Adoption Grant

I'm overwhelmed.  Grateful beyond words.  Jumping up and down.  Happy, elated tears.  Miracles do happen and God is definitely proving to us that He is in the spiritual business of adoption.

Today we received word that A Child Waits Foundation is granting us money for travel fees!  Oh yes, miracles do happen, folks!  The amount they are generously giving us will cover the $1400 we have due now in post placement fees.  It will also cover a portion of our travel fees.

The only hiccup we have will be in the timing of the payment of fees.  As stated in my previous post, our agency is requiring all fees in the next 2 weeks.  This grant foundation only sends fees right before travel. So, we'll see if our agency and this foundation can work things out to get payment in when it is due.

For Jay and I, we just need to figure out how to finish at least half of our puzzle fundraiser.  I'll punch the numbers tomorrow and will update our Donate! tab at the top to see how much we need to raise to get at least one of us to China.  Then it will be the decision of who will travel.  At this point, it might be just me going overseas.  We'll see.

But please join me in thanking God for His miraculous provision and financial gift through A Child Waits.  Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

Urgent Request!

Hi Friends.  We just received the longest and definitely the most confusing email from our agency.  It's a portfolio full of documents (20+ pages) we need to sign, articles we need to read, forms we need to fill out.  We have to make travel decisions (will one or both of us travel) too.  It also includes a fee schedule.

In the next 14 days, all our paperwork is due and all our payments are due (including travel fees)!

My biggest concern is something I clearly misunderstood.  At this time, we must pre-pay for our post-placement services.  China requires 6 post-placement reports that we must file on a specific time schedule after our daughter is home.  We will meet with our social worker, she will write the reports and send them to our agency who in turn sends them to China.  Right now, we must pay $1400 in post-placement fees.

Friends, without your help, we don't know where these funds will come from and they are due NOW!  This is my public plea for prayer and help!  Please donate if you can.  Just think about this: we could raise the money simply by...

14 families donating $100
or
28 families donating $50
or
56 families donating $25

See our Donate! page for details.  At this point, it would be best to send donations directly to our agency:  La Vida International.  But if you'd like the tax deduction, send donations to LifeSong for Orphans as described on our Donate! page above.  Please be sure to let us know if you are able to send anything so we can keep both organizations apprised.

Lastly, PLEASE help us spread the word!  Post our latest news on your Facebook pages and your blogs!  The more people who know about our need, the more people might help!  And above all, please pray that God would provide the funds we need.

(enjoy another picture too)

Soundtrack

I heard a song this past fall that brought our adoption process full circle for me.  My husband would totally think I’m crazy for this, so let’s hope he doesn’t follow my blog.  Ha!

For those of you new to our story, you may have to go back to this 2010 post when we first started our adoption process from Nepal.  But in a [rather large] nutshell, here's the backstory.

In the summer of ’10, I volunteered to babysit a newborn baby boy for 8 days.  The baby was the son of a teenage mom who was part of a ministry called Young Lives in Nebraska.  A friend of ours from church was an adult leader in that ministry and took these young girls away on a retreat to Colorado every year.  The young moms had to find sitters for their babies unless they were still nursing.  One young mom was in need of a sitter for her 4-week-old baby boy.  Even if my husband was hesitant, I knew it was something I could do.

I set up the old bassinette in our master bedroom, I washed off the old baby bottle drying rack and set it up in my kitchen next to the sink.  I brought out fresh blankets from the linen closet. 

When the young mom dropped the baby off at my home, she was expressionless.  They brought with them a suitcase of clothes that reeked of too much fabric softener and Febreeze, a baby swing and a car seat.  Our friend asked the young mom if she was ready to go, leaving our house with her baby behind and the young mom just nodded, wide eyed, both arms extended with locked elbows and handed her baby over without kissing his head, saying good-bye, without so much as looking me in the eyes.  It was a sad moment, it really was. 

I spoiled that baby for days.  I wholeheartedly loved our 3 a.m. dates over dirty diapers and formula and snuggling.  I loved taking him to the store, to steamy hot t-ball games (that was good for a laugh because all our friends did a double-take and knew there was no way I had had a baby).  I had to work one afternoon at church for a wedding and I dropped him off with a sitter, but when I returned and ran an errand with him to Target, I know I saw his first smile.  Precious!  Over the course of these few days, my husband sang a song to him that was quite fitting for his awkward life – “The Eye of the Tiger” from Rocky.  We wanted that boy to grow up to be strong, courageous, a fighter winning against the odds.  We sang it over and over to him, pumping his tiny arms in the air as he lay on our floor sprawled out on a receiving blanket.

When the day came for the young mom to pick him up and take him back, I never got a phone call when expected.  I figured they were driving all night from Colorado and they were just running late or had car trouble.  Lunchtime came and still no call.  Around 1 p.m. and I made a call to our friend to see if she was back yet with all the girls.  They had been back since 7:30 a.m.  It was the responsibility of this young mom to call me and to pick up her son and she never did.  I learned more of her story over the phone and while it’s her story to tell, I will say that on this retreat, she questioned her future as a teen mom raising a baby boy.  Despite our adoption situation, I offered immediately that I would give this boy a home if he needed one, be it temporary or permanent.  I was willing to dump our international adoption plans if that is what God wanted me to do.  I was willing to become a certified foster parent, or jump head first into a domestic adoption.  I had bonded and I was in love!  I had all boy stuff, everything I needed to take care of him.  When the young mom finally arrived after 2pm, my heart broke saying good-bye to the baby and I cried and told him to be good to his mommy as I clicked his carrier into the seatbelt in the van.  I stood in the driveway as they drove off and then I sobbed behind the closed door of my home after they had driven out of site. 

The very next day we were driving from Lincoln to Chicago for our annual trip home for the Leadership Summit.  I was still heartbroken and simply silent in the car.  My husband thought it was sweet that I had bonded with this tiny one in just a matter of days and told me I’d have no trouble bonding with our future adopted daughter.  I couldn’t even respond.  I simply cried a waterfall of tears as I stared out the passenger window.  Then “Eye of the Tiger” came on the radio as we were just outside Omaha.  The sobs came hard.  Oh, I missed that boy and felt like a part of me was missing!

Fast-forward 2 years.  Two years, one failed adoption, a new job moving us across the country, 2 boys and a referral in hand from China for a waiting little girl.  

I was driving home from school with my boys on Halloween and “Eye of the Tiger” was playing on the radio.  I think of that sweet baby boy and then I think of my waiting daughter.  As mentioned in my previous post, Hu Jing means “quiet tiger."   I almost had to pull over.  I really thought of the lyrics as I sang them through both sad, but now mostly happy tears.  What a song of challenge, of fighting for the dream, for the win, fighting to stay alive.  I think it’s an appropriate song for our haphazard adoption, for that sweet baby boy who must be 2 1/2 now, for the daughter waiting for us in China.  We have gone the distance and gotten back on our feet.  We have fought just to keep our adoption dream alive – the dream of our Quiet Tiger waiting for us in China.

Now go sing the song because I know I've gotten it into your heads!

LOA!!!

IT HAS FINALLY ARRIVED!  [insert sigh of relief, followed by uncontrollable sobbing, coupled with complete exhaustion]

In China's eyes, we have a daughter!  Today our agency received our LOA - Letter of Approval.  They are emailing it to us for our signatures, then we send it back so they can forward it to USCIS.  Hopefully within a month we will receive our I800 Approval.  Following that, the wait is only 7-12 weeks until we see our daughter face to face in China!

This LOA doesn't come without some drama, however.  Our agency knows Jay has a new job in CA and that he's been out there since last April.  Our Social Worker in Nebraska will have to add 2 or 3 sentences in a home study addendum stating as much.  Shouldn't take long at all and hopefully she can do that today or this weekend!

Now that we have our LOA, I am free to share her picture with you.  You've got to see this face!


This is the face of our DAUGHTER!

Her name is Hu Jing (pronounced HOO-jung) and we'll keep that as her middle name.  In Chinese her name means Quiet Tiger.  Be on the lookout for a blog post about how her name has special meaning for us.  Yes, we have chosen an English first name for her but we'll keep you in suspense.  Much like our pregnancies, we will keep her first name a secret until she's in our arms.

Hu Jing does have special needs and we will talk about them in a future post.  Normally I would never share personal medical information with anyone in any public forum, but her special need will be clearly visible to all of you and is not correctible.  So, just in the interest of preparing family and friends, I will share that info with you in the future.  Stay tuned.

For the time being I will not share info about where she is currently living.  When we travel, I'll will tell you what province she is from because we will have to fly there to meet her for the first time.  For now, I will protect her privacy and safety by keeping that info off of the internet.

Thanks for respecting her privacy on those 2 issues!

We are thrilled, excited, ecstatic, and in love!  We love you, Hu Jing - our Quiet Tiger -- and we are coming for you!

2012-13 Tax Credit Petition - Please Read and Sign!!!

I had said to myself that I wouldn't blog in 2012 until I received my LOA.  Alas, that hasn't happened, but this post is too important not to post immediately!

Adoption, domestic or foreign, is EXPENSIVE!  Ours is in the $25,000 range and that's after we already lost $9000 to our foiled Nepal adoption.  In years past, there has been a Federal Adoption Tax Credit where adoptive families have been able to recoup their adoption expenses over the course of 3 years after they complete the process and bring their children home.  The US Government has not extended the full Adoption Tax Credit for 2012 (it is modified) and calls for it's extinction after 2012.

Extension of this tax credit would greatly affect our adoption!  It would allow us funds to pay back our interest-free loan to LifeSong for Orphans.  It would allow us to restock our savings account.  And honestly, it would allow us to give to other families trying to adopt because you have been so faithful to give to us!

Please check out this link (just hover your mouse over this), read the info and sign the petition!  I firmly believe more families would adopt if a full credit were available to them!

And lastly, please take a moment and pray for this petition, that it would reach it's way through our government and that our leaders would not be able say no to children in need!

Thank you!