Here's the short version of what we're shooting for:
We should have our first $8,000 (aka, our agency fee) turned in by the end of 2011. This ensures that our application doesn't expire and we won't have to re-pay our application fee. Unfortunately, we can't apply for any kind of assistance with this first chunk of cash. We have to come up with all of it.
After this we will have to wait about 3 months for the U.S. paperwork to clear, our home study to conclude, a few other things to happen, and then we'll be all set to go from the U.S. side of things.
Once this is done, we've got another 6+ months of waiting for the Ministry of Women's Affairs in Ethiopia to take care of the Ethiopian side. Apparently there's no real way of knowing how long this will take, but we've been told to expect 6-9 months.
After the MOWA has decided to let us have one of their precious babies, we'll be matched with a baby living in Hannah's Hope, an orphanage located in the capital of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa. We'll finally get to see pictures of our baby, we'll receive their medical information, and we will take over their orphanage expenses.
Six months later, we'll board the plane to Ethiopia! We won't get to bring our baby home at this point - this will just be a 10-day-long trip to begin the bonding process, make final decisions, and take care of a few legal things.
Six weeks after that, we'll return to Ethiopia, finalize the adoption, receive our baby's U.S. Citizenship, and return home to begin our new, wonderful life.
Monday, September 26, 2011
Sunday, September 4, 2011
moving right along.
I'm so thankful that God has been so blatantly obvious about this whole thing. Sometimes I need to be slapped with the obvious (figuratively) in order to really understand His will, and He's been, well, faithful.
When I filled out the pre-approval there was a space where we had to list our top three "country choices." I tried to put "Ethiopia" in all three blanks, but it wouldn't let me. I finally clicked Taiwan and China as our 2nd and 3rd and turned that bad boy in. When our coordinator, Erin, called the next day she said, "I think Ethiopia is your best bet. For the other countries you have to be at least 30, so those won't work." My heart fluttered a little when she said that. "I knew those other countries wouldn't work," I thought, "our baby is in Ethiopia!"
After receiving our pre-approval, we filled out the actual application and sent that in immediately. We received a call not even 3 days later and were told that we had successfully made it through that phase of the process also.
Next came our first phone interview! We received a HUGE packet of information and were told that we needed to be very familiar with all of the information before the phone interview. We spent hours going over every detail - agency contract, adoption process, timeline, fee schedule (…oooohh, that fee schedule) - and, finally, we were ready. On September 7th, we had our first interview and it went perfectly.
We were pumped up and ready to go. The next step? Write a check. A big check.
Oy.
Erin had given us a list of fundraising ideas (and they were great ideas), but still…yikes. I started doing a little research to find out what kinds of things other families had done to fund their international adoptions. There are lots of awesome blogs out there - it's like a little community of families who are all in the business of helping each other bring home their babies. I'm excited to join in on it and get this ball a-rollin'!
Saturday, August 27, 2011
The email that started it all.
On August 21, we were in San Angelo for a baby shower for my friend, Sarah, and her new baby girl. Over the years Sarah and I have had lots of adoption talks. I mean, LOTS. Throughout the course of the weekend several friends asked me about whether or not we had started the adoption process and I would immediately think about that stack of paperwork sitting in the dining room, and then mutter a quick, non-committal reply like, "Oh, yeah, kind of. We'll really get started on it pretty quickly, I'm sure."
On August 23, I received an email from Sarah. The subject line simply said
"for your adoption heart."
As I read the quick description of the video I could feel my heart start pounding. Tears welled up in my eyes. I clicked "play" and proceeded to bawl throughout the entire 7 minutes and 35 seconds of the video.
ETHIOPIA, Lord?! How terrifyingly daunting. I didn't even know where to begin, but I knew it was right. THIS was the reason that paperwork had been sitting there for 6 months. THIS was God's plan. It had to be His plan, because there's no way we could pull it off on our own.
My family was already in bed for the night, so I spent the next few hours researching. I think I looked up every possible adoption agency that works with Ethiopian adoptions. Finally, I found the perfect one for us. As I scrolled through the pictures of all of the case managers, directors, coordinators, etc., I felt like I knew them. It seemed like they were already rooting for us! I was overwhelmed with excitement…and peace. Both at the same time! Crazy, I tell you.
I filled out the pre-application at 11:35 p.m. on August 23rd.
At 11:45 a.m. on August, 24th, I received a phone call from the agency. We were approved to begin the process of bringing our baby home from Ethiopia.
On August 23, I received an email from Sarah. The subject line simply said
"for your adoption heart."
As I read the quick description of the video I could feel my heart start pounding. Tears welled up in my eyes. I clicked "play" and proceeded to bawl throughout the entire 7 minutes and 35 seconds of the video.
The Video
(I'm sure they don't mind me sharing it…)
ETHIOPIA, Lord?! How terrifyingly daunting. I didn't even know where to begin, but I knew it was right. THIS was the reason that paperwork had been sitting there for 6 months. THIS was God's plan. It had to be His plan, because there's no way we could pull it off on our own.
My family was already in bed for the night, so I spent the next few hours researching. I think I looked up every possible adoption agency that works with Ethiopian adoptions. Finally, I found the perfect one for us. As I scrolled through the pictures of all of the case managers, directors, coordinators, etc., I felt like I knew them. It seemed like they were already rooting for us! I was overwhelmed with excitement…and peace. Both at the same time! Crazy, I tell you.
I filled out the pre-application at 11:35 p.m. on August 23rd.
At 11:45 a.m. on August, 24th, I received a phone call from the agency. We were approved to begin the process of bringing our baby home from Ethiopia.
Friday, August 26, 2011
Our story begins...
We've always known that we would adopt. From the very beginning of our marriage we have known that the Lord has called us to share our home and our hearts with children that were not born into a family.
After our son, Josiah, was born in such a traumatic way in July of 2010, we were advised not to have any more children biologically. We knew that we wanted more, we had hoped that all of our kids could be fairly close in age, and knowing that adoptions usually take a while, we started the "foster-to-adopt" process in early 2011. In March, we had an adoption counselor come to our house, meet our family, and conduct our first interview. We were approved to begin the process and I had ALL of the paperwork filled out within a week.
And it sat there in the dining room for 6 months.
That huge stack of papers took hours to go through and I just tucked it all back into the folder and left it there. I thought about sending it in every single day, but I just never could bring myself to do it. I was terrified of the "foster-to-adopt" program because I knew that there was always the risk of bringing the child home, loving him or her as our own for months, and then unexpectedly having them removed from our home. The process of adopting a foster child takes forever, and I knew that I would be afraid to get attached to "my" child because of the fear of losing them.
We thought "foster-to-adopt" was our only real option since domestic adoption is crazy expensive and foreign adoption…well, that's like "remortgage-your-house" expensive.
Oh, we of little faith. We had taken matters into our own hands and, as a result, spent all that time wondering if we were doing the right thing.
Little did we know that God was readying our hearts and preparing us to hear from Him in a massive way. In a way that would require us to trust Him like never before.
After our son, Josiah, was born in such a traumatic way in July of 2010, we were advised not to have any more children biologically. We knew that we wanted more, we had hoped that all of our kids could be fairly close in age, and knowing that adoptions usually take a while, we started the "foster-to-adopt" process in early 2011. In March, we had an adoption counselor come to our house, meet our family, and conduct our first interview. We were approved to begin the process and I had ALL of the paperwork filled out within a week.
And it sat there in the dining room for 6 months.
That huge stack of papers took hours to go through and I just tucked it all back into the folder and left it there. I thought about sending it in every single day, but I just never could bring myself to do it. I was terrified of the "foster-to-adopt" program because I knew that there was always the risk of bringing the child home, loving him or her as our own for months, and then unexpectedly having them removed from our home. The process of adopting a foster child takes forever, and I knew that I would be afraid to get attached to "my" child because of the fear of losing them.
We thought "foster-to-adopt" was our only real option since domestic adoption is crazy expensive and foreign adoption…well, that's like "remortgage-your-house" expensive.
Oh, we of little faith. We had taken matters into our own hands and, as a result, spent all that time wondering if we were doing the right thing.
Little did we know that God was readying our hearts and preparing us to hear from Him in a massive way. In a way that would require us to trust Him like never before.
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