Here we go.....

Well its finally official and we are headed to Brazil on Monday July 19th!!


As you all know its been a long, bumpy, and emotional road for us this last year.........but in God's timing we are finally going to start a new chapter in the Gouge Family. Thank you to all of you who have had to drive down this road with us many times........its amazing we still have any friends left! :)


We plan on posting daily happenings and pictures while we are there so follow along and watch how God unfolds His plan.
As many of you know we started this process in June of 2009 and for some reason thought "for sure" we would be getting both our children by the end of the year or into the very first of the year. Its July now......definitely not what "we" had planned, but trusting God's timing.
We have been approved for Donei for sure! He is our son now forever and the paperwork is done! Luana is a different story at the moment. We are not sure where she is "right now" in the adoption process (and really don't want to know at this moment.) But we have not been approved to bring her to the States.
For a little background on the Brazilian adoption~ Children who enter a orphanage in Brazil are either eventually returned to their families, or end up belonging to CEJA (Central Authority in Brazil who "owns" the children).
Donei has been in CEJA for several years, so he was available for adoption when we started this process. He went thru each step of the process by Brazilian law. Brazilians have first choice to adopt any children that become available. Once parent rights are taken away and severed the children are offered to waiting couples at a state level. If no one comes forward to adopt them then they are offered at country level. If still no one has adopted these children at a country level they then are placed on the list internationally for adoption.
All this to tell you that Luana is "somewhere" in this process, but not at the international level yet~ But we are praying for a miracle that God would move mountains to make it all happen to bring our precious little Lu home! She is going to have her 9th birthday in August while we are at CLM (Canaa Land Ministries Orphanage).
We fell in love with 34 children at CLM but God planted those two children in our hearts back when we first met them at CLM in March 2009, so we are trusting his will not only for Luana's life but our lives as well.
Donei will be coming to the Curitiba Airport in Brazil with Mary Gibson, director of CLM, to pick us up at the airport. We are so excited that we will finally be together with our son on Tuesday July 20th at 2pm! Yah!!!
We have been having fun emailing back and forth with Donei for about two months now since he was officially told we were adopting him. He is doing wonderful with his English~.....we are so impressed!
Donei is now 15 years old, soon to be 16. We were starting to get a little concerned when time kept ticking away and we still hadn't left because International adoption rules state that children MUST be adopted and on USA soil by their 16th birthday. Now with us leaving on 7/19 and then having to do our 6 week stay in Brazil, by the time we return on 9/6, we have exactly 11 days until Donei turns 16. Nothing like cutting it a little close!

"Faith does not question "why" when all His ways are hard to understand, but instead trusts and prays" ~Unk~
Thank you for taking the journey with us~
Steve, Tammy, Alyssa, Stephanie and Donei Gouge (and hopefully Luana!!!)