We need help

Soooo we are thrilled to be closer to bringing our son home but are realizing that we need help to do so. Adopting from China costs between $25,000-$30,000 USD. We have saved up some of that but are hoping to raise $5,000 to help out... This is where you, our friends and family, come in.

Our main fundraiser when we brought EB home involved months of training for hubby :) I got to cheer from the sidelines but he did the hard part, running the local half marathon (many of you sponsored him, THANK YOU!!!). For JJ we've decided to do something a little different. We are having a puzzle piece sponsorship! Here's how it works... We have had a picture of JJ printed on a 500 piece puzzle, hoping you all will sponsor a piece/pieces of the puzzle. Your name will be printed on the back of the puzzle piece that you buy. I am really excited about this because I think it will be so wonderful for JJ to be able to see the back of the puzzle, not his picture, but the part that shows him how many people love him and played a part in him coming home.

We are asking you all to sponsor a puzzle piece for $5 or $10. There is a paypal link below and also on the side of our blog where you can contribute. Thank you so very very much!

For those who are wondering, here is the picture that we have chosen to print on our puzzle. Its a pic of our sweet son, JJ, receiving his first care package from us, his forever family :) 

You need flash to view the Paypal giving box below. You won't be able to see it if you are on an iPhone or iPad. So sorry! :(

LID!!!

Woo hoo!!!! We found out that as of 1/17/2012 we are logged-in!!!

It's been...

too long since I've posted. I've been busy just keeping up with our girls and then there was Thanksgiving, and Christmas, AND a new puppy (Thanks Pop-pop!) :)

There are some exciting things to share though! We finally got our USCIS approval aka I800A approval/797. It was dated the 20th of December, but of course that was the day that we flew to Colorado for Christmas so we didn't really 'receive it' until we got home on Dec 29th. This precious piece of paper was our last document that was needed to complete our dossier. The girls and I drove this document all over so that it could be properly authenticated/sealed. This included getting it notarized (which in itself I think is pretty funny: that the lady who works at State Farm needs to notarize/approve the letter from the US Govt!), then we were off to the county clerks office to have the first notarization notarized. After that it was a trip to downtown where the county clerks notarization was notarized by the secretary of state. Then this precious paper was sent to Washington DC where it could finally be notarized/authenticated by the US Dept of State. Finally it stopped in at the Chinese Embassy for its Chinese authentication. Whew - lots of running around (this process was required for all of our dossier documents)... On a side note - all that the Chinese Govt requires on these documents is the Chinese Embassy's seal but in order for that to happen it has to be authenticated by the US Dept of State, who requires the previous 3 notarizations! Talk about a streamlined process ;)

We managed to get this all done relatively quickly (considering that the Govt offices were closed for New Years) so that our 797 was able to join the rest of our dossier in GA (at our agencys office) to go through 'critical review'. After that it was all fedexd to our agency's main office in CO where a summary paragraph was translated and then the entire dossier went to China!!!! yay!!!! We are officially DTC as of Jan 13th!!!! The CCC*A received our dossier (taken in by courier) on Jan 16th!!!

So now that this step is done we are on to the next hurry up and wait. We are still waiting for our official LID (Log In Date) which is when the CCC*A logs our dossier into their system. Then it is the unpredictable wait for our LOA, which can be as quick as 35 days or as long as 120+... no rhyme or reason for the variation in the time frame... Once we have our LOA we file the next bit of paperwork, and then we wait for our next approval before we can proceed.

If you're still reading at this point I'm impressed! I'm mainly writing this down for myself so that I can look back on it and remember, see Gods faithfulness in it all. I thought that I would remember all the dates and bits of the process last time but it didn't work out that way so am attempting to record more of it this time around.

SO from here (well, from our LID) we are told to expect it to be 4-6 months from there to travel approval... Once we have our LOA we'll have a better idea of time to travel as time frames are pretty consistent after that, it is just this unknown wait that we are entering now.

Thats our update on process, will post an update on our precious son next!

When it rains...

it really does pour. Its been one of those days today. We've been fighting with working with the school district to get some services for one of our daughters and after today are at the point where we are going to walk away and get what she needs privately. For us, right now, it is not worth the fight with the school district. I feel like I could bang my head against the wall and they still would not listen to me, afterall I'm just the 'crazy mom', I don't know anything about my child. Fortunately we have been seeing a wonderful SLP who is on the same page with us, has spent enough time with our daughter to really know her and see the issues that are going on... Anyway, was one of the thunderstorms today... its blown over for now :)

On a MUCH brighter note we did get an update on JJ yesterday! So wonderful to see 2 new pictures and to read about him... but at the same time just breaks my heart to hear that he is saying 'mama' but to know that he has no mama there to hear him and love on him, that we have missed his first cruising steps and first 4 teeth :( Oh I wish there was a way for us to get him now, or at least sooner rather than the current 8 month expected wait. The good news is that JJ is putting on weight (Thank you God!!!) and is healthy!!! From some of his initial reports we were concerned about his health/weight etc so are beyond grateful to know that he is getting the nutrition that he needs. In the report is also said that he hasnt received either of the packages that we sent to him - so had nothing from us on his first birthday...  breaks my heart... We are in the process of figuring out an alternative way to send him something (via courier), so hopefully we can send it in time for Christmas.

So I know this post is kindof like a yo-yo; up down, up down, good bad, bad good, buuut another bit of silver lining is that we got our 'receipt notice' from USCIS in the mail yesterday. We are making our way into their system now - hopefully will get our fingerprint appointment soon and can get our approval before the holidays come... so then we can finally be DTC.

So on that high note, gonna say good night!

When...

... are we bringing him home??? Thats a question we get asked a lot and one that I wish I knew the answer to. There are so many different steps that make up the adoption process and the timeframe for each of these steps is varied.

Our agency has told us that we can expect to travel to China 4-6 months after our LID. And how far off are we from that??? Well, right now we are waiting to get our approval from the USCIS (US Citizenship & Immigration Services) which they say will be done within 90 days - could be 30, average is about 50-60 but will be done by 90 days. After that we have to get our approval letter from the USCIS 'authenticated' which involves it being notarized a bazillion times and finally ending up in DC (via courier) at the US Dept of State and then the Chinese Embassy. Then our dossier gets translated by our agency, bound and put together... AFTER that we send everything to China.

So at this point, best guess when we will be bringing JJ home??? about 9 months from now... July 2012, when JJ is just shy of 2 years of age :( I completely understand the need for vetting families (support it 100%!) and understand that there are 'big governments' involved in this process (and big governments seldom move quickly) but it just breaks my heart to think of our son waiting sooo long for his forever family.

I know that God is a BIG God, mighty to save, so with all these timelines etc am trusting him... trusting that he is with Jon Jon, caring for him and using him until it is just the right time for him to come home.

A little bit more about JJ

Our sweet son is 1 year old - he just celebrated his first birthday recently. He is living in an institution in China called Maria's Big House of Hope (MBHOH) seen below.

JJ has a cleft lip and a cleft palate and also has syndactyly (which is the fusing together of the fingers... In his case it was present on both hands between the 3rd and 4th fingers) which has been surgically corrected at MBHOH. We are SO grateful to Show Hope for all they have done for so many orphans but specifically for our precious son. If you aren't familiar with Show Hope I encourage you to check out the link below...

Show Hope

We can't post pictures of him on here yet but as soon we can we will be!!! In the meantime we appreciate your prayers for him and for us (the waiting is *so* hard)

The start...

We started the adoption process a few months ago but are just now starting our blog that goes along with our journey. We are so thankful for our friends and family who are walking with us on this journey!

Hubby and I had really been thinking about our family, what we feel like God has called us to, the passion he has put inside both of us, and in wanting to live out obedience to God -knowing that we are not just here on earth for us- had thought alot about doing foster care/interim care/SAFE families with our old adoption agency, Bethany Christian Services, (which may end up being part of our story down the road but not right now)... hows that for a run on sentence! ;-) With all this on the brain, I (momma-bear), went to an adoptive moms retreat in Atlanta in Jan of this year. While at the retreat I felt really challenged, felt God stir my heart for the fatherless... for a particular group of kids with medical challenges... In talking and praying things over with hubby we felt like we were supposed to add to our family, permanently. We talked with some individuals about adopting kids with this particular need, did lots of research and ended up choosing as adoption agency that we had been told would be able to place this type of child with us.

Enter CC*I - located in Colorado of all places. On April 4th, 2011 we sent CC*I our 'medical conditions' checklist, specifying the type of child that we felt led to... I kept expecting that they would contact us, let us know about potential kids... but nope, heard nothin, nada. We had just moved (end of march) so were still pretty busy unpacking boxes, getting adjusted to our new home... felt like the adoption was on the backburner (well, not really even on the burner yet).

On June 26th, I got a call from CC*I, just following up to see if we were still interested in adopting. We asked if they had any kids available with the medical condition that we were open to, but they didn't. Did I mention yet that we had specified that we wanted a girl (purely b/c that's what we've already got - so seemed easier, sharing clothes/rooms/toys etc). While still on the phone the social worker said, 'You know we do have other kids who are waiting if you want to consider some without the specific need that you were pursuing. And there are a lot of little boys waiting -  it seems like everyone wants little girls.' I know the SW didn't mean anything by her comment, was just an observation, but man did it pierce my heart. There were little boys who were waiting purely because they were boys - girls who had the same needs as them would have already been chosen... just seemed so wrong... and yet here we were, one of those families who wanted a girl. So hubby and I got online, looked at some of the profiles of the precious ones who were waiting and were drawn to a sweet little boy with a cleft lip & cleft palate. Here we were, heading one way, only to be led by God in an entirely different direction... Is amazing to me that God would use our desire to adopt a child with a particular special need to lead us to CC*I where our sons profile was -  no other agency had his information, only CC*I.

On July 9th we met with our pediatrician to review sweet boys paperwork and then on July 11th we mailed off our formal application to CC*I along with our intent to adopt JJ. On July 14th we had been approved by CC*I... We submitted our formal Letter of Intent to CCC*A (the govt body in China responsible for adoptions) and miraculously had our pre-approval from CCC*A on July 15th. This basically means that they have put JJ on hold for us...

Now that there was a face & a name, not just the idea of some child out there waiting for his family, we started working like crazy to get our ducks in a row to bring our son home. We started the home study process (whole OTHER blog post there) and started the dossier paperchase. You may think that adopting from China cant be that different from Hong Kong's process but oh. my. word. Hong Kong will accept photocopies, photocopies, of important documents (like birth certificates, marriage certificates etc) but no, not China. They require that you give them certified original copies (yeah... not sure that makes sense but hey they say jump we say how high) of said documents (created within the last 6 months no less). These documents then have to go through the 'authentication process' which because we live in TN involves numerous steps.

• Step 1 (after obtaining certified original copy): Have it notarized.

• Step 2: Take the document to the county clerk to have the original notary's notarization notarized.

• Step 3: Now take said document (with its additional stamps) to the local state level and have the county clerks notarization notarized.

• Step 4: Precious document must now travel to the US Dept of State in Washington DC to have the TN state notarization notarized.

• Step 5: Document can now finally be authenticated by the Chinese Embassy and be ready to go to China as part of our dossier.

Having been married in Hong Kong (and hubby born there) added to the hoops and made things slightly more complicated... as was obtaining my birth cert from Hawaii... all this will have to wait for another post :) but it is all TOTALLY worth it to bring home our son!