Growing Family, Growing Faith — Fundraising for Adoption

Growing Family, Growing Faith — Fundraising for Adoption

Winners of the Christmas Giveaway

CONGRATULATIONS  to the winners of the Christmas giveaway!

Molly Ondrey is the winner of the Kuerig K75 

and

Michelle Osborne is the winner of the LeapPad Ultra.

Both of these women are a part of our church family, for which we are so thankful.

A big thank you goes to everyone that supported this fundraiser and helped make it a success. We also want to thank everyone that is praying for our adoption.

                                                                                      

                                                                                   LORI

Christmas Giveaway Ends Tonight

The Christmas Giveaway ends tonight. If interested in entering for one of the giveaways, please submit donations tonight by midnight.   A $10 donation = 1 entry and $25 = 3 entries. The drawing will be held tomorrow morning. The winners will then be announced on the blog and notified by phone or email.

Our goal for this fundraiser is $1,000 above the cost of the items; so far we are at $710. Please consider helping us reach this goal.

On another note,  the eight documents that were rejected by the Sec. of State's office for certification were resubmitted last Thursday. They were all accepted this time! I will be sending eleven documents to the Chinese Consulate this week for authentication. These documents are a big part of our dossier that will be going to China. 

Our social worker interviewed Adrian this morning for the home study. We originally thought this would be done by email, but China requires in-person interviews. Adrian is only home for the holidays, so he couldn't get this done at the same time as the rest of the family. We are expecting to have our home study submitted very soon! 

                                                                                                  LORI

Where Are We Right Now?

As far as we know, we have everything completed for our home study. We are waiting to hear back from our social worker on that. All documents for the dossier, except the home study and USCIS approval, are done, but still need certification by the Sec. of State’s office and then authenticated by the Chinese Consulate.

Adoption is full of ups and downs.  We had our first bump in the road this week when Brent took ten documents to the Sec. of State’s office for certification/apostille. Eight out of the ten documents needed certification, and they were all rejected because of wrong wording. The same wording was used on all of Mia’s documents, but apparently IL has since made changes concerning notaries. We are trying to get these all corrected today, and we will try to get them certified again next week. Please keep our adoption in your prayers. Specifically pray for our waiting child in China that he/she is getting enough to eat and is being kept warm this winter.

                                                                                      LORI

Christmas Giveaway Update

Giveaway Update:

Only 23 days remaining for the Christmas Giveaway. So far there are very few entries for the Kuerig K75 ($179.99 retail value). Both the Kuerig and the LeapFrog LeapPad Ultra would make great Christmas gifts! These items will ship to the winners on Dec. 18 and should arrive in time for Christmas. Please help support this fundraiser. All donations will go toward the adoption. We thank everyone who has shown their support thus far.

 Pure Charity:

To take part in the Pure Charity fundraiser, go to www.purecharity.com. Click on the sign up button at the top right corner. You can sign up with your facebook account or simply type in your email and create a password. Once you sign in, you click on the shopping cart at the top of the homepage. Then click on the install browser plugin. Follow the install instructions. Once this is installed, a pure charity box will show up whenever you go to any online merchant’s website that participates. If you see a red triangle, the merchant doesn’t participate in the program. If you see the white pure charity box in the upper left corner of the screen, click on the down arrow underneath it. A dropdown box will appear telling you what percentage the merchant will donate. Then you will see a message that will says click here, and you will earn ___ % for your giving fund. Most online stores participate. A few that participate are: Target, Old Navy, WalMart, Best Buy, Walgreens, JC Penney, Kohl’s, Gap, Babies R US, Aeropostale, and Bath & Body. Your giving fund will accumulate until you select the fundraiser or project that you wish for your funds to go to. It takes 7-14 days for funds to appear in your account. If you do any shopping online at all, this is a great way to support our adoption without any added expense. Even though the percentages may seem small, they all add up and all donations, regardless of the amounts, get us one step closer to bringing our child home. Please sign up at Pure Charity before you begin your Christmas shopping this season. Again, thank you so much for your support!

Sharing Our Story

Yesterday we had the privilege of speaking at an adoption training to six couples starting their first adoptions. We basically just shared the story of Mia's adoption. It's still amazing when I sit and think about how everything fell into place so beautifully. It's easy to see pregnancy and childbirth as miracles, but adoption is a miracle too. We are anxiously waiting to see what God has in store for this adoption.

                                                                                          LORI

Christmas Giveaway ending December 17th

We are having a giveaway in November/December to help raise funds for our adoption! PLEASE help spread the word through email, Facebook, Twitter, Pintrest, blogs, etc.!

Our goal is to raise $5,000 by the end of the year.   (This is to help cover USCIS $975, post placement report fees due in advance $1,500 and agency fees due upon USCIS approval $3,900.)

We are excited to be giving away one brand new Keurig K75 coffee maker and one of the top 2013 toys for this Christmas, a LeapFrog LeapPad Ultra.

Keurig K75 (Retail Value $179.99):

• Single-cup home brewing system for use with patented K-Cups
• One-touch control panel; blue backlit LCD display; digital clock; programmable on/off
• 5 brew-size options; adjustable brew temperature; removable drip tray
• Blue-lit removable 72-ounce water reservoir; descale indicator; dishwasher-safe parts
• Includes 12-count K-Cup variety pack and Water Filter Kit

LeapFrog LeapPad Ultra (Retail Value $149.99):

• LeapPad Ultra is the 100% kid-perfect learning tablet that is built kid-tough with a 7-Inch hi-res screen and Wi-Fi with kid-safe Web. Ages 4 - 9 years
• Kid-safe out of the box, LeapPad Ultra offers extra parental settings to easily control exactly what experiences a child can access
• LeapPad Ultra works with LeapFrog's library of 800+ apps, games, eBooks, videos, music and more
• LeapPad Ultra includes 11 apps (onboard and downloadable): Photo Fun Ultra, Art Studio Ultra, Pet Pad Party, Utility Suite, Pet Chat and more
• Features 8 GB of on-board memory which holds up to 40,000 photos or 140 Game Apps, built-in rechargeable battery, front-and-back cameras and more

WHEN DOES IT START AND END?
Donations will be accepted November 10 - December 17 for this giveaway, ending at midnight on the 17th.

HOW DO I DONATE?
Donations are accepted using the yellow PAYPAL DONATE button on our blog. Please indicate your contact information and which item you want your entries to go toward when you make your donation. You may enter for both items; just let me know how many entries you want for each item.

$10 = 1 entry
$25 = 3 entries

HOW ARE WINNERS SELECTED?
With each entry, you will be given a number. A separate series of numbers will be used for the two items in order to clearly identify the item each entry is for.

I will email your entry number/numbers to you after your donation posts via PAYPAL. On December 18, we will use a random number generator to select a number/donor for each item being given away. The winners will be notified by email as well as announced on the blog.

SHIPPING
The items will be mailed directly to the winners (within the 50 states) on December 18, and should arrive in time for Christmas.

WHO CAN DONATE?
Anyone. If you love orphans, donate. If you love coffee, donate, and if you know of a child between the ages 4-9 that would love a LeapFrog LeapPad Ultra for Christmas, donate.

Again, please help spread the word. Email, facebook, tweet, pin and blog about the giveaway. We cannot do this alone.  Thank you for your support.

Special Announcement

We are adopting again from China!  We want to keep Mia as the baby in the family, and we are requesting a boy or a girl between the ages of 3-5.

We had to switch to a different home study agency because the one we used for Mia’s adoption was not Hague Accredited. We also decided to switch placing agencies. I made a list of 24 agencies and researched them all. Many agencies are now only referring children from a specific orphanage in one province. We didn’t like this idea. The list was quickly narrowed down to 8. I then looked at cost. For our first adoption, I assumed all agencies charged the same fees.  This is not the case; they can vary by $3,000. We also wanted an agency that sponsored trips back to China as well as other activities for the adopted children and their families. The list was narrowed down to 2, and we finally decided on China Adoption with Love, Inc. They offer the lowest fees that I saw, and they sponsor trips back to China and a yearly get together for adoptive families on Chinese New Year. They are smaller than some agencies out there, but I feel they are the right fit for us. I do wish their website was better and more up to date, however.  So far they have made a good impression on me; they answer my emails very promptly. This seems to be a problem with some of the larger agencies.

We’ve applied and have already had our home study visit to update our previous home study. We are quickly gathering papers for the dossier. It isn't near as overwhelming the second time around.  Once our physicals are all out of the way in November, our home study can be submitted. This time doesn’t feel like a giant leap of faith that our first adoption felt like, because we have witnessed firsthand the miracle of adoption. We have to believe that God will take care of all the details and provisions as He did with Mia’s adoption.

                                                                                                       LORI

Gotcha Day - 1 Year Anniversary

Today is our one year Gotcha Day anniversary! One year ago today Mia was placed in our arms. It’s hard to believe it’s been a whole year; the time has flown by quickly.  She is a tremendous blessing and a living testimony of God’s greatness. 

Post from Daddy’s Face Book Page -

I simply cannot let today pass without a post about where we were one year ago. One year ago at this time we were sleeping on the very firm twin beds of the Majestic Hotel in Nanning, China. After arriving in Nanning more than 7 hours late due to flight delays and a very stressful day at the airport in Beijing we had finally arrived in Nanning around 7:30 pm local time. Upon arrival we were both exhausted and exhilarated. We were scheduled to meet Mia Xiao Wei at approximately 3:30pm the next afternoon. After waking up the next morning and having breakfast at the hotel we were excited, nervous, anxious, and nearly nauseous during the wait. Ultimately Lori and I would describe it as the most nervous either of us had been since our wedding day nearly 20 years before. Although we had expected the day to drag on forever it didn't. There were enough details to attend to that the time passed quickly and before we knew it it was time to leave for the Social Welfare Institute! Over the past year that precious little girl that we met for the first time at 3:30pm on July 23, 2012 has been a tremendous blessing to our family and those around us. She has been a joy in every sense of the word and through her we have been presented with opportunities to share the story of Christ's love and what God has done in our lives that may have never been there otherwise. 

September 2012

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Photo Courtesy of NCX Pro

2nd Birthday

Easter 2013

We love you so much Mia!