Thank you, Faith

Our first picture of Charlie. He looks good in pink.

This time last year, we had just received a call from our agency about Charlie's file. We were reeling.  It was so hard to process such a joyful beginning on top of such a difficult ending.

It still amazes me how we found Charlie--or how he found us--I should say, by the Grace of God. 

Let me put it to you this way...I was looking for Faith and Faith led us to Charlie.

A friend of mine (Carmen) had sent me a Facebook link to a wonderful well-known organization called Love Without Boundaries last Fall. I had been perusing their postings regularly and fell in love with countless faces on their website. I inquired about several children who I believed could be ours.

Then I saw Faith. I fell in love with her instantly. Faith was from the same province as Daniel. She was the same age. She even had the same heart condition.  Our agency felt it was "too close" for us. I didn't. I wanted to find that little girl, so I called our agency again and again hoping that they would locate her. But they couldn't.

On the morning of October 23rd, 2010, our Holt agent, Beth, signed on to her computer and began looking for Faith's file, once again. But then up popped a photo-listing she had not seen before. It was Charlie.

Beth said she knew instantly that he was "The Murphy's baby."  He seemed the perfect fit for our family, but where did his file come from?  He'd entered the Shanghai orphanage in December, 2009 and babies in China become adoptable after six months, which would have been June, 2010, just after Daniel had passed away. So why did his file just pop up in October?

Perhaps our guardian angels shuffled some papers around and kept his file--which must've been locked by another agency--under the radar until we were ready. 

Or perhaps there is another family out there--who we need to thank--for releasing Charlie's file after four months of contemplation about him.  

Either way, God found a way to get his file in our hands when He was ready, and when we were ready.

So, now we have Charlie. And we still have faith:)