjoy the family we have; not listen to any songs with titles like: "I don't have a home and it's Christmas"; "I'm alone in an institution and it's Christmas and you're someplace cozy without me"; "I have a hair fungus and no diaper and it's Christmas." We also made sure our furnace stopped working on Christmas Eve day so that we're not actually all that cozy unless we're in a lot of wool and sitting by the fire. Oh, and our final coping mechanism: buy two hamsters that are sisters.

I'm still feeling, however, the stirrings of The Crazies as I look at my World Clock App and find out it's almost tomorrow in Ethiopia. We're waiting to find out a court date. This will be the first actual date we've ever had in this process. We've measured progress or looked forward to milestones in rather generic terms: next week, a couple weeks, next month, sometime next month, etc. This will be a date so that I can focus all my energy on worrying about one 24 hour period, not nebulous timeframes. I, in the spirit of New Year Optimism, think that we will all enjoy me more this way.

The court date is a big deal because, at that point, if we pass court the girls will be ours. If we pass court, we get an embassy date. If we pass court, I can fly to Ethiopia about 3 weeks later and see them. If we pass court and I go...I can bring them home.

There are a lot of details that I will be able to include once we pass court (names, ages, I think even a picture). Please pray that all our paperwork will be in order and that we might pass the first time.

I'll write when we get a date. I'll wander aimlessly and unproductively around the house if we don't get a date. And I'll hover by the computer endlessly.

And I'll be thinking to myself that I have a new Life Verse:
I wait for the Lord, my soul waits;
and in His word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.

Psalm 130:6