Where there is a WILL, there is a way!

Hello friends!

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.

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.

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.
"hindsight" edit- who am I kidding?  I don't know how to do "brief"

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.

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!

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!)

Meet William TianYi Hawkins!

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!
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.

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.

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.

So there you have it, we have our Will. :)

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... :)

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.

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.

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 HERE.

 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. 

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? ;)

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.

I will do my best to keep up as things progress, but there are the steps we are waiting on.

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!

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.

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.
Here is a photo of the items we sent to him:

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

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.  

That's all for now, good night everyone!  Thanks for following our journey!

I apologize in advance for typos or grammar errors....I am too tired to edit the post tonight! Take that, grammer Nazis!

The Call

Wow, a lot can happen in 15 days.  A lot can happen in ONE day.

Let me bring you up to speed.

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).

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).
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.

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.

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!
(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.)

As far as we were concerned, the remaining steps would be:

-Receive appointment for our fingerprinting
-Get first 12 documents back from embassy and forward them to adoption agency
-Get last document (I-800) in the mail, have it notarized, certified, and then sent for authentification and then sent on to our agency
-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).
-Once the packet arrives in China and they log you into their database, you are consider LID- "Logged In Dossier"
-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).

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.

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.

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.

 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."

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).

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.

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.

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.

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. 

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.

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.
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.

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.
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.

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.

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.
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.
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 ;).

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 :)

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 our son in our hearts... we just have to wait for the paperwork to line up accordingly!

PUZZLE UPDATE:

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.

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 this post:

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.

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!

Worry Less, Love More (and why I'm not very good at it)

Confession time.

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.

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.

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 operations)  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.

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).

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.

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.

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.
(sidenote:  I have been promised that the report will be ready for pickup on Tuesday- hallelujah!)

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!.
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.

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.

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.

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.

-I worry that our home study report will be rejected by China
-I worry that we won't sell enough puzzle pieces and I'll have to do another fundraiser
-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
-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
-I worry that we will have a hard time being matched with a child that feels right for our family
-I worry about medical bills when we return home
-I worry about having to send our child to daycare and if that will interrupt our bonding with him/her
-I worry about policy changes affecting our paperwork process
-I worry our documents will be lost in the mail at some point and we'll have to start from the beginning
-I worry I will spend a lot of time applying for grants and it won't be worth my while

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.

Paperwork Progress (or lack thereof), Thirty-One Fundraiser, and Thoughts on Spending

I'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.
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.
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.
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.

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.  

That means we still have to:
-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 
-once those docs are authenticated they  can be sent to our agency to go in our Dossier
-review our Home Study draft for accuracy when we get it back
-let our Home Study (HS) agency know it's good to go
- HS agency will print documents, have them notarized
-we will have home study certified and authenticated
-they will send to our placing agency (CCAI) 
-we will also send a copy in with our I-800A application to immigration
-we will receive our fingerprinting appointment and go to be fingerprinted
-receive our I-800A approval notice, get that notarized/certified/authenticated
-overnight that to CCAI as it will be the final piece in our dossier
-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

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.


Puzzle Update:
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!

Thirty-One Fundraiser

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.
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:  https://www.mythirtyone.com/1730186/shop/Party/EventDetail/8781339

Here is the customer special for this month, along with some great bundling ideas making use of the special:

Thoughts On Spending:
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!  
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.
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!
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.
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.
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!

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.

Paperwork 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!
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.
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.

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!
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!

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.

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.

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".

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!

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! 

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.

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.

[This is one of them that gets me every time...]

Overdue Update

Hello!  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!

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.
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.


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...

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.

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*

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.

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!  

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!

Home Study Visit #1

Wow, I really got behind on my updates... where does the time go?!
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).

I promised that I would do a post regarding our first home study visit, so here it is.

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.

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.

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.

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.
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.
Overall, it was just a really nice time of sharing stories and making connections.

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.

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!

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!

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!

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.

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.