A Quick Update

We leave in the morning!  I am a bundle of emotions, but will leave that for another day...

For our friends and family not living in adoption world, I wanted to tell you about how the court process in Ethiopia works.  We actually have two court dates.  The first one was this past Friday (the 6th) and the second one will be the one we attend next Thursday (the 19th).  The first court date is usually referred to as the MOWCYA (or MOWA) court date.  This is where the Ministry of Women, Children and Youth Affairs issues their Opinion on our case.  Sometimes they issue their Opinion on their actual court date, and other times they issue it later.  Right now they're running a little behind, so we did not receive our Opinion on Friday as we'd hoped. However, our caseworker believes that MOWCYA should issue it some time between now and our court date, so it's not really a big deal. 

The other (hopefully) small issue is that the Judge requested to see a couple of documents that should have been in our file.  For whatever reason, they were not in the file, but Gladney's attorney will be resubmitting them this week.  Technically, the Judge scheduled another court date on the 30th to review those documents, but since the documents will be in our file on the day we go to court, we're hoping she will have everything she needs at that point to make us an official family under Ethiopian law.  If, for some reason, she needs more information, then we will not pass court on the 19th.  However, we will not need to go back for any other court hearings.  Our part will be done on the 19th.

I had really taken for granted that everything with the court process would go smoothly and quickly.  While this is really just a minor hiccup, it has me on edge a little bit.  Your prayers for our court process and my emotional stability would be greatly appreciated!

Stay tuned for our post-trip update!