OK, so it is Tuesday night and Thursday morning is coming quickly.  This is the first time that I have had a few minutes to sit down and collect some thoughts.  Which is more than I can say for Kelly.  She has been working tirelessly since Saturday getting everything done before we leave.  So, here are some of those thoughts:

• God is good.  The beginning of last year, we sat down as a family and put together seven unexpected expectations.  Things that seemed impossible, but that if God wanted them to come about, we were willing to accept them.  One of them was that if He wanted us to have another child adopted internationally, He would drop one in our laps.  AND, since last year had many challenges, he was going to have to figure out a way to pay for the adoption, too!  In July, our agency called and said they had a little boy.  Would we be interested?  Well, it isn’t faith, unless you step out of the boat, right?  So, we said yes.  And, within two weeks a large portion of the adoption was paid for with donations from people who love us and also have a heart for international adoptions.  Interestingly, as we have come close to our departure dates, several of our other “unexpected expectations” have shown some promise of being completed!  When you are faithful in little … God is faithful in much.  God is good.
• What is the WORLD am I doing taking my daughter and niece with me????
• Seriously?  Eight kids?
• Kelly and I feel like the neglected step child of the international adoption world!  Vietnam was pretty much a DIY sort of adoption and it appears that we are AGAIN blazing new trails as we hear the words, “you are the first family to do this!”  We should be able to manage the challenges that China will present much better than we did Vietnam!
• Why am I responsible for five people on this trip????
• A close friend of mine told me that Satan hates it when you take a child out of a godless country.  When you do, life seems to throw a million different challenges at you before you get on the plane.  I’m thinking he may well be right, but in the end, the fight is definitely worth fighting.
  
• My niece is going to HATE how restrictive we are going to be on her clothing and how little we will let her venture out on her own.  She and Brittany are just WAY too pretty to let out of our sights for too long!
• No, we are NOT flying through the great plume of death in Europe.  We fly into Chicago, then over Canada, north of Alaska over the Arctic Ocean, then we dive down through the Bearing Straight on a direct line into Beijing.
• If I don’t see the Great Wall of China, I’m going to be very irritated.  I know it isn’t the focus of this trip, but still ….
  
• Did I mention that God is good?

OK, so this is probably the last update before I update in China!  Stay tuned!

Cameron