Now that we have passed court and are officially a Putnam Family of 7, we are waiting on the US Embassy to clear our children’s paperwork. They need new birth certificates, visas, passports, and several other documents before we can leave the country. The time frame for this process is so wide and varied. Our agency gives an estimate of 8-10 weeks. Some families have finished in as little as 4-5 weeks. Some families have gotten stuck for 16 weeks or longer!

We are doing everything we can to help the process along. We have even looked into hiring someone here to double-check all of our paperwork and make sure everything is correct before we submit it to the US Embassy.

When we left America, we were expecting to be gone for 3-4 months. However, you all know that we have been here 8 weeks already and we just passed court! That kind of puts a damper on our plan for our timeline.

Many of you know that my husband’s best friend, Peter Crawford, died last year from a very aggressive form of cancer. We are so thankful that Peter was involved with the beginning stages of our adoption process! He was one of our biggest supporters and encouragers. Peter met Jesus face to face on August 21, 2011.

It is Scott’s desire to be home by Augst 21, 2012. He would love to be able to spend the day with Claire and Ethan, Peter’s children. We know that God has His own plans, but we are asking you to join us in pounding on heaven’s door and asking that we can clear US Embassy and be home in time for this important date.

Last Sunday the pastor here preached on Colossians 4:2-3

Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.  At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ.

He reminded us that God wants us to “continue steadfastly in prayer.” Not just throwing little one-liner requests up to our heavenly father, but to spend concentrated, repeated time talking to Him. And no matter what His answer is, we are to always pray with an attitude of thanksgiving.

This is what I would like to ask of you – would you join us? Would you continue steadfastly in this prayer? We want to lay this request at the feet of Jesus over and over again. And we would love an army of prayer warriors to join us in this. And no matter the outcome, we are committed to being thankful.

Blessings!

Natalie

PRAYER REQUESTS/PRAISES

*That we would be home by August 21

*Pray for our oldest daughter, Abigail

*Our health