DTC and LID

Our dossier went to China last week and we have a log-in date of 3/18/2011. We now wait 2-4 months to receive our RA, or official referral acceptance. (Since we received the referral before China approved our paperwork, they want to make sure we are good candidates for adoption before releasing our son to us.)

Once we get our RA, we'll get travel approval about 10-14 weeks later. And then we'll travel 2-4 weeks after that.

Meanwhile, we have more paperwork to complete! Our I800 and DS230 MUST be complete and ready to go when we receive our RA, so we are beginning work on those forms and supplementary materials now.

Our fundraising is going very well, but we still need more! We've raised almost $7000 of our $17000 goal for the last part of our adoption expenses. This includes our last agency payment, airfare for 3, in-country expenses, and fees we will need to pay in China when we travel (for the orphanage, etc.). We are excited at what God has done already in a few weeks! We have a few ways to give: t-shirts (reduced to $20), half-marathon, and Lifesong.

You may notice that I just became a blogger for Lifesong for Orphans. They have helped us so much with our adoptions, and we are thrilled with this opportunity to help them get the word out about ways you can get involved in orphan care.

Grants and loans

Last week we found out we received a $2500 no-interest loan for our adoption and a $3000 matching grant. We are so thankful to God! Here is the letter we are in the middle of sending out:


Dear Family and Friends,

“A father to the fatherless…God places the lonely in families” (Psalm 68:5, 6)

Many of you know we have felt called and directed by God to adopt another “fatherless” child into our family. We adopted Iona from Ethiopia in 2008 and brought her home when she was 6 months old and only 11 lbs. She is now a fierce 2.5-year-old bundle of energy and full of joy. Aidan and Iona adore each other, most of the time.

We have stepped back into the adoption journey and are pursuing Brendan, a 4.5-year-old boy from China. We have decided to adopt through the “waiting child” program in China, and we only waited 1 hour to be matched to our son. He, however, had been waiting one and a half years for a family of his own. Brendan has a special need called bilateral strabismus, which means he will most likely need glasses.

Why China? That’s a long story, and one we would be happy to talk more about in person! Basically, the Lord led us to pursue an older child for this adoption, and the Lord had long ago laid an Asian child on our hearts for our family. He orchestrated an amazing set of events in the past year to direct us to China, and we are excited to meet our son soon!

At this point, our dossier (portfolio of documents) is almost complete and should travel to China within the next month. We can’t share Brendan’s photo here until our dossier has been received in China and officially approved, but we carry the photos around and love to show him off! We are hoping to travel to China sometime in the fall of 2011 to bring Brendan home.

There are so many things God has used to prick our hearts and move us to adopt; here are a few:

Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress (James 1:27)

So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” (Romans 8:15)

The biggest challenge for us is not opening our hearts and home to another child, but it is in finding the finances to make this happen. We estimate our total cost for adoption fees, document preparation, home study, airfare, travel, attorney fees, etc. to be $27,000. That’s certainly money we don’t have, but we know God is faithful and is leading us to trust Him. By God’s grace we’ve been able to pay the initial $10,000. We honestly had no idea how that would all work when we began, but little by little, as we have needed each part of the funds, it has been available.

There are two ways you can help:

1. Prayer—Please pray God would tenderly care for our son in China until we are able to bring him home, that God would prepare Aidan and Iona for the upcoming changes to our family, and that God will give us wisdom, discernment, and insight as we raise our children to know Jesus Christ. Please also pray for our first months home as we learn to communicate with Brendan and meet his needs.

2. Financial support—Will you please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help us pay the remaining $17,000 in adoption expenses to bring our son home?

Lifesong for Orphans (www.lifesongfororphans.org) has graciously given a matching grant of $3,000 to help pay the “ransom” to bring Brendan home.

If you would like to be a part of this adoption, you can send your tax-deductible gift between now and April 10, 2011 to the address below. Lifesong for Orphans is a trusted organization administering the funds on our son’s behalf and will pay adoption expenses out of funds received.

1. Please make checks payable to Lifesong for Orphans and put “Juvinall Adoption” in the memo section of your check.
(*Note: In following IRS guidelines, your donation is to Lifesong, which retains full discretion over its use but intends to honor the donor’s suggested use.)


2. Mail checks to:
Lifesong for Orphans
Attn: Juvinall #1766 Adoption
PO Box 40 / 202 N. Ford St
Gridley, IL 61744

3. You may also give online via Paypal at http://www.lifesongfororphans.org/donation.html and clicking on “Make a Donation.” Please put “Juvinall #1766 Adoption” in the item line.

Thank you for investing in the Kingdom through prayer and finances—it will be an investment with an eternal return (Matt 6:20)! We’ll send you our new family photo when we return home. Please pray this entire process will glorify God and fulfill His purposes!

trade as one

until next summer...

So it's been an AGONIZING few days as we've been hashing and rehashing the whole move idea.

Here's what we've decided:

• We are not putting our home on the market until somewhere in April-June 2010.
• Our goal is to try to pay off as much debt as possible between now and then (more on that later). By then we should only be a month or a few away from "debt-free except the house."
• We are lowering our price range for a new place to one where we can afford a 15-year loan. This is totally doable where we live and we would still get a lot of house. We would be done with house payments by the time Iona started college.
• We are going to work on the home improvements our realtor suggested we make between now and then. We've already fixed one small thing, but we still need to get a new vanity for the main bathroom and...the big thing...rip up the carpet in the living room and hallway and refinish all the hardwood upstairs.

Have any of you had hardwood floors refinished? How do your small children do with the wood versus carpet? We may wait on this part until closer to the move, but we'd love to know what you think. We're collecting estimates like they are baseball cards. One guy today "forgot to write down" our appointment at 8 am this morning. I told him he lost the job. Boo. We seriously have had someone here (or supposed to be here) at 8 am for the past few mornings. And we have someone coming Monday at...you guessed it...8 am.

So I've decided to apply at the local community college for a teaching job...English Comp. Part-time--just one class to start with. This would seriously help with our debt reduction plan. And it sounds like I just might like it!! Please pray--they are hiring a number of new English Comp teachers. The whole thing is a God thing. Long story. I was able to get my transcripts today, and tonight I'm working on my curriculum vitae and cover letter.

I'm pretty darn excited. About all of it.

For now, we're having fun driving around and dreaming big.

house hunting?

So we went out again tonight to drive around and look at neighborhoods. It's been a common activity for our family lately. I think the kids are getting bored with it. And Aidan is NOT happy about leaving the only house he has ever known.

Yes, we are more seriously considering a move to a larger house in town. With a fence.

I'm waiting for our realitor to call us back so we can have our initial discussion. We've narrowed it down to some very specific areas of town. We're hoping Pete can still bike to work, but we know we may have to break down and buy a second car if we find the right house. We're going to try our hardest, though.

We also called a local roofing company and are getting an estimate on Thursday for a new roof. Then we'll talk to our realitor about what we NEED to do before it goes on the market. We discovered we MAY NOT need to get a new fridge and oven/range...they still have more years than we thought. But we want to see what else should do to the place.

We've been looking at the house hunting Web sites at local houses for sale, driving around and picking up sheets out in front of certain houses for sale, and figuring out what we can afford. It's exciting and scary at the same time.

I'm not looking forward to packing. Or keeping the house ready to show. But we're praying God will go above and beyond our best effort and smooth out the way before us. (Or redirect us quickly.)

We would love to pay off debt first. But that could be a couple of years. And we're hoping to get pregnant sometime soon. And we need a fence.

Time to pray again.

I Need Africa More Than Africa Needs Me

How God Provided for Our Adoption Expenses

In March 2007 we applied with our adoption agency, AWAA, to adopt a baby girl from Ethiopia. We had no idea how we were going to pay for it at all, but each time a payment was due we had the money. Here are some of the ways God provided:

• Both Pete and I received extra side jobs (mostly freelance)--this helped especially with the smaller amounts due


• We received a matching grant from Life International, now Lifesong For Orphans, and in total raised over $9000 thanks to the gifts of friends and family.


• We read this book and got inspired to go down to one car. We sold both cars and bought a van.


• We received a grant from the Lydia Fund.


• We made use of the Adoption Tax Credit, which we received after the adoption was complete.


• We received a no-interest loan from the ABBA Fund.


• We took out bank loans and used our credit card to help with expenses until we received the tax credit.


• We held 2 garage sales with item donations from people in our church and raised over $1000.

We are so incredibly blessed to see how God provided for this adoption. How will he provide for the next one?