An Update.

I had notions of grandeur when I started this new blog dedicated to our second journey of adoption but as usual life has gotten in the way. 

Its not a bad thing but when I have any time to myself I find its easier to veg in front of the TV. 

For weeks we advertised, collected, sorted and priced for our first fundraiser, a yard sale. It was a lot of work but we felt incredibly blessed as the donations poured in. We had so much help that both set up and tear down were flawless. I don't even want to try and name all of the people who helped us for fear I might leave someone out. We are so blessed. 

Our flyer that we posted online as well as in our local paper. 

Emily and Aubrey who were modeling the tattoo sleeves someone donated to us. 

All the bows my sis made for the sale. 

Judge Lee and B throwing all the Girl Scout cookies into our house from the truck.
We were given over 100 cases. 

YUM!

The night before. Sadly, I didn't get a pic of our back patio which was completely full of furniture. 

Jenn and Alice who worked our pay tent in the burning sun. 

Jackson trying to wake up with his daily cup of coffee. 

Some of our friends from church supporting our sale. 

We weren't able to sell them but donations from girl scout cookies alone totaled over $100. 

We had hoped to make enough for our next big bill which is our dossier fee of $3500. We made just about $1,000 less but God will provide. 

Which leads me to the update. 

We completed our home study last week and are currently waiting to receive the draft for review. Once we have reviewed it, it will go to our agency for approval. Once we are approved we are hoping to be approved to begin communication with our girl. Normally this is not allowed until your dossier is in China. However, since she is older and we are having to move much more quickly they will make allowances and we can begin writing letters back and forth and hopefully skype at some point. 

Her file is still not ready and therefore it isn't looking good for us to get an extension to re-use our dossier as we had once hoped but nothing is too big for God. In the meantime we have started working on it just in case. 

We are also working on several more fundraisers and just living life like the rest of the world. 

Jackson and Jayden will go back to school for the first time in 6 years and so the scramble to buy uniforms/school supplies is something I haven't had to do in awhile. 

JG has just had her 7th ear infection in 12 months thereby warranting tube surgery. Not exactly the best timing financially but as we ALWAYS say "it is what it is". 

Thanks for being with us on this journey...again. We cannot do it without your support and encouragement. 

Blessings.