Prayer request

Jade and her families both here in US and China are asking for prayers. Last November on her 17th birthday, I met with a lawyer about Jade staying her permanently. Jade's family in China wanted her to stay in US as they feel she would have a lot more opportunities and that she is happy here. Since she was 17 we were not able to do an "open adoption". We were told that we can apply to switch her visa from being an exchange student (which expires later this month) to an F1 visa (this mean that as long as she is in school full time (High school and college) she can stay in the United States and we would be her guardian/sponsor person. There was a form we needed from her high school, but they couldn't fill it out until 45 days before she finished with school. So May 1, I got the paperwork from the school, send what we needed to her mom in China to fill out. We got it back and put the request in at USCIS, we had looked on their website to see how long it would take, we didn't find anything, but figure it shouldn't take to long since we couldn't get the one form from the school until recently. When Dave and Jade registered on line at USCIS on the 18th of May, they also couldn't find anything on process time line. Yesterday (Sunday) Jade stumbled onto a website that talks about the process time. The process time is 90-120 days. Needless to say we all became sad knowing that we don't have that kind of time frame and so forth. She can not leave the country during the application process otherwise she is abandoning her request. She has asked her mom to look in what the process is for China, if she would start it there but we are thinking they are no faster then us. I spoke with a representative from USCIS and made a request to expedite her application. They have put the request in and we will know in 5 days whether they accept our request to expedite. Hopefully once we get that notice, we can get an idea on long it will take then. Jade's parents in China will lose money/get fined if she doesn't return after the end of the exchange program which means she needs to be gone by the end of the month. As things stand, she is to scheduled to leave on the 16th of June with the hopes she coming back on the 5th of Aug. This was the original plan. Please pray for Jade, she is already getting sad at the thought of leaving and now knowing she might not be able to make it back in August. I have been doing a lot of thinking this past week as I am frantically scrapbooking her book so she can take it home to show her family. Part of the reasoning for us to get an exchange student was to have us and our girls to have experience with someone who has lived in their birth country, to teach us first hand about China. Another reason was I still want more children, Dave isn't ready (and doesn't know if he will wants to adopt more children) and thought getting an exchange student will help me with wanting more children (hard to explain it in writing) along with the other reasons that I have listed above. What we got wasn't an exchange student, but a daughter who is such a short time has changed our lives. She has been an awesome big sister to Monika, Katie, and Jenny, she was an only child in China and has learned and offer so much to them. Even when they are driving her crazy which is what little sisters do. She fitted so well in our family as Dave and I's daughter. We are proud to say she is our daughter and it doesn't matter if she is here (which is the ultimate goal) or in China, the bond that has formed between us is a very strong and even though she has only been in our lives for 10 months, it seems like it been forever. Dave's and my family have accepted her and have treated her equality as they do with the other grand kids and they love her. For those of us that have adopted, we always say we got the perfect match, that God (or those of you that pray to someone else the higher power) knows the perfect match. We feel this way from Jade, we couldn't have asked for a better person to open our house and family to. The love we have shared with each other. The bottom line is that we love Jade, she is our daughter, and we will do whatever we can do to fulfill her dreams and her happiness and right now it is getting her visa to be changed so she can stay here, to be with us, to continue to fulfill her dreams. Thank you again for listening, prayers, encouraging words, advice, and being a friend.