Phoebe's First Give Away

jendmoyers@gmail.com won 1st,2nd, & 6th prize
trulymme@aol.com won 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 12th and 13th prize
jfaithjobes@yahoo.com won the 11th prize


This quilt was originally donated by Hope Anne Dueck. It was made by her family from all over the United States and Mexico, piece by piece. It was then quilted together in hopes to raise funds for a international adoption. We had a give away for it last year, Jill Spicer won it and graciously donated it to Yana. When our adoption fell through I asked her if she wanted it and she said to keep it and use it as we see fit.


Our second item is a wonderful book donated to me by Alan Philips. We had a "The Boy From Baby House 10" give away. He gave me two books. This book was for me to keep. It is the UK version-paperback edition-with forward from Russian Model Natalia Vodianova. IT ALSO HAS ALAN'S REAL AUTOGRAPH!! This book means a great deal to me. I adore Alan. The thing is, sometimes we have to let things go that mean a lot to us. Phoebe +1 is worth it.

Third through sixth item is a set of coasters (4 in each set) made by my friend Amanda Wood. These were also made for Yana's adoption. They are hand stamped and say something different on each tile (wish, grateful, always, and joy.) The coasters are made out of shower tile with felt pads on the bottom. They are heavy. Each one is hand stamped and fired...so they all are unique.


The seventh item is a $10 Itunes gift card. This was donated by my niece Beth Beattey. She was so excited about Yana. It broke her heart when she found out Yana couldn't come home...

The eigth item is a knotted blanket donated again by my niece Beth. She made it herself. She made it for chairity, but donated it to Yana to raise money. It is a larger fleece blanket. Peace signs on the front-neon green on the back.

The ninth item is a matryoshka doll donated by the wonderful Jensen family who is RIGHT NOW in country getting ready to bring thier son home!!!


Then tenth item is two packs of cloth wipes made by Malia Kalua Allen at www.bumbledoo.com


The eleventh item will be a handcrafted item from Jen. Here is a picture of her swaddling blanket she makes. She will let me know for sure what the item is. (It will probably be either a quilt top blanket or a swaddling blanket.)


The 12th item is a $25 Children's Place Gift Card donated by Brenda Hugen


The 13th item is a $25 Old Navy/Banana Republic Gift Card donated by Brenda Hugen




If I find anything else, I will be adding them. If you wish to donate something for the give away, email me or post a comment on here with your email address so I can contact you. I have it set up for two weeks. All of these things are new, never used. They were for Yana's adoption, and although Yana will always be in my heart, I have to see what is in front of me right now (Yana is in my heart so please don't think I have forgotten about her.) Right now we need $1,100 for agency fees (we already paid $1,500) we also have to redo all the documents for our dossier and to bring both girls home we need around $17,000. I am going to set up this give away to my email address to help with the $1,100 to our agency. I could do this with overtime, but truthfully I want to get them the $ asap. Our agency would like for us to bring them home before our visas expire in September. If we make over the $1,100 I will then switch the email address to Reece's Rainbow so all donations after that would be tax deductible.

What I have to Offer...

When we lost Yana I thought I was going to just fall apart. It broke my heart. On top of that, knowing that the agency partner lied to us by saying they had the dossier translated and submitted last fall was a lie, I was quite taken back. How could they do that to us and to Yana? We waited on a date for months when really we were waiting on something not going to happen. Mad, ticked, upset, sad, hurt were a few words I could use to describe how I felt. Then add the fact that we lost the money we paid the agency here-all the documents and personal info & the money we paid for them-all the time spent and gas getting all the required signatures/apostilles needed-all the money we paid for postage-we had to have bci/fbi redone-our homestudy has to be updated-etc, etc, etc. It may not seem like a lot when it comes down to the end result, but it is emotionally painful and yes it does matter when it all adds up. Then I looked at some of the things we had here from Yana's adoption, and that got me to thinking. Thinking that maybe we should do a give away for these items and try to raise money for Phoebe and her sister to come home. So, here it goes...

It's Not Acceptable....

I love this and the whole message. It is NOT ACCEPTABLE to call someone Retarded. It is hurtful and stupid. If you think it's ok, you are wrong. We are all people and deserve to be treated with respect. We are more alike then different!!!

New Pic of Phoebe

I love new pictures and I love how she is growing.

What We Have Ahead of Us....

I am at work, at lunch, and of course I can't get our adoption out of my mind. So, other then pounding out paperwork we need to raise some money. So, if I break it down,this is what we need. For an adoption in region 9 it is about 32k for one child. So if you adopted two at seperate times you are looking at 64k. Yikes! We would like to be able to adopt two litte girls with Ds. I am working hard to get the paperwork done and I am picking up extra time at work not only to pay bills, but to prove to Phoebe's government that we can afford to adopt them. With our fsp and Phoebe's grant we have over $16,400. The adoption of two is about $36,800. So, we only need a little over $20k to adopt both girls. A lot better then 64k right??? If the government allows us to adopt the other little girl her grant will help. So, who is up for some fundraising? I wouldn't ask for help for me, but I would ask for help for my kids. It would be a miracle to only have to worry about the paperwork. We will all see what happens in the next few weeks.

So Here Is The Plan...

So, here is the plan. When we knew that Yana was lost to us (at least for now) it was hard to make the decision to move forward. We looked at pictures and thought of many different options. I had Matthew look too. He fell in love with Phoebe and I picked another little girl from the same region. I really didn't want to make a decision. I wanted them both. So, when we contacted the agency we inquired about both of them. If you are at all familiar with thier country of origin, you would know that sometimes it doesn't always work out the way you want it. So after talking to our agency and Andrea, we have made this decision. When we submit our dossier we will submit for two and meet two of them on our first trip. Then before the court date we will petition the court (or whatever you call it) and see if they would allow the adoption of two. If they say yes, we can tell all of you at that time who the second child will be. If they say no, it will be heartbreaking for us because we will have already met the second child, but we all know adoption is not for the faint of heart. We could just move ahead with Phoebe, but we can't not try. So, we are going to be pounding out the paperwork and trying to fundraise for more $. To bring them both home, we need about $36,800. We have over $16000 (includinhg Phoebe's fsp.) So please pray for our adoption of beautiful Phoebe (and maybe a second child,) pray for more fundraising ideas/funds and please pray for Yana that she is safely protected by God and her angels. Oh, and the agency said if we can get the paperwork done soon and get the money, we might be able to have Phoebe (and a possible second child) home by the end of September before our visas expire. Now, I need to get to bed so I can work tomorrow and then come home and pound out more paperwork. Thank you all for your support!!!!!!

News

We have been looking at the RR site for some time now, I guess because in our hearts we new this was going to happen. I had dreams weeks ago and I posted on here about them. In my dream the children they tried to give us wasn't our Yana..... This week has been tough for us, me especially. I wrestled with myself all week. We have several choices in front of us, and I would think about all of them repeatedly. Then I thought maybe we should just give up. It would be easy and I wouldn't have this to worry about, but......I can't. All of the choices were the right ones, but what was best for us? I didn't know what to do or where to turn. I have talked to agencies and people all week, trying to figure out what was best. Then I woke up this morning and all I could think was~I can't let anyone else have them. Then I knew what the answer was. It's them. The region these two little girls are from allow multiple adoptions of unrelated children. We are approved for two by the USCIS. No brainer, but there is a catch. The agency is checking with the facilitator to see if the adoption of two for our family is possible. After talking with Andrea she wants to make sure it will be a for sure thing because it wouldn't be fair for us to hold up a child if they decide to say no. Then that child would lose valuable chances of finding a family. So, the agency will be talking with the facilitator and then talk with Andrea. We then will know how to proceed. Monday I will contact our hs agency to update our hs. We all know how that is. Then hopefully we will be able to commit to both of them. If not, we will commit to one and continue to fundraise for her and for the other little girl. I don't want to miss a beat. If we are allowed, I want to make sure we have the money for both of them and be ready to go. With our fsp and thiers, we will only need $17,000 to finalize both girls adoptions. I can't wait to share the news with everyone. We could wait a little while longer to make the decision, but with the news of Jacob Stolz's death, time is of the essence. Please pray that this works...and please pray that we have our own adoption miracle.