Sunday, May 22, 2016

Process and Fundraising Update

Wow, has it already been two months since my last update?!  Time sure flies when you're busy preparing for a 3 year old!

Many of you have been following our journey via Facebook updates, but in case you haven't and need an update, we have spent the last 2 months preparing our hearts and home for Will's arrival.

We finished his bedroom, spent some time finding great deals on toys and clothes at yard sales, attended two baby showers for family members who are also having babies, were blessed by two showers for Will, stood up in James' brother's wedding, and have been putting in a lot of extra hours at work.
                                            I love yard sale deals!

Needless to say, we've been busy, but a very good kind of busy.

Our adoption process has also been moving right along, and we are SO CLOSE to leaving for China to meet our boy and bring him home!  We now have our visas to enter China, and his immigration paperwork will be picked up by our agency rep from the consulate in China on Monday.  After that we enter into a waiting period for travel approval, which should happen in 1-20 days.  Once we have travel approval and a consulate appointment scheduled in Guangzhou,  we book our tickets, finalize our plans, pack, and GO TO CHINA!  

Long story short- we could be leaving for China as soon as three weeks from now.  That is a very surreal, but also very exciting idea.  We are really starting to feel like we have most of the things we need to care for him (and still have one big shower with both of our families on June 4), and our hearts are beyond ready to begin our journey of bonding with him and getting to know him in person.

We have come a long way towards becoming financially ready to go to China as well. We were very blessed to receive one of the grants that we applied for, which covered the remaining fees due to our agency.  We have enough saved up to cover our orphanage fee, so now we just need to make sure we have our travel costs covered- and airfare to China in June is certianly not cheap!  My work has been very very busy, so I've been able to put in a lot of overtime hours recently, which will really help us with costs and hopefully allow us to save a little for the 4-6 week portion of my maternity leave that will be unpaid.

We also have been very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to raise money through GoBena coffee sales.  GoBena makes awesome organic, fairly traded coffee, and 50% of the purchase cost will go directly toward our adoption fees.  We've received our first shipment of coffee that we ordered and my coffee drinking husband attests that this is really great stuff!
 Here is the link to our fundraising page:

We are also still working on the completion of our puzzle, and have the new opportunity to collect tax deductible donations for puzzle piece sponsorships through LifeSong for Orphans.  HERE is that link.

Our puzzle is currently about 1/3 of the way completed, so we still have quite a ways to go but I'm confident we can get there!  (The grey pieces are those that have been sponsored, the colorful ones are still available)


For those of you not familiar with our puzzle fundraiser, the complete information is found here

Beyond coffee and puzzle pieces, the biggest thing we could ask for is your prayers.  We all have a big transition coming, and even though I can tell Will has a very optimistic, outgoing personality he is still a 3 year old, and is about to experience a great loss and huge shock, so please join us in praying for perseverance and protection.

We are SO excited to get our boy home with us and enjoy our summer getting to know each other, playing together, and bonding as a family.  Thank you to each and every one of you who have helped support us in this journey of a lifetime!

I hope to include a more detailed update with more photos soon, but it's waaaay past my bedtime!