PRAYERS

Tonight we sat down with the girls and prayed for Tarik. It was like our normal bedtime routine in that half of their prayers were for things that don't exist or toys they won't get. But there was one difference... the next time we pray with the girls for Tarik, she will be in the next room!

Tomorrow the girls go with the grandparents so this has been a week of "lasts" as a family of four. No last is more powerful than praying. For so long prayer is all we had. At first there were prayers for the generic "little sister". We didn't know anything about her. Then came the news of severe drought -- our prayers became pointedly about her having enough food. And to see her chubby cheeks is a testimony of the power of prayer. Then there was the outbreak of pneumonia and orphans were dying -- again we prayed every night with the girls. In September we found out who she was and the prayers finally became personal. Don't think we are raising spiritual giants, the prayers for Tarikwa Teka (the girls typically call her by her full name) were mostly sandwiched between pleadings for Christmas presents and petitions to be fairies or mermaids. But still, prayer has been all we had. We couldn't hug her, protect her, or play with her -- we could only pray for her. There were times we didn't think that was enough and I always thought I could do a better job taking care of her than God, but we rejoice that our prayers have been answered and "little sister" will be home soon.

STRESSED!

The pressure is on at the Dunn household. We have a million things going in a million different directions. Maybe for pity, certainly for prayer, I thought I would let everyone know what we are up to. Here's to hoping that writing it down helps...

- Getting Frank (the dog) ready to be in Tulsa
- Getting the girls packed to be in Benton half the trip then Tulsa for the rest
- Packing for ourselves
- Packing clothes for Tarik (when we don't fully know her size)
- Packing enough toys to help with the 24 hour plane flight
- Packing gifts that go to our Compassion Child that we'll get to see
- Packing things that go to the orphanage to fill general needs
- Packing and organizing care packages that go to the children of waiting parents
- Getting super important documents like immigration papers in order
- Oh, and savoring our family of four in our last few days as such

Please pray for our peace of mind... we are just a bit overwhelmed.

OUR NEWEST LITTLE SWIRL

We can't wait to meet our new little beauty. We leave a week from Friday.

TRIP UPDATE

We have bought plane tickets and even started packing... here is what we'll be doing.

We'll depart Tulsa on Friday, Jan 23 and fly to Houston then on to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. We'll actually spend Saturday night in a hotel in Dubai (on the Persian Gulf!).
Sunday morning we'll get up and take a four hour flight from Dubai to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (pictured).

WHILE WE ARE THERE (Sunday through Saturday)...
- SUNDAY: some sightseeing.
- MONDAY morning we'll meet the 6 year old girl we sponsor through Compassion International.
- MONDAY afternoon we'll meet Tarik and actually take her with us to our guest house.
- TUESDAY: mostly paperwork and playing with Tarik.
- WEDNESDAY: an important day at the US Embassy in Addis Ababa.
- THURSDAY: don't really know.
- FRIDAY: finalizing documents we think.
- SATURDAY: fly out for Dubai.

We will try to spend time at the orphanage and other things like that -- the above is just stuff we know about.

Our return flight will look about the same. One night in Dubai and the next morning (Sunday) a direct flight to Houston. Lord willing, we'll get back to Tulsa late Sunday evening (Feb 1).

We are excited about an exotic trip and even more so about meeting a daughter we love but don't know. We have a lot to get done in the coming couple of weeks to say the least. Thanks for your interest and especially your prayers.

SHE'S ALL OURS!!!!!!!!

We are so happy to announce our favorite Christmas present this year. The little girl we are adopting had her court date on Christmas Eve and (praise God) she passed. That means she is officially and legally ours! That also means we can share more about her with you...

HER NAME:

Tarikwa Teka Dunn
We will call her "Tarik" (pronounced tar-ick)
It means "she has a story that He has replaced"
The meaning of her amazing name kind of strikes at the heart of why we decided to adopt in the first place -- we wouldn't dare change that!

OUR PLANS:

Everything will start to happen pretty fast from here. We will be traveling four weeks from this Saturday (12/27) -- that means we will be over there the last week in January. Pretty soon! We'll be in Ethiopia for about a week.

Her birthday is in early March which means she'll be 11 months when we get her and was 8-9 months old in these pictures. Thank you all for your prayers, support, etc as we have been going through this life changing process. Please continue to pray that all will go smoothly. We will keep you posted as things come up. Finally, we thank God who has graced our family with this little girl.

SNOWMAN! ...KIND OF

The year's first snow! We did what we could.

OUR LITTLE ODD-BALL

There are often no words for Adeline. She is our little clown that keeps us laughing. On this night we went to check on her before we went to bed and this is how she was sleeping. We're not sure where she found the gloves and why she thought she needed them. But that's Adeline...