Our Adoption Fundraiser - Open House Information

 

 

We've officially started a fundraiser to help bring our little one home.  My friend Megan is doing a Tastefully Simple fundraiser for us, and ALL proceeds will go directly to our adoption fund.  You can follow the link below and place your order online, and it will be shipped directly to your home.  The online party will run through Friday, February 8th.  Order online at https://www.tastefullysimple.com/secure/pomm/SpecialInvitation.aspx?pxid=3279590&key=cd7b1d51-15a8-4192-930f-efe1acaf2602. 

 

For those of you who live in the Indianapolis area, I will be hosting a taste testing open house on Saturday, January 26th between 2:00 and 4:00pm.  Stop by the house to taste some yummy food and to show your support as we prepare to become parents to another special little boy.  I'm excited to host this open house and everyone is welcome to come.  Please send me a note on FaceBook, e-mail me or leave a comment here if you plan to attend.  Have a question or need my address, just ask.  Feel free to bring a friend.  Can't wait to see you!!

Thanks for your support!!

More Holiday Happenings

Despite being under the weather off and on throughout the month, we have enjoyed our holiday season so far.

A couple of weeks ago we attended the Christmas Party at South Park, where Nikolas goes to therapy.  They had lots of fun activities lead by all of his favorite therapists.  It was a little crazy, but the kids seemed to have a good time.  Nikolas made a Christmas ornament and a couple of art projects, played games, listened to a story, visited with Santa and enjoyed some holiday goodies. 

Nikolas also put his OT skills to work by making some cool Christmas cards for his therapists and preschool teacher.  He's doing well with the scissors and is starting to tolerate coloring a bit more.  The cards turned out well and everyone loved them!

On Sunday afternoon we decorated sugar cookies with frosting and sprinkles.  Nikolas had a good time decorating them, but he likes eating them even more.

We were planning to host Christmas at our house and have Jason's family join us, but because all three of us are sick right now, our plans changed. December has been a rough month for us. We've been through three rounds of antibiotics for bacterial infections and now are dealing with a nasty cough/cold/fever.  Even so, Nikolas still had fun opening presents and watching Christmas cartoons.  He got a toy kitchen, a boy baby doll and a CAT bulldozer. 

As long as we are all healthy and my work schedule doesn't mess things up, we are planning to spend this coming weekend with my family.  My aunt and cousins are coming to Indiana this week, so I'm excited to see them.  Nikolas loves seeing his cousins and I can't wait to watch all three little boys open their gifts together.

Merry Christmas!!     

Questions and Answers

We've been asked a lot of questions since making our big announcement, so here are some answers.

Q. Are you using the same agency?
A. Yes, we are using the same two agencies this time around.  We are using Bethany Christian Services as our home study agency and Adoption Ark as our placement agency.  Bethany takes care of our home study and post-placement reports, as well as offers many classes that we can attend to complete our required education hours.  Adoption Ark helps us with our dossier, communicates with and relays information from the partner agency in Bulgaria and helps us get our little one home.  Both agencies are great, otherwise we wouldn't be using them again!

Q. Do you have the same social worker?
A. Not this time.  Our social worker who completed our first home study and all of our post-placement reports is no longer completing home studies for Bethany.  We have a new social worker and are getting along with her very well.

Q. How long will it take?
A. Although there's no way to predict international adoption, our goal is to have him home by the end of next year.  We have completed our home study and will have the final copy shortly.  At that time we can file for Immigration approval and finish our dossier.  Our target date to complete this step is March 1st.  We hope to receive our official referral by May and make our first trip shortly after.  The second trip should occur four to six months after the first trip.

Q. How will this adoption be different from Nikolas' adoption?
A. With Nikolas' adoption we submitted our dossier and waited for the MOJ to match us with a child.  We waited 22 months for his referral.  This time around we identified a little boy on the Waiting Child list and requested to be matched to him.  The Waiting Child list is a list of children who are available for adoption and are waiting for their new parents to find them.  It is published monthly by the Bulgarian government.  Most children on this list are older or have some sort of special needs.  The MOJ has approved our request to be matched to this child, and we have been given six months to submit our dossier.

Q. Does he have special needs?
A. Yes.  He does have some developmental and medical needs, but we feel completely prepared to meet those needs.  Because Nikolas had significant speech and developmental delays, we have a great team of therapists already in place to help him in those areas.  We are also blessed to be so close to Riley Hospital for Children, and they are nationally ranked in the department that will be treating him.

Q. Can you post pictures?
A. No, we cannot post pictures until he is legally our son, but if you see us in person, we'd be happy to show you a picture.  He's an adorable little guy and we can't wait to meet him.  

Q. Is Nikolas excited about becoming a big brother?
A. We do talk to him about it, but I'm not sure that he really understands what that means.  He loves watching the videos of the little guy online, and he often carries his picture around the house.

Big Brother!!

 

That's right!!  Nikolas is going to be a big brother.  We're going back to Bulgaria to complete our family.  We started the adoption process back in August and hope to bring our new son home by the end of 2013.  We found a handsome little guy on the Waiting Child list in October and the MOJ has approved our request to move forward with the adoption.  We have completed our home study and should have the final copy by the end of the month.  At that point we're going to put together the fastest dossier ever!!  Our target date to have our documents ready to mail is March 1st, and we should be invited to travel to Bulgaria a couple of months later.

 

We'll be starting a Tastefully Simple fundraiser after the first of the year, so check back for details to see how you can help us bring this little one home to his forever family. 

Holiday Happenings

We are in holiday mode at our house and are having so much fun.  Last weekend we kicked off the Christmas season by going to Christmas at the Zoo.  The weather was amazing!!  Since Nikolas loves the zoo so much, we try to go as often as possible, espcecially when they have special events.  The lights were beautiful and the atmosphere was just perfect.  If this nice weather keeps up, we might just have to make another trip this month.  After all, the new baby walrus in on display now, so we'll have to stop by to greet him soon.

 

We put up our tree this past week.  Nikolas was so excited about it.  He loved putting the ornaments on the tree and is fascinated with the lights.  The first thing he does when he gets up from his nap is turn on the lights and admire his work.  We also made some candy canes together out of glittery holiday pipe cleaners.  Last year he helped decorate the tree, but this year he enjoyed it so much more.  It was hard to get him to sit still long enough for a picture!

I've also been trying incorporate fun holiday activities into our schedule that will help Nikolas with his development.  We have a snowman countdown calendar that we update every evening.  Not only does he have to place the cotton ball on the correct circle, it gives him a visual way to see how many more days we have until Christmas. 

Today we decorated a big gingerbread man with stickers.  Peeling the stickers off of the sheets helps develop his fine motor skills, and placing them on the gingerbread man allows him to be creative.  Next weekend we're going to decorate cookies with frosting and sprinkles.  Should be fun!!  On Monday evening we'll be going to his therapy holiday party at Community.  He loves his therapists and is so excited about it.  There will be story time, snacks and a visit with Santa.

 

We will be celebrating Christmas at home with the three of us on Christmas Eve and will be hosting Christmas at our house on Christmas Day with Jason's parents, brother and sister-in-law.  The weekend after Christmas we'll be heading to Vermillion County to celebrate with my family.  Nikolas is so excited and we love seeing the holidays through his eyes!!