Getting Ready to Go

We started out the weekend by taking a trip to Macon to buy gifts to take with us to give to various people we meet while on our trip. These would include Jett's caregivers, the orphanage director, drivers, coordinators, etc. Just a small token of appreciation for the part they are playing in this adoption. We bought several UGA items based on a recommendation by others to give a gift that is representative of our state or area we live in.

Last night we started packing and it was a task. I think DeanAnne and I had two different ideas about how much stuff to take. DeanAnne's suitcase is on the top and mine is on the bottom. We bought a new rolling duffle bag at Eddie Bauer this weekend. Low and behold the thing is to big to check in on a plane. Total measurements are(L + W + H) cannot be over 62 inches. The duffle bag is 65 inches! I think we could get it in, but the excess baggage fee is $100 per flight. We'll leave it home to be safe. If anyone needs a good Extra Large bag for a trip, storage, or to park a small vehicle in, let me know. I'll make you a good deal. There is also a weight limit of 50lbs. After we re-packed the duffle bag in a smaller bag, guess how much it weighed. You guessed it, 50 lbs. Looks like we will be shifting some items to another bag.

I called about plane tickets today. I hope we have some concrete plans in the next couple of days. I'm really looking forward to getting those details ironed out. Right now the cheapest flight is out of Atlanta on Korean Air. For a few hundred more dollars we can fly out of Savannah on Cathay Air. I hope to make a decision before Thursday.

Let Us Introduce Ourselves

Most of you already know who we are, but I thought I'd give a little background for those of you who don't know us that well........ born on a rainy night in a one room shack on the outskirts of New Orleans, just kidding. My name is Jon and my wife's name is DeanAnne. We have been married for 5 years (is that right DeanAnne?). We have two sons, J.R. and James. J.R. will be four in August and James will be three in December. We live in rural Bleckley county on a farm that has been in my family for 100+ years. I drive a school bus for Bleckley County Schools( a fine bunch to work with if I say so myself) and work part-time as the attendance and safety officer. My brother Robert and I have farmed in a partnership for about 7 years now and we grow hay and cows. DeanAnne is a Physician's Assistant(PA) and she works for Eastman Pediatric Clinic in Eastman, GA. J.R. and James are currently un-employed.
Adoption was placed on our hearts about a year after we got married. Shortly after that J.R. was born and seventeen months later James was born. When James was almost a year old(October 2005), we once again felt led to open our home to an adopted child. We had no idea that 18 months later we would still be working on bringing a child home. God has used this experience to cultivate a new understanding of patience and longsuffering for our family.
In July 2006 we received a referral for a 1 month old baby boy who lived in an orphanage in the province of Binh Duong, just outside of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam. We immediately set to work on coming up with a name. For several generations in my family, all boys have been named with the same initials, JRF. Our little boy's given name is Tran Gia Bao Huu (pron: Yah Bow Who Chong). We were torn for a while on how to save part of his given name while not leaving him out of family tradition. We finnaly decided to name him Jett Reuben Fordham. We will attempt to maintain his given Vietnamese name legally if possible along with his new name.
On June 25, 2007 we received an e-mail from our agency informing us that we have been cleared for travel to Vietnam to complete our adoption and we should be in Ho Chi Minh City on July 7, 2007. Since the flight from Georgia takes almost 24 hours, we will be leaving on July 4 or July 5. We have been chronicling this entire adoption on our adoption website at Journey to Me.com. We will continue to post to that site as we travel. I thought it would be great to have this blog as well to post on while we travel for the many people who have shown interest in our adoption.
I will do my best to make at least daily updates while we are travelling so that everyone can have an idea about what is going on. Please remember us in your prayers as I am sure we will face numerous challenges. I will try to give a lot of details as we have numerous friends that we have met through this process who are also adopting and will be interested in what is going on.
Feel free to post comments and e-mail questions as I know your correspondence will be of great comfort to us. We will also be posting daily to the boys, J.R. and James while they are staying with my momma and daddy back home. Thank you all so much for your kindness and prayers for us during this time. We are so grateful that you all have chosen to share in this experience with us.