Adoption: Leia Joy Esther Scott

Rachel and I are proud to introduce our 6^th child and 4th daughter...

Leia Joy Esther Scott 

Born in China April 8, 2002, her name honors her current Chinese name, speaks to how we think of her, honors one of the great women of faith in our family, and includes the name that God used to lead her into our family. 

Leia – Part of Leia’s current Chinese name is ‘Lei’   Given her age, we wanted to honor her Chinese roots by choosing a name for her that was similar to her current name.  We were thrilled to learn that adding an ‘a’ to the end resulted in a beautiful name, Leia (pronounced LAY-uh) with a beautiful meaning - ‘child of heaven; heavenly flowers.’  As noted below, there is no question in our minds that God meant for this child to end up in our family.  Child of heaven indeed. 

Joy – We chose the name Joy not only because of the emotion we feel when we think of this child, but also as a way to honor my sister Heather whose middle name is Joy.  Any child adopted out of China comes from a place of brokenness – broken due to medical ailments or being orphaned or any number of difficult circumstances.  While Rachel and I have chosen to allow our children privacy on these kinds of matters, it should not be a surprise to anyone that Leia has experienced loss in her life.  My sister Heather is a mighty woman of God who loves Jesus deeply.  She has experienced loss in her life that would crush most women and yet today she is simply one of the most amazing people I know.  Our great hope is that Leia will learn to lean into the Lord as my sister Heather has done and find healing and wholeness where true healing and wholeness comes from. 

Esther -  I will never read the Biblical story of Esther the same way again.  Through this story God led us to Leia and that is why Esther is part of her name. 

In the next blog entry I will write about how we came to adopt through China.   But for understanding how ‘Esther’ impacted Leia’s story, one only needs to know that we started the adoption process in May 2015 being matched to our now nearly 2 year old Chinese daughter.  We learned after doing our home study and dossier that we could adopt two children on the same dossier.  However, most two person adoptions involved sibling groups or children from the same orphanage….neither of which was going to be the case with the girl we were already matched with.  Regardless, we prayed about this as a family and were open to the idea of adopting two children on this trip should the opportunity present itself. 

By November we were well on our way to getting all the approvals necessary to travel to China in January.  During this time, our church’s youth director asked Rachel to give a message to the youth about Esther.  As she researched the story and started gathering ideas, she noticed on one of the adoption Facebook groups a girl named ‘Esther’ was available for adoption.  Curious given the fact the she was researching the Biblical Esther, she decided to research this ‘Esther’ as well.  This girl was our Leia. 

As a sidenote, you may have noticed in the past two blog posts the term "For Such A Time As This..." included in the message.  That phrase is from the story of Esther and was the theme Rachel spoke about to the youth.  Little did she know she was preaching to herself as that is exactly how we felt when the opportunity to adopt Leia finally presented itself.  We were put in this place and time 'for such a time as this'  

Anyway, Rachel read through her information noticing immediately that she had hearing aids just like our Hayleigh.  She watched a video of her and immediately noticed the kind spirit when ‘Esther’ spoke to a younger child and the respect she gave an adult along with full eye contact in another part of the video.  AJ watched the video and announced, “That’s my big sister!!!”  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3ixfdOkvuU

All these things prompted Rachel to call the adoption agency to inquire about her status.  She learned that ‘Esther’ was 13 years old and according to rules set up in China she would ‘age out’ on her next birthday which was April 8.  Another flag went off in Rachel’s mind as that is the birth date of our son AJ!  What are the odds of finding a child with hearing aids like one of our children and a birth date of another one of our children?  Coincidence? 

Rachel learned that ‘aging out’ meant if this girl’s adoption is not totally completed before her 14^th birthday she would never be allowed to have a forever family.   While China allows children like this to continue to live at the orphanage and continue to be educated, you can image that with no family the long term outcomes are often not very positive.  Rachel was grateful to learn that a family was pursuing ‘Esther’ already, and it looked like she would have a forever family after all. 

Rachel asked the adoption agency if they had a 'waiting list' just in case something happened but they said ‘No, we don’t have a list like that.  Besides, we are confident this adoption will go through.”  Rachel went back to the adoption facebook page, left a message about how wonderful she thought this child was and that if something fell through with the adoption she would be interested in adopting her.  And we thought that was that. 

Fast forward the middle of January 2016….we received our travel approval for going to China for our nearly 2 year old child and researched buying plane tickets for January 22.  While doing this Rachel received an urgent Facebook message from someone she doesn’t know referring back to that ‘Esther’ thread from November.  The person told Rachel that the adoption had fallen through and with less than three months before ‘Esther’ aged out she was looking for a family to step up and take this precious child into their family.

We called Esther’s adoption agency and confirmed this was true.  Within a few minutes we received her more detailed electronic information packet.  I immediately noticed one important date in her life was my birthday and one important date happened last year literally the week we decided to adopt from China.  More coincidences? 

We called a family meeting that night and talked and prayed and talked some more and prayed some more.  We slept on it and ultimately we all agreed to open our hearts and our family to adopt this child.  Two other families had contacted the adoption agency before us but by the end of the weekend neither of them could move forward (not enough time to get paperwork done etc). 

Monday morning January 18 we got notification of our consulate appointment in China for our little one and while reading that note the call came in from Esther’s adoption agency saying if we wanted to adopt her, she was all ours. 

WE SAID YES YES YES!!!!    I wish I had a video of the little boys jumping up and down in excitement over this news.  AJ had been right after all….she was going to be his big sister AND his family birthday buddy.   

We called our adoption agency and told them what was going on.  They said that if we travel to get our nearly 2 year old daughter that it would trigger all kinds of new paperwork.  Therefore, it would be better to cancel the consulate appointments, do the paperwork that needed to be done for ‘Esther’ and then go to China near the end of March. 

That Monday in January, I felt God’s fingerprints all over this situation….not just because of all the coincidences but just something that I couldn’t explain.  Wednesday the 20^th I got the  call that my 86 year old father was probably not going to live through the night.  I flew to Dallas and he lived until the 22^nd which was the day Rachel and Sarah would have been on a flight to China had none of this happened.  Coincidence?  I don’t think so.

On my father’s last day of life with all the family who had made it to his bedside, I was able to tell them the story of our daughter Leia.  Her story was the last great story I was able to share with my father before his story here on earth ended and his new story began in heaven. 

Gotcha Day 

'Gotcha Day' is a term in the adoption community when you meet your child for the first time.  Real time this happened Easter Sunday in America (though it was the next day in China).  I was able to Facetime and talk with Leia for the first time Easter Sunday night just before midnight here in the States.  The translator was still with them and so I was able to explain the significance of her name to her.  She wanted us to write out the name for her and this picture I took while she was looking at her name for the first time.  This was really a special time for all of us and I will leave it at that....

Leia looking at her name for the first time

I'm going to post the picture below again because I love it so much.  The past 2 days I have been just like a brand new father showing this picture to pretty much anyone who would look.  "Let me show you my new daughter!"....to the receptionist at the dentist, the sandwich making lady at the restaurant in town, the mailman, the people at the gas station, people at the school, a guy who showed up at the door trying to sell me something "not interested, but let me show you my new daughter!"  

Rachel says things are going exceptionally well.  Leia calls her 'mama' and is 'so helpful, sweet, and kind.'  The sisters are playing games together and bonding.  In China, older children have the right to say 'No' after meeting the family.  Just as we said 'YES' to her back in January, she said 'YES' to us yesterday.  She is officially our daughter!  Blessings abound and we thank God for our 'child of heaven' Leia.  

As I post this on the evening of March 29 in America, Rachel and the girls are waking up in Nanchang China (flew there late on the 29th in China) and are preparing to pick up our youngest child a few hours from now.  Can't wait to introduce you to her in the next day or two!  

Until then God bless,

Andrew

Sister bonding....

https://youtu.be/Ltr4tQrXg90

My comment to Rachel was "Don't you think we should teach her English before we teach her to gamble?"  :)  

On the way to the airport...

Leia's first time on an airplane!  Flying from Shenyang to Nanchang.  Look at that dimple!!!!

An absolutely hilarious picture of Leia meeting her brothers for the first time.  Naked and in the bathtub.  Look at her and Sarah laughing!   They called when the boys were in the tub....what was I supposed to do???