Prayers needed!

We just found out there are some Government changes taking place July 14, 2014 that could potentially disrupt and even stop our adoption process.  With this said we are racing a clock, but our Dossier is in Country and due to be submitted this week, and our Team is working for us the best they can and will try to submit us as expedited, with that said it means we could be travelling the first week of June vs. the first week of July.  If this happens it is totally God trying to get our baby girls out of the Country and into our home before they are forever left in an orphanage and then moved to an adult mental institution.  We are still short on funds and now our travel date will be moved up, so we have less time to obtain these funds.  If you are not in a position to donate financially, then we ask that you donate your prayers and share our story with others you know, who might be able to donate.  Please remember all donations are tax deductible.  We are taking three horses to a trainer today or tomorrow to get them evaluated and hopefully sold.  If they bring what the trainer thinks they are worth, and if we can get a buyer quickly, then we will have all of our funds.  Please PRAY that we can get them sold quickly.  Again all of this is up to God now, he will provide if this is the path we are to travel.  Thank you Lord Jesus for bringing these beautiful little girls into our lives and family and Lord we know you will provide.

Trusting God...He has a plan...

Today I am feeling overwhelmed, a lot.  We have sold every available item we have to put towards going to Eastern Europe and bringing home our baby girl and possibly the second baby girl, if God puts her in our path, but we are still short.  I feel like people look at us from the outside and say "gee they live in a nice home, they don't need the money" but reality is, we are like everyone else who lives check to check.  Problem is in our case my husband has his own business and he does not get a check, we have to live on whatever money is available after all his business obligations are met, and these days it does not look good, between Shawn being off work from having his neck/spine surgery and customers not paying their bills we are struggling.  Next week is the first of the month and I am worried because he has no money as of today to contribute to paying our monthly bills.  This has never happened to us before and I believe the devil is attacking us, he knows we are saving to travel and get our babies, he knows this is Gods intention and he is trying to make us have to dip into our adoption fund to meet our bills.  The devil knows we don't have all the funding needed to travel to Eastern Europe and he is attacking my mind as well.  I am a wreck to the point I am having a hard time concentrating on my school work.  My semester is almost over, I have one final test tomorrow in Sociology and its done, then also by tomorrow I have to turn in a six page essay, along with three AB's of one page each, then next week I have an eight page essay due and then I will be finished with my English class.  I am struggling to get my essay written today, I have not even started my AB's, I will do them last, so all the way to Muenster when I went to pick up Natalie, I just prayed to the Lord and left all the finances at His feet, asked Him to put the knowledge and words in my mind to finish my semester and still make a good grade (I currently have an "A" in both classes), and asked Him to open doors where He wants us to go and close doors where He wants us to keep away from.  I still firmly believe He wants this adoption to happen, as I have prayed the whole time that His will be done and every time I have prayed and asked Him to continue to show us a sign or open a door so we know what we are to do, God has opened the door and led us once again towards the adoption.  Then He did it again today, after we got home I checked our FSP on Reece's Rainbow and our donation amount had increased by $240, I was so excited, I don't know who did it, but am so thankful they did and feel like its a start and another sign from God that all will be OK.  God will provide, God wants these precious baby girls to have a good home and be loved.  Thank you Jesus, we lay all our burdens at your feet and trust in your will for us!!

Now we wait, and wait.......

Today our very last document needed for our dossier was apostilled in Austin and is on its way to Houston for a lovely couple traveling to Eastern Europe to hand deliver to our legal team for us.  The paper chase is over, now we just sit and wait for our dossier to be submitted.  We are told it could either be submitted Thursday May 1 or Thursday May 8, after its submitted we wait for travel date, which is running 5-7 weeks after submission.  According to my calculations we should be traveling the last week of June or first week in July and we will have to remain in Country for about a month.  Shawn is trying to work his schedule so there will not be any conflicts for him while we are gone and his business will run smoothly.  I am happy it will be summer time and the weather will be nice, since we will have to walk to restaurants and shopping from our apartment, and we will have Natalie and Carissa with us, so much better all the way around.  Plus no missing school if we travel during the summer months.  Now we just have to get the rest of the money put together some how before we travel.  Please continue to pray that God will provide the finances in time for our travel.

We did it!!!!!!

We took the plunge yesterday, Monday and we drove to Dallas for a walk-in at the USCIS fingerprint center.  There was a security guard at the front desk, showed him our appointment letters for the end of the month and our medical expedite letter from the pediatrician, he was rude and kept telling me we had to call the 1800 number to reschedule if we could not go to the assigned appointment, I said you don't understand we want an early appointment because of the expediting and your Missouri office told us to walk-in, so I took a deep breath and kindly said, please call a person who works here that handles the appointments so we can ask them about taking us early, so he did, and the guy told us to come back in an hour and they could squeeze us in, so we hung out in Dallas a bit and went back and were fingerprinted.  I was finally able to speak to our assigned case officer today and she is printing our approval letter tomorrow and federal expressing it to us, we will have it Thursday morning!!!  Plus the last package of documents were apostilled today in Austin, thanks to my niece who lives there, she was kind enough to drive it to the Secretary of States office and then federal express it to me, so I will receive those tomorrow.  This package will be sent to a couple in Laredo who will be leaving on Saturday for Eastern Europe and they will hand deliver our babies.  Then the USCIS approval letter will be sent to my niece again and she will take it down on Monday and get it back to me by Tuesday and I will federal express to another kind lady from Houston who is leaving next Friday for Eastern Europe, she will hand deliver this last piece of document and it will complete our dossier.  Then we sit and wait for the Eastern Europe Government to approve us and send us a letter to travel.  Supposedly our travel date is anywhere from 5-7 weeks after we are submitted.  So hopefully we will be traveling during the summer, kids will be out of school and we will have great weather, because I understand it gets pretty cold over there in the winter months.

We are still working on the financing and have some deals in process to sell some items of value and hopefully be able to fully fund the adoption, other than running up our credit cards, which we have already been doing.  On another note, my husband spoke to his brother last night about our adopting a special needs child and he was not very positive, as a matter of  fact, he seemed a little bitter.  They have a son with Autism and he said you really need to think about a special needs child because ours has changed our lives forever, we never get to go anywhere as a family and enjoy outings.  We fully plan on carrying on our lives with Arielle just as if she did not have down syndrome, we will still go to church as a family, vacation, camp, swim, go to dinner and hire a babysitter for adult date nights.  We know down syndrome and any other special need will be a challenge, but should never stop your life from being full of fun and enjoyment.

Lord grant me patience and understanding!

This week has not been good. Shawn is in extreme pain and does not seem to be able to get it under control.  I am not sure if its because he is a man, or if its because its the first time he has ever had surgery like this and therefore has never experienced this sort of pain.  Its hard for me to empathize with him because I have had many surgeries over my years and normally within a few days post surgery, all is well and I can function and get rid of pain with pills.  That on top of my classes and the work involved there, I am currently trying to write three annotated bibliographies and a three page essay, all due in a couple of days.  Every time I sit down to devote time to my studies and homework, either Shawn needs something or Carissa is crying for something.  If all else fails, I will stay up all night after everyone is asleep and try to complete my work.

On an adoption note, we received our appointment letter in the mail from USCIS, which is not for another three weeks.  However, I spoke to the supervisor and he told me we could take the letter and try to get a walk in appointment.  He said it depends on how busy they are when you arrive, if they are not too busy they will take us in, if they are too busy they will turn us away.  Now I have to decide if its worth the risk to load up my husband who is in pain, drive 1.5 hours to Dallas and possibly get turned away.  I do have to leave on Sunday and drive down to Austin, spend another night and get my documents apostilled so they can be delivered in Eastern Europe.  This will only leave the USCIS approval letter as our last piece of information to be apostilled and delivered.  If we wait for our appointment, I won't get the approval until the first week of May, if we happen to get fingerprinted earlier, then I can get the letter ahead of time.  Decisions, decisions.  I guess its time for prayer!!!  God will lead us in the right direction on how to handle things.

Taking care of hubby...

Well Shawn had neck surgery a couple of days ago and came home from the hospital yesterday.  All is well with him, he is in the normal amount of pain and discomfort from having surgery, but other than that, his neck is 100% better.  He can actually feel his arm and fingers without any pain.  He is a bit grumpy since coming home because I am trying to make him follow the instructions from the doctor and that was, do no stay in bed, get up and keep moving and sit in a chair, use the bed only for sleeping.  Well since I am not the nurse at the hospital, he will be grumpy with me because he just wants to stay in bed!  I am glad to have his surgery over and get him on the road to healing, I need him 100% for traveling to Eastern Europe for our baby girl or girls I should say.  Yes we are considering a second baby girl and if everything continues as smoothly as they are now, then we will bring her home as well.

I called USCIS to see if they matched our home study up with our application yet and their computer system is down, she said call back in a couple of hours.  I called Texas Department of Public Safety on Monday and somebody had placed our fingerprints to the side and never did anything with them, she was upset and apologized and said they would print the report immediately and put in the mail that day, so I expect to see them today in my mailbox.  Next week we will drive down to Austin and get our documents apostilled and then overnight them to a friend who is leaving for Eastern Europe soon and she will deliver the documents for us.

Today is going to be another excellent day!!!

Our coordinator approved our home study yesterday, our social worker has signed it, notarized it and put it in the overnight mail.  I am expecting Lone Star Overnight to deliver our special papers today!  I am heading to Denton to pick up the letter signed by the pediatrician to get USCIS to expedite our approval, then the home study and letter will go into todays mail to USCIS.  Next step wait for them to schedule a fingerprinting appointment, hopefully very quickly!  Still waiting on DPS to deliver our background checks that were completed two weeks ago, hopefully they arrive today, I expect them any day now. Then the only document left for our dossier to be submitted will be the approval from USCIS.

On a different note, things have been stressful around our house, we are still trying to find all the funds needed for the adoption and Shawn's doctor scheduled him for surgery Monday, so he will be away from work for a while.  Ugh!  It's always something.  He has two crushed vertebrae in his upper spine and has been in severe pain, they did testing and scheduled him immediately after reviewing the results.  More money out of our pocket, so what exactly is insurance for?  I guess next week should go by quickly as far as waiting for the adoption process to run its course, because I will be dealing with his surgery and being in the hospital a couple of days and his recovery.  Hopefully they don't schedule our fingerprints before he can be up and around. Please pray for a quick and successful surgery, as well as a pain free recovery for Shawn.

Happy, happy day!!!

We received the draft of our home study today via email.  It has been reviewed and I sent it over to our coordinator for her approval.  Once approved our social worker will overnight it to us and then I can forward to the US government to get our approval from them.  This is the only piece of information they are waiting for to schedule our fingerprints and approve us.  I also had a very nice conversation with a pediatrician who specializes in international adoption and he is willing to write a letter saying it would benefit the child for the US and Ukraine governments to expedite our process.  Our coordinator said it would help us get a travel date quicker.  I am still hoping to have our dossier submitted to Ukraine no later than May 1st, and all I need to do that is my approval letter from the US government.  I am happy and excited the process seems to be back in motion once again!