Walking With Faith: Day 17...Guang Zhou

Well, with all the stress of the afternoon and evening no one in our group slept well. Most of us just slept in this morning and then stuck close to the hotel. Our friends Phil and Niki from Rienzi have been hit with a 4000.00+ flight change fee, and have been battling it out with United airlines all day to see what can be done to reduce the extra cost. The other families have all been charged roughly 250.00 to 350.00 per ticket to change flights. Most of us are going on faith that we will be able to fly home Tuesday or Wednesday. We will all additionally incur 121.00 per night for our hotel rooms, and the cost of food, diapers, laundry services, taxis, etc for our extended stay.

We gathered this afternoon in Phil and Niki's room and prayed together for our group and especially for Phil and Niki who are here with their two biological children in addition to their adopted daughter. We know that God has big plans for us, or He wouldn't have kept us here, but right now we are all so tired and ready to be home, that this is trying the very foundations of our faith. Please be in prayer for all of us to keep God's will in our sights, and have complete faith in His timing for us all. In addition to those in our group, tonight we also learned of another woman who is here with one of her children and her two newly adopted daughters with Down Syndrome. Being cooped up in a small hotel room with these children is very difficult at the best of times, and when several are sick, or in need of medical attention in the States, it makes it even harder.

We are doing our best to support one another, and to pray for one another and with one another as we continue to face the unknown time constraints of getting our adopted children's visas processed. In my last post found here, we asked our faithful friends and family to call or email your state reps, and senators, and anyone else you can think of who might be able to help expedite our visas here Monday. We are required to stay for 24 hours after issuance, so if our visas are not issued by Tuesday, we will have to again change our flights, incurring more costs. We ask you to please look at that post for more detailed information on how you can help us by simply copying and emailing or facebooking it on our behalf.

Since there is nothing more we can do, we just hung out here today, sleeping in and heading down to the pool this evening. Annabella had a super day, and we were able to get some pretty great pictures of her. Greg is really getting good with the camera, and I only wish I could get as good as he so I could capture the detail when I take pictures of Annabella and him as he does of us. We have an AMAZING pool here, and though it was a bit cool since we've had all the rain, it was still quite comfortable, and we had a nice time playing in it with Annabella. After the pool, we came back up and she had her very first bubble bath. No pictures of it though as we took a shower while she was in the tub. She was fascinated with the shower, but she didn't really want to get in it. We finally got her to put her tub toy into the shower spray, but she wouldn't touch it with her body.

Before I post the pictures from today, I just want to let you know how much your comments and prayers mean to us. I know I say that in almost every post, but we can honestly feel your support and prayers here, and we couldn't have gotten here, and been able to withstand this much, without your faithful prayers and support. God is faithful to His faithful, and He listens to all of the prayers you have sent up. He has given us more strength than we knew we could possess and has strengthened our faith even more through the trials we've faced. We will never be able to truly thank you enough for your love!

^"For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” Matt 18:20 NIV