Ephesians 3:20-21

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us,  to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.  

Our family was overwhelmingly blessed this past week by the goodness of God.  

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, we ran into a little speed bump in the paperwork process a few weeks ago.  This speed bump could have possibly required our home study to be sent back to DCFS for another round of approval.  On Friday afternoon we found out that our home study will not need to be resent to DCFS.  Our original approval date will remain and our home study is now ready for approval by Holt (our placement agency).  Our home study agency is in the process of moving offices so it will most likely be next week before our case worker is able to send everything back to Holt but things are moving once again.

Daniel and I have gathered all of our dossier documentation and are ready to take it to the Secretary of State's office for certification and then on to the Consulate for authentication.  The only missing items for our dossier are the official home study, our 797 (documentation that comes from Immigration), and photos of our family and home.  There is a light at the end of this tunnel!

Friday evening we hosted a children's concert, dessert fellowship and silent auction.  We were SO blessed by everyone who helped and attended.  There were about 65 people in attendance and everyone had a great time.  Daniel and I had an opportunity to share our heart for adoption and a little bit of our adoption story.  Over 50 items were donated for our silent auction.  In fact, we had so many items a few of them were not bid on.  Thanks to several amazing ladies from our church we had an abundance of delicious desserts and our talented pastor's wife put on an amazing concert.  We could not have done this event without the support and encouragement of so many and we are just extremely grateful.  

Our God truly is able to abundantly more than we could ever ask or imagine.  To God be the Glory!

Never Once

After what was a shockingly quick endorsement by DCFS we hit a little bump in the road.  Because we are using two agencies, one for homestudy and one for placement, our homestudy needed to be approved by our placement agency after we received our endorsement from IL.  A week and a half ago we received word from our caseworker that our placement agency wanted some revisions to be made.  Most were minor wording revisions but one of the revisions may require our homestudy to go back to DCFS.  We were hoping to avoid this step but unfortunately here we are.  We have approved the requested changes and have taken care of things on our end and are hoping to find out next week where we stand.

Of course this bump in the road was a little discouraging and disheartening but it is a minor thing in comparison to some of the other difficulties we could have and can still encounter.  Even though I wish we had not hit this bump in the road it was a good reminder that God is fully in control of this process.  He will not allow our girl to come home one day or even one minute too late. 

Just days before we came upon this bump in the road I heard the song, Never Once by Matt Redman.  It has quickly become our theme song for this process and I have a feeling it will one day show up in our Gotcha Day video when we finally bring our Little A home.

I am so thankful that we have never once walked alone in our journey with secondary infertility, miscarriage, and now the adoption process.  I am also so thankful that our Little A, wherever she may be, will never once be alone.

Endorsement

We received the email today stating that we had received DCFS endorsement on our Home Study.  Now we wait for final approval from Holt and then we will mail our I-800A to USCIS Immigration Services.

I told Daniel that I feel like my water has just broken in this paper pregnancy!

Concert and Silent Auction Fundraiser

 Kids Concert and Silent Auction

for the Cooley Family

An Adoption Fundraiser

April 5 6:30pm-8:00

La La Lisa and the Big Green Alligator

Suggested donation of $10 / family

Our extremely talented pastor's wife, Lisa Weyerhaeuser, will be performing with her band La La Lisa and the Big Green Alligator. The concert will be followed by a dessert fellowship and silent auction.

Amazing items for auction:

·      Computer Service / Training

·      Scentsy Products

·      American Girl Doll

·      Tastefully Simple

·      Photography by Kristina Capps

·      and many more

All proceeds will go towards our adoption costs.

Help us bring our Little A home!

If you are interested in attending please leave a comment and include your email address and we will send further information.

Movement

We received an email from our case worker today asking for approval for a change in wording on our home study.  This is great news because it means she has completed the home study and it has been sent to our placement agency for approval.  We have approved the changes and hopefully this means the home study will soon be headed to DCFS for approval!

Puzzle Update

We have currently had 1102 puzzle pieces sponsored!  Woo Hoo!  That leaves only 898 more pieces to go!  This puzzle has definitely been challenging but I cannot wait for it to be completed.  We are still behind a little on putting it together but it is slowly coming together.

Keeping It Real

Not a whole lot of movement on the adoption front right now.  Our case worker is currently writing our homestudy report and we are working (or supposed to be working) on our dossier documents.  I have felt a little overwhelmed with the process the past couple of weeks so have not made much progress in regards to all the paperwork we need to get done.  However, just when it seems so daunting someone or something comes along to bring a word of encouragement.  Just this morning I received an email from a dear friend who is sharing our blog with her friends and family.  It was the push I needed to get moving again to bring our Little A home.  I know that our girl will not come home a minute too soon or a minute late and that brings comfort.

Last week I was in south GA/FL for a weekend away with another dear friend and we spent a day walking on the beach.  I was reminded that God knows exactly who our daughter is to be.  He knows the number of her days, His thoughts towards her (and us) are greater than the grains of sand and He knows the exact moment we will meet her.  I took a few minutes to pray for our sweet A and then released her to Him.  Little A we love you and cannot wait to see your face.