This is the time of the month that, normally, I would be posting to share our newest wait-list update; however, I couldn't be more excited NOT to have been anxiously waiting for
that email today. Instead, I finally want to document the story of our referral call.
The Story of Our Referral
I (Kelley) was hosting a Thirty-One party at home which meant that Jeff & the boys needed to make themselves scarce during the gathering. Since his brother, sister-in-law and nephew were in town from Georgia, it was the perfect time for them to grab dinner and ride out to see our soon-to-be new home (I guess I haven't blogged about that either; I'm so behind). So, the party was well underway; in fact, we had reached the point in the evening where people were filling out their individual order forms.
Earlier in the evening, just as everyone was arriving, I had placed my cell phone in my bedroom on the charger because the battery was dying. Little did I know that Lesley had tried to call my cell phone. When she couldn't reach me, she called Jeff's. They were in the car, leaving the new house when my oldest (Jordan) saw his Dad's phone light up. He picked it up off the console and said, "There's a Lesley Scott calling you" and handed him the phone. Jeff's response to Lesley when she told him she wanted to talk to us together about a referral was,
"Lesley, I just crapped my pants!". Leave it to him. So funny.
Back at the party, I'm helping a friend complete her order form when Jeff and the gang come in the back door. I didn't give it a second's thought; just assumed they were going to go and hang out upstairs until the party was over. Now that I think back on it, I should have noticed something. They all came in and lined up straight across the back of the sofa and were staring straight at me. Jeff said something like, "Honey, I need to talk to you for a minute" and I wagged my finger at him and said something like, "In a minute". (That cracks me up now). He then said, "No. This won't wait. We need to go and call Lesley; she wants to talk to us about a 6-year-old girl".
The party carried on while we went into our bedroom to get Lesley on speakerphone and pull up our email to see the referral information and pictures. I can't really even accurately describe what was going through my mind. I was told by a friend at the party that I turned white and I'm not surprised. There had been times that I honestly wasn't sure if it was ever really going to happen.
Seeing our daughter for the first time.
Once we'd seen the pictures, received and read the information and finished talking with Lesley, we let her go and allowed the people who were here for the party to take a peek at our daughter. Once they had left, we called family members. My side of the family is all local and we've said all along that we were going to have everyone come see pictures when our referral came. We made them wait until everyone was here and then had them come to see her picture. It was such an exciting time and we were still celebrating well into the night. I think everyone left around 10:30 pm.
The Rest of the Story (bullet point style)
- We were ALL in town; even my college student, Jordan. I'm SO thankful for that.
- The Thirty-One party was an adoption fundraiser for a friend who's been particularly encouraging and who is beginning an adoption journey of her own. I think that it's so neat that we were together for the cause of adoption when our call came. As one journey begins.....
- My mom was here. I always thought it would be cool to have my mom in the "delivery room" (I had C-Sections)....and it was. So special that she saw our girl's face right along with us.
- Jeff's brother Barry, sister-in-law Wendy and nephew Blake were here from Georgia. Miles keep us from seeing one another terribly regularly but I love that they were here. The back story to that back story is that Barry & Wendy's daughter, our niece Bailey, is adopted. God used Bailey to show us how VERY much we could and would love a non-biological child...and boy do we love her.
- My friend Valerie was here. Chris & Valerie are some of our dearest friends; friends who have also traveled the adoption road; bringing home their two girls Hanna and Aby in 2011. I just know that our girls are going to be great friends and I'm so glad that they'll have one another.
And the MOST Important Part of the Story
Our daughter, Yenenesh; the sweet girl who was always meant to be part of our family. She crinkles her nose in the cutest way with every smile and I love that. She is six years old and we already love her deeply. She is ours.
At some point during the evening, Jeff researched her name. Yenenesh. It means "good news". And we couldn't agree more.
