Results of our FINAL adoption fundraiser yard sale

This past Friday we held our final yard sale in Galesburg. Once again, our family and friends came through to help us out. Our friend Marlene Johnson allowed us to use her garage for our sale. My mom packed up and helped haul items to Marlene's. My friend Angi loaned her folding tables. My sister Jessica got up at 6am on her day off from work to help me run the yard sale. It was a very HOT day, but we earned $350 for the day's efforts. It is a comfort to see our total inch towards our next goal. Tomorrow I will travel to Springfield to apostille all of the necessary documents. On August 1 I will send our first dossier to our agency with our check for $6000. They will review our documents to make sure everything is in order, translate them, and forward our dossier to Russia! It is exciting to be able to cross items off of our list! While we await for our official referral of the boys, we will continue to work hard to save for our first trip to Russia. We will need to cover our expenses for travel (flights alone will be about 3200) and then pay the agency fees for that portion of the process ($6000). We have applied for two grants so far and have heard back from one that we did not meet the criteria for their program. I am completing a third grant application and hope to send that one out soon. Chad and I are considering our options for adoption loans as I don't think we will have much time in the next few months to complete new fundraisers. We will continue to collect aluminum cans. We are waiting for the price of aluminum to go up; right now it is at 35 cents per pound. We would like for it to get closer to 50 cents per pound again and then we will haul our bags and bags of crushed cans to the recycling center. Currently the girls are enjoying some time with their dad. I am trying to keep my days busy since I am "flying solo". I have been continuing with my private speech therapy practice and exercising. We started painting our fence as well. Chad bought me a spray paint gun but it is no longer working so I am doing it "Tom Sawyer style" with the paint brush. We will go on a short weekend vacation to Des Moines before school starts. I return to campus on August 17th, and the girls go back the following week. Callie will attend preschool at United this school year. She is so EXCITED to ride the bus with Sam. Chad has been working six days a week; he has worked more this summer than last and we are thrilled about it. He thinks his crew will be working well into December. Summers really do fly by, don't they? Thanks again to everyone who continues to keep us in your thoughts.

I know, another yard sale.... but we have so far to go!

I know, I know, we are going to give it another round now.... I have been talking about yard sales for months and didn't we just have one? Our sale of July 4th was immensely successful. But, we still have a LOT of really nice items as well. So, if anyone continues to have items you would like to get rid of, we will have a sale on Friday July 23rd in Galesburg. We are finalizing our items for our dossier. Our social worker should be mailing our FINALIZED home study tomorrow. Although we have already received one denial for a grant, I am hopeful that the other two grants we are applying for will possibly see fit to offer us some money. Either way, we are committed to completing our adoption. Chad and I enjoyed the beautiful day today by completing yard work. There is something to be said about completing something which takes manual labor; I think it is seeing your hard work come to fruition. We shoveled gravel into our driveway to help even it out. It was hard work! However, after we were done, it looked so much better. The best part was not having to drive around the "potholes" when we pull into our driveway. We then attacked the fence and tested out our new paint sprayer. I hope to complete painting in the next two weeks. Keeping busy helps us not think so much about how difficult it is to wait for things to move along with the adoption. And of course, the girls help with that too! My next post may provide further details regarding when we will travel to Russia! Thanks again to everyone for your support!

One Amazing Day

I can not believe I have been blogging for six months! I have many things to share as today has been full of nice surprises. First off, here is an update of our fundraising efforts. This past weekend we held our yard sale on Cameron Days. We made a little over $800 on Saturday and Sunday. I am so appreciative of our family and friends whom donated items to our cause. We had so many items to price and place onto tables neatly and I think it really paid off. Amanda and Chad Maleug came by Saturday morning and helped set up. Jessica met me early Saturday to get things rolling; her Goodwill experience was a big asset in helping me price unusual items. Jaimey and my mom also came by to help set things up. Jaimey hung out with Chad and I most of the day on the 4th at our sale. Although we sold a LOT of items, we still have many items left. Chad and I decided we would take some of the more desirable items to a friends' house in Galesburg for a yard sale there to see if we can sell more items. Once we do that we will probably donate the items to our different charities locally. We were so tired at the end of the day! We spent the 5th lounging around in the morning and then went to Chad's parents in Little York to swim in the afternoon. Today I returned to work at WIU feeling exhausted. I became reenergized upon receipt of an email from Susan our social worker. She had received an email from DCFS asking her to add additional information to our homestudy. She completed the requested information and faxed it back. Susan felt this was a sure sign our homestudy will be approved by DCFS very soon! I am excited to be able to submit our homestudy with our grant applications. This afternoon we were blessed to receive a wonderful donation from a family. I am overwhelmed with gratitude to this family as they saw our need and felt strongly enough to support our adoption to make such a contribution. I do believe that God is leading us on this journey and it has been difficult for me to not question the direction we are following. Giving it up to God can be such a challenge for a Type A personality! We received a much anticipated phone call this evening as I prepared dinner. Dr. Ladage from Cardinal Glennon Children's Hospital in St. Louis called me to provide us with a consultation on the medical records we have received for the boys. I had been nervous to hear her opinion, as I knew it could include negativity about the medical history. Fortunately, Dr. Ladage stated that she did not see any diagnoses that caused her to become alarmed. She gave me specific ideas to use when we visit with the boys to acquire further information for her. When we are visiting the boys in the orphanage she will consult with us again as we will receive their full medical history. Once we return with the boys she can complete a full evaluation of their development as she is an international adoption pediatrician. It is nice to know that we are linked with professionals whom can provide us with support when we are in Russia. We hope everyone is enjoying their summer! Thanks again for all of the prayers and support!