For anyone who is local, please stop by our yard sale tomorrow and shop for a cause!! All proceeds will benefit our adoption fund AND the missions trip to Ukraine.
Date: Saturday, April 30
Time: 7:30am - 1:00pm
Location: 130 Jackson Street (up the stairs from Bollo's in the old Red Cross building. Just follow the signs!)
Please spread the word!!
Also...our dossier was delivered today! (According to our tracking number, anyway.) I'm still waiting to get email confirmation from our facilitators in country, but it looks like we should be submitted next Thursday AND we're getting a refund from UPS!
Friday, April 29, 2011
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
UPS Woes And Name Ideas
Well, our dossier package is finally showing up on UPS tracking. Apparently it has been LOST for SIX DAYS in Roanoke and they only found it last night!!! Oh my goodness, I just can't believe it. It's now on its way and we should be submitted next week (Thursday, May 5). Oh and we ARE getting a refund...again. UPS is certainly losing money (and business) on us!
As for names, we are kind of stuck and would like some more suggestions if you have any! "Zara" is still on the table, as well as her birthname. We also like the name "Lily" but we can't think of a good middle name to go with it. Any other ideas??!
As for names, we are kind of stuck and would like some more suggestions if you have any! "Zara" is still on the table, as well as her birthname. We also like the name "Lily" but we can't think of a good middle name to go with it. Any other ideas??!
Monday, April 25, 2011
Name, Name, What's In A Name?
I've had several people ask me how to pronounce "Zara". Well, we're no experts but we've been saying it "ZAH-ra", with the "ah" sound as in "car". This isn't her real name, however, it's just the alias she was given by Reece's Rainbow. All the children on the RR website are given an alias to protect their identity. "Riley" was an alias as well, we just liked it so much we were going to keep it.
We do know Zara's birthname but we are not going to announce it until she is officially "ours". We are still undecided as to what name we are going to give her. I do like "Zara" a lot. In Arabic it means "radiance" and in Hebrew it means "flower" or "princess". However, we do like her birthname a lot too. So, until we have our court date and Zara is officially a StClair, we will keep calling her Zara here in cyberspace.
In other news, a REALLY fun package arrived at our house today: clothes for Zara from my dear friend Kristin! These are Zara's first clothes, ever. She has never had anything belong to her in her entire LIFE. I almost cried when I opened them, and of course I took pictures of every outfit!
Thank you Kristin!! :)
We do know Zara's birthname but we are not going to announce it until she is officially "ours". We are still undecided as to what name we are going to give her. I do like "Zara" a lot. In Arabic it means "radiance" and in Hebrew it means "flower" or "princess". However, we do like her birthname a lot too. So, until we have our court date and Zara is officially a StClair, we will keep calling her Zara here in cyberspace.
In other news, a REALLY fun package arrived at our house today: clothes for Zara from my dear friend Kristin! These are Zara's first clothes, ever. She has never had anything belong to her in her entire LIFE. I almost cried when I opened them, and of course I took pictures of every outfit!
Look at this adorable sweater dress! Now all she needs is some skinny jeans and boots and she'll be more stylish than her mommy :)
Love this hoodie!!
"Daddy's Little Girl"
Another hoodie!
"Mommy Loves Me A Bunch!"
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Please Pray For Our Dossier
Dear Friends,
We really need you to lift up our dossier in prayer. Right now our UPS tracking number is still only showing that a label was created, but never received and it hasn't been scanned anywhere at all. I mailed it on Thursday afternoon and it's now Sunday evening. The frustrating thing is that UPS "can't do anything" until it is officially late. The scheduled delivery date is Tues, 4-26, so they can't do anything until Wed, 4-27. I can't even begin to describe how frustrated I am right now.
I know that God knows where in the world (literally) our dossier is right now. It is possible that it is on its way and on time, it just keeps missing scans. My response to that is, well then what good is a tracking number?! One missed scan I can understand, but how does it keep missing them?!!? It's also possible that it got left on a truck or fell off a conveyer somewhere. That does not fill me with the greatest confidence, either. In fact, that DID happen the to the documents we mailed in January! I thought, what are the chances of that happening again?? Apparently pretty good.
I can't stress enough how important time is to us right now. Even if they find it in the truck a few days later, it is still going to be that much later arriving in country. Yes, we will get a refund if it is late (I did last time) but it is still LATE!!
Mostly I am just kicking myself for using UPS again after the mishap the first time. I do NOT recommend UPS for international shipping of small, flat packages. I think they do ok with large boxes but they can't seem to keep track of anything small. Ridiculous!
Please, please pray that everything turns out all right. I know God's timing is perfect but right now it is so hard not to worry.
We really need you to lift up our dossier in prayer. Right now our UPS tracking number is still only showing that a label was created, but never received and it hasn't been scanned anywhere at all. I mailed it on Thursday afternoon and it's now Sunday evening. The frustrating thing is that UPS "can't do anything" until it is officially late. The scheduled delivery date is Tues, 4-26, so they can't do anything until Wed, 4-27. I can't even begin to describe how frustrated I am right now.
I know that God knows where in the world (literally) our dossier is right now. It is possible that it is on its way and on time, it just keeps missing scans. My response to that is, well then what good is a tracking number?! One missed scan I can understand, but how does it keep missing them?!!? It's also possible that it got left on a truck or fell off a conveyer somewhere. That does not fill me with the greatest confidence, either. In fact, that DID happen the to the documents we mailed in January! I thought, what are the chances of that happening again?? Apparently pretty good.
I can't stress enough how important time is to us right now. Even if they find it in the truck a few days later, it is still going to be that much later arriving in country. Yes, we will get a refund if it is late (I did last time) but it is still LATE!!
Mostly I am just kicking myself for using UPS again after the mishap the first time. I do NOT recommend UPS for international shipping of small, flat packages. I think they do ok with large boxes but they can't seem to keep track of anything small. Ridiculous!
Please, please pray that everything turns out all right. I know God's timing is perfect but right now it is so hard not to worry.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Pancake Breakfast TOMORROW!
For anyone who's local: Please come to our Pancake Breakfast fundraiser tomorrow morning (Sat. 4-23) starting at 6am and ending at 1pm!!!
I know what you're thinking...."Wow, that is a LONG time to be making pancakes!" Well, here's why:
Time: 6am-1pm
Date: Sat, 4-23
Location: The BCM building next to VT campus (307 Washington Street)
Cost: $5 per adult, $2 per child
All proceeds benefit the missions trip to Ukraine (which is the whole reason we're on this adoption journey in the first place) AND our adoption fund. Please spread the word and invite your friends! If you're going to the Relay, please tell anyone and everyone while you're there!
- Relay For Life at Virginia Tech begins tonight from 6pm - 6am. There's not very many places (if any) open that early for breakfast so come on over for some tasty pancakes!!!
- The Spring Game begins at 2pm. You want to get on campus early. Why not stop by for breakfast before you head over to eat a turkey leg and cheer on the Hokies?!!
Time: 6am-1pm
Date: Sat, 4-23
Location: The BCM building next to VT campus (307 Washington Street)
Cost: $5 per adult, $2 per child
All proceeds benefit the missions trip to Ukraine (which is the whole reason we're on this adoption journey in the first place) AND our adoption fund. Please spread the word and invite your friends! If you're going to the Relay, please tell anyone and everyone while you're there!
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Our Dossier Is On Its Way!
Today I mailed our dossier (doss-ee-ay) to That Far Away Land!!
Here is all the paperwork laid out on our kitchen table:
Here is me kissing it goodbye:
I prayed over it and then off it went! The scheduled delivery date is Tues, 4-26-11. Please join me in praying that it DOES in fact arrive on Tuesday. Also, it would take a miracle for this to happen, but God is in the miracle business....pray that our dossier gets submitted on Thurs, 4-28-11. That only gives our facilitators one day to translate the whole thing (so probably not gonna happen) BUT we can always ask God, right???? Right!!!!
I have told a few people that I feel like I am entering the "third trimester" of paper-pregnancy. I am SO ready for this to be over. I just want to go get my girl. If I have to send one more piece of paper off to get apostilled I will throw up (or at least throw something). Right now I am thinking "NEVER, EVER AGAIN" as far as adoption goes. I'm sure once we meet her and get home and get settled my mind will change, but right now....ahh, paper-pregnancy hormones!!!
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
How Did We Choose?
Several people have asked me this question. I'm not sure I have a good answer, but I'm going to try my best. The short answer is, God chose. The long answer is what follows. :)
The day we found out we lost Riley I came up with a "short list" of eleven children that were heavily on my heart at the time. This was easy for me to do because I look at the children on Reece's Rainbow obsessively. Certain children come to my attention here and there. A few stay on my heart for much longer than others. I listed out the ones that had lasted for a while and the ones that recently caught my attention.
Like any good wife (ha!) I emailed the list to Rob, who was at work, thinking that he would have an opinion and would help narrow it down. But Rob just couldn't. He wanted them all. (We still want them all).
The next day I found out one of the boys we had been considering had a committed family, so that narrowed it down to ten. For the next few days I poured over the pictures, begging God to speak out of the clouds or maybe the fire in our firepit. Just for the record, He didn't. It got to the point where I couldn't look at any of the children without feeling sick to my stomach. How in the world could I make this decision?
We sought counsel from some friends and decided to let it "simmer" for a few days. This was the few days before I defended my dissertation, and we agreed not to discuss it until that event was over. At this point we had it narrowed down to four children, all with different special needs. I was the most drawn to Zara but Rob was hesitant about Down syndrome.
I had dreams about Zara. I looked at her and felt like I was looking at my daughter. I could actually picture myself holding her, playing with her. But, I tried to choose a child without DS because of how Rob was feeling at the time.
Rob was feeling particularly drawn to this little boy, Joel:
Joel has arthrogryposis. I researched the condition and explained to Rob all the treatments that would be required. While we were certainly capable of doing all of it, something didn't feel right. But when we looked at his picture, it felt like his eyes were staring right into our soul (someone please rescue him!).
The weekend after my defense we didn't talk much more about it. I still felt the most drawn to Zara, but I didn't know what to do. Finally I decided to fast on Sunday and ask for prayer from the people in the RR Yahoo group.
Ten minutes later I found out that one of the boys we were really considering had found his family. I told this to Rob, who said, "Ok, Zara or ______?". I said Zara. He said OK.
It felt sooooo good to say "Yes" to Zara, but it also meant saying "No" to many, many other deserving children. It breaks my heart that we had to say "No" to Joel, Andrey, Nathaniel and Meade. WILL SOMEONE PLEASE RESCUE THEM?! It will put my hurting heart somewhat at ease.
The day we found out we lost Riley I came up with a "short list" of eleven children that were heavily on my heart at the time. This was easy for me to do because I look at the children on Reece's Rainbow obsessively. Certain children come to my attention here and there. A few stay on my heart for much longer than others. I listed out the ones that had lasted for a while and the ones that recently caught my attention.
Like any good wife (ha!) I emailed the list to Rob, who was at work, thinking that he would have an opinion and would help narrow it down. But Rob just couldn't. He wanted them all. (We still want them all).
The next day I found out one of the boys we had been considering had a committed family, so that narrowed it down to ten. For the next few days I poured over the pictures, begging God to speak out of the clouds or maybe the fire in our firepit. Just for the record, He didn't. It got to the point where I couldn't look at any of the children without feeling sick to my stomach. How in the world could I make this decision?
We sought counsel from some friends and decided to let it "simmer" for a few days. This was the few days before I defended my dissertation, and we agreed not to discuss it until that event was over. At this point we had it narrowed down to four children, all with different special needs. I was the most drawn to Zara but Rob was hesitant about Down syndrome.
I had dreams about Zara. I looked at her and felt like I was looking at my daughter. I could actually picture myself holding her, playing with her. But, I tried to choose a child without DS because of how Rob was feeling at the time.
Rob was feeling particularly drawn to this little boy, Joel:
Joel has arthrogryposis. I researched the condition and explained to Rob all the treatments that would be required. While we were certainly capable of doing all of it, something didn't feel right. But when we looked at his picture, it felt like his eyes were staring right into our soul (someone please rescue him!).
The weekend after my defense we didn't talk much more about it. I still felt the most drawn to Zara, but I didn't know what to do. Finally I decided to fast on Sunday and ask for prayer from the people in the RR Yahoo group.
Ten minutes later I found out that one of the boys we were really considering had found his family. I told this to Rob, who said, "Ok, Zara or ______?". I said Zara. He said OK.
It felt sooooo good to say "Yes" to Zara, but it also meant saying "No" to many, many other deserving children. It breaks my heart that we had to say "No" to Joel, Andrey, Nathaniel and Meade. WILL SOMEONE PLEASE RESCUE THEM?! It will put my hurting heart somewhat at ease.
A special blog has been set up to help raise funds for Nathaniel. Please check it out here. Donate if you can. This sweet boy needs surgery so, so badly it breaks my heart.
Meade (HIV):
Meade is so stinkin' cute I just can't believe he hasn't found a family yet!
And of course through all of this we miss Riley. It seems crazy because we never even met him, but we miss him. His little picture is everywhere. He will always be our son in our hearts. We will always pray for him, that he would be loved by his relatives, get the medication he needs, and most importantly, come to know Jesus when he is older.
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