I'm very persistent y'all!!
YEARS later after begging, posting pictures of orphans, scriptures, and PRAYING, he felt the time was right. We went down several paths and some of them ended in brick walls. We were actually matched with a birth mom and she ended up doing something different. Then, we went to Haiti….Oh Haiti, how you rocked my world. Our world. We met two precious babies. A brother and sister in a creche in Montrouis, Haiti. We.fell.inlove. We went into this with MUCH prayer. Our hearts had been broken and we wanted to be sure we were doing what GOD wanted us to do. We received that confirmation. We KNOW that God spoke to us and that these were our children.
We had done LOTS of research on the particular agency and creche that we planned on using for this adoption. We had followed up on references, met them in person, all the stuff you should do. We both felt at peace. We started the process. We received donations from many of you! (Words can't express our thanks!!!) We were told in the beginning it would be 12 months or less to bring these two home. We waited and waited and waited. Supposedly STUCK on the "Presidents Desk" awaiting something called dispensation. We had biological children so we had to get a special waiver from the President of Haiti to adopt these kids. We became friends with the director and founder of the agency and creche. We loved her. We supported her. But somewhere along the way (about August of last year) RED flags were going up all over the place. I was embarrassed to say anything because we had already heard things from people like "Well maybe its not God's will for you to adopt… what about all the money you already spent…" So quietly we started asking questions and finding out things that we NEVER wanted to find out. Things like misappropriation of funding, starving children, birth parents being told that their children were in "boarding school" and that the children were never intended to be adopted. It led us to hiring a private investigator to determine the orphan status of our beloved children. He had to search the mountains of Haiti to find their biological parents. God granted us a miracle and he found them in two days. This led to the biological parents removing the kids from the creche and staying with them for over a week. We then were able to get the kids into a new creche and hire a new agency to try to salvage our adoption. We were told we may have to start all over or even worse may not get our kids. Thats a lot for this mama to handle considering these kids KNOW us as mama and papa. They KNOW their siblings names. They WANT to come to America. After waiting and waiting and waiting, we were given permission from the government of Haiti to proceed with our adoption without starting all over. (Thank you GOD)
I am so happy to say that we are back on track with our adoption!!! Like we are really going to bring them home!!! Quite possibly they will be spending their first Christmas in America this year (Hopefully their first Halloween!)
Because of the switch in agencies and corruption of the other agency (lots of investigations going on here) we have to come up with $8500 to complete this adoption, not counting the $600 a month in support for the kids. I have started selling makeup to help with this (www.youniqueproducts.com/tracieward) and our kids school is doing a walkathon to help with the costs. The walkathon is on April 4. If you would like to sponsor Greyson or Conner you can send a check made out to Faith Christian School. You can message me for the address. We have a payment of $6100 due on April 15. We need a miracle. Please pray about it and feel free to share this blog on social media. God moves through his people and He has confirmed it over and over that we are doing right by these children. HIS children. If you just want to make a donation but can't in time for the walkathon you can make a tax deductible donation to Village to Village International on our behalf using this link!
http://www.villagetovillageintl.com/the-ward-family-family-79.php
Our family is fulfilling a call that God has placed on our life. Thank you for being a part of bringing us all together!!!!
And for some serious cuteness here….
