RUSSIA

A lot has happened since I last posted.
To much to even discuss except to say our adoption path has taken a huge detour!!
We had found ourselves getting discouraged from other friends we have meet on this adoption road that have been waiting years for a placement. I had a real struggle about do we stay with Bulgaria or do we start looking at other countries? It took us almost a year just to get registered with Bulgaria I just didn't know what to do!

Well after a lot of prayer and a decision to be proactive I started emailing other agencies to just learn about the programs in other countries. One of the things I did was to register with Rainbow Kids. Rainbow Kids is a website agencies can register to tell you about the children they have waiting. Some have major special needs some have a special need just because they are male and not a baby.

Last week I received an email that simple stated 17 month old, male child, healthy, Eastern Europe region, no picture. I just emailed out of curiosity thinking he might be in Bulgaria. Well I quickly got an email back and a very long phone call from an agency I have quickly grown to love. We where able to see his picture and we fell in love.

A week later we are looking at plane tickets to go meet our child. There is no other way to explain the events that have happened this week except to say God has led us to Moscow, Russia where my baby boy is waiting.

At this time we have plans to make our first trip at the end of Jan. or first week of Feb. and will eventually bring him home in March. We need lots of prayers because his adoption is more expensive than we had planned but we just know God didn't take us this far to leave us now.

Approved for Both Hands Fundraiser!!

We got word Friday that we have been approved to participate in the Both Hands fundraiser project. For those of you who are not familiar with Both Hands it is an opportunity for us raise money and do amazing work for a widow. I invite all of you to google Both Hands Foundation and learn more about this amazing project. We have found a wonderful widow we are hoping to be able to work with. I am working with her family to make this possible. Please be in prayer that she will allow us to help her and in return receive such blessing!!

We also got word from Bulgaria that we would get more information on where we stand in the lineup of waiting adoption parents. in January. At this time we will learn if we are one of a million waiting for a little boy or if the numbers are smaller. We also learned there are over 1500 special needs children just waiting in Bulgaria. Some of these children have huge struggles in life. I just pray that God will protect and guide these children until they are placed with their loving parents.

Continue to pray for us and baby brother wherever he is tonight!

Steph

Registered

Just found out we are officially registered with Bulgaria as of September 23, 2010!!!
One step closer!!

Steph

Friends in China

Please keep our friends John and Christy in your prayers. They are in China picking up their baby girl Sara. We met John and Christy in adoption class many months ago when we first started the adoption process. They have waited 4 and 1/2 years for Sara and according to the pictures she is apsolutely beautiful!! They have 8 more days days in China and then will be returning to Middle TN. They look so happy! God is amazing!!

Remember, keep your fingers crossed we should be hearing from Bulgaria soon. Just pray they are happy with all of our documents. I looked back at our timeline. They have had our documents for 5 months. They have until September 25th to decide if we can move to the next step.

Steph

Prayer

Before I forget we learned that a yard sale probably isn't the biggest money maker. We made $125, but on the bright side it was $125 more than we had. So thank you to everyone that attended!!

Our new prayer is for a project fundraiser we have applied for.
I am someone that doesn't like to just ask for money I would rather work for it. The program we have applied for is called Both Hands and it does just that. If we are selected to be a part of this program we would be raising money for our adoption but we in return will do work for a needy widow. I love the program because we will be working for the donation and continuing to follow God's word that tells us to take care of the orphans and widows.

So keep this program in your prayers. Hopefully we will be able to participate and this would be a great fundraiser opportunity.

Cause like I said before the yard sales just don't get it!! ha! ha!

Steph

More details from Bulgaria

Our dossier was submitted to the Ministry of Justice today. The Ministry has 1 month to review and respond back with a letter telling us we are officially registered. The ministry also has this 1 month to find fault in our dossier. If they request anything additional we have 1 month to correct and submit and then the ministry has another month to review again. So long story short please pray over the next month that the ministry finds no fault in our dossier and moves us to the next step. We should hear back by september 30th. That is our 15yr wedding anniversary so maybe that is a good sign!!

Update from Bulgaria

Just got word that our dossier is being reviewed by the Minister of Justice tomorrow. Please prayer that they find no fault and officially register our family. I will keep you posted as we get word.

Yard Sale

Checked in with out adoption agency today and still no updates from the Ministry since we last submitted paperwork they requested. Oh, well maybe no news is good news in this situation. At this point we are waiting for the ministry to accept our dossier that had been submitted.

Yard Sale fundraiser scheduled for Saturday!! It is supposed to be in the low 90's. A small blessing since we have not seen below 100 in awhile. I will keep you updated on how we do. Any little bit helps!!

Small Bump

I emailed just to check in with our adoption agency only to get frustrating news. Our paperwork that is in Bulgaria waiting to be registered hit a snag. While the courts where going through our paperwork they decided to reject our mental health certificates. Now keep in mind a mental health exam is very expensive and time consuming. The lawyers in Bulgaria told us the court was rejecting them because they where not completed by a psychiatrist. We had been told in January when the evaluations where completed that the clinical psychologist (who has a PhD) was fine to complete the form. Since January when the forms where completed and todays date they have decided his credentials are not acceptable. The funny thing is Bulgaria said we had the option to complete the form with a psychiatrist or our family doctor. My family doctor was great and agreed to sign the needed mental health form!! So once again our paperwork is headed off. Just say a small prayer that they won't find anymore problems. Once again adoption is just a reminder that we are not in control. We have to just trust that God has a bigger plan and that all things happen in his time not ours.

Paperwork

After a recommendation from our agency in Bulgaria we adjusted our home study. All we simply changed was to add our requested child age from 0-24 months old to 0-36 months old. We where told they would always try to get the youngest child possible for us if that is what we wanted but that they thought this would look favorable for us as a family to the court system. For some reason this little detail change really was a struggle for me to decide. In hindsight it is funny that it rattled me so much. I have always thought our son would probably be 2-3 years old but for some reason just having to make another decision rattled my cage. I think I had just been so relieved at the fact that we where finished with everything we could do that the slightest decision was very hard to make. All over with now! Paperwork done and sent! Now we just wait again to hear from our Bulgarian contacts. I laugh and joke at the fact that some time I feel like we are dealing with some secret underground world like the Mafia. I am just glad that we have the real "Godfather" in control. Thank you all for your prayers and best wishes!!!

Amazing News

I checked in with out International agency just to check on our progress. I didn't expect much news but didn't think it would hurt to ask. We discovered all of our documents arrived well and looked good to the lawyers in Bulgaria. The exciting news we found out was that the cost of our adoption has been reduced by almost $4000. I know last year the adoption program in Bulgaria went through massive changes. I am assuming they discovered a more cost effective way and have lowered the fees. What ever the reason I am excited and amazed!!!

How we began our journey.

In November 2009 Frank and I decided it was time to start our adoption journey. We had known several families who had adopted so we knew a little bit about how to get started. We had friends years ago who had used Catholic Charities for their home study so that is where we started. We then had to decide domestic or international. We quickly learned as a family that already had children we would not be eligible for a young child in this country unless we knew a birth mother. We felt like that was not the direction God was leading us so we decided to adopt internationally.

So what country do you pick? We first thought Russia. We had known several people who have adopted from Russia and had amazing experiences. However, We quickly discovered that Russia was not realistically within our budget. So the homework began. I learned all about travel requirements, travel expenses, length of time requirements and all of the other things required by different countries. We where instantly drawn to Bulgaria. I know it was a GOD thing. Once we decided on Bulgaria we still had to pick an agency to work with. We had our home study agency but we had to have an international agency that worked with Bulgaria. We where given a huge list of international agencies from Catholic Charities and looked at each and everyone of them. We were led to a small not for profit agency out of Portland Oregon. They seemed so knowledgeable and just like the right fit for us. Once again it was a GOD thing!

We are now at the point in our adoption journey where all of our paperwork has left the US and is in Bulgaria somewhere with someone!! I am new to this blogging stuff so I am going to work on a time line to show how our process has gone thus far.