I need to update this with what has been going on, but first I want to make this post about Joanna. So in a previous post I told you that there is this amazing person, Joanna, that we met through this process. We learned of her right when we put in the LOI for Caleb. Let me back up...I have met a lot of truly amazing ladies through this process and I hope to meet some of them in the near future. These ladies helped us learn more about Caleb in order to make the best decisions. Of course this was God's plan all along that we would meet him.
Okay, back to Joanna...we had heard about her when we first saw Caleb and learned that she just wasn't ready to meet us (there is another part of the story, but that is between us and Caleb). I prayed...prayed a lot that her heart would be healed and that she would want to meet us. In my mind, I just wanted to be able to have her be the first one we told that the adoption was completed. She loves Caleb, I mean really loves him and we hope to have her in our lives and Caleb's life forever.
One night we received an email from Joanna, it was Sunday October 10th. She introduced herself and told us all about her history with Hanzhong where Caleb lives. I printed out the email and read it to Tim and we both had tears, of course I was down right crying. It was so special. She lived in Hanzhong. She moved there in October of 2007 to teach conversational English to students at the university. While teaching she would visit the orphanage. She would visit every time that she could. She would help feed the babies and play with the children. In 2008 her and Caleb bonded pretty well. As time went on the orphanage allowed her to take him home with her for a weekend and needless to say over time they grew really close. She came back to the States to further her education in mid 2009.
She went back to Hanzhong in May of this year to visit and was able to be with Caleb every morning she was there. She was able to go there again over Thanksgiving too and sent us the video in the previous post. She sent us the photos below as well.
She was praying that Caleb would be "adopted by a family that loves the Lord with all their heart and have a desire to serve Him in everything they do". Wow, God works in wonderful ways!
So this is just a little bit about Joanna, but I think you can gather how involved she has been with him and how much she loves him. The blanket and bear were something Tim and I bought and sent to Joanna before she went to China to bring to Caleb. She had the ideas of what we could send and it turns out they were excellent ideas! He loved each of them.
Shaanxi Time
