The Journey to Hannah Jennie-Marie Min

An invisible red thread leads from one person to another, no matter how far apart the two may be. - Ancient Chinese Proverb

Our journey to make Hannah Jennie-Marie Min part of our forever family begins when we went to St. Louis to visit David's family for a reunion. David's cousin, Carol, had adopted 2 girls from China. We were already praying about adoption because after having Sarah, our third child in 1998, I had surgery for severe endometriosis.  We had prayed about this for a year and I am so thankful that I listened to the Lord and didn't drag my feet any longer. I've read that some people with infertility wait for years with no results. This was the right time to adopt! If I would have waited, I might have missed the opportunity to adopt our baby girls because the wait for a baby girl now  is about 4 years.

After moving into our new house (which we later sold) in July of 2001, we started the adoption process, and September 11 happened. Even though this was a terrible and scary time for our country we still felt called to adopt, so we continued with the paperwork. In December of 2002, David was laid off from the consulting company that he worked at for10 years. The whole IT consulting industry crashed and an enormous amount of people found themselves without jobs and no new ones were available. At that time we had all our paperwork done and had been waiting 12 months (and I thought that was a long wait) for our referral. Finally, in January 2003 we got the call and our referral of our beautiful baby girl. She was only 6 months old. We were expected to travel in 6-8 weeks.
We thought that we would travel the early part of March. Well, as we were waiting for our TA, and waiting, and waiting, we were getting increasingly nervous because the war in Iraq and SARS had started. At the beginning of March, my grandmother who was just 2 weeks away from turning 90 years old, passed away. She had suffered from Alzheimer's. If we had traveled at the beginning of March I would have missed saying good-bye to her and missed her funeral. So you see, the Lord knows what is best for us. I would have heard the news while we were in China and been devastated.

We finally received our TA and traveled the end of March during the war and the height of SARS. We were the last group to travel from our agency before the embassy suspended adoption travel because of the epidemic. However, it didn't really seem that bad while we were in China. The US news media really put a lot of fear in people. We were becoming increasingly nervous due to the fact that we were watching CNN. I believe the Lord allowed us to go through all of this to strengthen our faith in him and to show us that he is bigger than any opposition we encounter here on earth. Also, David was named the expert witness for a lawsuit case with his old company. He had part time work and was able to bring a W2 to the embassy for our adoption. You see how the Lord worked everything out. We didn't need to worry, even though we did.

Our "Gotcha Day" for Hannah was March 31, 2003 at 9:00pm. Yes, they brought the babies to the hotel lobby and we received them there. It was one of the Most Important Moments of our lives. It could only be orchestrated by God. I can't even fathom how 6 people, 2 worlds apart, could ever meet and become one family. We still, and always will, cherish this moment and cherish sharing this with our adoptive families.
Let me tell you about our travel group. We became part of a larger family when we adopted Hannah, something we realized on our "Gotcha Day". Our families are the best people in the world. Since our daughters are from the same orphanage, this is the only link they have to their past. We are family, we care for each other and we love each other.
When we were given Hannah, she never cried. She kept looking up at the hotel lobby chandelier. She slept through the night without a peep. In the morning, she stood in her crib, didn't cry, and just followed me around the room with her eyes, peeping over her crib. She was a very happy and easy going baby.

We had the opportunity to take a 2 hour trip to Yueyang to visit her orphanage. I remember it was a cold and rainy day when our bus pulled up to the gate of the orphanage. We were all very somber, even the men had tears in their eyes. The orphanage director welcomed us in a room and talked about the orphanage. We were allowed to walk around the courtyard and visit our daughters rooms. We saw rows of cribs in her room along with Hannah's empty crib. There was one baby who was laying on a cot with an IV and a nurse taking care of her. We could see that the babies were loved and well cared for by the nannies.There is no or very little heat, so they have to bundle the babies in many layers to keep them warm. Hannah's orphanage was sponsored by Half The Sky Foundation. We saw a playroom for the babies and toddlers and also nannies being trained by the Half The Sky staff. Together with the Chinese government and Half the Sky Foundation they had just built a new building for the orphanage which they soon would be moving into. The nannies recognized Min and were excited to see her.
While we were standing in the courtyard 2 toddler boys walked to their open door. We talked with the nanny and took their picture. They looked like they had a cleft lip which had been repaired through surgery. We never realized at the time that God was preparing us for adopting a boy with the same medical defect. He always puts the right people in our path when he is calling us to do something new.
Later, the orphanage director took us to a nice traditional Chinese restaurant for lunch to thank us for what we had done. It was more than we had ever expected. We have a love for the Chinese people that we would have never experienced if we had never traveled. So our trip brought us our beautiful babies and a love for a people and their country half way around the world.
There is so much more I could tell, like visiting the awesome Great Wall, Tienanmen Square, and lots of sightseeing and shopping, that I could go on and on. However, I will end with our wonderful homecoming of family and friends. We were finally home to be reunited as a new family. Our God is awesome and we give him all the praise and glory for his wonderful love.

For The Least Of These You Did For Me

Welcome to our family's blog. We are the Duryea family and we have six children. You might be wondering why we chose this name for our blog. Well, to begin with we have three beautiful biological children and three beautiful children from China. I'll share our journeys to China to bring home our beautiful children later. For now, I'd like to share why we chose this name for our blog. The Lord showed me this verse when we were first seeking adoption. The Lord  chose to grow our family through adoption. However, the Lord has also opened our eyes to the needs of orphans , especially in China. We consider "...looking after the orphans and widows in their distress..." James 1:17, as a way of life for us, a calling.

As I read through the many stories in our adoption agency's storybooks, there are countless stories that begin with "...after many years of experiencing infertility, we started the adoption process and are now a forever family"
If you are one of the countless couples that have experienced infertility, let me share with you the wonderful way of starting a family and at the same time providing a home for a needy orphan.God loves you and cares about you. "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you  hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11. If you are feeling hopeless, let me promise you that the Lord hears your cries. If you haven't ever trusted in Jesus and put your hope in him, do it now. Your life will be better than you could ever imagine. I never planned or dreamed I would go to China (3 times) and have this wonderful family. My plans surely would have never been as wonderful as they are today.

I had endometriosis for many years, yet I was able to conceive and have three beautiful children. After Sarah was born in 1998, I experienced severe problems and had surgery. However, I was unable to conceive, probably due to the scars left by endometriosis. Like many of you I had emotional scars as well. Even though I already had three children , I still felt called to have a larger family. Many months, tears, and prayers later we considered adoption. I heard about the plight of baby girls in China and the one child policy that left them abandoned. As we were praying about this, David's family in St.Louis was having a first time ever family reunion. I knew this wasn't coincidence, because David's cousin, a single mom, adopted two girls from China. One was 5 years old and the other was 9 months. This gave us the opportunity to meet them and talk to his cousin about adoption. When we came home we saw an advertisement for an adoption seminar in our area. We attended and were ready to start the paperwork to begin our adoption for a baby girl from China. Our lives would never be the same again.I will share each adoption journey on separate posts.