Our Christmas Letter

Greetings friends and family, hope this letter finds you all healthy, happy, and prosperous. This year has certainly flown by hasn't it?!
First of all I want you all to know that we really do appreciate your prayers and support towards us.

Shane continues to work at his job that requires him to travel the Maritimes and Quebec leaving on Mondays and returning on Fridays. We celebrated his big 40 this summer by having a surprise party for him at the golf club. He was very pleased to have so many friends and family share his big day. Jaclyn decided in March to move back home from her Dads and travel to college in Charlottetown. That was great news for me, I enjoy her company through the week. I can hardly believe she turned 20 this year! She graduated from her course with honors in May and is now working full time in a salon and part time in retail. I'm working away as usual, holding down the fort through the week. I changed my hours at the salon this summer, with Shane only home for the weekends I thought it was only fitting for me to have Saturdays off to spend with him. So I now work on Tuesday nights and have Thursday nights off so I can help with the youth group in our church. It's been something I've had on my heart for a long time. One day early this spring our youth pastor called and asked if Shane and I would be interested in being youth leaders and I was over the roof with excitement. I look forward to each and every Thursday night. We have had a chance to go on many youth trips and look forward to The Cry this summer '08 in Ottawa at Parliament Hill. YAY!!!!

We patiently wait for our daughter in China. Our file has been in their system now for 18 months. Currently they are working on files from December 2005! So please continue to pray for us and others in the same boat that things will speed up. It 's been taking them 4 months to get through 1 month of files. Right now they are 2 years behind. So we could be waiting as little as 12 more months, as many as 24 or any where in between. Proverbs 13:12 says, "Delayed hope makes the heart sick, but fulfilled desire is a tree of life." Which encouraged us not to dwell on timelines. We have faith it will happen so we patiently wait on Gods perfect plan. We've filled out immigration papers, received all the necessary travel shots, and collected our passports. The best news we received this summer regarding our adoption was that our file passed the review room which in China is the room that they put your file under the microscope to see if you pass their requirements. That was a huge relief! They accepted us!

We've had our nieces over to our house for a few sleepovers this year and hope to add our nephew to future ones next year. They are truly life's little blessings. We really enjoy taking them to Church with us when we can. Our Church family loves to see their smiling faces.

We took a 4 day vacation on our anniversary in September planning to go to the Cabot Trail which is a wonderful sight to see in the fall we hear....but we had a spontaneous change of plans and ended up on Broadway Street NYC!!!!!! We seen Ground Zero, St. Pauls Chapel, Battery Park, Statue of Liberty, and experienced my first ride on a subway!

The new year is looking bright and colorful at our house with a bit of a change, we are hosting our home to a 15 year old girl from February to June. She and her family moved here 10 months ago from Beijing, China. We will be teaching her English and about our culture and we will have the added benefit of learning some of the Mandarin language. This will help 5 months of the wait fly by! So here is to a new year with new journeys, new friendships, new memories, new adventures and much to be blessed by and thankful for.

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Emmanuel. Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Isiah 9:6 KJV

Blessings,
Shane & Debz