LOI, LOI, LOI!!!!!

It's still all a little surreal but we finally have a daughter!!!! We can't stop smiliing and praising God!! It was a little different than I had ever imagined, though.
We learned last Friday that some new angels had been added to our agency's waiting child list. For some reason, I didn't check the website immediatly, but when I did, I was immediatly drawn to this precious baby girl. (We had the opportunity to view a file of another CHI angel baby about a year ago, little Claire, who had a very similar diagnosis.) I talked with Chris and submitted a request to view her file. To be honest, I never thought we stood a chance. I was sure there would be tons of others who submitted their request first. We never heard anything all week-end but on Sunday morning, Chris and I went forward and prayed together at church that this little beauty would find her forever family. Monday morning Chris and I headed to St.Louis to take my father-in-law to a Dr.'s appointment. On the ride up I checked my e-mail on my phone and learned that she had a family reviewing her!! We were excited but not suprised and after so many dissappointments, I had protected my heart from attaching to her. Later,(about 5 miles from CHI's office) I was trying to entertain Hud while everyone else was in with the doc, and I saw another e-mail from Tina from CHI with baby girl's info. HUHHHHH????? They were allowing several families to view her file at the same time. But the file was too large to open on my phone. Panic set in, then I remembered WE BROUGHT THE LAPTOP!! Quick as a flash, I called my sis and told her to get a hold of my bro-in-law who's a doctor and I forwarded all her info to him. My sis said he may not get the message til later that evening,UGH. Meanwhile, my in-laws know nothing about what's going on so Chris and I spend our lunch giivng each other these knowing looks,LOL. On our way home, we stop at Coldstone Creamery(yum) and I get a frantic call from my sis, saying bro-in-law says we should "go for it." Next, a frantic call to CHI and we wait to see if she's been locked. Chris' phone rings while we were paying, she's ours!!! Okay, now I've had visions of this moment for years....tears of joy, birds singing, clinging to my overjoyed husband. Instead I'm standing next to my mother-in-law who's blissfully unaware of the situation, munching away at her ice-cream and I'm trying to contain my tears and screams. I was literally shaking!!! We finally get in the van and make our announcement!! This is one for the baby book! We raced home, completed our Letter of Intent (LOI) and sent it to our agency. We got word from our agency that it has been submitted today to the CCAA, so now we just wait for our pre-approval (PA), which usually takes around 2 weeks.
We are thrilled beyond words but are still feeling so very sorry for the families who were also reviewing her file and thought they had also found their daughter. We've been there and remember the pain, vividly.
We are hoping to travel this summer to bring home our little Ava!!! Will post more soon!!!