Baby Finnie!

Well the last 48 hours or so has been spent on that rollercoaster again! - somehow this is no longer surprising in the Finnie household!! We had our first meeting on Thursday with the social worker to discuss the possibility of adoption. She had informed us previously on the 'phone of a possible adoptive placement in Bloemfontein and we had therefore put together and submitted an all singing all dancing family profile for the birth mother and social workers to use.

We had presumed that the baby would be available in a few months, but when we met the social worker were told that mum is due to be induced on Monday! Big Shock! Once we had digested this news, we were then informed that the birth mother had chosen our family from 4 family profiles, to be the adoptive family for her baby!!!!

She then said that subject to confirmation over the weekend, the mother is going to be induced on Monday or Tuesday and asked what plans we had for next week! We are therefore flying out to Bloem' very early on Tuesday morning to go through the legal procedure to collect and bring home our baby on Wednesday afternoon so that we can start the adoption procedure!!!!! Can you believe it? We can't! We are overjoyed that the mother chose us - that means so much to us. We are thrilled that we can have the baby from day 1 or 2 of its life and yet we are scared to death to be starting down this road again with only a few days notice! How God is that?!!! Amazingly within a few hours of Paula talking to some other mums at Joel's nursery, we have been blessed with an amazing amount of baby stuff, so we have gone from feeling that we have nothing physical to offer the baby (we had no baby clothes, the house is too small, we don't have a pram or steriliser etc. etc.) to suddenly being almost totally equipped (we did buy a pram and cot - praise God for credit cards!). Regardless of the physical stuff, we do know that we definitely have so much love to give this child and we can't wait to welcome it into our family.

Please pray for us over the next few days. We are entering a hectic time practically (let alone emotionally) with forms to fill out, flights, car hire, accommodation etc. to arrange things to collect or buy, practical arrangements to overhaul our house, and all this with Christmas on the doorstep. We are so thrilled, we are almost bursting. We also need to pray that the mother will not take up her right to take the baby back in the first 60 days. That's a long time, but we are believing that this is the right thing all round. Please also pray for Joel - what a bombshell for him!! Pray that we will have immense wisdom to tell him and that he will have all the understanding he needs. Please also pray for a smooth and healthy delivery of the baby next week - for good health for the mum, and pray for those other 3 families who are not going to be blessed with this particular child.

On a practical level we are really feeling the strain of the adoption financially. Because we had to book flights at such short notice as this time of year, we have paid through the nose. We also have to pay for accommodation and car hire and have had to buy a push chair and cot (so far we've spent about a thousand pounds). This side of things fills us with alarm, but we know that God is in control and will provide for all our needs. If you feel that you would like to help us on any level, we would love to hear from you.

Thank you so much and we will keep you informed....