Sitting at #1

So close but still seems forever away. We've been sitting in the number 1 spot on the list since August 25th. I had no idea that we would be in the same place over a month later. The "nesting" bug has definitely bit me so I've completed a few little projects in getting the room ready. But not yet knowing his age or how big he is I've come to a stopping point...I can't wait till I can pull out the bins and bins of Carter's old clothes and picture my new son in his big brother's clothes.

The most challenging aspect of this part of the process is the not doing anything. It was much easier when I had things to check off the list, paperwork to be done, documents to pick up...but this part of the process is completely out of our hands. It's brought me back to the truth that every single part of the process is in the Lord's hands. He has chosen our son and He will bring him to us in His timing.

Waiting, Waiting, Waiting

That's what we've been doing. A few things have happened since my last update...God has continued to provide...money has continued to come in and we now have received $25,500!  Depending on travel costs and a few other unknowns this should be close to what we need.  Recapping where this has come from...our fundraising yard sale, t-shirt sales and dinner at Paul's Oyster Bar.  We have also received grants through ShowHope and Lifesong.  Finally, many friends and family around us have graciously and sacrificially joined us in the effort to bring home our son. We have been blown away by God's goodness and people's generosity.  Every time we receive a check...we are in awe. God is determined to bring home this little guy!

We were put on the waiting list in the beginning of May. Last month I checked in with our caseworker to see where we were in the process and we were at the number 12 on the list. Got an email from her this morning saying we are close to the top of the list....don't really know what that means exactly, but it does mean we are closer!

At this point all we can do is wait.  The majority of our paperwork has been completed and we have to get a few immunizations before we travel.  That is about it though.  Please be in prayer for us as we wait on God's perfect timing and prepare for our son's arrival.

Fundraiser Dinner

One of the amazing things about this whole process, specifically paying for it, is seeing the different ways the Lord has provided the money for each step of the way. To date, we have received $17, 500...this includes our fundraiser yard sale back in September, donations from people, and grants. This does not even include our t-shirt money which we are hoping will add another $1,000. And we have yet another opportunity to see the Lord continue to help us bring our son home...

Some friends of ours who have a heart for what we are doing are coming together to put on a fundraiser dinner. So mark your calendars...next Wednesday, June 1st, Paul's Oyster Bar will be hosting a fundraiser dinner and they are being incredibly generous by giving a portion of the evening's proceeds to help fund our adoption. If you can make it, our family plans on getting there at 5:30 but you can come whenever and we will be hanging out on the deck where there will be live music. If you come be sure to tell the cashier that you are there for us!

Unbelievable

It was a year ago that we seriously started considering adoption and started our research. We quickly found the numbers, the cost of the process, to be quite intimidating. While talking over dinner one evening after receiving info from one agency we talked about how the cost was just too high, how would we ever come up with that amount. Then my sweet son who has heard conversations like this before (usually having to do with buying Legos) then said, "Well, it must be too expensive, guess we can't do it." It was in the moment that followed that the Lord encouraged us with truth to push onto the next step, as He as done many times in the months to follow. We were reminded that all the money in the world belongs to Him. He has a heart for the fatherless. We felt certain that He was leading us to bring home our next child through adoption. Therefore...He could make it happen.

Well, here we are about a year later and He is making it happen. I am completely blown away by this whole process. Just a month ago we were still lacking well over half of the funds we needed. And in just a few weeks time...the Lord has shown us that we are to keep moving forward. We found out last week that we received a grant of $5,000 from ShowHope. After looking at our numbers that night we saw that we have in hand(in the bank from contributions or in grants), what is needed to pay our next two fees...$2,300 to the agency to complete our dossier and $8,500 for the Congo program. Crazy. I kept looking at the numbers...amazed. 


So, it gets even better...I emailed our case worker the other night and told her that basically our paperwork for the dossier is complete minus what we are waiting for from immigration and that we have the money to move forward. She then responds and tells me to go ahead and send in what we have for the dossier, we would just add the immigration clearance when it comes in AND that she is putting us on THE LIST...she is putting us on the list to wait to be matched up to the referral of a baby boy...our son!!

Moving slowly and tshirts

So, the lack of updating has been a combination of a few things...small steps in moving forward, computer issues, but really my own attitude in dealing with patience and good perspective. I had no idea how tedious and drawn out this process would be and it's been trying. The Lord, however, has been gracious in holding out our vision before us in different ways...our children talking about their baby brother, His working through others in providing funds along the way, and walking through this process with an old friend and seeing her come home with her precious one just a week ago...this was such a perfect reminder that all this, the tedious, the waiting...is worth it....at the end of all this paperwork and financial stuff...is our son, waiting for us.

As far as the completion of our dossier goes, we are still waiting on one last thing.  We are waiting on immigration to give us an appointment to get fingerprinted in Atlanta. We filed papers with them back in January and are just waiting for that appointment.

One of the things the adoption process has brought about is the need to be creative in fundraising. Back in the fall we had our very successful yardsale that brought in over $2,000 and we have since seen the Lord continue to provide as we have taken each step in this process. Our second fundraising project has been to sell t-shirts. Our goal is to see $1,000 come in from the sales of our shirts. We also hope that these shirts will also be a reminder of our son, who we are waiting and praying for as well as a reminder of the many other fatherless children. It's been encouraging to hear from others about conversations these shirts have prompted as well, from conversations random strangers to parents explaining to their children who these shirts represent.

Here are a couple of pictures of our "One Life, One Hope" t-shirts. We are selling them for $15. We started out with over 100 and we now have about 25 left. Let us know if you want one!

More paperwork and the Dossier

So now that the homestudy is complete...now what. Last week was a busy week, we officially started working with our agency, One World Adoption Services once we paid our first fee of $3,200. With that we got more paperwork to fill out as well as a better understanding of what our Dossier will consist of. Our Dossier is what our agency will send to the Congelese government. It consists of 10 things. For those interested I'll list those things for you.
1. Homestudy
2. State criminal clearances
3. Marriage license(certified copy)
4. Birth Certificates(again certified copies)
5. Tribunal letter(notarized)
6. 1717h or1797c (Immigration Pre Approval, notarized)
7. Copy of state adoption laws
8. Copies of passports
9. Passport size photos
10. Medical letter from doctor stating good health, free of HIV and TB
and $2,300 for the Dossier fee and translation fee

There you have it. Once we complete these things then we wait. Wait to be matched up with our little boy! Right now on paper it says the wait time from when the Dossier is turned in could be anywhere from 0 to 12 months. Last week was a little discouraging in that we were bombarded once again with things to do and papers to fill out. As well as the realization that the wait could be a lot longer than we had hoped for. And to add to that, Alyssa is now asking daily when her baby brother is coming =) I guess it's the Lords way of making me verbally claim the truth..."The Lord will bring our baby brother home when its time...He is in control."

Merry Christmas to us!!

We had several fun surprises during Christmas week. Our first surprise was receiving our FBI clearance (finally...after 2 1/2 months) and just days later having our actual Homestudy documents in hand! We are now past such a huge hurdle! Now that we are done with the homestudy we can start moving forward with our agency as well as apply for grants and loans. Our next Christmas surprise was seeing God continue to provide...our next agency fee is $3,500 which we were short on, we had just $1,000 in hand. Within 2 days at Christmas we received $2,500...which enables us to make that next payment! Kevin totaled up what we have received so far... $6,000!

Not really sure what the timeline will look like now. We should get a better picture after communicating more with the agency. We have been praying daily for our little guy. Praying specifically that he is being taken care of...fed, held and protected until we can bring him home.

Moving slowly

So I realize I haven't had an update in over a month. There really hasn't been much to update. Right now in order to finalize our Homestudy we are waiting on the FBI to clear us. We submitted our fingerprints at the beginning of October! So we are waiting on that as well as making our way through the required 10 hours of online adoption training. We have 2 hours left to do! It's actually been really helpful. And although it feels like it's taking forever to get through the required readings and videos, I'm glad that we are doing it. We are learning a lot about what the effects are on a child that has been in an orphanage and some expectations we should have in bringing our child home. It's been sobering but good.

Once we have our Homestudy completed we will then be able to start moving forward as fast as we are able to pay for things. We are unable to start applying for financial aid and grants without a completed Homestudy. So the plan is start applying for those things as soon as this Homestudy thing is done. Still not really sure what the timing will look like of when we get matched up with our child and when we get to bring him home. It's weird...to be expecting, but not know the due date. The planner and decorator in me is ready to work on the nursery...patience =)

Last Homestudy visit...check!

Yes, we can now check off the list our last homestudy visit! The visit went really well. This was the first visit that our kids were here and I am very thankful that they didn't do or say anything too crazy. She did have to "interview" Carter at one point. She said the requirement is to talk to children in the home that are older than 3. She asked Carter, "What do you think about adopting a brother?" I held my breath. Carter replied, "I am so excited that I will have brother to play Legos with and GI Joes with and play soccer with. And I am saving my clothes to give him." (Everytime I put away clothes he has grown out of he gets excited and says it will be good to have these clothes for his little brother.) He did good =) We continued with logistical things. I finally have a better understanding of what a homestudy actually is. She had a print out of about 9 pages, detailing everything we've talked about, things that were in our paperwork. A very detailed description of us, our upbringings, our health, our families, jobs, parenting...you name it. We went over that together and made corrections.
There are just a few lingering things to complete the homestudy process. Our social worker is waiting for our FBI background checks to clear, our tuberculosis results which we have to go back for tomorrow, we have to complete our online training, and get back references. After that she passes it onto her supervisor and our agency....and hopefully we pass =)
I feel so many steps closer now that we have gotten through this huge hurdle. It was sweet to talk to my dad tonight as we tried to picture the moment when I meet my little guy. It still feels forever away, but I do feel a tad bit closer to that moment.

Update

Today's visit with the social worker went really well. Kevin and I took turns talking with her. It was really laid back. She asked questions about our upbringing, our parents, siblings (yes Audrey I told her I have an amazing sis), college, jobs we've had since, our kids....you know pretty much all that could be summed up about our lives in a matter of 45 minutes each! We handed over documents and copies we worked on and talked about what we have left to do to complete the homestudy. We are down to 4 things on the list!! Her next scheduled appointment with us will be next Wednesday afternoon. We will wrap up loose ends and she will be around us with the kids for the first time...she hasn't met them yet.  At that point she passes things on to her superviser and then to our caseworker at our agency to look over everything....and then hopefully we will pass and be able to move onto the next step!!

The next step....after completing the homestudy we can then start applying for grants. We will also be working on putting together our dossier. What is a dossier? I'll just paste a definition from adoption.com to make it easier for me to explain... "a set of legal documents which are used in international adoption cases to process the adoption of a child in its own country by the adoptive parents, or for the adoptive parents to obtain the legal custody or guardianship of the child in the foreign court, so the child can be brought by the adoptive parents to the United States for adoption," I'll be able to be more specific as I get more of an idea of what this entails for us.


And pretty soon I plan on mapping out in a post exactly what this whole process looks like for us to financially go through. On our timeline, you'll notice that I am keeping track of expenses as well as when we raise money or receive money from people. We want to be transparent with every aspect of this process especially the money part...I know several people have mentioned interest in adopting one day but like us thought financially it's impossible. I'll quote a sweet friend..."The Lord has a heart for orphans...He will fund what He favors." 

2nd Homestudy Visit

Tomorrow we have our 2nd of 3 homestudy appointments. Our social worker will come to our house in the morning and individually interview Kevin and I. From what I understand she will be following up and questioning us based on the paperwork we filled out and turned in a few weeks ago. Please pray that this time goes well. Again it is a little nerve racking to be vulnerable about your background, upbringing, parenting and whatever else with someone who's job it is to assess your adequacy in adopting a child.

Other logistical things checked of the list this week...drug screening done (costing us $90), financial forms completed which include our family budget, assets and liabilities. Our plan for this weekend is to squeeze in a few hours of online adoption training, we need 10 hours total.

The Tedious

So much of what we are doing right now is what I consider to be tedious. I know these things are important...there's just a lot of "little" things to do. Right now as a part of our homestudy we are making our way down a checklist of about 20+ things, which some will also be included in our dossier later on. For example, this past week we spent some time tracking down all four of our birth certificates and getting certified copies. We also had to get a medical form filled out by the kids' pediatrician as well as schedule physicals for both Kevin and I. I also had to go to the Law Enforcement office to get a record of any 911 calls that have been made from our address within the last 3 years (who knew). Bought another smoke detector because the social worker pointed out we could use another one closer to the kitchen. And to date we have probably spent 6-8 hours on paperwork alone, haven't really kept track, probably a good thing. And there's more to come! We still have a few more forms to fill out before completing the homestudy... including our monthly budget and other financial stuff. Oh, and while I'm thinking about it I need to make an appointment to get our drug screenings done! We will also have to complete 10 hours of adoption preparation training... which thankfully we will be able to do online.

In the midst of all these tedious tasks, it's very easy to lose sight of why we are doing this. I had a sweet reminder this past weekend randomly while at the Chiaha Festival (Rome's fall arts/craft festival). I was shopping at a friend's booth getting a dress for Alyssa while Kevin started eyeing a sweet little blanket, hmmm....for our future little boy? And before I knew it, my sweet friend at the booth pulled a fast one on me and put the blanket in my bag. What a sweet moment...our little boys first gift. I now have a reminder that there will hopefully be a precious little boy to wrap up in this soft little blanket! Thank you Trent and Kat =) So all these tedious tasks and running around town do have a purpose...a purpose to hopefully bring home our little boy....to cuddle and hold in his new blanket.

Documenting the Process

We knew what to do to try to get pregnant =) We were clueless on how to have a son/daughter through adoption. I am not a pioneer or one that likes to stand out or do what's different. So now that we have taken the plunge into something so mysterious to a lot of us...I thought I would document our adoption process.

 I have several reasons on why I have now become a blogger, something I thought I'd never do! One reason is so that others can keep updated and know how to pray for us. Another reason is to raise awareness of millions of parentless children. And finally so that those who desire to adopt one day can see a step by step of what it looked like for us. Just as every pregnancy and labor/delivery story is different..so will this be our unique adoption/labor story. But generally speaking I hope this helps. I will keep a timeline of when things happen and how the Lord provides financially. Roughly 30% of Americans at some point consider adoption...less than 2% actually do. I hope this helps even just 1 other family take this crazy step. And for the rest, I hope this helps to let you stay connected to what's going on along the process!

A recent update...today we had our 1st of 3 homestudy visits. It went really well. I was a little nervous, since basically we are paying a "professional" to assess our home, our health and our parenting... yikes...but I came away with a good feeling. The social worker was great and very easy to talk with. She is all about getting this part of the process done as fast as we can get things done....so that we are not waiting on her. Our next appointments are already scheduled for Nov. 3rd and the final one Nov. 10. Then onto preparing our dossier (I'll explain that one another time).

Why are we Adopting?

There's a simple and a complex answer. The simple one is...we feel ready for child number 3 and when we think about the fact that there are 147 million orphans, 147 million children that need a mom and dad,  it kinda made sense for us to go this route for our next child.

Now for the complex...this has been on our hearts for a while now, we even talked about it while we were dating. When Alyssa was just a week old, we both felt that our next child would probably not come from my womb. Back in the spring we revisited this idea of adopting and the more we prayed and looked into it, the more we felt convinced that is the direction for our family. The verses from Proverbs 31:8-9 really stand out to me now..."Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy." I can no longer ignore the fact that there are millions and millions of children in need of parents, home, food and love. If I knew that either Carter or Alyssa were sitting on the side of a road starving, or sitting alone in an orphanage...no amount of money, no person, nothing would stop me from doing all that I could to go get them and bring them home. It is by God's grace alone they were born into a home where they are loved and well fed. I am convinced I have another child out there waiting to become ours.