We heard from our agency today. Our paperwork will arrive in China tomorrow! This completes what turned out to be a beast of a process. We had no idea the paperwork was going to be so complicated and time consuming. And when we say time consuming, we're talking about the time we spend on our end and the time we spend waiting for other people to process it.
But thankfully, that part of the journey is complete. This week we will send our special needs list to our agency. This list outlines which special needs we would accept. We have spent a great deal of time deciding the needs of our child. We want to be able to provide a home where our baby can thrive, but recognize we will need God's help each step of the way.
We have something else we are working on call the Support System Plan. This eleven page document contains 71 questions like, "What will do you if you child doesn't sleep well at night?" And, "Are you prepared for soccer practice three nights a week and games on the weekend?" Many of the questions require us to have names and numbers of the professionals who we might need for our child. So it makes us think through a multitude of possible scenarios that adopting families face.
We also have to get a passport for Hope. Tanya and Jade need to renew their passports. There is still a baby room to put together and we are sure plenty of other things will come up along the way.
Both Hands Update - our project is 10 days away. Todd and a friend, Kurt, went by Sharon's house today to finalize our task list for Sat, Aug 13. We are excited about helping Sharon and praying God's blessings on her while we ask God to provide for our adoption through this fundraiser.
Thanks for joining us on our journey!
Todd, Tanya, Jade and Hope
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Both Hands Fundraiser
We are excited to participate with Both Hands in a fundraiser for our adoption. The motivation behind this organization is James 1:27 - "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction."
The way it works is we find a widow in need and create a team of people to work on her home. Our team sends out letters to friends and family asking them to sponsor them as they work on the widow's home just like people get sponsors for a 5K. 100% of the money raised goes towards our adoption. Both Hands. A hand to the widow and a hand to the orphan. James 1:27 lived out in a community of caring people.
On August 13, we will gather to work on Sharon's home. We've known Sharon for many years and as well as her late husband, Paul. While she is excited to have help for her home, she is so glad this project has the potential to help us with our adoption as well. It is the perfect partnership.
Pray for good weather and God's blessings on this endeavor. If God's gives you a desire to give you can visit our page on the Both Hands website and make a donation.
http://bothhandsfoundation.org/todd-and-tanya-marlin.aspx
Thank you for continuing to join us on our journey!
The way it works is we find a widow in need and create a team of people to work on her home. Our team sends out letters to friends and family asking them to sponsor them as they work on the widow's home just like people get sponsors for a 5K. 100% of the money raised goes towards our adoption. Both Hands. A hand to the widow and a hand to the orphan. James 1:27 lived out in a community of caring people.
On August 13, we will gather to work on Sharon's home. We've known Sharon for many years and as well as her late husband, Paul. While she is excited to have help for her home, she is so glad this project has the potential to help us with our adoption as well. It is the perfect partnership.
Pray for good weather and God's blessings on this endeavor. If God's gives you a desire to give you can visit our page on the Both Hands website and make a donation.
http://bothhandsfoundation.org/todd-and-tanya-marlin.aspx
Thank you for continuing to join us on our journey!
Friday, July 8, 2011
Long Time, No Blog
As you can tell I (Todd) have not been good at keeping the blog updated. It is hard to believe my last entry was almost 18 months ago. Let me bring you up to date.
YES WE ARE STILL ADOPTING!!! Here are a few paragraphs to catch you up.
We spent Spring and Summer of 2010 getting our paperwork together for our home study. And when I say paperwork I mean health assessments, financials, criminal checks, birth certificates, marriage certificate, DNA and lie detectors. The last two I made up.
Somewhere along the way we decided to adopt a child with special needs.
Home study was completed in September 2010.
Immigration paperwork was submitted and approved. This took longer than we thought - 5 MONTHS!
Now it is May 2011 and we put together all our documents to send to China - THE DOSSIER! Each document has to have proof that it is authentic. So it has to have either a county seal or a notary signature. Then it must be authenticated by the state. Then it must be authenticated by the US Dept of State. Then it must be authenticated by the Chinese Embassy. The last two stops were in DC. And you have to pay for every authenticated document.
June 2011, we received all the documents back from DC. We hired a service to run our paperwork around our nation's capital. Thank the LORD for our couriers, Assistant Stork!
July 2011, all our documents are in the hands of our agency and are being prepared to be sent to China.
I know that is a quick look at the last year and a half, but now you are current and I don't plan on waiting quite so long before the next blog. Things are going to speed up from this point on.
YES WE ARE STILL ADOPTING!!! Here are a few paragraphs to catch you up.
We spent Spring and Summer of 2010 getting our paperwork together for our home study. And when I say paperwork I mean health assessments, financials, criminal checks, birth certificates, marriage certificate, DNA and lie detectors. The last two I made up.
Somewhere along the way we decided to adopt a child with special needs.
Home study was completed in September 2010.
Immigration paperwork was submitted and approved. This took longer than we thought - 5 MONTHS!
Now it is May 2011 and we put together all our documents to send to China - THE DOSSIER! Each document has to have proof that it is authentic. So it has to have either a county seal or a notary signature. Then it must be authenticated by the state. Then it must be authenticated by the US Dept of State. Then it must be authenticated by the Chinese Embassy. The last two stops were in DC. And you have to pay for every authenticated document.
June 2011, we received all the documents back from DC. We hired a service to run our paperwork around our nation's capital. Thank the LORD for our couriers, Assistant Stork!
July 2011, all our documents are in the hands of our agency and are being prepared to be sent to China.
I know that is a quick look at the last year and a half, but now you are current and I don't plan on waiting quite so long before the next blog. Things are going to speed up from this point on.
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