And One More Makes a Half Dozen!

That’s right, folks - the Dorr family is expanding!! Only this time we are adding an Ethiopian toddler to the family. We are so excited about what God is doing in our family and wanted to share our journey with you. Many of you already know, but we are in the process of adopting from Ethiopia. Adoption is something that Ryan and I have talked about at times throughout our marriage, but became something much more than an idea over the past year. The developments over the past year all started with a little boy named Blessing whom I met in a Nigerian orphanage last summer. He was about the age of our boys at the time. As I sat there holding him in my arms, my heart shattering into a thousand pieces, I just knew that God was calling our family to be more active in advocating for the millions and millions of orphans in the world. As Ryan and I talked about my experience and the experiences of so many people we know, God began to make it clear that he was calling us to adopt from Africa. We began doing a lot of research, starting with adoption laws in Nigeria, but soon learned that adoption is very difficult in many African countries. We have learned a lot about adoption in the last year and believe that Ethiopia has an excellent adoption program. We have several families in our church who have adopted from Ethiopia and even have an Ethiopian play group in town. We are really excited about where God is taking us and ask for your prayers as we work toward bringing our little girl home!

To give you a time frame, we are currently working on our home study application (we hope to complete it by the end of July), next we have to apply with the US immigration office and complete our dossier paperwork (international paperwork) (should take 8-9 weeks). After these are completed, we will submit them all to the US and Ethiopian governments and once approved we will wait for the referral of our little girl (could take 12-14 months). Once we have a referral (means they have matched us with a little girl) we will make our first trip to Ethiopia about 6-8 weeks after the referral. We will then make a second trip to Ethiopia 6-8 weeks after the first trip to bring her home! Even though we don’t know who she is yet, God knows and we would love it if you would join us in praying for her throughout this journey.