Homestudy, etc

We received our homestudy in the mail today. That means copies will be made tonight and grants will be sent out tomorrow! We should receive our official referral soon. There is just a bit more paperwork that the in country staff is working on. Although I am excited to receive the referral, it's also a bit stressful. Normally when you send your dossier in, you send in a large chunk of money. Then when you receive your referral several months later, you send in another large amount. Well we are essentially doing these two steps at the same time. That means that we need another $12,000 in the next few weeks. That's a lot of money that we currently do not have. However, I completely believe that God called us to this adoption and that He will provide. This adoption has been a big step of faith for us and we are grateful for the many things God has shown us. Please keep us in your prayers as we continue on this journey. We serve a big God and I know that $12,000 is nothing for Him.

Fingerprints

Today we had our fingerprint appointment. Here is the sign for the building. Not too exciting is it?

Just like before, we took a picture of ourselves in the car. (You can't take pics in the building.) John said the pictures took longer than the fingerprints!

Here we are in January 2008-

Here we are, just 2 years later. Think there will be another picture in 2012?

This is what should happen next:

• Rebecca will send our homestudy to USCIS.
• USCIS will review our fingerprints & homestudy. Then they will send our clearance- the coveted I171H.
• John will take a trip to Raleigh to get all notarized papers authenticated.
• Then our dossier will be sent to AWAA in VA.
• They will look over it and send it to the US Secretary of State for authentication.
• It is then sent to Ethiopia!
• Once there it is translated and a court date will be requested. YEAH!

Lemonade for Adoption

This is Carlie.  Carlie is a friend of the family who upon hearing about our adoption decided she wanted to help.  So, Carlie went out and set up a lemonade stand.  Being a smart business girl, she set up near a country club golf course.  At this point she has raised a little over $140.00 and is hoping to raise more.

It is things like this, when you see people who go out of their way to help, who go above and beyond, that truly makes us humble.  We are just amazed at what Carlie has done and her lemonade stand has blessed us in many more ways than just the money.  Her heart and her efforts are a true inspiration to us all.

Thank you, Carlie.

"Jesus said, 'Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs 

the kingdom of heaven.'” Matthew 19:14

In case you're wondering why our thermometer above went down......

When we started our homestudy, we had to pay for it upfront. At the time we didn't have the money so we charged it. We hated to do that because there is a service charge you have to pay with that, but we knew the money would be coming from our tax return soon. Well, the charge never showed up on our card. Since we now had money from the yard sale, etc. we went ahead and used that to pay for the homestudy. Since we still don't have our tax return, we decided to take that amount off until Uncle Sam finally gets that money in our bank. I know- you're probably thinking, "Why is she telling me all this?" It's just because when people are giving you money, I feel you should be very transparent with how it is being used. Hopefully the tax return will come in soon so that amount can go back up.

Dottie

Never Will I Leave You

Flip Video Camera

We are having a drawing for anyone that donates to our adoption between now and April 13th. You may donate on the ChipIn or you can send a check (see address to the left.) Just be sure that if you write a check, it gets here by the 13th. Thanks so much for your help. We're getting close!

If you are wondering where we are in the process, here's a rundown of what is happening next.

• We have our final homestudy visit this Saturday.
• We have our fingerprint appointment with USCIS on April 13th.
• We will receive our approval from USCIS 1-6 weeks after our appointment. (We're hoping for closer to 1.)
• If we have all the money that is needed once we recieve our approval, our dossier (all the official paperwork) will get sent to Ethiopia.
• Once there, it will be translated and a court date will be requested. Once we get to this point, I will update you on what would happen next.

Thanks again for all your help!

The Law

So yesterday afternoon, we were exhausted from  2 days of nonstop yard sale/stew. As we were packing up, one of the men from the church had a trailer hooked up to his truck that he hauled the gigantic stew pot cooker thingy in. Feromsa decided he wanted to ride home in the trailer. I of course said no. There was a bit of whining, please Mommy, etc. After he finally got in the van, he asked why he couldn't ride in the trailer. I simply told him that it was against the law. Feromsa wanted to know who made the law. Since I was completely exhausted and did not want to go into an extensive government lesson I said, "The police." There was silence in the car for approximately 30 seconds when Joshua decided to pipe in with this. "Actually laws come from the House of Representatives. Then it is passed through the Senate."

Thank you Joshua.

Gotta love that boy!