Adoption Update

Happy Holidays All!!

We are enjoying Hanukkah and Winter break and are looking forward to spending Christmas with family and New Years with extended family!! We are resting in not having anything to compile, fill out, send in or etc.

Here's one of our gifts this year…our agency mailed us a painting that JE did while in the US this summer. We also got a few pics of him doing his painting. What a blessing to get these items and to also know he has something in common with Tyvon and the twins (TJ and EJ). I'm typing this crying and smiling at the same time, TJ and EJ are twins by adoption and both love drawing and the arts…..WOW!! Our God is truly awesome.

Now onto our adoption. Our home study was finalized at the beginning of December. We have submitted our I800a application and have our appointment at the beginning of January. Our appointment was scheduled for January 5th but found out we could walk in once we had our appointment slipped. We were able to go today December 24th and are so excited that everything in our control is done for now!! We also sent our dossier off at the beginning of December to our agency for review while we wait for our I800a approval.

This process is where this process is different than our Ghana adoption which was non-hague. We completed a I600a application instead. And it continues to be different from here on out….Here's the process for us since we have been soft-matched with identified child who was hosted is a follows…Our agency will send our dossier to the Philippines along with our I800a approval.

1. We wait for our file to be reviewed. The executive committee of ICAB meets each Thursday. We are usually notified within a day or so after they meet that a dossier has been presented and approved.

2. Within 1-2 weeks of approval, ICAB sends The Sacred Portion Children’s Outreach a notice of the approval, along with updated pictures and information about the child.

3. Once SPCO receives the Approval Notice and child reports, they forward them, along with our “Acceptance Packet” to us. The Acceptance Packet consists of documents required by the U.S. and Philippine governments to process an individual’s immigration to the U.S.

4. We complete the Acceptance Packet and send back to SPCO.

5. SPCO forwards the completed Acceptance Packet to ICAB.

We will stop there with the process until we get further along in the above steps.

Prayer is needed for continued quick movement along the process and funding. We will have to send in a huge amount again at Step 3.

We are also still fundraising and need a little under $10k to be fully funded. We are still pushing our envelope fundraiser and have applied for 2 grants (both may take a while to hear back from; one we know will be in March). Prayers that we win both of these grants…it could drastically reduce the amount of funds we need to complete the adoption. We will also apply for another grant at the beginning of the year. We also plan to do another online auction. We made a little over $800 with the one we had around Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

If you would like to be a blessing financially, here are the available numbers in our envelope fundraiser. All the colors not shaded are still available!! You can donate directly at Petway Adopt Together or mailed us a check made out to Sacred Portion Children's Outreach; both ways are tax deductible!!

Four kids and another one to be added to our family……WHAT!!

Those of you who knew me since I was younger, know that having five kids was never on my radar. I had it all planned out; a husband and two kids…maybe a third. However God has a way to show you the plan He has for your life. "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand" Proverbs 19:21. I had plans of working for a large accounting firm and many other things. A year or so after having AT, my true passion pushed through which is the education field. I desire to be a college professor and a position like that one will allow me to spend a lot of quality time with our children.

Tyvon and I joke at times with each other about JE being our last child; saying this is our last adoption. However we know that if God directs us to go down this road again we will. After JE gets home, our plan is to enjoy being a family of 7 and a very transracial family living only God knows where for a good number of years. We pray that we will be able to birth some type of missions ministry that the entire family can take part in. We also hope to do some international mission trips with the entire family.

Adopting a child with a special need….ARE YOU CRAZY? Yes we are; crazy in love with the things that are on God’s heart. Looking back now, I see why we walked through what we did with AT's ears, speech therapy, major surgeries and now a hearing aid. It was all preparation that soften and open our hearts to desire to parent a child with a special need. All of our children, including JE who we are working to be approved to be his dad and mom and give him the gift of family, are perfect just the way they are!! Uniquely made in the image of God!! “You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body
 and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion,
 as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out
 before a single day had passed” Psalms 139:13-14. Before our adoption of EJ from Ghana, Tyvon and I discussed the various types of special needs we felt we could maneuver with all the dynamics of our family life and the demands of our careers.

Why aren’t you adopting from here; there’s many black children in foster care? So first you adopted from Ghana, Africa and now the Philippines; he won’t look like you. He will feel left out; he will feel like the odd ball. These are some of the questions and statements we have heard. My first answer…if you feel so strongly about the foster care programs in America, why don’t you adopt a child or two. Secondly, we have looked into that route more than once and every door closed each time we tried. We felt like God directed us to Ghana and why not…they are our family. Ghana and Ivory Coast is where most of our ancestors are from. And why can’t a black family raise an African child. As for the awesome boy we are bringing home from the Philippines. It’s a people group that we have connected strongly to. Our inner circle of family/friends are made up of people that look a lot like us and completely different from us. Again…why can’t a black family raise an Asian child? A child can be raised by their biological family and feel like the odd ball. The love that we have for our children goes deeper and is much stronger than blood and skin color.

Adoption….its messy. It was messy when Jesus had to die on the cross due to the sin and choices that were made in the Garden of Eden. Adoption is worth it….not because you get to say “look at me, I’m wonderful” but because you get to see how not so wonderful you are. God is able to work on the hearts of all involved. Adoption isn’t plan A….we were supposed to live in the Garden of Eden forever and commune with God. EJ and JE, in the perfect world, would be with their birth families but because we live in a fallen world, choices that were made, situations, etc etc resulted in adoption. We will always do our best to honor their first (birth) family and culture and they will forever be apart of our family.

Happy National Adoption Month!!

Taken from a foster mom’s blog…

“It’s true that she and I are very different. I was adopted (in the family of God) and she wasn’t. She brought him into the world and I didn’t. I know him in ways she doesn’t.

And every time I say “Come to Mama” I am reminded that there is another.

But in this we are the same. She and I are both the other mother.” Read the entire blog entry here….

Envelope Fundraiser Update

We still have a way to go (94 blocks to be selected)

In case you missed the original post, here's how it works…

We took 200 envelopes and numbered each envelope 1-200. We created info cards for the donors to keep to know how to pray. (Thanks Ashley Frey who took on this task).

Now, we are asking people to commit to taking an envelope (or more than one if you are feeling overly generous or want to try to help us get all the envelopes distributed)!

When you agree to an envelope, it means that you are volunteering to be responsible for coming up with the dollar amount on your numbered envelope. So, if you have the number 1 you would commit to $1. If you have the number 2 you would be committing to $2, and so on. The highest numbered envelope is 200. So the most anyone would commit to is $200.

Donations can be tax-deductible by making checks to "Sacred Portion Children Outreach." If you want to be totally electronic, another option is donating at www.adopttogether.org/petwayfamily.

*You do not have to come up with the money on your own. Ask your friends and family members to join you. Perhaps you could have your small group commit to taking an envelope or two, or you could do your own fundraiser. (If you do this, please let us know, so we can advertise your fundraiser and give others ideas on how they could raise funds!)

Your envelope(s) will be sent (given) to you with the number(s) you have requested. It will already have a stamp and our address for you to send your pledge back to us once you have collected it. (We are having them sent to our personal address to collect them all to send them into our adoption agency together).

If you would like to help, please let me know. I will keep a tally on Facebook for people to sign up for specific numbers.

We thank you in advance for assisting us with this fundraiser. This fundraiser cannot be a success without each one of you.

If all 200 envelopes are committed to and returned...this fundraiser will cover almost most of our adoption cost! 

Would you consider committing to take an envelope?   Leave a comment in this blog post and we can go from there.

If you are curious how much our adoption costs and would like to see the breakdown of expenses, please click here.


Here's what we have left….

Envelope Fundraiser and ADOPTION Update

We are halfway there with our 1st fundraiser endeavor. As of tonight, we have 100 of our blocks spoken for; only 100 more to go. We believe God can do it!! Tonight I had this wild thought that we would go over what we need for the adoption. So WHEN we get fully funded and have funds left over, we will turn it into a grant to bless a family working to bring a child home!

Want to help, pick an unclaimed number from below and donate that amount at www.adopttogether.org/petwayfamily

Our adoption process is moving forward at a good rate…we are awaiting our finalized home study report!! We have to complete one more appointment and then that will be available. Then its on to getting our I800a submitted and approved. We had a small hiccup but still believing that we will get our dossier into country by the end of this year.

Also November is Adoption Awareness month….

Envelope Update…..

We raised $4000 in envelopes pledges so far…..we still have a ways to go but thanking God for getting us this far. We also received a grant from the summer hosting program for $1500. We applied for an adoption grant and hope to hear something by the first of the year. We will received $2000 from the military once our son is home and adoption is finalized.

As you can see we have a ways to go so that we are fully funded but we fully trust God to provide…..

Would you like to support us….here's what our grid currently looks like….

You can look back an old blog post for our cost breakdown by clicking here.

You can send us a cash or check donation directly. Or you can donate electronically at www.adopttogether.org/petwayfamily

Thoughts…..

Tonight my mind is on JE….it has been a lot! I wonder how he transitioned back to orphanage life after living with a family for a month because of Gillette's Summer Hosting program. Orphanage life for him is extremely DIFFICULT…..it's hard for any child however when you have some type of "difference" it can be unbearable. We pray that he gets move to a loving foster home until we can bring him home. I wonder if he is smiling like I've seen in the many pictures while here in America this summer. I cherish the few times we were able to FaceTime with him and look forward to when we will be able to Skype with him on a some what normal basis and inform him that we are his FOREVER FAMILY. Those times were priceless, and some days I close my eyes and try to replay our conservations and his SMILE!! God has blessed us to have a wonderful relationship with his host family, and his mom sends us pictures and videos at just the right time. We also get reminders of him from the Summer Hosting Coordinator…..just a taste of heaven.

We stay really busy with ministry and with the kids, but its during our down time that this process gets the hardest. The kids even ask when can we Skype with JE again….soon babies soon!! Its funny how I tried my hardest to come up with every excuse to not pursue this adoption and God showed it plain…."its time; I've got you covered." And look at me now….thinking, planning, praying and declaring over JE, our LOVE. Back in the deep ocean we go…..opening our hearts to the "one in front of us." Taking on something we have never done before but we get to do it together….using our marriage and life to bring glory to our Father and all the while, we get to reap the benefit of some awesome children. We have the pleasure to raise children that will impact the world; Impact the kingdom!! We get to show them how to overcome every obstacle that tries to come in their way of achieving their goals and God giving purposes!!

What do we do in the waiting? Pray for JE….his wait is far more painful than ours….he has been waiting for years to have someone to call Daddy and Mommy! We pray for others in the process….I have actually made a friend with one of the families adopting another boy from this year's hosting program….we have someone to cry, encourage and praise God with. Our social worker comes in the next 2 weeks…and we should have our finalized home study in our hands by the end of the month. Our plan is to have our I800a application in by Thanksgiving and then dossier in country before end of the year.

I challenge those of you reading this blog to step back….take a look around, ask God how can your live your life to the fullest for him. It will look different for each of us……..

Video message

Just thought this would be a fun way to give you an update…

Enjoy…..this was the best "take"….LOL

How much does it cost? Why is it so much?

Please see the breakdown of the estimated fees we will occur in order to bring JE home…

Cost	Allocation	Time Due/Explanation
$300	Application Fee	Due at time of application
$500	Supervisory Fee	Review of home study completed by another agency. Due at completion of home study
$3,000	Agency Processing Fee	Due when dossier is sent to Philippines
$200	ICAB Dossier Approval Fee	Due when Dossier is sent to Philippines
$2,000	ICAB Placement Fee	Due at time of ICAB approval
$3,000	Agency Placement Fee	Due at time of ICAB approval
$1,000	Child’s Visa & Travel	This fee covers the processing and bureaucratic fees, documents, passport, visa, and other overseas expenses in getting the child ready to travel. Due when submitting letter of acceptance to ICAB
$1,000	Child Care Support	This is a donation to the child’s orphanage to cover some of the costs associated with caring for the child.
$1,000	Humanitarian Aid	Supports the orphanage outreach projects of The SPCO, specifically the Rehoboth Children’s Home in the Philippines
$6,500	Transportation, Accommodation & In-country cost	Estimate of parent’s airfare and child’s one-way. 5 days in country.
$1,800	Home Study Fee	Due at completion of Home Study
$100	Documents Fee	Estimate cost of acquiring various documents such as marriage certificates
$890	I-800A Application & Fingerprinting Fee	This is paid to USCIS and is based on two adults.
$600	Post Placement Supervision	This is the cost of social worker visits/reports during the six-month period following arrival home.
$21,890.00	Total Estimated Fees

Week 4: Envelope Fundraiser

We are steadily pushing forward with this fundraiser and the mounds of paperwork we need to plunder through.

Here's our current grid….we have 60 squares filled...

Our lowest number available is 33 and largest number is 196. Our kids have joined in on the fun and pick numbers and used money from their piggy banks.

So what's going on in the process?
Our social worker will be visiting us in about 2 weeks and our home study should be completed by the end of October. We are hoping to have all of our documents for the dossier by then to submit to the agency. We have to file for the I800a after our home study is complete which will be the last thing to go in our dossier.

So we are praying and believing that everything falls in line…we are believing that we will be fully FUNDED and the need for money will not hinder the process.

Interested in participating in the fundraiser, click HERE!!

Week 2: Envelope Fundraiser

Thanks to all who participated in Week 1 of our fundraiser. We filled 47 of the 200 boxes and got the top 3 numbers on the grid pledged!! Praise God!!

We are believing God that we can have 100 numbers colored in by the end of Week 2. If you are new to our blog this week, click here to read and learn more about our fundraiser.

As for the adoption process, we got a lot of items out in the mail for our home study. We are getting all the necessary documents for our dossier.

We got a magazine in the mail from our agency….well written too!! Almost at the back of the booklet was a picture of the kids from the Gillette Summer of Hope 2014. I've seen this picture a few times but it was something about seeing it in a 8 x 10 size…..I fell in love with our boy all over again….his SMILE just does something to this momma's heart!!

How can you help? Pray, sow (donate) and spread the word to others to help us reach our goal.

I leave you with a quote I saw on a church member's Facebook page.. "In regards to missions, the goer and the sender get the same reward." I feel this true in the area of adoption too!!

Remember you don't have to send a check or cash, you can donate directly to our adoption account at www.adopttogether.org/petwayfamily!

Family Update

We just felt we should give an update as to all the changes going on in Praise Family Land. For those of you new to our blog, this gives you a fast way to know more about us. In June, I resigned from my teaching job in the public schools to be home with the kids. I also accepted a position as the Church Administrator for our church and along with Tyvon picked up some more pastoral care duties there. This job is flexible so I work 4 days a week while the kids are at school. This was a giant faith step but we are blessed and honored that I'm able to do this. I love being home when the kids wake up in the morning. I'm able to prepare breakfast, we have a time of praise and worship then devotion and I get to take them to school. It's awesome!!

EJ has been home for a little over a year from Ghana. He is very accumulated with the family and we are the same with him. We celebrated his Forever Family Day at a park and then created him a memorial book. He and his "twin" TJ are in 3rd grade this year but in different classes. He is playing academy soccer this fall. The girls AT and TJ plan to take a dance class at our church. DJ is enjoying her play dough and cuddling with mommy and daddy when the kids are doing their extra-curricular activities.

Over the summer, I had the pleasure of going with AT on her first mission trip to Meddelin, Colombia. It was a great time to share with her and be able to experience the move of God with our oldest daughter. It just ignited her passion and desire for the things of God more.

As you are all probably aware of now, we are beginning our 2nd adoption. So there's a lot of transition going on with our family. With my income now gone, we have cut back some of our expenses and also aggressively fundraise so that we have the funds needed to keep the adoption process moving along.

Our prayer…(because you know when we ask God, we ask BIG) is one that our 1st Fundraiser will cover all the cost and that JE will be able to join his forever family sometime during this upcoming summer!! We believe God can do it….He's done it before.

We solicit your prayers, encouragement and financial support….IT takes a village…will you be apart of our village?

144 Envelope Fundraiser

Not only are we diving into the adoption process, we are diving into our fundraising BIG time!! We are doing the "144 Envelopes Fundraiser," however we have decided to dream BIG therefore we have extended it to 200 Envelopes.

So here's how it works…

We took 200 envelopes and numbered each envelope 1-200. We created info cards for the donors to keep to know how to pray. (Thanks Ashley Frey who took on this task).

Now, we are asking people to commit to taking an envelope (or more than one if you are feeling overly generous or want to try to help us get all the envelopes distributed)!

When you agree to an envelope, it means that you are volunteering to be responsible for coming up with the dollar amount on your numbered envelope. So, if you have the number 1 you would commit to $1. If you have the number 2 you would be committing to $2, and so on. The highest numbered envelope is 200. So the most anyone would commit to is $200.

Donations can be tax-deductible by making checks to "Sacred Portions" with "Petway Family" in the memo field. If you want to be totally electronic, another option is donating at www.adopttogether.org/petwayfamily.

*You do not have to come up with the money on your own. Ask your friends and family members to join you. Perhaps you could have your small group commit to taking an envelope or two, or you could do your own fundraiser. (If you do this, please let us know, so we can advertise your fundraiser and give others ideas on how they could raise funds!)

Your envelope(s) will be sent to you with the number(s) you have requested. It will already have a stamp and our address for you to send your pledge back to us once you have collected it. (We are having them sent to our personal address to collect them all to send them into our adoption agency together).

If you would like to help, please let me know. I will keep a tally on Facebook for people to sign up for specific numbers.

We thank you in advance for assisting us with this fundraiser. This fundraiser cannot be a success without each one of you.

If all 200 envelopes are committed to and returned...this fundraiser will cover almost most of our adoption cost! 

Would you consider committing to take an envelope?   Leave a comment in this blog post and we can go from there.

If you are curious how much our adoption costs and would like to see the breakdown of expenses, please click here.

Here's how far we have gotten so far in just 2 days…