Wednesday

KIARA This sweetie remains happy and content most of the time. She blends in so well into our family. We are so thankful for how well the bonding is going! We can’t wait for you all to meet her!


VISA Yippie Kiara has her passport and visa and is all approved to travel to the USA! We are all super excited!


MALL All of the younger kids were able to take pony and zebra rides at the mall! What an innovative idea!


KFC just came to Tirana recently! It is funny we have never eaten at KFC in the States but since it is familiar food we decided to try it. While it is not Chick Fil A it was a yummy dinner the other night!


BUS RIDES Lauren, Megan, Emily, Kiara and I all rode the bus to the mall for a girls afternoon of shopping. We had a lot of fun!


TURKEYS I saw a man herding his turkeys through the streets of Sauk. He was kind and let me take a photo of him with his turkeys. He had about 30 Thanksgiving dinners with him!


HALLOWEEN Because of Western influence some Albanians now celebrate Halloween, a day to celebrate death! How sad that our nation shared this tradition. May we share the love of Christ instead. Conner and I passed out gospel tracks at the mall and at the park today. Please pray for these seeds of truth to reap a harvest of righteousness!


SPECTACULAR VIEWS High hills equal beautiful views! Lauren and I took a prayer walk yesterday and we made it to the highest hill near us. We enjoyed God’s beautiful handiwork of the sculpted mountains! The view reminded me of Matthew 17:20 “He said to them, because of your little faith. For truly I say to you if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain move from here to there and it will move and nothing will be impossible.”


MIRACLES In over 22 years of adoption in Albania the adoption team here has never seen so many miracles for one family!

1. A family to go from home study to placement in only 6 months!
2. For the judge to complete all 3 court hearings in one week instead of the usual 3 or more.
3. For the passport to be issued in less than 12 hours
4. For the translator to come to the court 3 times and not charge any fee, he said “We should be paying people like you for adopting children”
5. For Kiara’s US visa to be issued the same day by the US Government
6. For a family our size to be allowed to travel all together for this adoption
7. To have raised almost $35,000 toward the cost of the adoption!

LAKE and LADIES We enjoyed a beautiful walk near a lake today with Bob and Cathy our Bethany hosts. We also enjoyed letting the kids play on a truly innovative playground! The USA should take notes…it was a very fun park! While at the park three park employees engaged in a conversation with Cathy and I had the opportunity to tell them why we adopt and to clearly share the gospel with them. Two curious medical students joined in the conversation and they have already become friends with Lauren on Facebook. Lauren hopes to have continued opportunity to share Jesus with them. We shared a track with all of them. Oh how we pray that our journey here with so many kiddos and our love for Jesus would reap a harvest of believers for the kingdom!




HIS LITTLE FEET The other day Wyatt asked me if he could take a photo of Kiara’s feet and text them to His Little Feet a beautiful choir of international orphans. We saw this concert perform this summer and Wyatt thought it would be really neat for them to know that our family adopted two more little feet!




SEA SHELLS We were blessed to visit the Adriatic Sea! While visiting we had time to dig in the sand and wade in the water. I even had a chance to take Kiara and Juliana on a short walk searching for seashells….she found the prettiest whitest shells ever! It was so nice to have some one on one time with just Juliana!


PRAYER REQUESTS Thank you for praying for us so far in this journey! Please pray for the following as the Lord brings us to mind.

1. For Conner’s drone to be returned before we leave. They will will need to bring it back tomorrow. (this is my mustard seed request!)
2. For our flight back. We leave our apartment at 2:00 am on Friday morning. Please pray for the energy and strength needed to take the 2 flights home. The first flight is to Vienna Austria and the second brings us to the Newark Airport at 3:20 (Friday). Because we are flying back in time we will get home the same day)
3. Tonight Tim’s 3rd and 4th cousins came over to visit again (they came to visit us at the beginning of the trip and now they wanted to meet Kiara). I had the opportunity to clearly share the gospel. Please pray that seeds were planted in their hearts.

Just two more nights and one more day and we will be on our way home!!! Yippie!!!



In the grip of His grace,


Dawn