tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29359747579176819532024-03-06T02:49:22.157-05:00Worry Less, Love MoreKristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-68738172444660229002019-05-06T15:09:00.002-04:002019-05-06T15:09:24.774-04:00Hiding in Plain Sight: Lessons from a MushroomLast August, our family moved from a large subdivision in a metro area to a house surrounded by woods and farmland, 30 miles from the nearest city. We own nearly 3 acres of property, but are surrounded on 3 sides by woods and a large creek and a field across from our house.<br />
Since moving here, we've enjoyed having more land and nature at our fingertips and have found joy in harvesting grapes and pumpkins from our garden last fall, cooking up puffball mushrooms found in the woods, and even trapping and boiling up crayfish from the creek out back.<br />
My husband has been eagerly awaiting this season of country life- the time of year where the locals take to the woods in search of wild asparagus and <a href="https://untamedfeast.com/morel-mushrooms/" target="_blank">morel mushrooms</a>. I'm not a fan of consuming either, but I'm always up for a walk in the woods and a search of any kind, so I've been playing along the past week or so by keeping my eyes on the ground in pursuit of the prize. My parents were here visiting last week and they also took to the woods in search of this highly coveted fungus. Much to our surprise, after hours of searching in areas known to be mushroom-friendly (near dead stumps, near other mushroom patches, on sunny hills, etc). This past weekend we enjoyed some beautiful weather, and spent much of our free time outdoors- mowing the grass, planning out our garden, playing with the kids, and yes, mushroom hunting. Despite our best collective efforts, we had come up empty handed.<br />
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This morning I was taking a quick walk around the yard before the predicted rain came in so that I could check our mole traps, pick up my son's shoes left out back yesterday and clear my mind for a moment while both kids were at school. I passed by our swing set, and something caught my attention- yes, there, in plain sight were 3 small morel mushrooms. No feast by any means, but how exciting to find something you've searched for so hard! And to think they were in the most unexpected of places- right there by the swing set, in this highly trafficked area, a ways away from tree bases, with bad soil and no protection.<br />
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And then that little light bulb went off (you know, that one that would spark a little "ah ha!" bubble above a comic book character). Isn't this just how life works? How often in life do we find that what we are searching for is in fact right in front of us?<br />
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I'm sure you've been told before that whatever lost object you're looking for is going to be "in the last place you look." Well of course it will be, because who would keep looking for something after they've already found it?! But I think the true sentiment behind that phrase is: don't search in the places you expect to find things, look where you'd least expect them to be. When my sunglasses go missing, they aren't usually hiding in my car, my purse, or on the kitchen counter, they're usually someplace that doesn't even make immediate sense- like sitting near the bathroom sink, near the washing machine, or on top of the dog food bin. <br />
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Anyone know lives with males knows how often things tend to "hide in plain sight." Your son, brother, or husband asks you where something is, you tell them, they go off in search of said item and then show back up a few minutes later telling you "I looked everywhere but it's not there." You drop what you're doing, go back with them to the location you had indicated prior, and poof, there is the item, exactly where you told them to look. Yesterday, it was my son's pajama's- I told him to go upstairs and check in his bedroom. He goes, comes back 3-4 minutes later completely exasperated "but MAMA I looked EVERYWHERE! They're gone!" I follow him back up the stairs, turn the corner into this bedroom, and laying on the floor in the middle of the doorway? His pajamas of course! His response? "They must have just magically appeared because they weren't there when I looked!" mmmhmmm...... I'm sure every mother, wife, sister or friend of the male species could come up with at least 5 stories to the same tune. <br />
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As we poke fun at our male counterparts, how much more must God be chuckling at us and also painfully watching from above while we blindly stumble through life; ignoring clues, missing signs, tuning out his voice, forgetting his promises, following the wrong paths. The things we often strive the hardest for in this life are SO OFTEN right in front of us, hiding in plain sight. Whether it be our relationships, our vocation, answers to family struggles, direction for our future is so often much clearer than we make it out to be.<br />
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After growing up in a small town, one of those "where everybody knows your name (and your baggage)" type of places (the same one we ended up back in last summer), I set out at age 18 to find my own path. I moved a few hours away to a Christian college where I only knew one other person and was on a mission to form a new life. Being surrounded by peers of my age who shared the same beliefs and values, it was sort of expected that you'd find your future spouse at this school, or at <i>least</i> enjoy a dating relationship or two. Much to my surprise/demise, I never seemed to have luck with either prospect, and my senior year of college I found myself in a relationship with a close friend from my hometown (now my husband of 11 years). That was hard for my pride to swallow; I was shallowly thinking "I came ALL THIS WAY to end up marrying someone from HOME?!" But God knew what He was doing with my life. He knew the ending of the story before I had even opened the book. I spent years dealing with loneliness, longing for a relationship when all along, the person I was meant to be with was right in front of me.<br />
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This move to the countryside has been a true struggle for me these past 10 months. I spent nearly 15 years building a life for myself in the city where I had attended college. I had a career, friends, a church, a neighbors I loved, and all the other parts of life all settled and figured out. All of that got left behind with this move, and I'm being forced to rebuild. Of course there are obvious benefits to our new location and things that I love dearly about living here, but I don't think I was prepared for the amount of loss I'd be experiencing when we moved. It's been a lonely 10 months, and I've spent most of it feeling as though I was stuck at the bottom of a dark hole. I no longer have a tribe to call on when I'm feeling down or in need of a coffee date, I haven't had a church family to help me feel supported and lifted up in prayer, and for the first time since I was 15, I haven't had a job to pour myself into and take pride in my accomplishments. Of course my job as a mother is the most important one I'll ever have, but the rewards in parenting aren't immediately recognized. There are no incentive bonuses, no employee of the month award, no raises or bonuses for a job well done. I'm learning how to find value and matter in things that actually matter- those little "rewards" that have been hiding in plain sight: the smiles on my kids' faces, the laughter that fills the house, the chance to attend field trips and kiss ouchies and be in control over what my son watches on TV, eats for lunch, and how he spends his time. I'm beginning to see that some of the things I've been searching so earnestly for: meaning, purpose, direction can be found right in front of me- through my service and dedication to my own family.<br />
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So the next time you're facing big questions about life, maybe you don't need to go soul searching in the woods- maybe the answers are in fact right in front of you.<br />
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P.S. If you're an experience morel hunter with tips to share, I'm sure my husband would be overjoyed to hear them!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-61958124022996460352018-11-08T12:26:00.000-05:002018-11-08T12:26:21.590-05:00Where Am I? How Did I Get Here? Where the Heck Am I Going?Well, I can't afford a therapist, so you all get to play that role today. <br />
I will pour out my thoughts, worries, wonders, and struggles for you. <br />
Why would I choose to do this in a public space? Well, maybe one of you will offer up some profound wisdom for me, or maybe you are struggling to and feel alone in your struggles so my sharing might help you in some way. I hope that some good comes of this making myself vulnerable for the world to see... if not, well, it was still cheaper than therapy so perhaps it's worth the risk.<br />
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<b><u>Where Am I?</u></b><br />
Well, I'm 32 years old. I live in a small town in the Thumb of Michigan, a town a grew up in and left when I turned 18, swearing I'd never return. I'm married to a man I went to high school with- another thing my 18 year old self swore I'd never do. I'm a stay at home mom (yes, you guess it, I swore I'd never...). I have two boys, who are currently ages 3 and 5. Each of my sons was adopted from China at age 3. And just for fun, I also share my home with my 11 year old Beagle named Chester and my two 10 year old cats, Griffin and Cosmo (whose sole purpose in life lately seems to be making my house stink, destroying furniture, and racking up expensive vet bills >:-( ).<br />
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I'm tired, stressed, lonely, confused, overwhelmed, exhausted, wore out, and a little lost.<br />
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My husband is an incredible spouse and father. My boys are amazing, smart, and hilarious (and loud, disobedient, strong-willed, and wild). A few months ago, we moved into an absolutely beautiful home nestled on a wooded 3 acre lot with a creek running through the backyard, a big garden, grape vines, apple trees and some pretty stunning views. I finally got the hot tub I've been BEGGING for the past 10 years. I finally got the chance to be a stay at home mom, not having to feel the constant pressure of managing both a career and a family. We have reliable vehicles, food to eat, a warm home, a comfy place to lay our heads at night- WHAT ON EARTH DO I HAVE THE RIGHT TO WHINE ABOUT? WHY CAN'T THIS BE ENOUGH? DON'T I REALIZE THAT MILLIONS OF PEOPLE ARE SUFFERING IN PAIN, ARE HUNGRY, HOMELESS AND ALONE?! HOW CAN I BE SUCH A SPOILED BRAT?! Rest assured, these thoughts go through my head quite regularly, along with the "pull your chin up, lady. Put a smile on, buck up buttercup, life's not really so bad, be thankful for this stage before it's gone, you don't know how good you have it, etc etc"<br />
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Maybe I'm not praying enough, maybe I'm low on Vitamin D, maybe I need a cold hard dose of reality to make me appreciate what I have, maybe, just maybe, I'm just tired and lost and in need of respite. But how do you find respite when you can't afford a babysitter, your mom is battling cancer, your boys are a total handful, and your family depends on you to run everyone to and from school and manage the appointments, chores, and finances of the home?<br />
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<b><u>How Did I Get Here?</u></b><br />
How did my 18 year old self, who planned on going to college, running off with the Peace Corps, starting an orphanage in Africa, and later settling down in the South while managing a successful career as a guidance counselor end up married to her 9th grade best friend, and living in her hometown as a stay at home mom?<br />
I'll spare you my entire life story, but here's a snapshot:<br />
I spent a college semester abroad living in a 3rd World country-an experience I totally loved but one that also opened my eyes to a level of loneliness I'd never felt before. I lost a close family member to cancer while I was there, and felt helpless being so far away and not getting to come home and say goodbye. I found true companionship and understanding through a long-distance relationship that sparked up during my time away with my now-Husband. It became aware to me that most important things in life aren't the accomplishments we tally up, but the relationships we build and feeling loved, understood, and accepted for who we are. I knew that James was meant to be my partner in life, and that meant giving up my dream of living in the South- a compromise I was willing to make (but of course, still slightly bitter about). We married young, the economy was turbulent and our student loan debt was out of control so I put off that Grad School degree for the sake of instant income. I spent a year doing Americorps working with Refugees in a social work setting. Although I LOVED the work, I immediately recognized that my personality sets me up for complete burn out in that field- I'm a worker, a problem solver, a "don't stop until the job's done" type of gal. In social work, the job is never done. I worked myself into the ground for a year and realized that if I wanted that career, I was destined to end up alone. I chose the family route instead. (Now that I'm a little older and seasoned I think I could figure out a way to do it the right way, but... that opportunity has passed me by). <br />
I spent the next 7 years building a career in banking, paying off debt and enjoying a job with a lot of structure, tasks, relationships, and learning. 3 years ago, we felt the call to adopt from China, and began that process. We brought our first son home a year later and I continued working in banking full time the first year he was home. In May of 2017 his daycare provider passed away unexpectedly, and I decided to quit my job in order to stay home with him and also care for the friends he had grown so close to. He was thriving and I was trying to minimize disruptions to his life after he had gone through such massive loss the year before when he moved from China into our lives. It was summer and I was longing to spend it outdoors with children instead of stuck inside, pouring over loan documents in a cubicle.<br />
We had gone back and forth for a while about adopting a 2nd, but had firmly decided to hold off for another year or so. The very same day I quit my job in order to pursue the daycare dream (aka financial ruin), our adoption agency called and said they had a file for us. I couldn't bear not to look, and the minute I laid eyes on that little boy, I knew he was our son- and that this level of "sink or swim" was surely another call from God to trust his plan and surrender control. <br />
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I mean really, who says know to THAT face?!<br />
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And so, from May to February I ran an in-home daycare, started a side-business selling children's books, managed a bunch of household repair/improvement projects, prepared to adopt our 2nd child, and learned what it meant to merely survive. My beloved 6 year old hound dog was diagnosed with cancer in November and passed away in January. I spent the coldest winter in years cooped up inside a small house with 5 boys under age 5. I felt like I was losing my mind.<br />
I loved the kids I cared for intensely, and loved feeling like a blessing to their families. But I didn't enjoy the work of juggling screaming infants with hungry toddlers, bus pick ups and drop offs, preschool runs, messes, dirty diapers, bottles, naps, and ear infections. I was looking forward to our China trip and adoption as a temporary escape from the insanity of daycare. Enter our new son Isaac, who I had dreamed up as a quiet, shy, tender little boy (he was indeed tiny- wearing 12-18 month clothes at age 3). HA! He entered our life screaming, and we immediately learned that instead of the quiet little lamb we planned for, he was a fiesty, intense, opinionated, aggressive, vocal strong willed little guy who was used to using his voice to make up for his small size and who was NOT afraid to let you know when he didn't like something. <br />
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Yep, this about sums things up for those first few days...<br />
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Those first few weeks were traumatic for all of us- our 5 year old son had to learn that rules he was just learning to follow suddenly didn't apply to his new brother- mom and dad didn't have the patience or energy they used to, and we all struggled through the loud screaming fits that seemed to occupy most of our day (even if they were only a few hours combined). I threw my firmly held-to beliefs about parenting and structure and never letting kids be in control... anything to quiet the screaming boss baby. ANYTHING.<br />
We returned home from China and I felt torn between wanting to get back into my role of helping my daycare families out (I did miss those sweet faces dearly, and served a few single moms who really relied on my care) and needing to focus solely on helping our new son adjust. We needed the income and they needed care so I started working again before any of us were ready for it. We all suffered. (well not my older son, he was just happy to have his playmates back in his life, and so proud to show off his new little brother).<br />
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My first few weeks back to work, someone was cry-screaming for about 10 hours a day- be it my new son, or one of the two infants I cared for, or one of the toddlers crying out in search of my attention. I felt alone, my husband was gone from 7am to 6pm and by the time he walked through that door at night I both hated him and saw him as my hero. Isaac was still going through major food anxiety after living in an underfed orphanage for 3 years, and I would lock myself in the bathroom just to escape and screams and sneak a snack. Life felt hopeless, I needed help and knew I couldn't keep going on with the status quo. I was trying to hold out for summer, when my school-aged kids would be there to help with the little ones, and we'd be able to get outside and play and do the things I loved most about running a daycare (trips to the park, playing in the yard, picnic lunches, crafts, and board games with my big kids during naptime). I also knew it wasn't fair to any of us to keep going like this. I couldn't be the provider I wanted to be for so many little people when I was running on fumes. <br />
I wanted my mom, my aunts, my cousins, grandma, ANYONE who might be able to step in occasionally and offer company, advice, respite. My friends weren't showing up for me in the way that I needed them to (they were all overwhelmed with new babies, careers, and young families of their own), so I saw moving back home near family as the answer to all of life's problems. <br />
My husband was offered the chance to work from home (which meant being away 9-5 with a break for lunch instead of 7-6- MUCH BETTER!). I found a house for sale that I loved, and felt it was time to give my husband the life he had longed for after 10 years of him chasing my dreams. the housing market where we were was HOT and we were able to sell our house for a big profit, paying off the rest of our college debt and getting us ahead a little bit.<br />
And so, 4 months home from China we packed up everything, said some extremely hard goodbyes, left a church we loved and felt so cared for in, left a city I had lived in for 15 years, and headed home. We threw another big curveball into poor Isaac's world, when he was already struggling to handle the changes he was dealing with. We left a huge subdivision just miles from every convenience known to man for a dirt road with more tractor traffic than cars. A trip to Target is now a half-day affair instead of a quick run around the corner. I left so many amazing friends who had had been my rock during hard times but gained the proximity of both sides of our family. We left an award-winning, diverse school district for a struggling, all-white school filled with teachers and staff who already knew and loved my kids. We don't have a park to visit, but our backyard resembles one. We gained SO MUCH in moving here. But I wasn't prepared for the losses. Telling my daycare parents about my decision was one of the hardest things I've ever done, along with saying goodbye to the kiddos who I loved like my own.<br />
I wasn't prepared for "back home" to feel so lonely- I had been gone so long that most of the people and places I knew and loved at age 18 were gone. I wasn't prepared for my mom to be re-diagnosed with cancer the month we moved, for my mother-in-law to land the job opportunity of her life (which also meant working full time 3rd shift), my sister-in-law to start working full time (in a job she loves and I'm so very happy she found for herself), and for the reality that having two kids in two different school districts (and counties) meant that I'd be spending about 2 hours of my day playing taxi driver. <br />
I wasn't prepared for being a stay-at-home mom of a 3 year old with rage issues to be more exhausting than running a whole daycare by myself. I wasn't prepared for how tight finances are trying to raise a family of 4 on a single income. I wasn't prepared for the constant internal pressure to keep a perfectly tidy house and cook 3 healthy meals a day simply because I'm not working (I hate cleaning and despise cooking... you can imagine how great I am at staying on top of those tasks living with three hungry males who don't pick up after themselves-ok, my husband does, but not the kids). I wasn't prepared to feel the constant pressure to host and entertain family even though I'm falling apart at the seams internally. I need company, but I'm too anxious to handle it.<br />
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So here I am: I'm tired, stressed, lonely, confused, overwhelmed, exhausted, wore out, and a little lost.<br />
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<b><u>Where the Heck Am I Going?</u></b><br />
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How do I move from the place I am in now to a place where I feel like more than just a mom, drive, cook, and maid? How do I know which move to make next? Going back to work full time doesn't feel like the right answer, because it would mean pulling Isaac out of preschool and he's thriving here. I felt like my older son went from toddler to Kindergarten in the blink of an eye and I missed most of it. I don't want to miss my time with Isaac. But I'm also aware that I'm not even enjoying it right now, and I want that to change. I want to savor this time together, to spend it playing and laughing and learning together. Instead our days are filled with arguments, tantrums and time outs. I need to lower my standards, I'm becoming more and more aware of this. I need to learn not to resent myself for all the things I DON'T get done in a day, and learn to praise myself when I pour into my kids instead of my Iphone, or when I manage to keep my calm in the midst of a meltdown, or when I find the time to spend one-on-one time giving my kids attention, affection and eye contact each day.<br />
I'm holding out hope for February, when Isaac turns the corner from age 3 to 4 (my least favorite age to my favorite), and we cross that magic "one year home" mark that for so many adoptive families, is associated with a turn from darkness into light.<br />
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But where am I really going, long-term? <br />
I'm often resentful of the simplicity of my husband's heart, focus and drive. He's fascinated by technology and computer programming, so he has made a career as a programmer. He enjoys his work, feels confident about his career path, and works hard and successfully. <br />
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I on the other hand, have ZERO idea about what direction I should be going. I attended a liberal arts college with a huge focus on finding your vocation in life. For a long time, I felt that if I wasn't out creating sustainable water systems in Uganda, or teaching children in Guatemala, or using my clear God Given talent as a nurse or engineer I wasn't measuring up. Surely God never calls someone to be an assistant manager of a bank branch, or a mortgage processor. I liked the jobs I had, and found them rewarding in their own ways, but never felt like it was enough. I always worried I had settled.<br />
So I've got a voice in the back of my head lying to me and telling me I need an "impressive" job, and I also am faced with the reality of the fact that I love secretarial jobs. I love retail. I love team management. I love counting money and sorting coins and counting things. I love taking inventory and working in a stock room. You see, I've never really had a job I hated, unless I was working with personalities I found unbearable. I've worked as a daycare assistant, store clerk, grocery bagger, stockroom associate, babysitter, bank teller, customer service rep, assistant manager, mortgage processor, daycare owner, animal shelter volunteer, and salesperson. I've enjoyed each job for different reasons. Should I return to the workforce, any of them seem like viable options. I'd also love to work in a post office, vet clinic, school, as a case aide for a social worker, or a flight attendant. I could see myself doing so many different jobs and being happy, but how do I know which path to follow? I LOVE being able to drive my kids to school, attend their field trips and class parties, but I also long for a career and a feeling that I'm contributing financially to our family. I cannot fathom adding another child into the mix right now, but I also have a strong desire to continue adopting- so why even think about work when I'd just want to quit again as soon as child #3 enters our family?<br />
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Do I reach out and try to make new friends with others who are possibly in this same stage of life, or try to invest my energy into the countless relationships I already have, that I miss and are in need of attention? Do I give into every social invitation on the weekend to ensure we don't miss out on quality time with loved ones, or say no in order to get the rest and relaxation we need as an immediate family? What will people think if I keep saying no? I moved over here with the intention of constantly hosting friends and family into our home, but at the moment I'm just too tired to take on anything else.<br />
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Part of me also longs to go back to school, obtain my Masters in Social Work, and finish the path I abandoned for sake of income and debt repayment. But why take steps backward at this stage in life? what if I rack up a bunch of student loans and end up hating it? Perhaps I'm too risk-averse to go that route. I could probably just volunteer in a social work role and end up financially better off.<br />
How about the kids; how do I know what's best for them? Do I put them into the school district where I think they'd feel a sense of belonging and acceptance for who they are, or the one that's closer, has better academic and athletic programs, but they won't get busing or free lunch and will be feeling more pressure to "keep up with the Jones'?" Do I spend our free time chasing down specialists and therapies to ensure they're getting the best possible medical care for their conditions and staying at the front of issues before they show up, or just let them be kids, and handle problems as they arise? Do we enroll them in as many extracurricular activities as possible to ensure maximum exposure and chances to find their niche, or let them just rest, play and go to bed early? HOW DO PEOPLE FIGURE THIS STUFF OUT?! HOW DO YOU EVER KNOW IF YOU'RE DOING THE RIGHT THING, AND IF YOU DON'T EVER KNOW, HOW DO YOU KEEP THE CONSTANT WORRIES AND WONDERING OUT OF YOUR MIND?!<br />
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Well, I'm sure I've lost you all by now, but if you have any insight to share, by all means, please do!<br />
It did feel really good to write this all out. I can't explain it, but somehow seeing your thoughts before you helps to make sense of them. I still don't know where I'm going, but maybe the answer is just to stop worrying about it.<br />
I understand now where I am, and how I got here. Maybe the answer is simply to just BE HERE. Quit worrying about everything else. Just BE HERE. I'll have to get back to ya'll on that one.<br />
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As always, thanks for reading, and please leave input.Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-58908603965836352232018-10-29T11:47:00.002-04:002018-10-29T11:47:41.927-04:00Mom Guilt and HalloweenMOM GUILT. I'm usually drowning in it, how about you?<br />
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But have you ever stopped and asked yourself why? Why do we all feel that we're not measuring up to some invisible standard of parenting? Why, even though our kids are happy and loved and safe we somehow feel like we're never doing enough for them? Why, even when our parents, spouses, community and friends tell us that we're wonderful mothers, we still convince ourselves that we're utter failures? Is it because of social media? Pinterest? A deeper issue of low self-esteem, anxiety, or feelings of inadequacy?<br />
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Recently I made the shift from working full-time to becoming a stay-at-home mom. Before doing so, I imagined that not having to split myself between work and family duties would mean that I'd feel like such a great mom, a better wife, and more productive person. Then why is it, that in this season of life, where I have the option to devote 100% of my time and energy into my household, without the distractions of work, social obligations, or other outside commitments, I am finding myself feeling more anxious about my role as a mother than ever before? Why do I let myself believe that if I don't prepare 3 nutritious meals a day (from scratch), do an afternoon craft with my toddler, and have healthy after school snacks ready for my kindergartner I'm a terrible excuse for a housewife?<br />
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I've spent a lot of time thinking about this lately, and trying to really understand why we as parents put so much guilt, blame, pressure and negative self-talk on ourselves.<br />
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Let's use Halloween as a case study.<br />
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When I was growing up, Halloween was one day of the year. Sometime the week of Halloween you spent about 10 minutes carving a face into a pumpkin. Said pumpkin came out of a big cardboard box at the grocery store. Then you woke up that morning, put on a costume, went to a school party, and trick-or-treated after school that night. Our costumes were usually some terrible flexible plastic mask with a thin elastic string that was sure to break before the night was over. The rest of the costume was the equivalent of a garbage bag with printing on it. It would also surely rip during all of those trips in and out of the conversion van while you trick or treated. But did anyone care? NOPE! It was all about the candy! We didn't have cute coordinated trick or treat pails... you had a free plastic bag from the telephone company, a pillow case, or a brown paper sack from the grocery store. If you were real lucky, you had a McDonalds happy meal pail... yep, that was the DREAM. But if you didn't have one, you surely didn't question your parents love and devotion for you. Some kids had homemade costumes- but let me tell you, they weren't masterpieces- they were cobbled together, had less than perfect seams, and were usually comprised of items found around the house. There were no pinterest-perfect face paint jobs walking around on Halloween night. You never really cared what your friends were even wearing- you just wanted the candy! Of course there were a few students whose mothers just loved sewing and crafting and they looked perfect... but no one really cared. <br />
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We never went to a pumpkin patch or apple orchard unless it was a school field trip. Trunk or treat was unheard of. Halloween camping? Nope. Spending the three weekends before Halloween trick or treating at 5 or 6 different events? Definitely not. Once in a great while we visited Crossroads Village, a local amusement park with the girl scout troop for a haunted train ride and trick or treating... but it was by no means an expectation.<br />
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How did we get to where we are today then? Why is it that I feel like a bad mom because it's October 29th and we haven't been trick or treating yet? On one hand, I'd be a terrible mom if I allowed my boys to live on candy for the next 4 months, but at the same time I'm failing them for not taking them trick or treating 5 times? WHY? Do we honestly think our toddlers will care if they miss all these events they don't even know about? Of course not! One hour of trick or treating on Halloween night is more than enough for them! So why can't I convince myself of that?<br />
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We were just at DISNEY WORLD for last weekend for crying out loud! Disney World! And yet I still wallowed in mom guilt this weekend because I didn't take my boys to ride the haunted train at Crossroads. Did I even stop to think about how many trains, trams, and trolleys we rode at Disney and airports last week?!<br />
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Mom Guilt. Is it because we're all competing for the award of busiest family? Have we come to pride ourselves on the number of family outings we do with our children? Why are we doing this to ourselves? Why can't we just savor the holidays through our kids' eyes? They surely don't care about the fact that we spent 20 hours shopping for and preparing that perfect homemade costume. In fact, it probably resulted in numerous tantrums because they wanted our attention and we were too busy. <br />
They don't care about the incredible jack-o-lantern we spent 3 hours carving. They got bored 20 minutes into it and ran around the house while we sat yelling at them, and poured a mixed drink just to get ourselves through it all. For WHAT?!<br />
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Why is it considered "lazy" if we just go to the store, let them pick out a costume (that THEY are excited about), carve a simple pumpkin, and then take them through our community getting candy on Halloween night? They surely aren't holding us to the standard of perfection- they'd honestly probably have more fun this way. So why do we silently compete with each other for the best Instagram photo? Why do we tell ourselves that we're not good enough?<br />
THERE ARE NO AWARDS FOR "BEST AT HALLOWEEN!" <br />
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And of course this isn't just true for Halloween; this stuff pours over into everything we do as parents: every holiday, every family vacation, weekend, camping trip, etc. We convince ourselves that we need coordinated outfits, themed snacks, homemade crafts, and those picture perfect moments for everything we do! But do any of us really even care what the others are doing? Do we value people more who have cuter snacks, matching outfits, or best holiday decor? No, in fact, we secretly resent those friends- because they are reminders to us that someone else has it more together than we do. What a silly game we play.<br />
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This morning I attended my son's preschool Halloween party and I noticed another parent snapping pictures her child (as we all were... gotta blast those onto Facebook or we didn't really do it, right?!- Yes, I am making fun of myself). She kept saying to her daughter "look like you're having fun!" Now let me say this, I'm not shaming her. I'm sure we've all done this at one time or another. However when you're removed from the situation, you realize how silly it is. Shouldn't we focus more on making sure she IS having fun than if she appears to be for a photo op? Why can't we resist the urge to capture it all, share it all, show it all off? (Yes, I've already posted my own pictures of said party to social media- I'm not above any of this behavior- I'm just realizing how silly it all is). <br />
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I don't have the answers to this dilemma, but I am working hard to become more self-aware of my actions, to focus more on my kids' actual happiness and enjoyment than on what I THINK might make them happy.<br />
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We all have moments were we could do better- of course, we're human. But the fact is, there are millions of kids in this world who don't even have parents. And even more who have them, but aren't loved or cared for by them. We need to stop the guilt game. If your children are loved, clothed, fed, and have a safe home to live in- YOU'RE WINNING! Maybe you don't even have all of those boxes checked off, but you're working your hardest to get there- you're winning too!<br />
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At the end of the day, our kids aren't going to remember whether they had the best homemade costume, coolest pumpkin, most trick or treat events, or best porch decor- they're going to remember having fun, and whether their parents were joining in on the fun with them or standing on the sidelines yelling at them. I'm ashamed yet honest enough to admit there is typically more grouchy mom moments around here than the moments where I put my phone down, lower my expectations, and just have fun with my kids. It's hard. But there's just got to be a better way. Let me know if you've already found it.Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-20897029343538524962016-06-16T03:34:00.001-04:002016-06-16T03:34:19.911-04:00Travel day 5- Gotcha Day!I'm behind on my blogging, so this is post was started on and is about Monday- the day we got Will.<br />
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Today I woke up at 5am and there was no chance I was getting back to sleep. I spent some time getting caught up on Facebook and let James sleep until 6 and then we headed down to the lounge for breakfast- this hotel has the biggest breakfast spread I have ever seen!<br />
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We came back up the room around 7 and we got ourselves ready, tidied up the room and finished getting our bags packed. We ended up having a little time to kill before we had to be in the lobby to meet the group so we had fun goofing around with our selfie stick and chatting with a few friends.<br />
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Will's bag all ready to go!</div>
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We're ready to go!</div>
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My (un) traditional "pose by the door" oh your way to the hospital (government building) to meet your child shot :) </div>
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We met our group downstairs at 9:30- what an exciting time for everyone! We were. all so happy and in such an eager, anticipatory state it was just a room full of energy. We soon left to head to the civil affairs office to get our kiddos- it was a short bus ride, maybe 15-20 minutes. Our guide Yisha gave us some last minute tips and instructions and before we knew it, we had arrived!<br />
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Going in as Two, coming out as Three! </div>
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I expected Will and his caretakers to already be there when we arrived but when we walked in I did not seen them anywhere. I started watching other families get their kiddos and about 15 minutes after arriving we heard someone call out to us- is this your son? And sure enough, he was there with another boy- I Have no idea if they had been there the whole time and if so, how we missed them. <br />
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We walked over to them, and I tapped the caregiver on the shoulder and she turned around and got Will's attention on us. He was very happy to see us and immediately gave us a huge grin, and then began sharing the dried fruit he was eating with us- and the other 10 people in our vicinity. I had given the caregiver a bag full of gifts for the caretakers at Angel House, and Will found his way into that right away and tore into one of the boxes of jelly beans, then of course he needed to share those with everyone else also. One by one he/we began unpacking the bag of goodies/toys I had brought and playing with each item inside: bouncy ball, cars, toy planes, balloon (we also learned that he very well may be a champion volleyball player one day). We spent the next 30 minutes or so sitting on the floor in the middle of the room laughing, playing games, and having a blast. I got to speak to the two girls from Angel Home a little bit and they showed us some really special gifts that were sent with him. Cherries from his/our friend who is a volunteer there, and a special traditional style outfit she bought for him along with a ver special paining of one of his portraits which was extra special to me because it was of one of my favorite photos of him- the same or or very similar to the photo I've had framed on my desk at work for months.<br />
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Thanks for the cars, Becky! </div>
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Admittedly, I felt a little guilty because while he was running around laughing and having a blast most of the other children in the room were crying and screaming, terrified what they were experiencing- how I had always imagined our child would be on this day. I think a little bit of our situation has to do with his outgoing, happy demeanor, but I credit most of it to the amount of preparation Angel House had done for him- they had spent months talking to him and preparing him for this day. Showing him our photos, explaining to him what was about to happen, and reassuring him how much we loved him. I do believe it also helped tremendously that we had the chance to visit him at Angel House a few days prior to this. He recognized us as soon as we arrived and was able to associate us with the fun, loving people who he had already spent hours playing with just a few days earlier.<br />
After a while we had to go up to have our photo taken, which went very quickly and smoothly, and then shortly after that they said one of us needed to go to the desk to fill out paperwork. Since Will was in James' lap I went up, and when I returned I discovered that the nannies had left during that time. I was very bummed I didn't get to say goodbye but I understand they needed to get back and they had already stayed quite a long time already. Will was crying very hard and was understandably extremely confused. He did recover much faster than I would have expected him to and before too long was back to playing volleyball with the balloon. And then all of the sudden he was just done... He crawled into James' lap and refused everything offered to him. At that point we picked up our belongings and moved from the center of the room to the wall near the hallway where it was much quieter and darker. I could tell he was exhausted ad overwhelmed. Not long after that he fell asleep in James' arms, and then a little while later we were able to load up on the bus to head back to the hotel.<br />
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Our first family photo1 </div>
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I can't remember if he woke up before or during the bus ride, but I do remember him sleeping the morning ajority of the way here. Thankfully he did wake up when we were getting off the bus, which I was happy about because I didn't want him to wake up in the hotel room and panic not knowing where he was. As soon as we arrived to the room he was a burst of energy. He ran into the room, immediately found the photo album we were given from Angel House and brought it to the bed and showed us all his friends. I was worried this might trigger a meltdown, but I think it was very helpful for him. He closed up the book and then started jumping on the bed- this was was our first glimpse into the bundle of energy we had just brought into our lives. He has the most infectious lalaught I've ever heard and it filled my heart with joy to see him to so happy so quickly. Here's a video I shot of him walking into the room-<br />
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So my absolute favorite moment was when I gave him his stuffed monkey. Backstory: I bought two of these monkeys and mailed one to him in the care package we sent shortly after being matched. I had never seen it in any photos of him, so a while ago I inquired on whether or not he still had it, and was told that when asked what happened to it, his response was "oh that was a naughty monkey- he jumped out the window". Of course he's three so you have no idea what that might actually mean so we just sort of left it at that. Well when we got into the hotel room and I gave him the duplicate, he immediately, without any hesitation walked right over to the window and threw the monkey at the window. He has made it very to clear to us even still that he does not like that monkey! That's even funnier to me because twice the dogs had gotten ahold of it at home before we traveled and I was so upset and had washed it and dried it so carefully to be sure to preserve it perfectly for Will- well, I guess it's destined to be a dog toy because he hates it!<br />
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He told us all of the sudden he had to go pee so we rushed him to the toilet- being the first timers we are, we didn't do something right and he ended up with pee on his shorts, socks, and all over the floor. I know from many hours spent reading brace book groups that many of these kiddos are terrified of their first bath and really don't like you taking off their clothes that first time so I panicked a little in my heart knowing we'd have to do this so soon. He was apprehensive but willing except for his socks- so we took a bath with socks on. In my mind, I thought we were still doing awesome by getting him the tub at all so just go with it. He accepted the new outfit I presented without hesitatation and began running around the room laughing. We had a snack of jello and bread and then tried seeing if he might take a nap but he made it clear that was no going to happen. James had to leave for a while to go do some paperwork to prepare for our next day so I stayed in the room with Will. We explored every toy I had packed for him- cars, play dough, books, balls, etc. Then we sat in the window for a while watching the traffic below. He is a total chatterbox and he never stops talking. It's so sad for me to have no idea what he is saying but the few times I've had people watch his videos and translate he's basically just saying every single thing he sees.<br />
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James came back and then it was my turn to go. When I arrived back to the room I found them throwing pillows and running around- oh my, boys will be boys! We decided we needed a couple of things from WalMart so we loaded Will into the ergo carrier on James' back and made the trip out. Walmart here is nothing like it is at home. You enter on the ground floor, and then the actual store is split up into two levels on the 2nd ad 3rd floor. As soon as we left our hotel room he got very quiet and seemed to be a little nervous about what was going to happen next. We got up to the third floor and I was trying to engage with him when his face turned solemn and he said with extreme urgent envy "Niao Niao!" Which means pee-pee. James began to panic, assuming he was about to end up with urine running down his backside and legs. I frantically searched for a worker and the first one I found I pointed at him and said "toilet"" - blank stare- pointing at Will, "Niao Niao" and she understood, and escorted us to a trash can and took the lid off. Yep, nothing says welcome to parenthood like holding your child over a trash can in the clothing department of Walmart so he can pee into it. We couldn't stop laughing and we're just so thankful that he told us and that James stayed dry!<br />
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After that we decided we had enough adventure for the day so we returned to the room and had noodles for supper on the floor. We knew he could feed himself but it was amazing to watch how meticulous he is with the fork. He focuses so hard and will go for each and every little piece in the bowl and then drink the broth when he is done.<br />
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He's a very regimented child- he takes care of his dishes, wipes his face washes his hands, dries his hands and then is ready for the next task. This is clearly a sign of growing up in a group setting but this Mama is not sad about having a boy who insists on washing his hands before and after every meal and after going potty each time. <br />
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After washing his hands he began throwing his toys into the tub and turned the water on! Bath time again, ok! When he wants something he goes for it! We had so much fun watching him laugh and play in the tub. His joy is overwhelming and even though he is a handful to keep up with, it's just such a blessing to me to see the joy we have been seeing in photos for months manifest itself in real life. One of my biggest fears of this adoption would be that he would lose the joy we had fell in love with through pictures, and that does not seem to be the case, praise the Lord!<br />
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Loves the bathtub!</div>
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We got him all ready for bed and put his favorite show, Super Planes on the IPad and cuddled up in bed together. One of the many little details we are so thankful to know about him that we learned through the staff at Angel House. Now we are on day 3 together, and he knows every time he hears that music he climbs into bed with us and that means it's time for a nap or bedtime. Two episodes and he's out! That first night we did move him into his crib next to our bed because he was a sweaty mess and we have a big down comforter on our bed. He slept through the night- I think about 10 hours straight, and we actually had to wake him up the next morning for breakfast.<br />
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Thank you all for praying for this day and praying us through this day. It was magical and we really couldn't have asked for a better situation. We are so in love with our boy already and our hearts are so full. I'll try to continue getting caught up on the blog but in the meantime, enjoy the snippets on Facebook. My number one focus is on bonding with him and most of the time when when he's asleep this momma is too tired to do anything but join in!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-23096387592264414772016-06-12T10:58:00.002-04:002016-06-12T10:58:53.308-04:00Travel Day 4- Arrival in ZhengzhouToday was a travel/prep day for us. We got to take the high speed "bullet" train from Bejing to Zhengzhou (pronounced Jeng-Joe), which is in the province of Henan. This is where Will was born, so this is where we have to take custody of him and finalize the adoption.<br />
We woke up at 5:00 am to finish packing our bags so the bell boys could pick them up at 5:30. We finished getting ourselves ready and met the group members who were taking the train with us in the lobby at 6:15 we boarded our bus for the train station and had our pre-packaged breakfasts handed out- 2 apples, a peach, one juice, and about 5 slices of bread for each person. We all chuckled about that one but it was better than nothing! :)<br />
Our guide Jason was kind enough to get us right to the correct gate once at the train station to make sure no one got lost and everyone managed their luggage ok- CCAI guides really are amazing! One of the many, many things that really set them apart- they really take great care of every single step of this process. <br />
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James and I with Jason, one of our Beijing CCAI reps</div>
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Zhengzhou/Will, here we come!</div>
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The smog today was the thickest it has been since we've been here, and my throat has been feeling pretty scratchy all day. I'm assuming the two are related, but I'm loading up on vitamins and airborne just in case.<br />
The bullet train was a great experience. We paid just a little extra (still cheaper than the option to fly) for VIP seats, so we had a ton of room and had big comfy seats, and a private car with just us, another family, and one other Chinese man in it. I was shocked at how quiet and smooth the ride is, even though we were traveling up to nearly 200 mph at times.<br />
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There's our train!</div>
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Waiting for the Train</div>
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It was great to see more of the landscape of China- we saw a lot of different farm crops as well as a ton of tree nurseries. I'm not sure if it's related to the hundreds and hundreds of newly planted trees we saw all over the city or if China has always grown so many trees but it appears they are really working hard at greening up their cities. China is so much more westernized than I could have imagined, and in many ways more advanced and cleaner than any US city I've ever been to. One big difference is the landscape though. There are no small towns or even small cities here. Our entire journey here I saw farmlands juxtaposed against enormous high rises everywhere you looked. <br />
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You just can't fathom how many people are here until you see the astounding number of high rise housing developments. It's easy now for me to understand how 1/5 of the worlds population is Chinese.<br />
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Mopeds everywhere!</div>
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The view from our hotel room- 21st floor</div>
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The Hilton in Zhengzhou- our home this week- 38 stories!</div>
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We arrived in Zhengzhou (ZZ for short) around 12, and our guide brought us back to the hotel. Then she took one member from each family group to the bank to exchange money. When I walked into our room for the first time I saw the crib all set up next to our bed for Will- I definitely choked up a little bit at this sight.<br />
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Once James returned from that trip he and I went to a local noodle shop for lunch and had a good laugh at ourselves trying to learn how to eat ramen-style noodles with chopsticks. We eventually got the hang of it and the food was delicious so I'm sure we'll be making a few trips back there during our 5 day stay here.<br />
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Shortly after lunch our group headed to the nearby Wal-Mart to prepare for the next few days with our kiddos. We stocked up on snacks and of course had to sneak in a few new toys for<br />
Will. We recently found out that his favorite show is called Super Wings so I found a few of the figurines/toy planes to play with in the room. We came back and were so tired we wanted to go to bed right then but we both knew we'd be torturing ourselves if we did- we would wake up way too early tomorrow and then would just have to sit around and wait for our time to go and meet Will.<br />
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We finally motivated ourselves to get outside and go get some dinner, and just settled on something easy, close, and familiar- KFC. Little did I know that it was going to be so spicy my lips and mouth would be on fire, but it was still very good. It's so weird trying to order food that you're used to in a restaurant chain from the US but no one on staff speaks any English. They are always so sweet and kind to us and we eventually get our point across by pointing and using gestures. The Chinese are such kind, helpful people and the level of customer service we receive here is unlike anything I've ever experienced back home. It dawned on us during dinner that this was our last time eating out as a "party of 2" for quite a while.<br />
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Our last date night out without a kid or a babysitter. After 9 years together as just the two of us, things are really going to be different now!</div>
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We got back to the hotel room and got everything prepared for tomorrow- gift bags, money envelopes, and Will's bag- full of suckers, toys, and treats. I'm also packing a LOT of Kleenex- there will be 17 families receive 18 children tomorrow, all in one big room- I imagine a LOT of tears, from both the parents and the kiddos.<br />
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By this time, Will is on a train on his way here with one of the caretakers from Angel House. He will sleep on the train tonight and arrive into the city around 7am. Please pray for this little heart- that his fears are calmed and that he knows his mom and dad love him and are waiting for him. Also please pray for the many volunteers at Angel House who have cared for him the past 3 years- it is beyond evident how much they really love him and it's going to be heart wrenching for them to see him go, even though they are happy to know he has a family. My heart just hurts thinking about it.<br />
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Once again, I'm falling asleep as I type this so it's time for bed. Please know that around 10:00 pm Sunday night (Michigan time) we will be receiving Will into our arms forever. He is already our son in our hearts but now he's going to be with us for real. I have no idea what to expect for tomorrow but I'm so excited to see how it all unfolds.<br />
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I will try to post an update and photos as soon as possible after our "Gotcha Day" but no promises- we just have to wait and see how he is doing with everything. Have a great day everyone!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-70888321095324714442016-06-11T10:18:00.002-04:002016-06-11T10:18:49.107-04:00China Trip Day 2 & 3It's been a very busy, yet very fulfilling couple of days here in China.<br />
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Yesterday after I left off we headed to the hotel lounge for breakfast, and then loaded up on our bus at 9 am to head to <span style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; color: #222222; font-family: Roboto-Regular, HelveticaNeue, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Tiananmen</span> Square and the Forbidden City to tour. That was an incredible experience- to walk on stones that were laid down in the 1400s and to see the history we've been reading about and watching documentaries of come alive.<br />
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I continue to live in a state of having to continually remind myself that I'm really here- it all just seems very surreal at this point. One pleasant surprise I've found is that I really haven't noticed the effects of jet lag too bad. I think staying awake for a full 24 hour window actually helped so that on the very first night here I went to bed at a somewhat normal time and made sure to stay awake the entire next day. I think if we had allowed ourselves to take naps yesterday when we were feeling tired it would have really messed us up. We each woke up at least once in the night last night, but we both managed to fall back to sleep until the alarm went off at 5:30 am. Waking up that early isn't nearly as hard as I would think, maybe because it's already daylight out, we're eager to see what the day holds, and also because we are going to bed much earlier here than we do at home (8/9 vs. 12/1).<br />
After our tour of the forbidden city and the square we took a short bus ride to a traditional Chinese housing area, and took a rickshaw ride to a local family's house for lunch.<br />
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Because our group is so big (12 families or so) we had to split up into smaller groups and we each had lunch in a different area. Our group consisted of us and three oth er couples. This was a great time to get to know some of the families we are traveling with. Up until that point we were feeling a little like outsiders in our travel group as some of them had already started to get to know one another. We are the youngest couple in the group, and also the only first time parents. <br />
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After lunch we came back to the hotel and then James and I got to experience something very special which I will tell you more about later. For those of you who know that the special event was, just know that it went better than I could have ever imagined. :)<br />
We arrived back to the hotel pretty late- it was almost 8pm and we were extremely tired, so rather than venturing out to find food we just ordered a pizza and sat outside in the hotel's "beer garden". The pizza was very overpriced and tasted like cheap frozen but we were too tired and hungry to care. I was so tired when we got up to the room I fell asleep while chatting to a friend, in my clothes from the day and with my jewelry still on. James was in getting ready for bed and said he heard my phone hit the floor and came in to find me completely passed out.<br />
This morning we had to leave the hotel a lot earlier because they wanted to beat the traffic for the dragon boat holiday. We got up around 5:30, grabbed breakfast at the hotel and met in the lobby at 7:15. We drove to one of the many sites of the Great Wall and when we got there they gave us a few hours to climb. It was really stressful at first because there were a ton of people going up and down and it was really congested and people kept stopping but once we got up to the first pass the crowd thinned out quite a bit. This was unlike any climb we had done before- this section of the wall was extremely steep, and sometimes there might only be a few inches between stairs and sometimes they are so far apart I feel like I'm going to do the splits trying to get my leg up high enough to reach the next stop. We managed to get to the highest point at the section we were in and then had to turn around and get back down, which was actually more strenuous than the climb up. My legs were shaking so bad and it doesn't help that I'm afraid of heights and the stairs are extremely uneven so you can't really get a good rhythm going. <br />
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After the climb we had a while before our bus left so it was another good chance to chat a bit with some of the families in our group. Once everyone was back together we boarded our bus and headed to a government run restaurant and jade factory/store. This was another group lunch, filled with lots of good stories and laughter. There are a few families in our group who have adopted from China already so they had plenty of good stories to share with the rest of us. Both days our lunches were served in tradiontal family style, where a large number of dishes are served to the group and they are placed on a big lazy suzan in the middle of the table and everyone shares. Both lunches consisted of WAY more food than our group could possibly eat but this is a great way to try a lot of different options at once. Many of you know what a picky eater I am, and it's been a huge relief to find that every meal we've had there have been a lot of options that I have really enjoyed.<br />
Following lunch we all boarded the bus again and our driver drover us near Olympic Village to see the water cube and bird's nest that were constructed for the 2008 summer games. One thing I've noticed about Beijing from driving around is how green it is- there are little mini parks everywhere and the big main streets are all divided with parks running all along the center. I've never seem so many trees and flowers in a big city before. Many people think of Bejing as very dirty and full of pollution but it's really exrteremly clean.. The air quality is certainly an issue but today was bright and sunny with blue skies and clear air for most of the day. When the pollution does get really bad it just looks like a hazy/foggy day. It's easy to forget that it's anything other than weather.<br />
After our lunch we went to an acrobatics show which was a really cool- it reminded me of a cross between Shen Yun and Cirque de Soleil.<br />
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James and I lost track of our group's plans for the evening so again we just did our own thing for dinner. We went for a walk in the area near our hotel in search of a good noodle shop but didn't find one so we just ended up at Pizza Hut instead. It was nice to get out and walk around without a big group so we felt like we just blended into the crowd a little more. We wlalked through the big shopping district with the big Apple Store and all the designer name stores (Prada, Tiffany & Co, Rolex, Gap, etc).and then also stumbled across the well-known "food alley" street with the all street venders selling everything from steamed dumplings to cooked starfish and cockroaches on a stick. Interesting experience but no we didn't try anything.<br />
We got back to our room and took much overdue showers and got our laundry going. Tomorrow morning we have to have our luggage ready by 5:30 am and then depart the lobby at 6:15 to head to the train station for the bullett train to Zengzhou, where we will get Will and our adoption will become official. I'm really excited for the train ride- the train goes over 200 mph and we are traveling with one other family so it will be nice to get to know them a little better.<br />
Well, that's all for now, I'm struggling to keep my eyes open and my alarm goes off way too soon! Thanks for all of the prayers and well wishes- we are having a great time and are so excited to get Will on Monday. I hope you're all having a great week!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-64130061678857226712016-06-09T19:51:00.002-04:002016-06-09T19:51:53.988-04:00We made it to China!I started this post half-way through our flight, continued it right after we got to the hotel, and finished it this morning after waking up here on our first morning so it's a bit fragmented but at least you get the whole thing :)<br />
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Our luggage all packed and ready to go the night before we left- the big one is all Will's stuff!</div>
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<u>Written from the airplane</u>: Of course between finalizing our packing and preparation and pure excitement about the journey ahead, I only managed about 2 hours of sleep the night before our big journey was to begin. Nevertheless, that didn't stop me from eagerly waking up to the 4am alarm this morning- I cherished a few extra snuggles with each one of the cats and then got up to get in the shower and prepare for our flight. <br />
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You got it IPhone!</div>
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We left the house around 5:15 am and had a very easy time at the Grand Rapids airport. <br />
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Adios Grand Rapids!<br />
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By 7am we were in the sky, for a very short 29 minute flight to Detroit. We landed in Detroit around 7:30 am and after a short walk around the terminal, settled in for the next 5 1/2 hours. It was a bummer to have such a long layover, but I managed to get some thank you cards written out from the last two adoption showers, have a nice long catch up phone conversation with Amanda, and got to chat with Melanie quick while James took a nap. I took a walk to find some postage stamps and a mailbox to arrive back at the terminal to find the gate agents had arrived and a line was starting to form. <br />
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There's our plane!</div>
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Because we didn't have seats assigned yet we were a little unsure of what we needed to do in order to ensure our getting to sit together. We got in line but then they told us they were working on the seating arrangements and would page us to the counter. This was a little stressful because it was 1 1/2 hours before takeoff, and we hadn't eaten lunch yet, but when I asked the gate agent he said not to leave. So we sat for an hour, they never called us up, and then it was time to board. I gave up my hopes of indulging in some Chik-Fil-A and settled for some snacks from the closest gift shop and a couple of overpriced salads. We boarded our plane and were pleasantly surprised that the did get seated together, and James had a window seat. We are right in front of the bathrooms, which are incredibly busy, but at least we're not split up and we have a window to look out of. <br />
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Here we go! </div>
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So excited! (And tired!)</div>
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So far I've watched two documentaries on the in-flight entertainment, one about a man returning to China after having lived in the US for 40 years (My Life in China), and another one about Janis Joplin.<br />
I should be working on practicing/learning some Mandarin but I don't think my brain can really retain any new information right now... Hopefully I'll find a little time for that between now and Monday when we take custody of Will.<br />
So far it doesn't really feel like this is actually happening. I think it's just been such a long process of one task after the next and weeks of running errands that it just seems like we're in the midst of another errand. It's hard to comprehend that in another 9-10 hours we will be IN CHINA, and in just a few days we will get Will. 5 days until we become parents in real life and not just in our hearts. <br />
I don't really feel nervous or anxious about anything anymore, I think the best way to sum up how I am feeling is curious. I just wonder what it will be like when we land, how I will feel, how many hours I can make it on no sleep (I'm totally incapable at sleeping on planes) and how bad the jet lag/exhaustion is going to be from going nearly 48 hours on just a few hours of sleep. <br />
I know that we will be experiencing every kind of moment in the next couple of weeks- moments of pure magic, pure exhaustion, confusion, feeling overwhelmed, doubt, confidence, joy, fear, etc. But I also know that the same Great God that has carried us this far is also going to carry us through this time of great transition.<br />
As I sat in the airport earlier today (or was it yesterday... Hopping 12 time zones is confusing!), I was overcome with awe at how many people God has used to carry us through this journey- so many of you have prayed for us, bought t-shirts, coffee, purses, donated cash, shared our story, spoken words of encouragement, loaned us items, gifted us stuff for Will, thrown us parties, and just shared in our joy and excitement. I cannot tell you how much it means to us, and I also hope you realize that you were all part of a bigger plan- a promise that I heard that night back in March 2015- that if we stopped worrying about the logistics that God would provide. And He worked through so many of you to do just that. I'm seriously convinced we have the best circle of people in our lives imaginable.<br />
So far, I know that we have about 9 hours left on our flight, and when we land in Beijing we will be greeted at the airport by 1 or 2 guides from our agency who will take us back to our hotel. It will be 2:30 pm local time on Thursday when we land, 2:30 AM Michigan time. I'm hoping we can manage to stay awake until at least 8:30 local time so that we can go to bed at a somewhat "normal hour" as Friday is a BIG DAY.<br />
Well that's it for now. They made everyone shut the windows on the airplane and I'm getting drowsy. Maybe I'll try my hand at a little nap again. It's SO COLD on the plane- I'm wearing yoga pants and a long sleeve knit top plus a cardigan, wrapped up in two blankets and I"m still freezing (note to self, dress even warmer next time)<br />
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<u>Written from hotel room:</u><br />
The rest of the flight went well. The only thing that really bothered me during the journey was that a few hours into the flight they made everyone close the window shades and kept them close until the final hour of the flight. I can never sleep on airplanes, especially when I'm sitting right in front of the lavatories and an on my way to pick up our son, but regardless, my favorite thing to do is to look out the window every few moments to see the world from above. It was a bummer I couldn't do this especially since we were flying over places I had never seen from the sky. Hopefully they don't do the same thing on the way back. I passed the remained of our flight watching more movies and attemping (without success) to fall asleep. <br />
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So close! </div>
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Hello Bejing!</div>
When we got off the plane we went through customs and got our bags and then were greeted by our CCAI rep. She had to stay at the airport to wait for another family, so a driver took us back to our hotel. Our hotel room that CCAI booked is huge! It's bigger than our first apartment was, and has a kitchen, laundry, dining room, leaving room, and 2 bathrooms. <br />
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<u>Written next morning (today)</u><br />
We got checked in and settled into our room, and then had dinner in the hotel restaurant. The wait staff was really sweet to us, and right before we left, they came out and explained today was a very special holiday (Dragon Boat Festival) so they had some complimentary special dish for us to try- sticky rice wrapped up in bamboo leaves- delicious! We were both so tired that we came right back to the room, got ready for bed and fell asleep around 7pm local time. I slept until 5am and though I knew I should try to get another couple of hours I couldn't fall back asleep. Now it is 7 am and we we will get ready, grab some breakfast at the hotel and then meet up with our travel group. Today is a big day! We have our tours mentioned above and then something even better that I can't tell you all about just yet (hey just be thankful you get updates! ;) )<br />
Have a wonderful day everyone! Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-26781105130791487522016-05-22T01:28:00.001-04:002016-05-22T01:28:32.677-04:00Process and Fundraising UpdateWow, has it already been two months since my last update?! Time sure flies when you're busy preparing for a 3 year old!<div>
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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.</div>
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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.</div>
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I love yard sale deals!</div>
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Needless to say, we've been busy, but a very good kind of busy.</div>
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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! </div>
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Long story short- we could be leaving for China as soon as <i><u>three weeks</u></i> 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.</div>
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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.</div>
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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!</div>
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Here is the link to our fundraising page:</div>
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<a href="https://my.gobena.org/stories/hawkins-adoption-fund/?id=21">https://my.gobena.org/stories/hawkins-adoption-fund/?id=21</a></div>
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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. <a href="https://mystory.lifesongfororphans.org/stories/hawkins-family-adoption/" target="_blank">HERE</a> is that link.</div>
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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)</div>
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<b>For those of you not familiar with our puzzle fundraiser, the complete information is found <a href="http://www.worrylesslovemore.com/2015/11/puzzle-piece-fundraiser.html" target="_blank">here</a></b></div>
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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.</div>
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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!</div>
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I hope to include a more detailed update with more photos soon, but it's waaaay past my bedtime!</div>
Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-8968747481046888202016-03-14T22:49:00.000-04:002016-03-14T23:00:19.014-04:00Where there is a WILL, there is a way!Hello friends!<br />
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Here I am, slacking again on keeping my blog up to date, but this time I have a good excuse... we have been so busy and having so much fun preparing for the arrival of our little guy that I just haven't felt like sitting down in front of the computer.<br />
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At least two or three times a week, a great idea for a blog post crosses my mind, but by the time I get home I just can't muster the energy to sit in one place for enough time to get my thoughts out in a post.<br />
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<strike>This post will be brief, as it's getting late and I'm still recovering from daylight savings time sleep deprivation, but so much great stuff has been happening I wanted to keep you all in the loop.</strike><br />
"hindsight" edit- who am I kidding? I don't know how to do "brief"<br />
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The day after I wrote my last post, we got news that our letter of intent to adopt our son was accepted, and also that our Dossier (big packet of paperwork) was officially "logged in" to China's system... officially putting us in the LOA wait. Many people say that the wait for LOA is the most agonizing part of the adoption process, but for us it has been the most fun... we finally know who our child is, and can start preparing for their arrival. I feel like I'm in the third trimester of pregnancy without the swollen feet and ankles, aching back, sleepless nights, and constant runs to the bathroom.<br />
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I have been connecting with many other families who have adopted from our son's orphanage/foster home and have been able to find so many photos of him... such a blessing!<br />
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Now, for the moment you have all been waiting for... ready to meet our son? (many of you have already seen photos on Facebook, but in case you haven't, here he is!)<br />
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Meet William TianYi Hawkins! </div>
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Yep, that's right, we've also decided on a name! His Chinese name is Tian Yi, which translates as Tian= Heaven, Yi=wish this prounounced "Tee-En Yee". I can't think of a better fitting name... wish from heaven... yep, that's him!<br />
We decided early in the process that we would give him a more traditional first name and keep his all or part of his Chinese name as his middle name. Because we won't want to take away from the full meaning of his name we will push the two names together, but keep the Y capitalized... TianYi.<br />
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As I touched on in my last post, Will has malformations of all four of his limbs, namely his hands and feet. He was born without any fingers, and only one or two toes on each foot. But don't you worry, this little guy is going to be running laps around us and proving to us daily that you can do anything you set your mind to. It is clear his nannies have done an excellent job teaching him the importance of having a positive outlook... he is ALWAYS smiling and laughing in all of the photos and videos we see of him. <br />
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I love the name "Will" because it means "determined (protector)". When we got his file they sent us quite a few videos of him performing various tasks, such as stringing beads, turning the pages of a book, drawing with a pencil, sorting toys, etc... the very first thing that James and I noticed about him was how determined and focused he is. He does not let his limb difference slow him down one bit, and everything I've read about him echos the sentiment that this little boy is determined to do everything for himself.<br />
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So there you have it, we have our Will. :)<br />
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We started working on his bedroom, and this past weekend my mom and I went to a couple of consignment sales and to Target to pick up some toys and bedroom decor for him. I got a great deal on a train table, and wouldn't you know my parents, my husband and I spent quite a while working together to set up the track and "test out" the equipment... :)<br />
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We still have a long-ish road ahead of us, and we are still not fully funded for our journey, but I have decided to take a little break from grant applications and constant worry about the funding. We fully trust that everything will fall into place as needed.<br />
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Of course we are still pinching pennies and saving whatever we can (and I've been able to get some overtime hours in at work due to the busy season for mortgages starting), but I was just becoming so consumed with financial worry that I was missing out on soaking up this special time for our family.<br />
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Our puzzle fundraiser will continue to run until we travel to pick him up, and as it stands our puzzle is still only 25% complete. If you would like to sponsor any pieces, please refer to the instructions for doing so by clicking <a href="http://www.worrylesslovemore.com/2015/11/puzzle-piece-fundraiser.html" target="_blank">HERE. </a><br />
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Unless we receive any of the grants we have applied for so far, we are currently about $5,000 short of being able to fully cover the costs of our remaining fees and agency costs. Knowing that it is unlikely that we will face huge medical costs when we arrive home sets my mind at ease, and if we have to take out a small loan to cover the remaining expenses then we will certainly do that. <br />
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I'm also considering a small yard sale in May during our neighborhood sales, but I'm not sure I can pull it off due to having a VERY busy couple of months ahead of us. Between now and the time we travel we have 4 baby showers, a wedding (that we are both standing up in), and a few small projects on the house we'd like to get done.... but that's ok! The busier we are, the faster time will pass, right? ;)<br />
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I just cannot explain to you the amount of love we have in our hearts for this little boy, and how quickly it grew. We think about him all day, we dream about being with him and playing trains, and we talk about the things we will learn together and the experiences we can't wait to share with him. Our first few months together will likely be very difficult months- he has spent his entire life in a wonderful foster home with very dedicated nannies who love him dearly and care for him as their own. He will be experiencing tremendous loss, fear, and confusion. While we know this, we also know that God has a plan for this child and for our family, and that He will be with us as we walk through the dark days and will carry all of us through the struggles. <br />
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I will do my best to keep up as things progress, but there are the steps we are waiting on.<br />
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We are currently in day 25 of our "LOA wait", and expect to be waiting at least 2 more weeks before we receive word that our dossier and intent to adopt Will has all been cleared. At that point we go through a series of steps to get immigration approval coordinated between the US and Chinese governements... a process that usually takes around 9 or 12 weeks. Then we will be issued travel approval, and about 2 weeks later will hop on a plane to China!<br />
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We are in the final months (we hope!) of our lives as a "party of 2".... crazy! It seems like this journey has gone by so quickly, and at the same time the thought of waiting three more months to meet him seems SO LONG! We are really crossing our fingers that we will be able to travel in June, but anything is still possible... there are still a lot of steps to get through, so I'm trying not to get my heart set on anything. At least we know he's in a wonderful place with people who love him dearly.<br />
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We were able to send him a small care package a few weeks ago and received word that he did receive the items we sent him. I can't really say much, but we were told that he knows he has a family and seems happy about that fact.<br />
Here is a photo of the items we sent to him:<br />
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We put together a little photo album with labels in Mandarin introducing us, the pets,and Grandparents so that he will be familiar with our faces when we meet</div>
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If you would like to join us in praying for our son and his nannies, that would be much appreciated. It's helpful to remember that China is 12 hours ahead of us, so when I am getting for work every morning, he is going to bed. When I'm going to bed he is likely eating lunch, and when I am eating dinner he is probably waking up. I try to remember this when I pray for him. I pray that he finds comfort in knowing that he has a mom and a dad, and that he finds courage to face the huge changes that lay ahead of him. I also pray for comfort and peace for his caretakers. I worked four summers at a daycare, and I STILL think of those children I cared for all of the time. I cannot imagine working with a child (and possibly even living with?) for 3 1/2 years and then having to say goodbye, not knowing if I will ever see them again. They have been there for every one of his milestones- his first words, first steps, first bumps and bruises and illness. They have wiped his tears, watched him laugh and run and play and soon they will have to say goodbye. My heart truly aches at the thought that our joy accompanies others pain. </div>
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That's all for now, good night everyone! Thanks for following our journey!</div>
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I apologize in advance for typos or grammar errors....I am too tired to edit the post tonight! Take that, grammer Nazis!<br />
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Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-75006482723505402842016-02-18T21:59:00.002-05:002016-02-18T22:00:28.503-05:00BIG NEWS!Well, a lot can change in just 2 weeks!<br />
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I have been meaning to do an update for almost a week now, but every night has been busy and now there is a lot to catch you all up on!<br />
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I have so many ideas for blog posts in my mind but since it's getting late and I have big news to share I will cut to the chase and make this an update style post, but I do have so much other stuff on my heart that I hope to share with you soon.<br />
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First of all, we got great news on 2/12- are are officially DTC! (Dossier to China)<br />
But even better, we got word that the little boy who we were matched with in December, the boy who stole our hearts and I haven't stopped thinking about and praying for since was matched with a family! That is really all I know at this point and I hope and pray we somehow get to connect with his parents at some point so that we can follow his progress but either way, I feel like I can finally sleep a little better at night. I knew in my heart that God had a plan for him, and that God was going to find the perfect parents to care for his medical needs but it was just killing me to see it picture every day on my agency's web page.<br />
I kept telling James that there was no way I would be able to accept another match if he was still waiting for a family, because it would just feel like I was letting him down. I still lay awake at night wondering if we could have made it work for him to be our son, but it's not fair to commit to a child that you aren't 100% certain you can provide everything he may need, and we were definitely not certain.<br />
And it's a good thing that this all happened on Friday, because Monday we got a call from CCAI- with ANOTHER MATCH! I tried SO HARD to remain calm and collected this time and not let myself get all worked up and instantly attached like we did the last time.<br />
I got the call at work, I think it was around 3 pm. They explained on the phone that they had a little boy who had just turned 3, and that he had limb malformations (that's really all I can say at this point). He asked if I'd like to review the file and I said yes, so just like last time he said to let him know within 24 hours if we were interested, and then if we were we had until the following Monday to give them our final answer.<br />
I did take a quick peek at the photos before I left work, and wow, is he ever a cutie!<br />
I called James around 4 pm and told him not to work late, to come right home because we had another file to look at. <br />
When we were both home we reviewed everything together and right away I felt there was no doubt in my mind that we were totally prepared to be his parents. His medical needs are something that is totally within our ability to care fore, and will allow me to return to work and him to daycare.<br />
James said he was definitely interested in getting more information, so I called my friend Carolyn (who is a pediatric NP) and had her review the file to help us decipher the medical terminology and labwork/blood tests. James needed time to think everything over and process things, so we decided to sleep on it and have the orthopedic PA who helped us last time take a look at his xrays and medical information just to affirm what we thought about this possible treatment plans, etc.<br />
The next evening when I got home form work James came in so excited to show me videos of really neat prosthetic devices that might one day be helpful to our kiddo and he said he was ready to make a commitment to this child. We sent off the email to our adoption agency and began making phone calls to family members.<br />
It felt so good to finally know that I could let my emotional guard down a little and allow myself to say THIS IS MY SON! <br />
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I can't wait to share his photos with all of you, but I cannot do so until we have approval from the Chinese government to adopt him, so just hang tight.<br />
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We are so incredibly blessed that he is in a WONDERFUL foster home, and we have so many photos and videos and information on him. He is such a bright, happy child and is laughing in almost every picture we have. The videos they sent me show that he is incredibly intelligent and determined. My heart beams with pride watching him overcome his physical differences and do whatever task is set in front of him. I have no doubt in my mind that this child will be completely capable of doing anything he puts his mind do. The only limitations he will ever know will be those that other people teach him... and we certainly won't be those people!<br />
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So what next?<br />
We sort of have two processes happening simultaneously.<br />
We are still waiting on the news that we are LID (logged in dossier), and then from there we will wait to hear that we have LOA (letter of approval)<br />
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Also happening now, we just submitted a LOI to the Chinese government stating our request to adopt this specific child, so we will wait for them to approve us.<br />
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Even though we have been in the process for a while now, in terms of China they didn't really know we existed until just this week... everything we have done up until this point was for our home study and/or our adoption agency.... so now we have to wait for the whole approval process to go through on China's side.<br />
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After that we go through all of the steps with the US Immigration to bring this kiddo into the country and get his citizenship.<br />
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All of this to say.... even though we would love to jump on a plan tomorrow to go get our little guy, we've got a long wait ahead of us. Most likely time frame is 4-5 months. I'm hoping for sooner and planning for longer just so we don't get our hopes up and later face disappointment.<br />
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We still have a long way to go before we are fully funded so we will continue working on fundraising and grant applications, and try and fight the urge to buy every cute thing we see... and boy is it hard. Leaving Costco last night without a swimsuit, life jacket, mini beach chair, adorable Easter/dress suit, and toys was nearly impossible, but I did it! I will not let myself buy clothes until we are closer to travel!<br />
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Well it's getting late and I have to get ready for work tomorrow but I wanted to keep everyone posted as to what's going on.<br />
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I look forward to sitting down this weekend and finalizing a name, and hopefully getting started on getting little man's bedroom ready! I've never been more excited to redo a bedroom before!!!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-34578120437950454592016-02-01T21:34:00.001-05:002016-02-01T21:35:48.155-05:00Slow and Steady Wins the RaceHello friends!<br />
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How is it possible that more than a month has gone by since my last update?! I guess it's a good thing that time is going by quickly, because when I think about how far we are from traveling to China I get really discouraged, but thinking about how quickly the past two months have gone gives me hope that these next ones will pass by quickly too.<br />
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I would love to tell you that I have a lot of new information to share regarding our adoption progress, but that sadly is not really the case. We have made significant progress, just not as much as I would have liked. One of the main reasons you haven't heard from us is that there really just wasn't much information to share. And I know that you had no interest in hearing me whine and complain about how slow everything seemed to be moving through these past couple of steps.<br />
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Another reason is that I really just needed some time to grieve through the experience of having had to say no to the first file match. I was not expecting to be matched that early in the process, and was definitely not prepared to have to say no to a file. I still pray for that little boy every single day. His file is still on our agency's website which means he has not yet been matched with a family. Please join me in saying a prayer that he will be matched soon. <br />
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<u>Here is what <i>has</i> changed since my last post.</u><br />
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We enjoyed a wonderful Christmas holiday spending time with my parents. My mom is going through some medical issues right now and may be feeling a little under the weather these next few months, so it was really nice to spend some quality time together and getting out and having some fun while she was still feeling up to it. We grilled steaks on Christmas day and took a drive out to a local lake (because when it's 45 and sunny on Christmas day in Michigan... you feel the need to be at the lake I guess), we visited our local public museum, saw a movie at the theater using a gift card I've been saving up, and just enjoyed our time together.<br />
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On Monday 12/28 I sent the first 11 documents in to our adoption agency, and also notified them that we would not be pursuing the file of the little boy I had told you about.<br />
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Here is what a 95% completed Dossier looks like:<br />
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I had already scheduled the day off work, and was able to walk in early for my fingerprinting, and thankfully they allowed me to do so. This all worked out wonderfully because I got the paper I needed in order to do my fingerprints that day the Saturday before, just in the nick of time.<br />
James had a busy week at work that week, so he wasn't able to go in and get his fingerprints done until his scheduled appointment time, the following Monday (1/4).<br />
The fingerprinting is required for our US Immigration, and once you get fingerprinted you are waiting one on little piece of paper to be mailed to you to tell you that you are approved to adopt by the Department of Homeland Security. From everything I had been reading and seeing in the adoption groups on Facebook, people were getting their approval letters on average 4-10 days after their fingerprinting appointments. Once this paper arrived, it needed to be notarized, certified, sent to the consulate for authentication and THEN sent to our agency to complete our Dossier.<br />
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Let me tell you how hard it was to come home every day from work to check the mailbox and get NOTHING for over 2 weeks. It doesn't help that we can only get to the Secretary of State on Wednesday nights and Saturday mornings, so each Friday and Tuesday the form didn't come it was extra disappointing.<br />
The approval FINALLY came on Friday 1/22- Happy Birthday to me (Yahoo for being 30 and officially old enough to adopt from China)! So of course the next morning we raced to the bank to get it notarized and then to the Secretary of State to have it certified. By Monday at lunchtime it was on it's way to Chicago to be authenticated. I thought we would JUST squeak in under the deadline to get it to our agency so they could get it to China before the Chinese government closes for Chinese New Year (CNY). Sadly,I have learned that is not the case... we missed it by about 2 days. The form will arrive to our agency tomorrow, but since the shutdown begins next week, our agency won't mail it until after CNY to avoid it getting lost. Totally understandable, but this is the step we've been so eagerly waiting for for so long and it was a bit of a bummer to hear that it will be delayed by at least another week.<br />
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My initial goal was to be DTC (Dossier to China) by December 31, but the delays with our home study made it clear that wouldn't happen. Then I set the goal of having that step reached for my birthday, but of course the delay with our fingerprinting approval held that up. And now another delay that is out of our control-the biggest holiday of the year in China. But honestly, that is just the name of the game in international adoption- you can do everything in your power to get things done quickly, but so much of the process is really just waiting on things are are totally beyond your control. Facebook is such a blessing to be able to be in touch with so many other adoptive families- to share advice, ask questions, and learn so much about this crazy journey we are on- but it can also be dangerous, because there is a huge temptation to constantly measure your progress against everyone else. I was in touch with a number of people who were fingerprinted weeks after we were and got their approval sooner. Why? We will never know, and really it doesn't matter. This adoption will happen according to God's plan and not ours. Everything will come to be in his perfect timing.<br />
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Our next steps are getting that DTC email from our agency (this step is a huge deal in the adoption journey because it means that all of our paperwork is done, it's in order, and it's shipped to China!)<br />
A few days to a few weeks later (or in our case, maybe a few months, lol)... we'll receive notification that we are LID (Logged In Dossier). This means that China has acknowledged receipt of our paperwork and we are logged into their computer system. At this stage we are eligible to receive matches of children with more mild special needs. It is said that you can usually expect to travel approximately 4 months after you are LID.<br />
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Between LID and travel is another slew of paperwork, and of course more waiting.<br />
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At this point, we are assuming the earliest we might travel is June. We were really hoping to travel sooner, as airfare costs double during June/July/August, but as long as we have kiddo home before Christmas next year we won't complain! There are of course certain benefits to getting to travel in June... that means that our time off from work will also coincide with my favorite months of the year, and will allow us to have more than a week of "summer vacation" just one time in our adult lives. This is not necessarily good news for my coworkers, as these are the busiest months of the year in our industry, but of course I have no control whatsoever over when we get to go to China. I will feel bad leaving during such a busy time, but after waiting this long to finally meet our child, there will be nothing holding me back from traveling at the first available opportunity.<br />
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It seems like we have been on this journey for so long already, but in reality it hasn't even been a year yet! I saw on my personal Facebook the other day in my "on this day" app that it was just about one year ago exactly that we really started exploring the idea of adopting. So in one year, we went from thinking about adopting to having all the initial paperwork done and turned in to do so!<br />
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Because we know that aboslutely no progress in our case will occur during the next couple of weeks, we are using this time to get as many applications in for grants as possible. We have been working so hard to save every penny possible these past 6 months, and have also been so incredibly blessed by your generous contributions to our fundraisers, but we are still figuring we have between $7,000-$9,000 to come up with, so we are going to submit as many applications for adoption grants as we can.<br />
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Our kitchen table has looked like this for months, and I don't see that changing any time soon. <br />
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It's hard not to stress about the finances in this process, but just as God promised on that night back in March, He has been faithful at each step along this journey. Last week we submitted our second round of big fees, and between what we had saved up from the puzzle fundraiser and our personal savings we had exactly enough to cover the costs. <br />
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And while my head spins at the thought that we still have 2/3 or more of the adoption costs ahead of us (a large portion being the travel costs), I know that God will provide. Worry Less, Love More, right?<br />
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<u><b>Puzzle Update</b></u><br />
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Today marks exactly 3 months since we began our Puzzle Fundraiser, and our puzzle is a little over 25% complete! So far, we have received sponsorship for 257 of the 1,000 pieces, and have 743 still available. If we were to sponsor each one of the remaining pieces at an average of $10 each, our adoption would be fully funded! (Pieces can be sponsored for as little as $1.00 each- see complete instructions <a href="http://www.worrylesslovemore.com/2015/11/puzzle-piece-fundraiser.html?m=1" target="_blank">here</a>: <br />
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Here is how the puzzle looks today:<br />
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The pieces right side up are the ones that are still available. While I realize we may never complete the entire puzzle, I really hope to at least finish the border and the big dragon before our trip to China.<br />
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Thank you so much to all of you who pray for us, who follow along in our journey, and who let us know that you're thinking of us. It really means the world to us to know that we aren't alone in this journey, and we hope that in another month or two we'll have a picture of a precious child to share with you all!<br />
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I wish you all a happy, health, 2016!<br />
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If you have any interest in Chinese culture, do a little research on the Chinese New Year celebrations. 2016 is the year of the Monkey, and the Chinese New Year beings February 7th. We might head to a local celebration this weekend that is being sponsored by our home study agency to learn more about the holiday for ourselves.Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-7247580004416673342015-12-26T21:42:00.001-05:002015-12-26T21:42:41.243-05:00A Weary Heart RejoicesMerry Christmas to all of my friends!<br />
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I hope that you have enjoyed a wonderful Holiday weekend full of love, laughter, hugs, and HOPE!<br />
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It has taken me a few days to gather my thoughts in order to write this update.<br />
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Though we HAVE had a wonderful Christmas, full of love, laughter, hugs and hope, our Christmas admittedly started off a little rough.<br />
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As you may remember, we were matched with a child's profile on December 15th, and were told we had until Monday, December 21st to reach a decision. We had requested additional information regarding that child's medical diagnosis and current condition, but were told if the information didn't come back before Monday the 21st we would have to make a decision regardless. As you remember, James and I had decided that unless we DID hear back, and the information we got painted a drastically more severe picture than what we currently saw, we were going to proceed with the file.<br />
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Monday came and went, and I never heard from the adoption agency one way or the other. I called them on my way home from work, expecting to be told they needed our commitment to move forward with the file that night. Instead, she told me we could wait until Wednesday to see if the information requested came in. I was a little disappointed, just because I was eager to move out of the "uncertainty" stage and ready to make a commitment, but trusted that this was happening for a reason and it was probably wise to give it a little more time.<br />
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I did not hear anything Tuesday, so again on Wednesday morning I emailed them asking if there was any news and what we needed to do. She said there was in fact a response from the orphanage, and that she would sent it to me right away, but we needed to let them know that day, before they closed for the Holiday. I quickly punched out for lunch so that I could review the information. Unfortunately, what I saw when I opened the files was the worst case scenario.... our little boy's condition was MUCH more severe than had initially been implied. We had inferred from the earlier information that he had never had surgery on his legs, but now that we got pictures without all the big puffy clothing on, we saw that his legs had scars in multiple locations, indicating at least 2 or three prior surgeries. There was no muscle tone whatsoever, and we were also informed that he experiences a lot of pain, and is in pain whenever the nannies bump him. We were also told this he has problem with all of his joints. This does not mean that we were intentionally misled or lied to with the first set of information. We will never know why some of this information wasn't included in the original file, and at the end of the day, that isn't important.<br />
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Suddenly our future went from raising a child who will likely be able to stand and walk after therapy and a possible surgery or two, to raising a child who will likely never be able to stand or walk, and is a large deal of pain right now. Of course anything is possible... it's impossible to diagnose a patient from a few photographs. However, with adoption you have to prepare yourself for the worst case scenario. You have to be committed to the worst case scenario. And for the sake of this child, you have to be sure that you can handle the worst case scenario.<br />
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I began scrambling to contact every doctor and adoptive mother I had talked to regarding his suspected diagnosis over the past week. Thankfully, I did get quite a bit of information back by the end of the day, but I hated the idea of making a decision without talking to James face to face. The doctors who did respond were all in agreement this this child was now a severe case, and would likely never stand or walk independently. I contacted the agency asking for at least until 6 pm EST (they are 2 hours behind us) and they said we could actually just take until Monday the 28th, because they were not able to match him to another family this late in the day anyway.<br />
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I think I knew in my heart right away that we didn't have what this little boy needs, but I wasn't ready to admit that to myself or to anyone else. I was feeling so lost, so heartbroken, so confused. How could something that felt SO RIGHT just days before, feel so wrong now? How could I have felt so much peace, and have been so convinced about God's plan for this child in our lives, and now have all of that unravel before my eyes? My heart just ached for this little boy, and his scarred legs, thinking of how scary it was to go through those painful surgeries without a mom and a dad to comfort you and hold you through the pain. Man, adoption is just HARD sometimes. You know going into this journey that it's going to be hard, but you have no idea in what ways.<br />
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I hoped from day one that we would never have to say no to a file, that God would somehow match us to the perfect child for our family on the first file assigned. It was so hard for me to reconcile the idea that even if we did not accept this file, we were not being disobedient to God's calling for us. I reached out to my adoptive community for support, and was overwhelmed with encouragement and understanding, but I still had to go through a grieving process that I wasn't prepared to go through. I think I spent most of Wednesday night in a state of grief and shock. I just felt so confused and so lost.<br />
<br />
There were so many "God sightings" those first few days after being assigned his file, and so many reasons why we were SO CONFIDENT that this was our child, and that no matter what happened, God was going to provide us with whatever we needed to care for him. But now I could also say that maybe it was God's doing that the agency gave us those extra days, and that we got the additional information, He was protecting us from getting in too deep. The thing about God's plan is.... we'll never be able to comprehend or understand it. Just when we think we have it all figured out, He reminds us that we don't have a clue... our minds just aren't big enough. We just have to pray, and trust, and seek direction with each new day. The more I sought direction with this situation, the more I felt that it was ok to acknowledge our limits, and it was ok to admit that this child's needs were just beyond our limits of care of provision.<br />
<br />
It wasn't a matter of whether we were willing to make sacrifices- I wasn't sad for ourselves about raising a child with limitations. I was sad and heartbroken to think of not being able to give him the best life possible. And in my heart, I knew it wasn't fair to anyone to bring this child into our home. We simply aren't in a place to provide for this child. It's so hard to say that, because I know full-well that when you have your own children, that's not a choice you get to make. You can't choose what condition your child might or not be born with, and whatever they are born with, you make the best life you possibly can for them, no matter what it takes. But it was important to remind myself that this child has already suffered the consequences of ill-prepared parents once in his life. From here on out, he deserves parents who have everything he needs. And it's humbling to admit that you just don't have those things. By letting ourselves say no, we will be allowing ourselves to say YES to a file that we can adequately provide for. And hopefully, in another year or two, we can say YES again. And maybe again... who knows :). <br />
<br />
Over and over again, however, others reminded me that I needed to listen to my intuition- that if I didn't have peace about moving forward, this wasn't our son, and I needed to release his file so that his parents could find him. It felt like I was betraying him, like I wasn't being faithful to God's promise to provide for our needs. However, I knew that if it was the right thing to do, I would be feeling peace about it, and I just wasn't, and neither was James. We thought about the fact that it was very likely that accepting this file would mean I would have to quit my job and how that would mean we wouldn't be able to adopt any other children. We thought about the fact that we would likely have to rehome our animals so they weren't bumping him and causing him pain, and how we probably couldn't send him to daycare, that we would need to move, get a new vehicle, and so on... there were a lot of reasons that told us we just weren't the right parents for him. At this point in our lives, we do not have the resources to provide for the needs he has. We will always think of him, and will always be praying for him. I hope that somehow I can advocate for him, and that maybe even I'll see someone post about adopting him one day and will be able to follow his story. One good thing is that now all of the information we gathered will remain a part of his file, so that the next time he is matched to a family, they will get everything up front, so they will be able to make a more informed decision from the start.<br />
<br />
We attended my family Christmas party on Christmas Eve. The party where I imagined I would be passing around his photo, introducing our newest family member. Instead I had to explain to those who had read the good news about what had happened, and I feared having to deliver bad news on such a happy occasion. Thankfully, everyone was (of course) more than understanding, and extremely supportive. Not that I expected any less, it's just a hard thing to deal with. We also were able to spend a little bit of time with James' grandparents and mom, and they were also in agreement with our decision. <br />
<br />
We have not officially declined his file, just because our agency is closed, but as soon as we decided that would be our decision, and we told our close family and friends, we both felt the peace we were looking for before. We knew we were making the right decision, not just for US, but for HIM. Please join us in praying for this little boy in China, whose legs don't work, and who is in pain. Pray that he is matched with a family who can give him the life he deserves, and pray that he finds relief from his pain and knows the love and comfort of a mom and dad soon.<br />
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Now for the REJOICING!<br />
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Christmas Eve we got a special package in the mail- our first 12 documents came back from Authentication! They are all ready to be sent to our agency to go in our Dossier. One thing I thought was sort of neat is that they are all signed by John Kerry (original signatures, no stamp!). Kind of crazy to think of someone so well-known handling our documents and signing them. I wonder how many of these he does every day...<br />
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And one more celebration- my fingerprinting notice finally came today! I was really hoping this would happen, as I have Monday off work. I'm going to try and walk in early to try and get my fingerprinting done on Monday so that I don't have to try and go before work on my scheduled day and have to be late getting there and just deal with all of that stress. Keep your fingers crossed for me that they let me do this. Strangely, James' approval didn't come. His will likely arrive Monday or Tuesday, so we will just have to go at separate times.<br />
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Who knew that paperwork in the mail could be SOOO exciting?!<br />
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And finally, one more cause for rejoicing! If you remember, the day we first go news that we had a match, we had also gotten bad news regarding the health of a family member.<br />
Well, this time, the day we got bad news about the child's file... we got GOOD news about our family member. They had some additional tests run, and they came back with favorable results, so the situation isn't any worse than what we had already been told- praise God!<br />
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So there you have it... a weary heart rejoicing. We will continue to keep you all posted regarding the status of our adoption, but I promise, next time I won't post news about a match until we have locked everything in- no more emotional roller coasters for our readers! Just because we go through them doesn't mean you all have to as well.<br />
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Thank you to each of you who shared in our joy last week- I really wish I didn't have to bear the bad news that I did today. :( Please pray for continued guidance and direction as we navigate this difficult journey. Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-18016520397707169122015-12-20T18:53:00.000-05:002015-12-20T18:53:00.066-05:00The CallWow, a lot can happen in 15 days. A lot can happen in ONE day.<br />
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Let me bring you up to speed.<br />
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On Tuesday, December 8th our home study report was finally ready! James went to the home study agency's office on his lunch hour and picked up the report, and then stopped at the post office on his way home to mail out our I-800A application. (this is the document that goes to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to give us permission to bring an adopted child into the country).<br />
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On Wednesday December 9th we made another trip to the Secretary of State in order to have the home study report certified. (remember, each document that gets sent to China has to be notarized, then state certified to attest to the validity of the notary, and then authenticated by the Chinese consulate to attest to the validity of the state seal... yes, a lot of hoops!). We will have 13 notarized, certified, authenticated documents which will make up our Dossier, which is the big packet of paperwork and photographs that gets sent to China for them to determine whether or not we are a suitable family to adopt a child. The last document in this packet will be our I-800A, which will come after they process the I-800A application and we go in for fingerprinting. While we wait for that last document, we went ahead and sent the first 12 documents to be authenticated, so that we can get them back, send them to our agency to review, and when that last document comes in they will have (hopefully) already reviewed the others. This also gives us time to correct any mistakes that could be on the first 12 documents (which we are hoping are not there).<br />
When we got to the secretary of state's office that night the line was the longest we had seen it yet. (I think this was our fourth trip for adoption paperwork so far). We only had an hour before the post office was closing, so I quickly gave up hope of getting everything mailed out that night. Low and behold, we finished at the secretary of state with 10 minutes to spare! The mail truck was already waiting outside at the post office, but we made it in the nick of time and got our documents sent out that night.<br />
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From there, we just wait for paperwork to flow through the right
channels. It's hard to explain, but once we got to this stage, all of
my anxiety was gone. I was suddenly fine with the wait that I knew was
coming, and felt a big burden lifted off my shoulders. <br />
<br />
Our documents get sent to a courier, who will review them for accuracy, and then walk them into the consulate and then go pick them up when they are ready. There are a few different consulate offices around the country, but because the one closest to us (Chicago) had recently changed their rules about notarization just days after we had our documents done the way they no longer allow, we have chosen to use the one in Washington D.C. Of course this consulate allows our notarization, but does require an extra step that the documents get certified by the U.S. Government office before the Chinese consulate. If you try and make sense of this stuff it just makes your head hurt- you just have to follow the rules and not ask questions. For example, your documents cannot be mailed to these agencies- they must be walked in in person. That is where the courier comes in. Since we cannot spend multiple days walking documents from one office to the next in Washington D.C., our courier will take our documents to the first stop, go pick them up, and then take them into the second. When they are ready they will mail them back to us. Bureaucracy at it's finest! I don't really care one way or the other how complicated it is... so long as it gets done!<br />
(I did check in with our courier on Friday, and our documents should be in the mail to us by Tuesday or Wednesday of this week.)<br />
<br />
As far as we were concerned, the remaining steps would be:<br />
<br />
-Receive appointment for our fingerprinting<br />
-Get first 12 documents back from embassy and forward them to adoption agency<br />
-Get last document (I-800) in the mail, have it notarized, certified, and then sent for authentification and then sent on to our agency<br />
-Once the agency has your complete dossier, they review it, translate, and then send it to China (adoptive families call this step DTC-"Dossier to China" and it marks a huge milestone because at this point, it's all just a waiting game... no more running around getting papers stamped, sealed, approved, etc).<br />
-Once the packet arrives in China and they log you into their database, you are consider LID- "Logged In Dossier"<br />
-On the traditional adoption path, it is at this point that you can be matched with a child. We were planning/anticipating this step to happen sometime in late January or early February provided no major hiccups with our paperwork. A few months back I would have assumed this to take even longer, but certain steps are taking much less time than they have historically and other families have been seeing much faster processing of their paperwork. (I'm connected to many different groups on Facebook where other adoptive families are able to share advice, ask questions, and encourage one another on our journeys).<br />
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Fast forward to Monday, December 14th. One of our family members had had a medical procedure done the week prior, and would be going in the next day to find out her results. I was talking to her on Facebook just before bed giving her my well wishes and I said "Just think, in another month or two you'll get to see the face of your new relative for the first time." She was shocked it could happen that soon, and we talked about how exciting that day would be.<br />
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The next day, I waited anxiously at work for the phone call from to fill me in on what kind of news they got from the doctor. I finally got in touch with them around 1:00, and unfortunately it was not the news we were hoping for. We remain fully confident that we will overcome this next hurdle, but we were really hoping to hear that they would be putting this issue behind them so they could get the medical attention they needed for another issue.<br />
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I spent the next couple of hours trying my best to focus on my work, and wrap my mind around what all of this meant for our family, and for our adoption journey also. I had considered putting everything on hold so that I could be there for my family in whatever way was needed, but I was really feeling as though that wasn't the answer, either.<br />
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Around 3:00 PM, my cell phone started buzzing on my desk. I looked at the screen, saw "Denver, CO" on the caller ID, and dismissed the call. I remember looking at my co-worker and saying "oh, probably just another extended warranty call for my car..... oh wait, my adoption agency is near Denver!" As soon as the words rolled off my tongue my office phone started ringing, and it was the same number calling- I knew I had to pick up the phone this time. When I answered, sure enough, it was CCAI. The woman on the phone greeted me in a friendly, chipper voice and explained that she had great news- they had a match for us! It was an adorable toddler-aged boy with a fairly minor medical need (I cannot share any details at this point...adoption legalities... stay tuned for a later blog post with more information). I let her get through her piece, and then politely responded with "I'm so glad you called, and I appreciate it, but I actually think you have the wrong family. James and I are not LID yet, so I do not believe we can receive referrals yet."<br />
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She explained that this little boy is on a different list of available children, and can be matched with a family before their paperwork is in China. I didn't even know that was possible! I thought the only way to be matched before LID was if you went out onto the lists and identified a child for yourself. Now my head was really spinning.... She asked if I'd like to see the file, and of course I said yes. She informed me that I had 24 hours to let her know if we would like to possibly proceed with the file, and if we did, we would need to have a concrete answer to her by the following Monday (aka tomorrow).<br />
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I immediately went in and talked to my boss, and asked if I could leave a little early that day (it was now probably around 3:30 already, and she said yes. I was totally emotionally numb- I had experienced both the lowest of lows and the highest of highs all within a few hours, and I really didn't even have any feelings left at that moment. I called James at work and told him he needed to come home early to review this file with me- we might have a son! He was just as shocked as I was, but also just as excited! Unfortunately, he was under a deadline and couldn't just stop what he was doing but promised he would be home as soon as he could. I did not want to look at the file without him being there with me. In the event this really was our child, I wanted to be together the first time we saw his face.<br />
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I finished up what I was working on and headed home around 4:15. I knew that I couldn't trust myself not to look at the file, so I kept myself busy with phone calls until he got home. I called my family members first to tell them the news- this was hard, as we were all still trying to process the other news we had gotten earlier that day, but I did not want to tell anyone before I had told my family. The next call I had to make was to a good friend who is a pediatric Nurse Practitioner. I had talked to her early on in the adoption process about helping us review the medical file of the child(ren) we were matched with, and to help interpret some of the medical language for us. She answered right away, and already started giving me what information she know about the condition he was diagnosed with and which local doctors might be best to have review his file. By the time James made it home, I was already sitting at the table with laptop open and the email ready, but I did manage to keep myself from "peeking." Once we had looked everything over I forwarded it all on to my nurse friend to look over.<br />
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I also got on some of the Facebook groups for adoption, and asked about the condition on his file and which doctors to send his file to for review, what this condition usually involves in terms of treatment, prognosis, etc. Within hours, I had gotten over 50 comments, and over and over again the names of the same 3 or 4 doctors kept coming up as the absolute experts in this condition. Over the course of the next couple of days, I sent the file off to these doctors, as well as a couple of local doctors.<br />
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By Friday, we were pretty convinced that the condition he has may actually be something other than what is listed on his file. Again, I have to be vague and I'm sorry for that, but we are not allowed to share any information about him publicly until we are officially approved to adopt him. <br />
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The thing with international adoption is that the files are often very inconclusive and do not contain enough information for a U.S. doctor to really make any sort of firm determination about the child's medical situation or future needs. In our case, we had four photographs- two full body shots of him sitting in a chair (with baggy, puffy clothing on), and two of the area of his body related to his diagnosis. The photos are grainy and of low quality. There is also a few pages of medical reports, which aren't filled out completely and most of which are a little old. An update from just last week outlines some of his basic abilities and daily routine, and there is a 19 second video of him sitting on the floor catching and throwing a ball. Not really enough for a doctor to look at and make a firm assessment of his health. Adoptive parents just have to be willing to take a leap of faith in some ways.<br />
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We have requested additional information from the orphanage he's in, but honestly do not expect to hear back before tomorrow, when we have to make a final decision one way or the other with his file.<br />
In the event that we do hear back, and the information we get paints a picture much more difficult than what we are already imagining, we may have to pass. Otherwise, our intent is to proceed with adopting this child.<br />
<br />
The condition we believe he may have is one that we had never even heard of before this week, and the lifestyle outcome that could result is one we had never imagine for our family. Most likely, it will be a very correctable issue with possibly a few surgeries and some extensive therapy, but we also have to be okay with the worst case scenario of this condition, which would mean some pretty substantial changes to the way we go about our daily lives.<br />
Over the past few days, I have spent hours and hours online researching the condition, finding out about insurance coverage, consulting other families who have adopted children with this condition, and most importantly, praying for wisdom and guidance. My husband has been doing the same, and both of us have come to the same realization- that God has brought us this file for a reason, and He has a plan and purpose for this child's life. If we step outside of our comfort zone a little and put our trust in Him, He will provide, just as He always has. To some, it might look like we are taking on too much, or getting in over our heads. And you know what, I'm sure we are. We very well may be getting in over our heads..... BUT we have an incredible lifeguard who I know will not let us drown.<br />
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The funny thing is, when I imagine my life being at a fork in the road... Option A is to continue as we are... comfortable jobs, comfortable finances, comfortable life. Option B is to take a chance on this child, risk taking on the worst case scenario involving his health. Possibly take on multiple surgeries, years of therapy, and a dramatically different lifestyle than what we have ever known or imagined... for some reason there is more Hope, Peace, and Joy when I imagine Option B. I cannot explain it, other than to say that it's a calling that's coming from above, and peace that comes when we answer a call.<br />
<br />
So where do we go from here? Well, I'm not 100% certain on the details, but I know we have to submit what's called a LOI, or "letter of intent" to China to adopt this particular child, and once they have reviewed that, if they approve us we will be issued a LOA or "letter of acceptance." This process can take a few months. From there we have to apply U.S. government for permission to bring this specific child into the country and to get permission to travel, get our Visas, etc.<br />
Absolute best case scenario- we could be looking at travel as early as April, but I'm still planning on May or June as the earliest scenario.<br />
Anything could cause delays at any step of the way, so it's important that we do not get our hearts set on any particular timeline. I do know that now that we've seen our child's face the waiting will get harder and harder as we go. I know that this child needs medical attention, and while none of their suspected conditions are life threatening or even progressive (that we know of), the sooner we could get him started on treatment the better. The one good thing about having a file assigned earlier though, is now we can actually plan- we can prepare the child's bedroom, start buying some of the things we will need, and so forth. And of course, we've already decided on a name. It is likely we won't be sharing his name with anyone other than immediate family and friends for quite a while, but I guess you'll just have to wait and see ;).<br />
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I'm sure you're all dying to see a photo, and I'm sorry that I cannot share at this time. Once we have been given permission from our agency to do so, I will post a photo on here, but I'm not sure when that might happen. So please just imagine the cutest little face you've ever seen on a toddler-aged boy from China, with bright eyes and pinch-able little cheeks, and you won't be too far off :)<br />
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That's all for now. Please pray for continued peace for our families, and for the little boy that we hope will someday soon be ours. He is already <u><i>our son</i></u> in our hearts... we just have to wait for the paperwork to line up accordingly!<br />
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<u><b>PUZZLE UPDATE: </b></u><br />
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Our puzzle fundraiser is still going strong, and we are so thankful for the amount of help we've received from this fundraiser so far. We will have another $4,000 in fees coming due within the next few weeks, so if you have not yet sponsored any pieces but would like to do so, now would be an excellent time for that! I assure you, the funds will go to use right away! :) If you need to wait until after the Holidays and/or income taxes, that's ok too. We'll have another $3500-$4,000 due when we get LOA, which I'm assuming will be sometime in January or February. We will be saving every penny we can in the meantime, and I have already began working on some applications for grants as well.<br />
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Here is how the puzzle looks today. We are almost 20% of the way completed! (the brown/upside down pieces on the left are the ones that have been sponsored, the ones that are right-side-up are still available) Details on how to sponsor pieces can be found in <a href="http://www.worrylesslovemore.com/2015/11/puzzle-piece-fundraiser.html" target="_blank">this post:</a> <br />
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Here is the one gift we bought for ourselves this Christmas. A special ornament for our tree, from a fundraiser to help support another adoptive family. Mine hasn't come in the mail yet, so I borrowed this photo from someone else.<br />
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If I have any substantial news to share this week I will share it, but if not, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas! God bless your families and give you all comfort and peace. Safe travels to those who travel, and happy resting to those who do not!Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-53798725992472561242015-12-05T11:04:00.001-05:002015-12-05T14:45:18.454-05:00Worry Less, Love More (and why I'm not very good at it)Confession time.<br />
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This has been a rough week for me in regards to the waiting that is such a huge part of the adoption process. And when I say rough, I mean I nearly came unglued yesterday on the director of my home study agency, who just doesn't seem to be in any hurry to get our finished report to us.<br />
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It's funny that God laid the phrase Worry Less, Love More so heavily on my heart the night we decided to forge ahead and pursue this adoption. I honestly believe it's because He knew this was going to be the mantra that I would need to keep me sane through all of this.<br />
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For those of you who don't know me personally, let me introduce myself to you: I'm a bit of a control freak. I do NOT like unpredictable situations. I love timelines and clear expectations. I like step-by-step processes and systems that function as efficiently as possible. (hence my chosen career track in mortgage <i>operations</i>) I'm probably not among the most impatient people in the world... but I'm probably a Tier 2 on the imaginary scale of impatience. I'm definitely one of those I'll-just-do-it myself-because-I-have-a-hard-time-trusting-anyone-else-to-do-it-right sort of people.<br />
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Going into this adoption process, I kept reading blogs and Facebook posts of adoptive parents who were just agonizing over the wait. Over and over again, people kept telling me "Oh the wait is the hardest part, but it's SO worth it". To be honest, I really didn't understand what all of the fuss was about. At this point in my journey, I had nervously and anxiously agreed to God that I would set my worries aside and trust in His plan for my life, but I was still absolutely terrified. In my mind, I was in no rush to get this adoption finished because I did not feel prepared to become a parent. I assumed that everyone who struggled through the waiting had been wanting to become parents for years already, and were at the end of their rope in their ability to wait. I had only recently decided I wanted to give up the orderliness of my life and surrender that to child-rearing. I assumed I would never become one of the anxious types, checking their email every 30 minutes, consuming their thoughts with getting to the next step (and the next, and the next).<br />
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I'm not sure exactly when all of that changed, but boy, has it ever! The problem with the internet, and the ability to become connected to so many people who are in the same situations you are, is that you also have the ability to be constantly comparing yourselves to others. This can hold true in all areas of life- Am I doing as well financially as my peers? Is my baby developing as fast as my friend's baby? How nice is my house compared to others I graduated with? How many trips do I take compared to my friends? etc etc. The adoption community online is a very connected community. That has been SUCH A HELP to me as I navigate this unfamiliar territory. I have learned so many great fundraising ideas, have received so many great tips for paperwork completion, have a list of what to pack for China, have lists of what to buy for our child's room, and so on. Unfortunately, though, one other thing this community has allowed me to do is to constantly chart my progress against others who began their process around the same time we did. And when I started to fall behind others who started "the race" at the same time we did, I started becoming anxious, impatient, frustrated, and, in yesterday's case, just plain angry.<br />
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What began to happen is that I lost my ability to see those involved with my adoption process as fellow humans, with busy lives and long days, who work hard and share a common goal of helping orphans. I lost my ability to grant Grace to those people, and to trust God that He has this under control, and that everything will come together in His perfect timing. I forgot my mantra... Worry Less, Love More.<br />
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I'll spare you all the details, but essentially what has been frustrating me this week, is that in a perfectly timed and fine-tuned world, James and I could have realistically had our home study report in hand by the first week of November. It is now the first week of December, and we still do not have it. We've completed everything we can at this point, and cannot move forward in our process without this report. That means that an extra month has passed by, without really getting anywhere in this process (or so it seems). That is a tough pill to swallow. That means that we will wait one more month before seeing their precious face, learning their age or their gender, and ultimately, that a child will wait without a family for one more month.<br />
(sidenote: I have been promised that the report will be ready for pickup on Tuesday- hallelujah!)<br />
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However, when I start looking at the glass half full, November was not a month wasted. We started a puzzle fundraiser and through that have raised the cost of our immigration approval (due the day our homestudy is ready) and have raised some of the funds for home study cost itself. We had a super generous friend host another fundraiser (a Thirty One sale) for us, that will also bless us financially and also got us some great travel gear for our trip, some storage options for our child's bedroom, and an adorable diaper/daycare bag for when we get home-all for free!.<br />
We had one extra month (and 4 paychecks) to continue paying down on some of our debt and also save up money for our fees and travel costs.<br />
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The thing about time that I always seem to forget, is that you can't get it back. So if something isn't going my way, or time is passing the way I think it should... I need to find other ways to spend my time that is still worthwhile. I need to find ways to live in love instead of worry. James and I will only be a party of 2 for a "few" more months.... we should be making the most of these moments, enjoying our peaceful, quiet evenings while they last, because I know there will be plenty of exhausted, stressed out times as parents that we will long for just-the-two-of-us time. We should be getting (the cheap/free) home repairs done while we have the time to do them. We should be applying for grants, reading up on attachment, and so many other productive ways to ready ourselves for parenthood.<br />
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So here I go... I'm going to try my best to push the reset button in my mind and heart and try to regain my patience, grace, and trust. It's time to hold myself accountable to the name of my blog and the phrase on my t-shirt: Worry Less, Love More. We are only in the beginning of many long months of waiting, waiting, waiting. With each step we take in the process, a new wait will begin.<br />
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I am going to list my worries, because I think it's important to name our struggles. I think that naming struggles, and owning them, is the first step in letting go of them. So here I go.<br />
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-I worry that our home study report will be rejected by China<br />
-I worry that we won't sell enough puzzle pieces and I'll have to do another fundraiser<br />
-I worry that we won't get our dossier completed before some of our documents expire and we'll have to start all over again<br />
-I worry that we won't get our dossier to China before they shut down for the Chinese New Year, and that will cause even more delays and waiting<br />
-I worry that we will have a hard time being matched with a child that feels right for our family<br />
-I worry about medical bills when we return home<br />
-I worry about having to send our child to daycare and if that will interrupt our bonding with him/her<br />
-I worry about policy changes affecting our paperwork process<br />
-I worry our documents will be lost in the mail at some point and we'll have to start from the beginning<br />
-I worry I will spend a lot of time applying for grants and it won't be worth my while<br />
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Ok, I've named them. Some of these are silly, ridiculous things to worry about... but isn't that what worry is? SILLY. I believe in a God who cures disease, who raised his Son from the dead, who created THE EARTH... and I'm worried about paper? If God has called me to adopt, He will see me through this. He will provide the funding (and guide us in our saving, fundraising, and grant-applying). He WILL see this adoption through, according to HIS plan and HIS timeline. I've been fighting with him over the reigns, and it's time to let go.<br />
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<br />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-53039670471692867262015-11-30T20:35:00.001-05:002015-11-30T20:35:11.538-05:00Puzzle Fundraiser UpdateTomorrow will mark one month since we began our puzzle piece fundraiser, and I want to say THANK YOU so much to everyone who has made this such a success!<br />
To date, we have received sponsorships for 98 pieces, so we're almost 10% of the way to having the puzzle completed!<br />
<br />
This puzzle has also raised $1,169 so far for our adoption costs! I cannot tell you guys what a huge help this is, as we have over $2,000 in fees coming due within the next week or two, and then another $4,000-$5,000 before the end of the year. Every single donation adds up quickly and each $5 puzzle piece is getting us one step closer to bringing our child home!<br />
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Here is what the front of the puzzle looks like currently:<br />
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My goal right now is to at least complete the big dragon. I understand that we might not be able to complete the entire puzzle, so I figured it would be nicer to have the names spread out across the back rather than in just one corner, so every piece that gets sponsored for now is going to the dragon (unless it's a border piece sponsorship).<br />
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I'm not going to lie, I get a little teary-eyed every time I look at the back of the puzzle... it is such a special thing to see the names of everyone who has played a part in helping us get our child home all together. I look forward to the day when I can sit down with our child and explain who each person is and how we know each other. I hope our child feels so loved and wanted seeing how many people cared about them before seeing their face or knowing their name.<br />
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Here is how the back of the puzzle looks today:<br />
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So once again, thank you to everyone who has contributed, and please know that your donations, big or small, have all made a BIG combined impact!<br />
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If you haven't yet sponsored any pieces but would like to, please see instructions on how to do so <a href="http://www.worrylesslovemore.com/2015/11/puzzle-piece-fundraiser.html" target="_blank">HERE.</a><br />
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I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday! I had no trouble coming up with plenty of things that we were thankful for this year!<br />
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One other thing that struck me this past weekend is how normally I would be so focused on finding deals online and out scrambling to get items checked off our Christmas lists, fighting the temptation not to buy things for ourselves just because they are on sale. While it is a little bit of a bummer not to be buying gifts for friends and family, I am not missing the holiday shopping at all. And I certainly don't feel like James or I are missing out one single bit. We are so spoiled with having more possessions than we need, and the only thing our lives are missing is our child! It's so easy to not go out and spend, spend, spend knowing that every dollar saved is one step closer to getting us to China! Instead, it was so nice to have the weekend 100% focused on spending time with family, appreciating all of the blessings that are already in our lives.<br />
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Hopefully next year we'll be doing a combination of shopping for Christmas gifts for our child, while also teaching our child the true meaning of Holidays- spending time with family, appreciating all that we have, and finding ways to bless others out of the abundance in our lives.<br />
Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-81594108585907555882015-11-21T10:09:00.001-05:002015-11-21T10:13:16.546-05:00Paperwork Progress (or lack thereof), Thirty-One Fundraiser, and Thoughts on SpendingI've been waiting to publish a new blog post until we had some good news regarding the progress of our "paper chase," but things are moving a little slowly in that department.<br />
We turned in our homestudy paperwork to our social worker 2 1/2 weeks ago, hoping that we would have a draft of the report within a couple of days. We are still yet to see that draft, but I've been told it would be here this weekend, so I'm doing my best to remain patient.<br />
I know in my heart that things will all happen according to God's perfect plan for this adoption, and that I shouldn't get myself so worked up about timelines, but its hard not to when you know that with each day that passes, your child is without a family and a home. I need to trust that God will care for our child until we are able to, and let go of my anxiety.<br />
Today we will take the last few documents we have to be notarized and certified, and will likely try to get some photos printed as well, as we have to send in sets of photos with out dossier, some of just the two of us, and some with us along with other people.<br />
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<span class="fsl">So that's where we stand. Once our Home Study
draft comes back to us, we'll begin a mad dash towards working on our
goal of getting all of our dossier paperwork to China (DTC) by the end
of the year. At this point it's looking like we have a 50/50 shot of
making that goal, but that doesn't mean that I'll give up on it. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="fsl">That means we still have to:</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-get
our 11 docs we have certified authenticated, which means sending them
all to D.C. to pass through the US Embassy and the Chinese Consulate </span><br />
<span class="fsl">-once those docs are authenticated they can be sent to our agency to go in our Dossier</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-review our Home Study draft for accuracy when we get it back</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-let our Home Study (HS) agency know it's good to go</span><br />
<span class="fsl">- HS agency will print documents, have them notarized</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-we will have home study certified and authenticated</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-they will send to our placing agency (CCAI) </span><br />
<span class="fsl">-we will also send a copy in with our I-800A application to immigration</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-we will receive our fingerprinting appointment and go to be fingerprinted</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-receive our I-800A approval notice, get that notarized/certified/authenticated</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-overnight that to CCAI as it will be the final piece in our dossier</span><br />
<span class="fsl">-Once
they have all of the 13 documents and supporting docs that make up our
dossier, CCAI will review them, translate them, and ship them to China</span><br />
<span class="fsl"><br /></span>
<span class="fsl">Pretty hefty goal to have all of that happen in just
5-6 weeks, but that doesn't mean I'm ready to give up just yet.... we
will do our best, and if it doesn't all come together by 12/31, then
we'll know it just wasn't meant to be.</span><br />
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<u>Puzzle Update:</u><br />
Our puzzle piece fundraiser is off to a great start! It's hard to know how much to advertise the event vs. just letting things happen as they will. I have noticed that with each post I do on Facebook it seems to spur one or two additional sponsorship each time, so I'm trying to just limit myself to one post every 2-3 days. I hope people are enjoying seeing the puzzle progress along. Here's an image of where the puzzle stood as of a couple of days ago. We still have over 900 pieces to go, but we've made some great progress so far!<br />
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<u>Thirty-One Fundraiser</u><br />
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One huge blessing that has come our way recently is that a friend of ours who is a sales consultant for Thirty-One reached out to us and offered to do a party for us, in which she would donate all of her earnings to our adoption fund. I was nervous to do this at the same time as our puzzle piece fundraiser for fear that people would think we asking too much. In the end, I decided I should never turn down an offer of support, and that if we were going to do a sale, the best time to do it would be now so that people could get some of their Holiday Shopping taken care of, all while supporting a great cause. I am so glad we said yes! This event is turning out to be a great help to us, and will also allow us to get quite a few travel bags that we can use for our trip to China for FREE! :) It was also nice to have a little get together in our home, and spend some time with some friends I just don't see nearly enough of.<br />
Our sale is winding down, and orders need to be placed by midnight tomorrow night (11/22), but if you'd like to take a peak, here is the link: <span class="fsl"><a href="https://www.mythirtyone.com/1730186/shop/Party/EventDetail/8781339" rel="nofollow nofollow" target="_blank">https://<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span>www.mythirtyone.com/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span>1730186/shop/Party/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break"></span>EventDetail/8781339</a></span><br />
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<span class="fsl">Here is the customer special for this month, along with some great bundling ideas making use of the special:</span><br />
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<span class="fsl"><u>Thoughts On Spending:</u> </span><br />
<span class="fsl">In the meantime, while we wait for the Home Study draft,I'm keeping myself busy with Christmas cards (almost all of them have been mailed out... woo hoo!), thank you cards, and will begin working on grant applications this weekend so that once our home study application is done we can pop those in the mail! </span><br />
<span class="fsl">We will have about $7,500 in fees to pay before our Dossier can be sent to China, and then another big chunk (around $4,000) before we can receive our referral for a child, so we're doing everything we can to save whatever money we can, and I will be applying for a lot of grants.</span><br />
<span class="fsl">The good news is, we now have enough points saved up on one of our credit cards to pay for at least half of our hotel stays in China, and James found a great deal online where if we put our next two big fees on this other new card, we should be able to get at least one of our plane tickets paid for in points. Every little bit is going to help in the end!</span><br />
<span class="fsl">One thing I thought about last night is that even though I'm able to save hundreds of dollars each month, I don't really feel like we're missing out on anything. Sure, it would be nice to be able to eat out more often, but I keep asking myself what else I would be spending that money on if I wasn't saving for this adoption. I realized how many things I can convince myself that I "need" just because I have the ability to purchase them (new clothes, items for the home, special treats, electronics, etc). Right now I'm not feeling for need of anything (ok, the dream of a hot tub is still here, but that's just never going to go away)- I'm aware that we have WAY more than we will ever need, and it's actually quite freeing to just commit to not buying anything other than food and essentials. Once I stopped looking at the sale ads every week, and told myself NO, I realized that it's really not that hard to just start appreciating the things we do have instead of constantly searching for more, more, more.</span><br />
<span class="fsl">One sort of funny thing that happened recently is that while we were in Costco I noticed they had some REALLY nice winter boots for around $40. Now the boots that I have are working fine, but they soles are getting a little worn, so I have to wear these special gripper things on them so that I don't slip and fall on the ice. They are still super warm, and are in good shape, but I've been wearing them for about 5 or 6 winters now so I know I've gotten my money's worth. The first time I saw the Costco boots I stood firm and just said "no, Kristen, you don't need those, you can wear yours another year or two and just be thankful you have warm boots at all". The second time I saw them, it was more like "weeeell, it's only $40, and it could save you a $100 co-pay if you slip and fall on the ice again and need to go to the ER, and what if your boots give out on you (not likely) and then you have to buy some last minute and spend more than $40... NO YOU DON'T NEED THEM... KEEP WALKING". Then the third time I saw them, there was only one pair left in my size and of course I just lost all self-control. I figured I would buy them, set them aside for emergencies only, and if I could make it through the winter without wearing them, I'd just return them and get my money back. (you see how my mind works? tricky, huh?). Well, low and behold... the boots didn't fit right, they weren't comfortable, and they just weren't going to work for me! I was so RELIEVED! No more temptation! James and I laughed so hard on the way home about how much time I had spend deliberating over one stupid purchase, and it would have been solved the very first day if I would have just tried them on.</span><br />
<span class="fsl">Lesson learned? Yes, my boots are totally fine (better than whatever my child has, I'm sure) and I will wear them this winter and be GLAD for them. And I will no longer allow myself to go through the middle aisles at Costco... It's necessity aisles only from here on out!</span><br />
<span class="fsl"><br /></span>
<span class="fsl">It is going to be hard for me to skip out on all of the Christmas shopping this year, just because I truly enjoy giving gifts, and I do enjoy searching for bargains and joining in on the Holiday Shopping. I also know that giving our family the gift of a grandson, nephew/niece, cousin, etc means more to anyone than whatever electric blanket, pot or pan, or sheet set could ever mean though, so that will get me through. We are excited to do some small homemade gifts for our closest relatives and will enjoy the extra time together we will get to spend preparing those items.</span>Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-20961575846561619922015-11-01T16:09:00.000-05:002016-05-16T21:40:39.422-04:00Puzzle Piece Fundraiser<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<u><u><span style="font-family: "impact" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Would You Like to be a “Piece” of our Adoption Story?</span></u></u></div>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-family: "monotype corsiva"; font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 115%;">To help cover the costs of our Adoption Journey,
we are doing a Puzzle Fundraiser</span> </span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br /></span></u></b></div>
<br />
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Here’s how
it works:</span></u></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have purchased a 1,000 piece brightly
colored jigsaw puzzle with a colorful Chinese New Year’s theme picture </span></b><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">(see picture below)</span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We are
offering friends and family the chance to “sponsor” puzzle pieces by providing
a donation in the amount of your choosing<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>($1.00
minimum)</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: .75in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><u><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Suggested Donations</span></u></i></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">:</span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .75in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>-Border Piece: $25</span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 1.0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">-Inner Piece $5</span></i></b><br />
<br />
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">*Pieces can also be sponsored in groups, with one piece for each family member* </span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 1.0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">To purchase
one or more puzzle pieces, you can:</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">a.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Mail a
check or money order- (please contact me directly for mailing address)</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">b.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Use the “Send
Money to Friends and Family” option in PayPal</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> <a href="http://www.paypal.com/myaccount/transfer/send">www.paypal.com/myaccount/transfer/send</a></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level3 lfo1; text-indent: -9.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Our account is linked to: KristenGere@Gmail.com</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level3 lfo1; text-indent: -9.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "symbol"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Please choose the “add a note” option at payout to
indicate which names should be written on the puzzle piece(s).</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">c.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pay by debit/credit card online at: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></b><a href="https://squareup.com/market/HawkinsFamilyPuzzle"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">https://squareup.com/market/HawkinsFamilyPuzzle</span></b></a><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> </span></b><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 18.4px;"><b>d. EXCITING NEW OPTION! Tax-Deductible donations can be made to our LifeSong for Orphans page at : </b></span><span style="line-height: 18.4px; text-indent: -0.25in;"><b><a href="https://mystory.lifesongfororphans.org/dashboard/my-story/">https://mystory.lifesongfororphans.org/dashboard/my-story/</a> (please note, a small processing fee is charged so if you are not interested in the tax deduction options A-C are better choices)</b></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">*** Please note that options A. and B. are preferred, as they do not incur processing fees***</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Once we have
received funds for your sponsorship we will write your name(s) on the back of
the puzzle piece(s).</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Follow
along on the progress of our Puzzle Completion on Facebook or on our blog</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">When the
fundraiser is finished, we will put the puzzle together and hang it in a
double-sided glass frame in our child’s bedroom so that he or she can always
look and be reminded of who had a “piece” of bringing them home!</span></b></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj24pwLYJWLXwyUPLvCiPZmX1Qqx8jKtz1Z88EOKxd-uABZTXWgMsFurLLJjUZq5cwdymSOLRr72ScthTt4oVYLJ20zz8sdMUCr45aMDMGM-fLPCs7MfWqCHCHI-iRSYeVOrf4ZaZNKVfd0/s1600/puzzle.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj24pwLYJWLXwyUPLvCiPZmX1Qqx8jKtz1Z88EOKxd-uABZTXWgMsFurLLJjUZq5cwdymSOLRr72ScthTt4oVYLJ20zz8sdMUCr45aMDMGM-fLPCs7MfWqCHCHI-iRSYeVOrf4ZaZNKVfd0/s320/puzzle.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Here is the puzzle we will be completing</div>
<br />
All funds raised will go towards the cost of our Home Study fee, our second Agency fee, and if possible, 3rd agency fee as well as travel costs.<br />
<br />
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "monotype corsiva"; font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 115%;">THANK YOU for your consideration to give. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even if you are unable to donate monetarily at
this time, your prayers mean just as much to us!</span></i><span style="font-family: "monotype corsiva"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%;"></span></div>
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<br />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-68578906662942684772015-11-01T15:50:00.003-05:002015-11-01T15:50:40.512-05:00Thoughts on FundraisingMy intention was to do one blog post today- announcing our puzzle fundraiser. Instead, I found myself thinking "well, you've made so much progress in your paperwork you better do that one too", so I decided on two posts. Then I just couldn't bring myself to announce my fundraiser without sharing what is on my heart in regards to that topic. I was just going to write a paragraph or two at the beginning of the post, but sometimes that's just not how it happens. So now we have three posts. I will not be "advertising" this post, and honestly struggled with the thought of publishing it all.<br />
This is raw, it's vulnerable, and it's honest. I know that I am not the only adoptive parent who has struggled with these feelings, and so I have chosen to publish this post, once again, in hopes of helping others on their own adoption journey.<br />
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Money is not a comfortable subject for any of us, is it? We would never want our bank account balances being made public, or our income being announced to our friends and families. We might brag about a great deal we snagged on a particular purchase, but overall, we like to keep our own finances very private.<br />
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Adopting a child is not cheap. Raising a child from birth certainly isn't cheap either, please don't think I am assuming that one is a bigger financial burden than the other.<br />
From start to finish it will cost approximately $20,000 for James and I to bring this child home. The exact figure is hard to predict, as some of the biggest costs are variable, such as airfare and hotel costs, but $20,000 is a pretty reasonable guess.<br />
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While James and I would love to be able to finance this adoption all on our own, the costs of completing this journey are simply greater than what we are able to provide at this time. In fact, the financial aspect of adoption (along with parenthood itself) was a big reason I kept pushing the whole idea out of my mind for the past few years. When God spoke to me back in March the message was very clear: "You open your heart, and I'll provide the way."<br />
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Let me say this- it's HARD to humble yourself enough to seek the help of others.<br />
We live in a "I can do it myself" society and I think we all tend to get a little judgmental and skeptical of those who let their guard down and admit they need a little help.<br />
I worry that if we accept money from others, every dollar we spend will be scrutinized and subject to the judgment of others. Am I allowed to buy new winter boots if I just asked my friends and family to donate money for our adoption? Should we never go on another vacation because will people think to themselves "oh they can afford a vacation but they couldn't afford their adoption?" Will people think that I shouldn't adopt at all if I don't have the $20,000 saved up to pay for the expenses?<br />
Is it acceptable to spend money buying (discount) flooring for their bedroom if we had to fund raise for adoption fees? These are the thoughts that keep me up at night, and make it very hard for me to ask for financial support.<br />
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While of course we have been making significant spending sacrifices (no more
clothes, eating out, vacations, extra treats, or other big purchases
with the exception of gifts and special occasions), we still will not be
able to save enough money before our fees are due to our agency without
taking any drastic measures. Yes, we could sell a vehicle, pick up an extra job(s), take out another loan, sell furniture, eat Ramen for the next 9 months, etc. I believe we really need to save our loan options for the unforeseen situations that can (and are sure to) arise when we return home- medical bills for our child, the cost of me not working for at least 8 weeks when we bring our child home, unforeseen home issues, surgeries, etc. The other options might help in the immediate sense of providing cash, but they are not sustainable solutions, and working extra jobs would certainly prohibit us from getting our paperwork done.<br />
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God has been clear in his message to us to rely on Him to provide the way for this adoption journey. This does not mean we are not taking ownership over the financial burden, but it does mean that we are accepting the help of those who feel called to give.<br />
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Of course after I've been grappling with my insecurities about fundraising all week, I find myself in church this morning, listening to a message based on John chapter 6 when Jesus feeds the 5,000. Our Pastor was talking about how much we insist on doing things ourselves instead of relying on God's grace and provision for our lives.<br />
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So I will continue trusting in God's provision, and will humble myself to accept the help of others. At the end of the day, I know it's not asking for money from others for myself. I'm asking for money to help bring an orphan out of an orphanage into a loving family with a mom and a dad who will always do everything in our power to make sure their physical, emotional, and medical needs are provided for.<br />
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If you feel called to help us out, please know that your assistance will forever be appreciated. If you are unable to help financially, please know that simply keeping us in your prayers means just as much to us as mailing a check. At the end of the day, parenthood is not a journey any of us should take a lone- it really does take a village to raise a child and support a family, and I hope that I am able to bless those around me as much as I have been blessed by your support.<br />
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Thank you for reading, and I pray that you all may know the Love and Grace of our Savior. Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-23492450274730332942015-11-01T14:52:00.001-05:002015-11-01T14:53:02.509-05:00Paperwork Progress and Photoshoot Sneak Peak!James and I have been making great progress in our "paper chase" process for our adoption. It's so good to finally feel like we are really moving forward in the overall process. We had a little while where we really weren't able to get much accomplished due to me being ill, but the past two weeks we have managed to get a lot of steps checked off the list and it feels so good!<br />
Last Friday was James' birthday, so we had requested the day off of work back in January of last year assuming we would possibly take a mini vacation or just do something fun. Little did he know that 10 months later he'd find himself spending his "fun" birthday having a photo shoot done, visiting the notary's office, and then spending the afternoon at the Doctor's office and then getting more lab work done (they ordered the wrong tests last week)! When you work full time, you have to make the best out of those days off! Despite the fact that no one wants to spend their birthday at the doctor, it was still such a giddy, happy feeling to know that we were making such great progress in just one day.<br />
We did manage to spend some quality time having fun with friends in celebration of his birthday after running all of those errands. We have been trying to keep to a very strict budget to save as much money as possible for our adoption, but it was very nice to have a night out for a special occasion. We joined two of my friends for a hockey game (our city is home to a feeder team for the Detroit Red Wings) and then visited a couple of local breweries in town.<br />
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Yesterday (Halloween) was another very productive day- we woke up early (for a Saturday) and took a few more documents to be notarized, and then visited the Secretary of State's office to have them certified. Walking into the S.o.S. office at 11:30, my heart SUNK when I saw the lobby- there must have been at LEAST 150 people in there. There was no place to sit, people were line along all of the walls, sitting on the floor, and all looking very frustrated. I had never seen so many people in there. I took a deep breath and resigned myself to spending our entire afternoon in that office, but when we went to do the "pre-check" the lady told us to step right up to the counter and someone would be right out to help us. We ended up waiting about 10 minutes and then the manager came out and asked us just a few question and then got to work. Until this moment I really had no idea what this "certification" step really entailed, but really all it is is the S.o.S. clerk looking up the name of the notary or county clerk on each document in their database, and then printing out a cover sheet to attach to each document that verifies that person is actually authorized to issue or notarize that document. Then they put a big gold seal on the front of the cover letter and staple the cover letter to your document. another seal goes over the staple (folded over the two documents) so that they will know it hasn't been tampered with, and then another staple goes through the seal. Walking out of there I saw a few people give us not-so-friendly glares (I'm sure they were wondering why we got to cut in line... we still don't know why, but I'm not complaining) but that could not stifle my excitement about having this step behind us!<br />
Let me tell you, I was more exited about these gold seals (and the fact they stood for progress towards bringing our child home) than most kids are about Halloween Candy!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjM88BJoDCwGyZ7GTdtqFNaGM-zWvX3uc6wzzcPBAgslcGoYw3ppJqpZ5DX1NKj4ugy7r2Pzf1XNcNFdMwy4en9_TcTfcKDeXwwddz9TQID8wKp3HkHNvZc1Vhc6P6F4ascr65UIkbS0G_D/s1600/certified+docs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjM88BJoDCwGyZ7GTdtqFNaGM-zWvX3uc6wzzcPBAgslcGoYw3ppJqpZ5DX1NKj4ugy7r2Pzf1XNcNFdMwy4en9_TcTfcKDeXwwddz9TQID8wKp3HkHNvZc1Vhc6P6F4ascr65UIkbS0G_D/s320/certified+docs.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
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I was on such a role that when we got home from running errands I got right to work in planning for our next fundraising effort (stay tuned). Due to it being very cold and rainy weather we had very few trick or treaters, so I was able to nearly finish that task, and will be launching the campaign later today.</div>
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The next step in our paper chase is to have these documents authenticated by the Chinese consulate. Unlucky for us, the consulate we are assigned to in Chicago actually drastically changed their rules this past Thursday, which means that 4 or 5 of our 10 certified documents no longer meet their notarization requirements. Rather than starting from scratch on those items, we will be sending our paperwork through the consulate in Washington D.C. For whatever reason, each consulate has very different rules, and when you use D.C. the documents first have to go through the U.S. Department of State. Thankfully, there are courier services who will help you navigate through all of this, since documents have to be walked into these locations in person to avoid weeks of delays if you mail the documents. Once we gather up the next two dossier documents (James' employment verification letter and our completed home study) and get them certified, we will send our documents to a courier service, and (for a fee of course) they will handle getting them authenticated by the U.S. Department of State and then the Chinese Consulate and and them mail them back to us. At this point they will be ready to send to our adoption agency, who will translate them and then send them on to China. This collection of documents (comprised of medical checks, marriage license, birth certificates, photographs, employment letters, doctor's letters, etc) is called your Dossier, and the date it is acknowledged as received by China is referred to as your LID, for "Logged In Dossier". LID is a huge milestone in the adoption journey, and means that you are close to being matched with files of children to review. Our goal right now is to be LID sometime in January or February. There is a one or two week shutdown at the beginning of the year for Chinese New Year, so that might end up pushing our LID into February, but hopefully not much further out than that.</div>
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This week our big milestone will be meeting with our Home Study social worker on Wednesday to turn in all of our paperwork for the home study process (most of that is just photocopies of certain documents needed for the dossier). Our agency's policy is that they have 10 business days to completed a draft of our home study report. We will then receive a copy, and have the chance to proof-read and request any changes before it is sent on to our adoption agency for what is called "critical review".</div>
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We would have been able to turn everything in this past week, but of course the doctor's forms were the last piece we were waiting on, and our social worker left for an extended vacation the day before our appointments. It is going to feel SO good to hand her our paperwork, knowing that one of the two biggest steps in the adoption process is complete!</div>
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I'm sure that all of that is WAY more than you all wanted to know about adoption paperwork, but it's important to me to try and document as much of our journey as possible to one day share with our adopted child(ren). I also hope that some of you reading this might be fellow adoptive parents yourselves- I know that reading the blogs of others has really helped us through our process, so any insight I can share for others to help them along would be worth my while! </div>
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Now we will shift our attention to preparing for the next two big fees we have coming up, our home study fee and our second agency fee. Stay tuned for another post today announcing our next fundraising venture to help us with these costs.</div>
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Here is a sneak peak at some of our favorite photos from our shoot last week. I am so blessed to have a good friend with an awesome gift of photography! I'll be honest, when we were taking these photos we were really just having a lot of fun with it and it was a very lighthearted experience, but every time I look at a few of these shots I get a little teary-eyed.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqynEGfeS_gWqgWpT25tCBCdmd-jILYqijLKraDiB8lVfzJp-R6vZiBs61dlPVQMKo1B7kdPEGCKgTfCNSO7GyHSaq8DwXpcsYqpCmlafXdrs-gCJ0Wp5_nPWO_QxxebjLkiwYAEamyZZG/s1600/James+and+Krissy+Adoption-8397.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqynEGfeS_gWqgWpT25tCBCdmd-jILYqijLKraDiB8lVfzJp-R6vZiBs61dlPVQMKo1B7kdPEGCKgTfCNSO7GyHSaq8DwXpcsYqpCmlafXdrs-gCJ0Wp5_nPWO_QxxebjLkiwYAEamyZZG/s320/James+and+Krissy+Adoption-8397.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5lGuOzgllWBReE-ubfSqSi6Xkiq8rqkiV9Hyi9iOWRqkoEFzOcb5KmoVwySxxrS8QKwmhhh8IMXPHEcnkefl-HjusmTvdMbwC8ku8shyebV8wJMzdzXhnsgpfw5WraEa7qt_kbJLG-hFz/s1600/James+and+Krissy+Adoption-8409.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5lGuOzgllWBReE-ubfSqSi6Xkiq8rqkiV9Hyi9iOWRqkoEFzOcb5KmoVwySxxrS8QKwmhhh8IMXPHEcnkefl-HjusmTvdMbwC8ku8shyebV8wJMzdzXhnsgpfw5WraEa7qt_kbJLG-hFz/s320/James+and+Krissy+Adoption-8409.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
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[This is one of them that gets me every time...]</div>
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<br />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-36171601639775747942015-10-20T20:13:00.000-04:002015-10-20T20:13:43.427-04:00Overdue UpdateHello! I can't believe how quickly time flies by these days. I can't believe it's already been a month since my last post!<br />
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I have to tell you all, I have SO many times when I think to myself "oh I have this great idea for a blog post and will get that written as soon as I get home".... and then of course I get home, get distracted or busy, and then the post never gets written. I can only imagine how much harder it's going to be get to things accomplished when we have a toddler running around here!<br />
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So all that to say, stay tuned/bear with me... I do have a number of posts "brewing" I just need to find/make the time to sit down and get them written.<br />
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I feel like we're finally making progress with all of our paperwork. In recent weeks we've been able to finish up our online parenting training, complete our second home visit with our social worker, get our passports ordered/re-ordered, and got our labwork done for our medical form.<br />
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This week James and I both have our doctor's appointments, which will complete the last task for our home study. We are a little bummed out because our social worker leaves for a long vacation the day before we have our appointments, so we can't get our paperwork turned in right away, but we aren't in a HUGE hurry to move onto the next step yet because we have a bit more saving/fundraising to do.<br />
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Along with our home study, we've been working on our Dossier, which is the collection of documents that will get sent to China. Many of the documents are required for the dossier are also needed for the home study, but there is a lot more to the dossier, so we will still have quite a few steps that need to be taken before this is ready to be sent to our placement agency (CCAI). A completed home study is also one of the required pieces of the Dossier, so completing our home study is necessary before anything else.<br />
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We have our next meeting with our social worker set up for November 4th, and then I believe she has ten days from then to get us a draft of our home study report. Our goal is to have our home study mailed to our adoption agency by the end of Thanksgiving, and then our Dossier sent in by the end of December.<br />
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Nothing is set in stone with adoption, and of course much of the process is dependent on how quickly we get OUR part of the work done. But since I'm sure many of you are wondering what all of this means for the overall process, so here's a total guess at how the next few months might play out.<br />
If we get everything turned in for our Dossier by the end of December, we SHOULD hear back from our agency within 4-6 weeks that it's been translated and sent on to China (providing that there isn't anything we need to revise or redo). "LID" (log in date) is the step that everyone strives for in the adoption process. That is the date that your documents have arrived to China, they've been reviewed, and deemed acceptable, so you are "logged in" to the China adoption program. It is after this step that you can start receiving children's files to review. In a perfect world, this means we COULD reach this step sometime in February or March. Travel to China usually occurs between 2 and 4 months after accepting a match, which means we COULD be traveling to China as early as next April, and fairly likely by June. All of that being said, we went into this process telling ourselves that as long as this (2015) is the last Christmas without our child, we will be happy. I figure that's giving us an extra six months of cushion, which should be more than enough time to cover any bumps that come up along the way. I'm still not getting my mind or heart set on any particular timeline, however, because there are still SO many variables in this equation, and I don't want to set ourselves up for disappointment. Part of me would prefer to travel in the fall of next year, as that will allow me to have a few more days of my time off paid, but I'm sure as soon as we receive that match we're not going to want to waste any time going over and getting our kiddo and bringing them home. So there you have it. The best guess I can give you is this: highly unlikely we'll travel to China before next April, and quite possible we'll travel before next December, but we are still too early in the process to really know anything for sure.<br />
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Going into this adoption I kept hearing so many people say that the paperwork is one of the hardest parts of adoption, I thought to myself "I don't know why everyone stresses out about the paperwork so much, how bad can it be?". Let me tell you, it's honestly not that bad. I think people who have never adopted actually assume it's a lot more cumbersome than it actually is. So far, it's just gathering up a lot of legal documents, and then we will have to get them all notarized. From there we'll have to take them to the Secretary of State to be certified, and then after that happens they go to the consulate in Chicago to be authenticated. Because there are so many steps and so many documents it's easy to get overwhelmed and lost in the process, but I've found if we just take it one step and one document at the time it's not nearly as bad. The hardest part for me is just finding the time and motivation to sit down and work on it. I can tell you, after a long day of work where I sit in front of a computer working on forms all day, it's the LAST thing I feel like doing in the evenings. It's so easy to say "well I'll just do that tomorrow." But then we all know how that story goes...<br />
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So as of this week, I've committed myself to taking one step forward each day. Even if that means one thank you card mailed, one document gathered, one thing notarized, or one blog post written. I'm hoping this new strategy will help us reach the finish line a little faster.<br />
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On top of all the paperwork fun, we've also been gearing up for that
next fundraiser, which I will be launching within the next couple of weeks.
*stay tuned for more on this in a later post*<br />
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So there you have it! A very brief summary of what we've been up to for the past month or so. I still hope to write some of my posts that have been brewing in my mind soon, but I felt like I at least needed to get SOMETHING out there before I lost everyone.<br />
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<u><i>One post I'd really like to do is a FAQ style post. In order to do this, I need some CROWD PARTICIPATION! I need to know what questions you all still have unanswered. These can be about China, about adoption in general, our process, our story, family, anything! If you have a question you'd like to see answered, please leave it in the comments, or email me! </i></u><br />
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For now, I'll leave you with a cute picture of the dogs I took yesterday. These two are our first adopted "children" (well, technically 2nd and 4th if you take our cats into account). Our dogs are a VERY important part of our lives, and I think it's safe to say they will be almost as happy to have a little brother or sister as we will be to have a child. Thankfully they love kids and are super sweet with them. Chester (the smaller one of the two) has a little "nanny" personality type and I even get to use him to help rehabilitate kittens and cats who have fear issues through the animal rescue I volunteer with (where we adopted each of the dogs from). Huck (the larger dog) is a little more skittish and takes a little bit longer to feel safe with new situations, but is a total sweetheart. I can't wait to see how the relationships play out between our kids and our dogs. I know it will be hard at first, as many Chinese adoptees have never been around animals, so they tend to be very scared, and need to learn safe boundaries with pets once they do open up, but we hope and pray it all comes together nicely for everyone!<br />
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Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-24292739730366400892015-09-19T23:45:00.000-04:002015-09-20T13:02:05.806-04:00THE BIG GARAGE SALE POST!Alright folks, I hope you're all snuggled in, this is going to be a LONG post!<br />
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My #1 goal for this post is that I can provide insight and advice to anyone who might be planning for a fundraiser yard sale for their own adoption or any other cause.<br />
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I also hope that those of you who played a part in this day can see how big of a success the event was for us. <br />
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<b><i>I'll break this post up into four sections, as follows:</i></b><br />
<i>1. What we did</i><br />
<i>2. How it went</i><br />
<i>3. What I learned</i><br />
<i>4. What I would do differently next time</i><br />
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<u><b>1. What we did.</b></u><br />
As soon as I decided to have a garage sale fundraiser, I began to do some homework. I spent a lot of time researching on the various adoption Facebook groups I belong to, and ordered a book called "Adopt without Debt" by Julie Gumm that contained a lot of great information about yard sales. If you are in the process of adopting and don't already belong to the Facebook
group "Adoption Fundraisers and Support," I highly suggest joining! Through this group, I stumbled across a "pay it forward" style thread involving a yard sale banner that is traveling around the country to different families hosting yard sales. I got my name on the list just in time to reserve it for our sale!<br />
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Here's the really cool banner we got to use- it's HUGE! <br />
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<u><b> </b></u><br />
Once I had done my homework and had gotten a rough idea of what the day would look like, I started asking for help from my friend and family members. I did this about a 4-6 weeks before the sale itself, which gave people enough time to plan ahead for the date,and also to start thinking about cleaning out their closets, cupboards, garage, etc.<br />
I decided to do a three-in-one event, adding both a pop can drive and a bake sale to my yard sale. I had originally planned to sell lemonade and cold bottled water as well (many other adopters said these were huge hits at their sale) but we ended up scrapping that plan at the the last minute as we had a chilly autumn day that day.<br />
I made sure to plan our sale on the same day that our semi-annual neighborhood sales were happening, knowing that there would already be an increase in shopper traffic that day.<br />
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I created an "event" on Facebook, so that I could easily communicate with anyone who wanted to volunteer that day, and also so that my friends could begin spreading the word about our sale to potential shoppers. <br />
I let people know that I would be accepting donations, but asked that they not drop anything off until the week of, as we did not have the space to store all of these items (big mistake, see more on this in the "what I learned section").<br />
The next thing I did was create little quarter-sheet-of-paper "save the date" flyers on brightly colored paper. My initial plan was to compass the neighborhood passing them out, but we
had just had some phishy solicitors going around the week before, along
with a couple of break-ins potentially tied to these solicitors, so I
decided it was not a good time to be going door-to-door, as people were on high alert (our neighborhood rarely sees any
crime like this). I also realized that with the size of our neighborhood, hitting each home would take hours and hours of our time, which we just don't have much to spare these days. Instead, I watched our neighborhood Facebook group for anyone hosting a yard sale, and then asked them each if they would be OK with handing out these flyers at their own sales (they all said yes). In my post on the neighborhood group I also asked if anyone would be willing to take a small stack and pass them out to their block, and I had a couple of people volunteer for that.<br />
<i>Sidenote- I live in a HUGE (like couple hundred houses huge), well-known subdivision that is bordered on three sides by very busy main roads, and I believe this was one of the biggest contributing factors to the success of our sale. If you do not live in a high-traffic area, consider having your sale at a friend or family member's house who does (if they are willing of course), or even a church or business' parking lot.</i><br />
Beyond raising awareness for the sale itself, these flyers were great because many of the yard sale hosts who passed them out for me also ended up donating a lot of their leftover sale items to my sale.<br />
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<i>Here's an image of the flyers I created</i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFHz6Ea6HhgizQgBEFYfES4IKCUPiSOdzdebcI1lMXkpcEfmYM5UNNxBxmHMbPYiRGlzfK9YU5KYFyiyTdJLo1NrzU03QNJbVXaKjs7OX28aI4c0aooERnMEGq0Pp7HJK6jopOCLeGFkBl/s1600/yard+sale+flier2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a><i>In case you can't read the text in the image above</i></div>
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<i> </i></div>
<u><i>Fast forward to two weeks before the sale:</i></u><br />
Once we got our garage cleared out, we opened the door to donation drop offs. At first things were coming in at a very manageable pace, one load every couple of days, so we were able to price items as they came in. This was extremely helpful. I tried sorting things out as best as I could, and spent a couple of hours each night out in the garage putting stickers on items. Some people suggested NOT pricing items and just letting people make offers, but in the end, I was very glad I priced each individual item. (more to come on that topic in the "how it went" section).<br />
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<u><i>The week of the sale:</i></u><br />
The neighborhood's Facebook group was truly one of my biggest assets in this whole endeavor. I ended up connecting with a woman who let us borrow a cash register, 4 clothing racks, and 7 or 8 huge wooden tables! The kindness of strangers in all of this was such a wonderful surprise!
Another neighbor offered to use his trailer to help my
husband and I go get the items. We picked all of these up on the Monday
before the sale. It was so nice to get all of this from one place and not have to worry about returning items to multiple people/homes. (We did borrower a few card tables and clothing racks from a couple of friends, but they all live close.) <br />
Another friend found a HUGE box of hangers for free on one of the local yard sale sites, which was also a huge lifesaver! Monday night we started hanging and pricing clothes.<br />
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<u><i>Tuesday-Friday:</i></u><br />
<u>Never underestimate the power of advertising! </u> If you have friends that want to help your cause, but are not able to get out to your house, put them to work cross posting on Facebook pages, Craigslist, and other sites to get the word out about your sale. One thing I had a friend do was to create little 8 1/2 x 11 signs to be hung up the day of the sale, with different quotes and facts about orphans and adoptions. These ended up being a huge hit and great conversation starter the day of my big sale.<br />
Other friends took a revised flyer I whipped out (based on our save the date version) and helped share it around Facebook. Every little bit helps so much.<br />
My parents showed up on Thursday, which was such a blessing because my husband and I both had to work all day Friday. Donations started POURING in Tuesday and Wednesday, and by Thursday you couldn't even move in our garage. Bless my mom's heart, she spent the entire day on Friday hanging, sorting, and pricing clothes. I was absolutely astonished at how many total strangers showed up with van-loads of items to donate for our sale... it was very humbling and slightly overwhelming, but more than anything I was just so thankful because I knew we would have no trouble attracting buyers!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimpR-OPsmI0WQFfNJPO_ePR_khT66tffqc41wyw6V2tMcyVlCEVjJL_pNkD0ksbJto0V_npRTXzyF0BUswJJHr2UxdTZKqAEttSBlSqLSmJYdPaiOSuH8M4F8-gotFIiwPb-DfNhaeyqQ6/s1600/garage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimpR-OPsmI0WQFfNJPO_ePR_khT66tffqc41wyw6V2tMcyVlCEVjJL_pNkD0ksbJto0V_npRTXzyF0BUswJJHr2UxdTZKqAEttSBlSqLSmJYdPaiOSuH8M4F8-gotFIiwPb-DfNhaeyqQ6/s320/garage.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<i>Here's the point at which (I think this was taken Tuesday night when
only a few drop offs had come in so far), I knew we were in for a BIG
sale.</i></div>
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Another overwhelming thought was that I had advertised our sale starting at 8 am, not even considering the fact that this time of year it doesn't get light out until shortly before that time, and also not thinking about how early that meant I would need to get up that day! I put a plea out for a 7am crew to help us set everything up, and thankfully my friends really came through for me. One of the many perks of having young mothers as friends- many of them are up that early on a Saturday morning anyway! :) My husband and I got up at 5am on the day of the sale, and left the house around 6 and drove around the neighborhood putting signs out in the dark. I don't know if it was because we were half awake, or just because we were so excited for this day, but this was one of my favorite parts of the day. We were so giddy sneaking around in the dark putting out our nearly 30 signs, that whole thing just seemed sort of surreal and crazy.<br />
Apparently our signs worked right away, because by the time we got back to the house at 7 or so to find our huge crew of busy volunteers pulling stuff out of the garage in the dark, we were already getting people driving by slowly IN THE DARK scouting out our sale! Garage sale shoppers are a serious breed, let me tell you!<br />
Signs are SO important in getting buyers to your sale. As we live near the dead center of our huge neighborhood (which is full of twisty-turny roads and can be very confusing to navigate through), I knew it would be important for us to have adequate signage. I made 11 big bright neon signs to post along the main roads that said "Adoption Fundraiser- HUGE SALE- credit cards accepted" (I thought of all the times I drive past yard sale signs, wanting to stop but then I don't because I don't have any cash on me) and then a bunch of smaller, "arrow" type signs with our address on them to post throughout our development to lead people to us. Also, because our neighborhood also has a very large city park in it with a lot of ball fields and pavilions in it, I made sure to post a big sign down at the park to let people know about the sale. <i>note: yard sale signs are expensive! This was definitely the biggest expense we had. Thankfully a friend loaned us 6 signs, but had we known the cost earlier this is another item I would ask to borrow. If you do buy your own- don't waste your time with the flimsy little signs that need to be stapled to poles. get the kind with stakes attached, that are sturdy plastic so they can be left out overnight and will survive the dew and the rain.</i><br />
Here are the signs we used:<br />
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<i>Around the perimter of the neighborhood (found the wood for the stakes in the clearance bin at Home Depot- score!)</i><br />
<i> hint- when you make the signs, make the arrows so that you can flip them around and have them work for either direction.</i><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiTWwyRAhGQaYBHGLV3yc9iec2HPY3LXrlC1RYiEUp-q7hfm56BpKrq3eU8JeGAtDX7fVpZfr7Yx2njCRuzPqK_9CZT5v01gaweLbY_sqSXtWqwafamoRaLwDtvcG78kdyS6tbkrg5jSTv/s1600/yard+sale+sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiTWwyRAhGQaYBHGLV3yc9iec2HPY3LXrlC1RYiEUp-q7hfm56BpKrq3eU8JeGAtDX7fVpZfr7Yx2njCRuzPqK_9CZT5v01gaweLbY_sqSXtWqwafamoRaLwDtvcG78kdyS6tbkrg5jSTv/s320/yard+sale+sign.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<i>Throughout the neighborhood leading to our house</i></div>
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One thing I did which ended up being super helpful was to print out a map of our subdivision, and then used colored hi-lighters to trace the many different routes to our house, and marked out which intersections would have signs at them. This made our sign placing and retrieving SO much more efficient because we knew exactly where to go. Many of our shoppers commented on how easy the signs made it to find our house. When it was time to retrieve the signs, we checked off the little dots as we went so that we knew we weren't missing any.<br />
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<i>Here is the little map I made</i></div>
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One of the only disappointments we had happen was that we learned it's actually it's actually against city ordinance to post signs along public roadways and on street corners where we live. Early in the morning one of our first customers told me they saw the city driving around pulling all of our signs along the busy roads. My heart sunk, and I immediately got to Facebook pleading for friends and family to share about our sale, fearing our traffic would come to a halt without our signs out. We stayed so busy all day that we never had time to go check on the signs for ourselves until after we were all done for the day and went to pull up the posterboard signs for the night (I left the plastic ones up throughout the neighborhood for the next day). The strange thing is, when we went to get them, we learned they had only pulled 2 or 3 of our 11 signs, and seemingly in a random fashion. I'll never understand this, but at least they left the majority of them up! <br />
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The other great thing I did to prepare for our sale was that a few weeks before we had the sale I ordered a credit card reader. Through the company Square, if you get a referral link from a friend (I found someone on the fundraiser Facebook group), you get the device for free, and also get the first $1,00 of transaction processing without any fees. This was a wonderful thing to have, and I ended up doing about 20% of my business through my card reader. They are so easy to use and really save a lot of time, plus people tend to spend more not having to worry about running out of cash. (send me your email address if you'd like a referral link).<br />
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<u><b>2. How it went. </b></u><br />
The day was honestly one of the craziest, coolest days I've ever had. I was running on fumes and adrenaline, as I had a hard time sleeping the entire week beforehand, but I don't even remember feeling tired that day. It was just so cool to see so many of my friends gather in the same place for the same cause! I met so many wonderful strangers that day who shared their adoption stories of their own, and also met so many kind neighbors, some of which are now becoming friends.<br />
Once we got everything set up, I honestly don't know where a lot of it even came from! I'm convinced some of it fell from heaven =my dad says no- he remembers how many times that doorbell rang the two days before the sale. We even had some donations show up the morning of!<br />
<i><b>Here are a few photos of the sale all set up and ready to go:</b></i><br />
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<i>Since it was too cold for lemonade, we had coffee and hot cider (just gave away for free). Here are the facts/quotes signs my friend made for us.</i></div>
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<i>So many clothes! (this only shows about a third of them)</i></div>
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<i>So many of everything!</i></div>
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<i>Thank goodness we had a lot of tables!</i></div>
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I had asked any of my friends and family coming that day to wear their "Worry Less, Love More" shirts, so this also provided for some great photo opportunities in our new shirts :)<br />
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<i> These girls and I all went to college together, but really grew in our friendship these past few years after we spent a couple of years meeting weekly for a Bible study group. We no longer meet weekly, but try to get together as often as possible given a few of them are now mothers and one more is a mom-to-be. Our child will certainly not lack for friends their age!</i></div>
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<i> This is a dear friend I met through work, and has been such an encourager and help to us!</i></div>
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<i>Another work friend, she also helped us one night the week before the sale getting items ready and donated many nice items to our sale.</i></div>
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<i>The biggest helpers and supporters- my parents! My husband's mom also helped a lot too, she just wasn't able to be there the day of the sale due to work, but she gets huge credit for driving 5 hours the night before just to drop off items to us!</i></div>
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<i>2 out of 3 of my college roommates. One came in from out of state the night before,and the other showed up even through she was 11 days away from her baby's due date! Talk about dedication! The 3rd would have certainly been there I'm sure, had she not just recently moved a few hours away to start grad school.</i></div>
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The funniest thing about yard sales to me is that you always sell the stuff you think is total junk the quickest, and the items you think are really nice and priced really fairly tend to sit there all day (I can't be the only one who has had this experience).<br />
We stayed busy all day, right up until about 6 pm. Just when I would think we were slowing down, more cars would show up. It was certainly the most busy in the morning and early afternoon, but never close up shop just because it slows down... there is definitely a big "after lunch" crowd that rolls in around early evening.<br />
We did open for a few hours the next day, which brought in another good amount of money for us.<br />
The following weekend, our friends' neighborhood was having sales, so we took the nicest items over there. I felt like we were really busy and we definitely sold a ton of stuff, but apparently I was selling it TOO cheap, because we really didn't make a lot of money. That's OK though, we got rid of a lot of stuff that day, and had a fun day hanging out with them.<br />
TIP-It's important to find a happy medium between striking a bargain and nearly giving stuff away. For example, I had one item priced for $20 and let someone buy it for $3. <br />
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We're still tallying up items, and I'm still trying to sell some of the nicest leftover items on Craigstlist, but a safe estimate is probably around $2500 raised from the yard sale/bake sale (I didn't separate these amounts out) and around $150 from the pop can drive. Certainly a huge success!<br />
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My husband, my volunteers and I probably logged about 200 hours of work combined, but as the saying goes, many hands make light work and so many people seemed eager to lend a hand. If you have the people who are willing to help this is certainly a worthwhile venture!<br />
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<u><b>3. What I learned</b></u><br />
I certainly had a few surprises through all of this. I'll try to be brief here, as I know you've been reading for quite some time already.<br />
-One of the biggest surprises I had, was how many people tried to negotiate on prices, no matter how cheap I had stuff marked. Lesson learned- <u>price a little high, so you always have room to bargain down</u>. If you want to make $2 on something, price it $3 or $4. Even when I had stuff marked for 25 cents, people would try to take me to down to a dime! <br />
-Another thing that surprised me was that even though I live in a community where adoption is very common and well-supported, <u>the vast majority of folks who showed up were not there because it was an adoption fundraiser- they were there because it was a yard sale. They were there to get a bargain. </u>This is not to say that many people didn't let me "keep the change", add to our donation jar (we made about $150 from this alone- certainly worth doing, despite my insecurity about it), or just our friends and family who showed up and handed us checks. One neighbor even rounded up a $30-something sale to $300---- that was one the craziest moments of the day--- I was fighting back tears and shaking as I slid his card. He and his wife live a few doors down and foster children and just genuinely have a heart for this cause. They were strangers before this event, but I have a feeling we will become friends, and it's great to know we share the same heart for these children. What a blessing!<br />
-Going into the sale, I was overwhelmed by the amount of clothing we had. In my previous experience with yard sales, clothes just did not sell. I was pleasantly surprised to find the opposite to be true with this sale. I sold more clothes than anything else. <u>The key is to have ALL CLOTHES HUNG, and sorted by size. </u> I sold most of the clothes on day 2, which is when we had one rack for each size.. People just don't want to pick through, dig through, and rummage for their size. When you put everything on hangers and put an entire rack in front of them with things that fit, they WILL buy! Goodwill prices have even gotten expensive, so when someone can come and fill a bag for $5 of very nice, gently used clothes- they will! Ask your friends for racks to borrow, you'll be surprised how many people have them. Worst case scenario, you can buy decent ones at Target for $20, or you can also look into renting them.<br />
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Here is the set up we had for clothing on day 2:<br />
Each rack had a sign attached that said what was on it along with the price (i.e. "Womens size Medium- 50 cents each item)<br />
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-<u>Don't limit yourself to just one day. </u> At first I didn't want to commit to doing the sale again on Sunday, but let me tell you, once you've already done the work of advertising, putting out signs, and getting everything staged, it's very little effort to drag it all out again and sit with it for one more day.<br />
For our Sunday sale, we let everything know that just about everything was half off, and that's when we introduced the "Fill a bag for $5" option for clothing. The day before each item was sold as marked. We sold a lot of clothes that way, and of course made more money on day 1, but marking them down the 2nd day was a nice way to make some extra cash.<br />
-<u>In our experience, the following items did not sell and were just more worth moving and storing than was worth it: </u>printers (for some reason we ended up with about 6 of these- I did sell a few, but only because I practically gave them away), older style TVs (we had some really nice ones with DVD players built in, and I couldn't even sell them for $1 and had a hard time getting rid of them for FREE!, shoes (now the strange thing here, is that we ended up setting up the sale again a 3rd time at a friends house the following weekend and sole a ton of shoes- but only after I weeded them out and kept only the very nicest ones- maybe having all the junky ones in the pile made the whole pile look junky? not sure here), coats (also a huge surprise to me- we had our sale in the fall and had some really nice coats- maybe this was just a fluke for us?), and books.<br />
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<u><b>4. What I would do differently next time</b></u><br />
<i><b> If and when we ever do a big yard sale again, there a few things I'll do differently.</b></i><br />
<u><b> </b></u><br />
<u>Start at 9-</u> It's important to start early to attract those early buyers, but give yourself at least an hour after daylight before opening for business. No one likes getting up at 6am- if shoppers show up, that's fine, but in your advertising list a little bit later of a time.<br />
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<u>Avoid donations of: </u>TVs, heavy furniture that's not likely to sell, books, and printers.<br />
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<u>Set a cutoff date to incoming donations at least 2 days before your sale</u><br />
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<u>Start collecting donations early, even if it means you have to dedicate a room or two of your house to storing them. Ask that anyone donating clothes makes sure they don't have any stains or tears on them.</u><br />
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<u>Get your clothing racks a couple of weeks before the sale, and get those clothes sorted and hung well in advance. </u><br />
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<u>Price everything with room to bargain (but not too high to where people are not even going to ask)</u><br />
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<u>Plan for a two day sale (at minimum)- </u>We didn't end up "opening" until almost 2 pm on the second day. We still ended up with a decent profit, but I bet we would have made much more had we done earlier hours to catch people on their way home from church.<br />
<u> </u><br />
<u>Write out thank you cards each night, as you get donations in- this only takes a few minutes at a time, and this will prevent you from forgetting where everything came from.</u><br />
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<u>*EDIT*- </u><i>Another adopter mentioned that after her sale she sorted out the nicest leftover clothes and took them to consignment store and made a few hundred dollars that way. I wish I would have done that, as I had some items that even had the tags on them still. This is certainly something I'll try next time!</i><u> </u><br />
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<u><b>Take the day before the sale off work!</b> </u><br />
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Well, that's all I have. I truly hope that you found this post to be helpful and informative, and I really hope that if you are planning an adoption yard sale for yourself, you find it to be as profitable as I have!<br />
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I personally do NOT like event planning, so going into this sale I kept telling everyone if I do an event, I follow the motto "Go big or go home"... we certainly went big, and we certainly made a big dent in getting our little kiddo home!<br />
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<u>Best of luck to you!</u><br />
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<u>Please feel free to ask any questions in the comments! </u><br />
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<br />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-84392063534187992872015-09-17T20:58:00.003-04:002015-09-17T20:58:47.922-04:00Home Study Visit #1Wow, I really got behind on my updates... where does the time go?!<br />
I guess for us the past couple of weeks pretty much went to yard sale prep, yard sale, and yard sale recovery (more to come on the sale in a separate post). <br />
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I promised that I would do a post regarding our first home study visit, so here it is.<br />
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Because our adoption agency is based out of Colorado (and we live in Michigan), we had to contract with another (local) agency to complete our home study. We were given a list of about 5-10 different agency choices, and noticed a wide variety in pricing. I found the most cost-friendly agency, did a little bit of research to make sure others who had used them previously were satisfied, and went ahead and sent them my application. Being a very small agency, it did take quite a while to hear anything back and to get this process going (come to find out I applied just shortly before the whole office shut down for vacation for a week). However, once we finally got connected with our assigned Social Worker, things began to go very smoothly.<br />
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Lucky for us, our assigned social worker has a regular full time job on top of this duty, so her availability for meetings is on nights and weekends (one of the things I worried about was that our social worker would want to meet during daytime/working hours, which doesn't work for us). She reached out to me on August 24th and we set up our first meeting for the 29th.<br />
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Going into this visit, I really had no idea what to expect. Of course before the visit I scoured all of my adoption Facebook groups for hints and tips from others, and found some people saying their social worker probed into every cupboard and closet in their home and others who said the visit is more about YOU than your house. Some said that the social worker probed into every nook and cranny of their personal lives (one said theirs even asked about their "intimacy") and others said it was just a casual "get to know you" conversation.<br />
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We tried not to stress out about the visit too much. We enjoyed some quality time together Friday evening, and then woke up early Saturday morning to get the house cleaned and ready for whatever level of "inspection" might come our way. We moved all the chemicals up to the top shelves of closets and cleaned the rest of the house, but didn't go too crazy (there was no baseboard scrubbing or wall washing). Our social worker arrived around 3:30 in the afternoon. Before she even asked to see the house, we all sat around the table for a little over an hour. She spent a lot of time talking about the agency she works for, as well as her own experience with adopting her daughter from China. She did ask us some basic questions about our lives (marriage, work, pets, etc). and asked about what led us to adoption.<br />
We had some questions about the process, which she also answered for us, and she gave us a binder to help us keep track of the documents we need to gather for our home study.<br />
Overall, it was just a really nice time of sharing stories and making connections.<br />
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Before she got ready to leave she did ask for a tour of the house, but she didn't bother going through closets or ask to see the insides of any drawers, etc. She just wanted to make sure we had a bedroom for our child, our house was generally safe and clean, and that our dogs weren't viscous (that was settled about 2 seconds after she walked through the door). She asked about if we had any guns in the home, smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors, but she wasn't worried about a fire escape plan, child safety locks, etc.<br />
<br />This was the first of 4 visits we will have with her. Our next visit is scheduled for this coming Monday evening. We could have got it in sooner, but needed to take some time to really devote to the big yard sale fundraiser we hosted last weekend. The one thing I do know that will take place at this next visit is individual interviews with each of us without the other one present. I'm sure this is just to make sure we are both on the same page about adoption, child-rearing ideas, and so forth, but I guess we'll find out for sure soon!<br />
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We appreciate the casual, laid-back nature of our social worker. She did reveal to us that in her near 20 years of doing home studies, she has only had to deny one applicant,and it was a pretty extreme situation (mental illness, unsuitable housing, etc). Hearing that definitely put our minds at ease in a huge way! I had been so worried that maybe even having foster cats in the house at the time, or the fact that our deck rails might not be up to code might create problems for us...oh, the things we worry ourselves with!<br />
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Now we need to focus on the paperwork gathering process. I've already sent in for (and received) copies of our birth certificates, marriage license, and we went and got our police clearance letters- now we need to get/renew our passports and gather a few other letters from our employers and so forth. Once we get all of the letters and documents together we have to get them notarized, and then send the notarized copies into the state so that they can certify the notaries are valid. They definitely call it a "paper chase" for a reason!<br />
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One of my friends posted this diagram on Facebook a few weeks ago which I thought really summed up the whole process pretty nicely for those who have no connection to it.<br />
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As always, we appreciate your comments and would love to hear what questions any of you might have for us! I've really immersed myself into the "adoption culture" these past couple of months and sometimes it's hard for me to remember what the average person does and doesn't know, and what you all might be curious about.<br />
<br />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-87673578415517494352015-08-30T20:13:00.002-04:002015-08-30T20:15:35.030-04:00Where my Trust is without borders<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Note: this blog post was intended to be all about our home study visit that happened yesterday, but I just couldn't get myself to push this other post out of the way. For those of you anxiously waiting to hear about the home study visit- I will update on that soon, I promise. Just know that it went well, and was a nice, informative, encouraging afternoon. </i></span><br />
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A few weeks back I saw a really cute shirt in one of the fundraising groups I belong to on Facebook that said "Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders" and had the outline of China printed in the background. I had never heard this phrase before but I thought it was so fitting for this international adoption process. I liked it so much I almost ordered it, but I didn't because we're really trying to save money for our adoption, and if I ordered every shirt on that site I loved, I'd have a new wardrobe every week!<br />
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Fast forward a few weeks and I found myself in church today, and the worship team started singing a song with the same phrase in it (in hindsight, I'm sure the song is what inspired the shirt idea). I just can't emphasize enough how closely this song aligns with our adoption journey. (see lyrics and video at the bottom of this page)<br />
<br />
We are embarking on the journey I've always known I was meant to take. From a young age, I knew I was called to adopt, but since James and have been married, I've let my fears convince me that it wasn't the right time. Well, as I shared in one of my first posts, I was called out by the Holy Spirit in March that I need to TRUST and FOLLOW and let the Lord lead us through this journey.<br />
<br />
Shortly after deciding to move forward with the adoption, we knew that we needed to re-balance our schedules and make church attendance a priority in our lives, and have been blessed beyond our imaginations by joining a new church congregation at <a href="http://www.madisonsquarechurch.org/north/">Madison: North.</a><br />
Even though I think we've only been able to attend maybe 5 or 6 times total due to summer travel and house guests, I know beyond doubt that this is our church home.<br />
<br />
At one of our first visits they had an insert in the bulletin advertising a parenting workshop for parents of adopted children (which I wasn't able to attend, but at least I know I must not be the only adoptive parent in the congregation!) Since then, one of my close friends has told me her neighbors attend this church, and they have adopted multiple children. I have yet to meet them, but look forward to that encounter.<br />
Every other time we've been in attendance, the message has spoke directly to something I've had on my heart that day or week, and this morning was no exception.<br />
<br />
I decided two weeks ago that I'm going to make a concerted effort to focus my Sundays on gratitude. I will make every effort to get thank you cards written to those who have shown us help that week, and I will spend time in reflection for the many blessings we have witnessed in our life that week. It is important for me to do this type of exercise when going through a stressful situation -- it's all to easy to get sucked up into the whining, complaining, fatigue, and annoyances of the endless tasks, paperwork, and fundraising efforts. However, every time I take a step back and think about the people who have spoken kind words to us, who have said they are praying for us, who have donated money, pop cans, or garage sale items to our cause, I am AMAZED at the love that is being shown. It is so humbling to think that there are that many people who even think of you, and who are interested in your lives. <br />
It's also important for me to give acknowledgment that God is doing what He said He would- He is providing a way for us to bring this child home.<br />
<br />
This morning I woke up about an hour earlier than I needed to, which is normally something that I find really annoying. What usually happens is I wake up feeling awake and refreshed, but convince myself to take advantage of more sleep time, so I fall back asleep, only to find myself feeling exhausted and cranky when that alarm goes off. Today I decided to break that habit, so I got out of bed, came out to the living room, and sat down with my breakfast in front of the window overlooking our yard. I was amazed at how quiet and still the neighborhood was. I enjoyed taking in the sights and the sounds of a foggy, wet morning after 24 hours of off-and-on rain showers. The crickets and cicadas were still chirping, and a few birds could be heard in the distance. I could hear the gentle "drip, drip" of the rain drops falling off of tree limbs, and for a moment, it seemed I was perhaps the only one in the neighborhood awake. I was overcome with gratitude- for our house, for our yard, this neighborhood, and again, all of those who have helped get us to this point in our adoption journey. I also found myself reflecting on the dear Granddaughter of a friend who nearly died in a tragic near-drowning 2 weeks ago today. Despite original Doctor reports that it may be weeks before she even regained consciousness, and threats of brain damage and a long, long road of recovery, that little girl walked herself right out of the hospital just two days ago-12 days after her accident. She had thousands of people praying fervently for her, and God has heard our prayers and has saved her for a bright future. Hallelujah!<br />
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Fast forward a couple of hours, and what does Pastor Joy talk about at church? GRATITUDE. She challenged us to spend the next two weeks jotting down items each day we are thankful for, and talked about the importance of reflecting on gratitude, even in times of difficulty. The message was based on 2 Kings 6, and how things are not always as they first appear. How when God gets involved, our circumstances seem so much different (a fish turns into a feast, a sacrificed man turns into a Risen Savior, a Giant falls at the stone from a slingshot, etc). Of course my mind immediately added on "and two people from Kentwood, Michigan, will travel across the world to rescue an orphan and bring them back home to show them a lifetime of love and guidance."<br />
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So that's all I have for today- I encourage you all to spend time reflecting on the seas in your life you feel are uncrossable, the mountains that seem un-passable? What is holding you back from taking that step of faith into the unknown? God has promised us if we put our trust in Him, He will provide, and He will lead us through. I pray that He might speak to your heart and show you the way to love and trust.<br />
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Perhaps God seems far away right now. Perhaps you feel as though you are sinking in oceans deep, and have no life line in sight to grab onto. Just remember, that even when you can't hear or see God, He is always there. <br />
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Here are the lyrics to the song I mentioned above, and a video clip if you'd like to hear the song for yourself:<br />
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<i><b>"Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)"</b></i>
<i><br /></i>
<br />
<div>
<i>
You call me out upon the waters<br />
The great unknown where feet may fail<br />
And there I find You in the mystery<br />
In oceans deep<br />
My faith will stand</i>
<i><br />
And I will call upon Your name<br />
And keep my eyes above the waves<br />
When oceans rise<br />
My soul will rest in Your embrace<br />
For I am Yours and You are mine</i>
<i><br />
Your grace abounds in deepest waters<br />
Your sovereign hand<br />
Will be my guide<br />
Where feet may fail and fear surrounds me<br />
You've never failed and You won't start now</i>
<i><br />
So I will call upon Your name<br />
And keep my eyes above the waves<br />
When oceans rise<br />
My soul will rest in Your embrace<br />
For I am Yours and You are mine</i>
<i><br /></i>
<i>[6x]<br />
<b><u>Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders<br />
Let me walk upon the waters<br />
Wherever You would call me<br />
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander<br />
And my faith will be made stronger<br />
In the presence of my Savior</u></b></i><b><u>
</u></b><i><br />
Oh, Jesus, you're my God!</i>
<i><br />
I will call upon Your name<br />
Keep my eyes above the waves<br />
My soul will rest in Your embrace<br />
I am Yours and You are mine </i></div>
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<i>"May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you Peace." </i></div>
Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-29976124084724248272015-08-19T21:03:00.000-04:002015-08-19T21:10:47.962-04:00Fundraisers Galore!We are still waiting to hear back from our home study agency to start scheduling our home visits, so our paper chase is on a temporary hold. During this time, we are trying to take advantage of our spare time by getting as much fundraising out of the way as possible.<br />
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<br />
Our t-shirt sales ended this week and overall, I would say were quite successful.<br />
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I thought I would share a review of my experience with the T-Shirt sale,
in case any of you adoptive parents are considering doing a
campaign to raise money for your own journey. Even if you are not an
adoptive parent, maybe you have to do a t-shirt campaign for another
organization or cause. Either way,<u><b> here is a recap of our experience: </b></u><br />
My biggest surprise was how much better the adult shirts sold than the toddler's or children's sizes. I was thinking that the bright colors of the shirts combined with a very kid-friendly design would really be a hit, especially among adoptive families (and you better believe I was cross posting that sale all over different adoptive family Facebook groups). Unfortunately, we ended up only selling 6 toddler sizes and 3 children's, and we ordered 1 of each category. This seems to be a fairly common occurrence- maybe it's because parents figure their children will grow out of the shirt too fast to make it a wise investment, but who knows. The good news is that we sold 75 adult shirts (and yes, at least 5 of those were for us, but I am still very pleased!)<br />
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We used the website TeeSpring, mainly because I had done a couple of purchases through them for fundraisers put on by the animal rescue I volunteer with and found them to be very user friendly, simple, and easy to work with. I know that with the first sale the rescue did some of the shirts came in sized a little weird, and Teespring was very flexible in offering refunds to buyers. There is also zero upfront investment from the seller, and they handle all of the shipping, which is nice.<br />
In case any of you are considering a T-Shirt fundraiser for your own journeys, here are my personal opinions based on the experience we have had so far-<br />
<br />
<b><u>In hindsight, here are the downsides to using Teespring:</u></b><br />
-The only times to reach anyone by phone is during working hours<br />
-I kept having issues where it would show I made a purchase successfully but then I never got a receipt. Upon further review, it would show my order was cancelled, even though I never requested that. I really hope it was just a glitch for me and no one else!<br />
-You have do launch separate campaigns for children, adult, and toddler sizes, and because we sold so few of the kid's and toddler's shirts, we netted almost zero profit from those campaigns.<br />
-They do not disclose to you who ordered, so if people don't let me know, I will never know exactly who placed orders, and what colors and designs they chose.<br />
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<u><b>And you have to take the bad with the good, so here are the perks of using Teespring:</b></u><br />
-The design tool is very easy to use and they have a large selection of pre-loaded graphics. I did have a little trouble getting the Mandarin characters to carry over (I guess it's glitchy when you have two languages in one design), but the support team was very responsive in getting it fixed right away for me when I called them<br />
-The site is fairly advanced, and lets you offer promotions, discounts, and up-sell incentives to buyers<br />
-They handle all of the shipping<br />
-Communication with buyers and sellers is excellent- clear, concise, and very quick<br />
-I love the feature that allows you to message all of your buyers for your campaign<br />
-Not having to pre-buy the shirts and then re-sell them and worry about shipping them out was a HUGE perk for us!<br />
-The shirts shipped in less than 12 hours from the campaign ending, so they are very quick!<br />
<br />
All in all, we made a little over $630 profit from the sale, which I am very happy with. Subtract out the $150+ we spent on shirts for ourselves and our little one, and we still made almost $500, which will certainly be a help to us. I knew going into the endeavor that it wouldn't be a huge money maker, but what is more important to me is that every time someone wears one of these shirts, it will help raise awareness for orphans worldwide. I hope to make a photo book for our child of everyone wearing their new shirts so they can always know how many people contributed to their adoption.<br />
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One tidbit of wisdom for any sellers- keep reminding people, even though you feel like you are being so annoying about it! We launched a 21 day campaign, and had a very slow 10 days in the middle, and then everyone seemed to scramble to get their orders in at the last minute. I created an "event" on Facebook, as well as posted on my own timeline. Ask your friends to share your posts to help spread the word. <br />
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Our next big event is a <u>Yard Sale/Bake Sale/Pop Can drive</u> we are planning for September 13th. I've been passing out flyers around my neighborhood and have already had a few friends drop off items to be sold. Now it's time for me to get busy pricing those items and getting everything organized! There was a post a while back in one of the fundraising groups I belong to about a traveling banner, and I lucked out and got on the reservation list. It's a "pay it forward" process, where the only thing you need to do in order to use the banner is agree to mail it to the next person on the list... how neat!<br />
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If you live in the Grand Rapids area, come on out on the 13th to check out our sale! We will have a TON of items, as I've got quite a few friends and family members donating so far! <u><i>If you'd like to contribute items to be sold, pop cans, or baked goods please let me know. </i></u>Or maybe you'd just like to help out the week before with sorting, pricing, or sign making... I'll be needing all hands on deck!<br />
If you do not live near Grand Rapids but would still like to help out... you of course can mail us your bottle slips :)<br />
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Another tip I learned from one of the Facebook groups was to get a credit card reader. Thankfully Square has them for free, and you get the first $1,000 in swipes processed without any fees. Additionally, if anyone else signs up under me they get $1,000 in swipes free, and we get an additional $1,000. I think having this device will really help our sale- I know there have been so many times I've driven past a yard sale and wanted to stop but I didn't have any cash on hand.<br />
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Here is the link to sign up: https://squareup.com/i/A4CF8CD0 <br />
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If you are an adoptive parent, and looking for fundraising ideas, here are three very helpful Facebook groups I have found:<br />
-Red Thread Trading Post<br />
-Shop With a Purpose- Support Adoption Fundraisers<br />
-Adoption Fundraisers and Support<br />
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I'm also working my way through the book "Adopt without Debt" written by Julie Gumm which so far has been very insightful.<br />
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That's all for tonight- stay tuned for an update as soon as we hear back from our Home Study social worker.<br />
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Here is a picture of the banner which we will be using in front of the house:<br />
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Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2935974757917681953.post-61881260829505439042015-08-16T18:28:00.002-04:002015-08-16T18:31:15.299-04:00Blessings AboundIt has now been nearly three weeks since we began our fundraising journey.<br />
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I have been so amazed at the caring, kindness, and generosity we have been shown by friends, family, neighbors, and even a few strangers these past few weeks.<br />
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While our fundraising mission has only just begun, I am so encouraged and energized by how many people have offered us their time, their pop cans, trailers, tables, clothing racks, prayers, facebook shares, and more.<br />
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I've been putting at least a couple of hours in each night into this process, but I can see the first fruits of my labor already, which is so encouraging! Back when I was sitting in the movie theater in March hearing God's calling that now is the time for us to take action, I just couldn't push aside the fear, the doubt, and the worry about finances. And of course with every "But God..." protest, I was met with the answer of "TRUST ME." I had no other choice but to do just that... We dived into this journey feet first, knowing that in order to see this mission through, we would have to rely on the help of others.<br />
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Fundraising in and of itself is a very humbling process. Asking other people, especially strangers, to give of their time, money, or resources is never a comfortable process. Fundraising for yourself is even more humbling than I had imagined it would be. I had so many reservations about asking others for help, but knew that I wasn't asking on my own behalf, but rather on behalf of an orphaned child who deserves a loving home and a forever family. That fact alone doesn't mean that it's really any easier to ask people for their money, time, or support, but it does remind me that I'm not asking out of my own selfish desires.<br />
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As my last post mentioned, we kicked off a <a href="http://teespring.com/hawkinsadoption">T-Shirt sale</a> which ends tomorrow. I had no idea what to expect with this venture, but since it was a zero-investment effort, I figured it would be worth giving a try (not to mention I just really wanted some shirts to wear to help us spread the message about our journey!).<br />
In hindsight, it was totally worth doing, even though it has amounted to about 1 hour of my time every day for the past three weeks. There are certainly faster, easier ways to raise money, but what I love about the t-shirt sale is that when it's all said and done we'll be able to see so many others wear a shirt that I designed, and then hopefully show pictures of all these loving friends and family to our adopted child. I'm hoping that by the time the sale ends, we will have made almost $500 profit from the sale... not a huge amount of money, but every little bit helps!<br />
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Another thing I've been pouring my time into is gearing up for a Yard Sale Fundraiser event. We will combine the yard sale with a bake sale and popcan drive. I've got a HUGE banner coming from one of the Facebook groups I belong to, it's been making it's way around the country to adoptive families for use... what a wonderful "pay it forward" idea! I've been spreading the word on Facebook, and also made flyers that I've been passing out around our neighborhood. A few neighbors had sales this weekend, and generously offered to pass out flyers at their sale for me (I hesitate going door to door handing them out as we've had a few suspicious individuals knocking on doors lately and it's go the neighborhood a bit on edge). So far I've had one person drop off pop cans, another friend drop of items, and a large number of people tell me they are looking forward to helping us out on that day and are saving up items for us! I feel so very loved and honored to know so many wonderful people.<br />
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Here are just a few of the crazy blessings we've experienced in the past few weeks:<br />
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-One neighbor whom we've never met dropped off three huge bags of pop cans within minutes of me posting in the neighborhood group about our fundraiser<br />
-Another "stranger neighbor" (someone from my neighborhood association Facebook group that I've never met) is letting us borrow 4 clothing racks and 10 tables for our sale<br />
-A random stranger from one of the adoption groups I belong to on Facebook was having trouble ordering a shirt so she sent me all of her personal information and credit card number so that I could get one ordered for her! wow! I felt so humbled that a total stranger would entrust me with that information!<br />
-Another "stranger neighbor" got my email address from our yard sale flyer that I post and then blessed us with a $50 paypal donation<br />
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And the kindness continues on a daily basis... God is certainly proving his point that if we trust in His Goodness and Faithfulness, he will provide the way for us to bring our child home.<br />
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We are so thankful that we chose this neighborhood to move into last year... it is such a family-friendly place to be, and has a big, beautiful park right in the middle of the neighborhood that we cannot WAIT to introduce our child to! As much as I'm trying not to get my hopes up for anything to happen shy of 18 months, I would really love to bring home our child next summer.<br />
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Another thing I'm so thankful for is having found a great church to call home. While we haven't been able to get into a solid routine of weekly attendance this summer due to being out of town so often, it has become so apparent to us what a close-knit "family" this church body is, and we cannot wait to become more involved. (If you are looking for a great church and are in the Grand Rapids, MI area, you should check out <a href="http://www.madisonsquarechurch.org/north/">Madison North</a> too)<br />
Today's message was based on John 15:5<sup> </sup><span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj"><sup class="versenum"> "</sup>I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.</span></span><br />
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<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">What an appropriate message for this season of our lives! It is so true that apart from God's help, we certainly could not accomplish this mission on our own accord. This journey is going to be long, exhausting, emotional, expensive, and at times, discouraging. But we can rest in the confidence and assuredness that God will see us through, and He will provide for all of our needs along the way.</span></span><br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">Today the speaker told a story about a clematis vine, and how it will attach to anything it can find. In his case, they had one which had no trellis to climb, so it had began wrapping itself around tulip stems. Of course the tulips died off, and the vine had nothing to "climb" and ended up right back on the ground. They ended up clipping out the dead tulip stems and pulling them out of the grasp of the vine before finding something more sturdy to lean the vine on.</span></span><br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj"><br /></span></span>
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">How often do we wrap ourselves around things that fade away, only to find ourselves right back on the ground, rather than growing Up and Outward as we were meant to do? I know I've caught myself clinging to my spouse, my career, my friendships, my education, and so many other things in my life for meaning and fulfillment, only to find my heart still empty and yearning for more. Until we wrap ourselves around the never-ending love and support of our Savior we will continue to fall down, ceasing to grow in the way that we were intended to.</span></span><br />
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<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">And so we will strive to abide in the Lord, and trust that he will deliver us through this journey.</span></span><br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj"> This isn't an attitude of "Well, God will take care of it so I don't have to..." </span></span><br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">We will do whatever we can to bring our child home to us. We will scale back our budget, we will sacrifice nights out, we will spend our evenings and weekends pouring over paperwork, trimming flyers, researching fundraising ideas, sending out thank you cards, and anything else we can do to help speed this process along.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">For right now, it's focusing on the yard sale and getting our paperwork process started. James also needs to apply for a passport and we need to start ordering copies of documents for our Dossier.</span></span><br />
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<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj">I heard from the home study agency on Friday, and they will likely be contacting us soon to begin that process as well. I will do another update when we learn more about what the home study process is going to look like. </span></span><br />
<span class="text John-15-5" id="en-ESV-26693"><span class="woj"><br /></span></span>
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<img class="irc_mi" src="http://livesent.heritageqc.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/abide.png" height="393" style="margin-top: 0px;" width="686" />Kristen.Adelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05158011025915218550noreply@blogger.com0