Fundraising Success :)

Ok, so I have not blogged in a really long time. Life has been crazy, but we have been making slow and steady progress with the adoption. We have completed all of our paperwork with the exception of one doctor's form that has to be redone and our taxes, which we are waiting to get back. We have USCIS approval and should be traveling within the next 2 months.

Now, on to the fundraiser-Our church hosted a BBQ/bake sale/yard sale today. We sold tons of stuff including 100 pounds of BBQ. The total is somewhere in the ballpark of $2300, as more continues to slowly trickle in.

We have had several very generous donations including several $50 gift certificates and some really nice gift baskets. I will be putting them up on facebook and my blog soon to try and raise a little more money. Gift cards include Target, Lowes, The Little Gym (Huntersville), and Best Buy, oh and we have 3 certificates for 15 minute chair massages and 6 coupons for free personal pan pizzas from Pizza Hut. I am hoping to get this up and running in the next day or 2. Take a look at the fundraising thermometer. We passed the half way mark today! While this is awesome news, we only have 2 months or less to raise the remaining funds. Remember, all donations made through our Reece's Rainbow account are tax deductible. If you know anyone who is interested in contributing to a good cause (and a tax write off :) please let me know.

Thank you all so much for helping us get this far. We couldn't do it without you!

Valentine Fundraiser for Quinton!

Thank you everyone who purchased one of our Valentine cookie bouquets! By the time we collect all of our money, we will have raised $851! With each fundraiser, we get a little bit closer to bringing our baby boy home. I have had several people ask us/suggest doing Easter bouquets. Well, as successful as this fundraiser was, I don't think my mom or I will be ready to see anymore cookie bouquets for quite some time. We have something a little different in mind for Easter :) We must have baked, iced, and decorated over 250 sugar cookies (and you can only bake them 6 at a time), but it was well worth the time and effort. Thanks to my mom for spending an entire week baking, and to my dad for painting 38 pots. The support we have received from friends and family has been amazing.

Just a quick update: Our i-600a (application to United States Immigrations and Customs) is ready to go in the mail on Monday. After it is received, they will send us a date to go get federal fingerprints. Once we are approved, we can send our dossier to Quinton's country to be translated and upon approval, we will receive a travel date to go see him for the first time. I get teary eyed just thinking about it! This would put us there in roughly late May or June. We are planning on sending a letter with our i-600a explaining the urgency of getting Quinton home as fast as possible due to his heart condition. Just last week another orphan with a heart defect went to be with Jesus. He was not adopted in time to get to the United States for treatment. Please pray for God to sustain Quinton's heart long enough for us to get him home. We greatly appreciate it.

Here are some pictures from our recent cookie endeavors:

Quinton's Surprise Party!

So, Friday started out as a really tough day for me. I was pretty bummed about missing Quinton's first birthday, but it got so much better. My coworkers worked really hard to plan a surprise party for him. I can't believe my students didn't let the secret slip. It was so sweet. They bought him gifts and a beautiful cake that we enjoyed in his honor. It really touched my heart. Now we just need to get him home so he can enjoy all of his new things. Here are some pictures from the festivities:

 Surprise! When I walked in, the kids started singing happy birthday. They didn't get that it was Quinton's birthday, though. They all sang happy birthday Ms. Miller :)

 This is me "holding Quinton" for the first time LOL

All Quinton's goodies-He is one lucky little boy to have so many people love him already.

Thank you to all of you who donated or prayed for Quinton in honor of his first birthday and thank you to my spectacular friends who threw him this party. I love you guys!

To My Son-On Your First Birthday

My sweet baby boy,

Oh, how I wish I could be with you today to tell you Happy Birthday-to hug you and kiss you and tell you “I love you”. I want so badly to be the first face you see when you wake up every morning the last face you see when you fall asleep at night. I want to wrap my arms around you and hold you tight. I long for you to be here with us, at home where you belong. As I sit here, I am crying tears of pain because today is your first birthday and I cannot be there with you. A mommy should never have to miss her baby’s first birthday. She should be there to buy presents and balloons and to make a cake that you can dig your hands and face into. No worries though little guy. When you come home, we will celebrate. We will celebrate and it will be a celebration like no other, because you will be home forever. You will be ours and we will be yours. I will love you like crazy. I will hug you everyday and tell you how much I love you. I will kiss your boo-boos and make them all better. Your daddy will give you piggyback rides and take you fishing and do all of those things that daddy’s do. From the day you get home my son, you will know that we are a family and you will know how much we love you and you will know that we are truly A Match Made In Heaven.

Loving you from across the world,

Your Mommy

Who says 3rd time's a charm?

While we are anxiously awaiting our final copy of our homestudy, we went ahead and began working on our first part of our dossier. Each page has to be notarized and then sent off to Raleigh to be apostilled (@ $10 per page!). Sounds easy, right? Go to the bank and have the papers notarized...no big deal. Well, seeing as how my husband and I work opposite shifts and the notary has to witness both of us sign the papers, it is much easier said than done.

First attempt: Tuesday-snow day and the perfect chance to get our documents notarized before Brian leaves for work except that the snow turned to ice and everywhere is closed :(

Second attempt: Wednesday-Brian's day off. I leave after work (teacher workday) to meet Brian and go get the papers notarized. I get home only to realize that I have left the folder at work!

Third Attempt: Thursday-Brian's last day off until the next Wednesday. I bring the folder of papers home and we go to a bank in Stanly county where we already know and like the competent notary. She sits down to notarize and realizes that our official papers say Cabarrus county on them and she is a Stanly county notary! By this time it is 4:30 so we hightail it to a bank in Concord. There are very specific guidelines to notarizing international documents and this man clearly could not get it right. It is probably a good thing we ran into problems with there not being enough room for his notary stamp without overlapping any writing (a big no-no which will get your documents rejected!). Feeling very defeated and out of time, we went home. Brian fixed the margins on the documents to allow plenty of space for the stamp so we would be ready to go NEXT WEDNESDAY! I was so bummed since we are racing against this vote. (More on that later-if I remember LOL. For now, just know the vote could lengthen the adoption and has been postponed...again). Note: third time NOT a charm!

Fourth Attempt: Friday-We had a snowday. School was closed and Brian does not have to go in to work until 2:45. So this time we know that we need to go to Cabarrus county and we know not to go back to the bank with the kind notary who could not get it right-bless him for trying, though. We go to another bank and successfully get our documents notarized...finally! The lady was so sweet and genuinely interested in our story. Whoever said 3rd time's a charm was wrong. For us the 4th time was a charm and despite the fact that I have to work the next 2 Saturdays to make up for all the snow days, I am so blessed that God gifted us those days so that we could get things done. Now we are yet another step closer to bringing Quinton home :)

My Heart is a Little Sad Today

Tonight I was working on completing some last minute training in preparation for the final phase of our homestudy tomorrow. The training was on Eastern European Adoption and focused a lot on cultures and subcultures that the children become accustomed to. The subculture they were referring to was life in the orphanage. This is the only life these kids know. They are fed together, go to the bathroom together, and wear each others clothes (which are all labeled with group numbers). It almost reminds me of the holocaust where people were only known by their numbers. Nothing belongs to them. They don't have toys to call their own, not even a blankie to sleep with at night. Nobody even acknowledges their birthdays. This is what broke my heart tonight. Tomorrow is my birthday. We will celebrate by finishing our homestudy (yay!) and this weekend we will probably go out to eat with my family. My Mom will call me and I will probably get lots of Happy Birthday wishes on facebook, but one month from today, my baby boy will turn one year old and nobody will even acknowledge it. I cannot be there to shower him with hugs and kisses and happy birthday wishes and it kills me inside. I can't get to him soon enough. I knew from the get  go that we would not have him home by his first birthday, but I have fallen in love with him a little more every day and I had no idea how heartbreaking it would be to be away from him. So tomorrow whenever someone wishes me a happy birthday, I will stop and whisper a prayer for my baby boy. I love you Quinton!

In the news...

Here is the link to the Salisbury Post. If you have a minute, read this article. It features one of my students and her family who introduced us to Reeces Rainbow and ultimately inspired us to adopt Quinton. Brian and I get a little publicity at the bottom too :)
http://www.salisburypost.com/Lifestyle/122610-Rescuing-Anastasia-qcd