We are six months into the adoption journey and celebrating small victories to lead us closer to our son!  The first 5 months consisted of frantic paper chasing and the classic game hurry up and wait.  After our dossier was complete, it was sent off to China and we received our official locked in date (LID).  This is a VERY important date.  Our timeline for travel approval and meeting our son will follow about 4 months from this date if everything goes smoothly.  Although we have officially been matched with Wes and have "Pre-approval", we hope to receive our official "Letter of Acceptance" (LOA) in the next 3 weeks.  God has kept our anxiety low and we have felt like busy worker bees in following the many steps of paperwork, grant applications, fundraising, taking on extra work, and preparing our family.  Our hearts are becoming heavy as we see our boys talk about and pray for Wes daily, thinking about him in big and little ways throughout the day.  The central theme this time of year is family, togetherness, loving one another... The movies, commercials, and marketing all around us points to family.  We continue to make it our mission to have one less orphan in the world.  One less child who will never experience the feeling of a home, one less child who will grow up without the unconditional love of family, one less child who will be cast out versus accepted and cherished for his uniqueness.  The vision of our family is coming into focus and God has beautifully written the story of our son's life to be a mighty overcomer.  He will have a team behind him to lift him up as he is facing adversity and we will we do our best to patiently love him through every peak and valley.  We are going to need your continued  prayers and encouragement.  Please consider donating towards our final adoption and travel costs.  We will be in country per China guidelines for 2 weeks to finalize the adoption.  It's a tax deductible through Adopt Together!  Thank you ❤️