Busy, Busy, Busy...

Well, life has been busy at the Parris house!  Crazy busy!  Many days I feel overwhelmed with all we have on our list to get done to bring our sweet girl home…

But we are getting it done!

I can remember when I thought we were never even going to get our home study ASSIGNED to our social worker and now it is almost done!  She is writing it early this week!  WOOHOO!!!!

We had one project that we wanted to get done before our home study and that was to finish our master bath…we got it all done except for painting!  Hope to finish it tonight or tomorrow!

We also, for some crazy reason, decided to tackle multiple home improvement projects all at once…during VBS week…what were we thinking?!?!?!

We hired someone to install the shower in our bathroom, trade out all the windows for walls in what used to be a sunroom and turn it into a beautiful pink new room for our FOUR girls and to remove that terrible unsafe ramp from our out building and build a deck and stairs.

At the SAME time, Bryan decided we could handle tackling three of our OWN projects inside the house:  new shelves in the kitchen for a pantry, a new laundry sorting/folding area in the laundry room and a new utility closet.

We really have lost our mind……

Most of it is all finished except for painting…Friday is my goal!  Can't wait!


So worth it for this beautiful girl…..

What's next, you ask?  The paper chase continues……

As soon as our home study is written:

• it comes to us for us to review and fact check
• it goes to our placing agency in Delaware for them to review and approve
• it comes back to our home study agency in Birmingham for them to review and approve
• then we get our final copy to use for our I-800 and our dossier! WOOHOO!!!

Then we send off for our I-800…basically the US says we are approved to adopt.

Then we gather documents for our dossier….see what I mean about the paper chase continuing…HA!

Here's what goes into the dossier…

1. Our inter-country adoption application letter…a little about us, why, who we want to adopt, etc.
2. Our completed home study report
3. Mine and Bryan's birth certificates
4. Mine and Bryan's marriage certificate
5. Both of our divorce decrees
6. Medical exams on both Bryan and I 
7. Certificate of our financial status
8. Police clearance on both Bryan and I from our local police department
9. Employment verification letters on both Bryan and I.  Mine of course will be an "unemployed applicant letter" and Bryan's will be a "retired applicant letter".
10. USCIS approval letter

All of the above documents have to be notarized and certified by our county as well as our secretary of state then authenticated at the local Consulate or Embassy of China.

The dossier also includes the following documents that do not have to be notarized and/or certified:

1. Copies of mine and Bryan's passports.
2. Passport photos of Bryan and I.
3. Photos pages containing eight photos depicting our family life with descriptions.
4. A signed post adoption agreement.
5. A signed inter-agency agreement since our placing agency did not complete our home study.
6. Three notarized reference forms: one from David (adult child reference required), one from a teacher of our children and another by a family friend.

Not to mention I have to get three power of attorneys completed and notarized since I will be traveling without Bryan.

See what I mean about the paperwork…..this is no joke people….adopting is not for the faint of heart…

Once our dossier is complete…THEN we send it to China and wait for their approval.  

SO excited to really see the light at the end of the tunnel!!  I am SOOOOOOO ready to go get our little girl and bring her home.  

It is so impossible to describe the feeling of knowing your daughter is being tucked in at night by someone else….being held by someone else….

Don't get me wrong, I am so thankful she is foster care….I just long for her to be in MY arms…..

It can not get here soon enough….

In our hearts and minds she is already ours…we just need the paperwork to prove it….

We are coming sweet girl,

Mommy

Updated Videos and Pictures of Our Sweet Girl!!

So excited to have gotten updates from our adoption agency!!  What a  blessing!  Enjoy!

MinLan with her foster mom and foster dad.  Praying for this sweet family who is taking care of our girl until we can bring her home!  Please pray with us!

Stop-N-Shop Fundraiser

Can I just say that I have the best friends EVER!?!?  We are so thankful to our friends Charlotte, Meredith and Kimberly who are hosting not one but TWO Stop-N-Shops to help raise money for our adoption. What a blessing! 

Origami Owl, Thirty-One Gifts and Pampered Chef will all be represented!

Stop-N-Shop June 15th

10:00am to 12:00pm

Ted Turgeon's TKD

Barry Street Plaza

Oxford, AL

Stop-N-Shop June 22nd

10:00am to 12:00pm

Ted Turgeon's TKD

203 Pelham Road South

Jacksonville, AL

Can't make it to shop in person?  Live too far away?

You can shop ONLINE!!!!  WooHoo!!!!

FOR ORIGAMI OWL

www.charlotteallen.origamiowl.com

Use party ID 151762

Contact Charlotte at 256-225-0275 with questions and to order.

Booking bonuses announced at the Stop-N-Shops!!!

FOR THIRTY-ONE GIFTS

www.mythirtyone.com/strainm

Click on "My Parties" then go to "Parris Family Fundraiser"

Contact Meredith at 256-343-2244 with questions and to order.

For every Thirty-One Gifts party booked from the Parris Stop-N-Shop Fundraiser for the months of June, July, and August an extra percentage will be made to the Fundraiser by Thirty-One Gifts and the Hostesses will receive Free embroidery on 1 item at the time of their party.

FOR PAMPERED CHEF

www.pamperedchef.biz/housecooking

Enter "Parris" as the host for our family to get credit.

Contact Kimberly at 256-310-2414 with questions and to order.

Kim will be having a drawing for $40.00 in Free Pampered Chef products. 

The drawing will be held at the Stop-N-Shop on June 22nd @ noon. 

You do not have to be present to win. 

Here is how to get entered in the drawing:

 
1 entry for making a purchase
1 entry for every $60.00 you spend in product purchase
1 entry for booking your own Pampered Chef Party

If you can't make it to the stop-n-shops then you can still order & book a party.
www.pamperedchef.biz/housecooking

The Parris Family Fundraiser will get $3.00 for every person that books a show from the fundraiser. Kim is already booking for July. You can earn an extra $100.00 or $200.00 in Free product depending on your show sales for the month of July only!!!

Thanks so much for shopping!
Love,
Jenifer

Making Progress…..

Wow!  Has life been crazy around here!  We have had two of our required four home study visits with our social worker.  Bryan and I both are probably WAY to talkative, but I think the visits went great!  We might be the only family in the history of adopting who needs 8 visits just to answer all the questions! HA!

If VBS week wasn't crazy enough in our house, we decided to do some much needed home improvements this week….talk about insanity here!  Our kitchen pantry is in our living room, my dirty clothes baskets are in my kitchen, nowhere is quiet enough to take a nap, but I am LOVING IT!!!!

I am loving that with every nail driven in, we are one step closer to bringing our girl home!  When all is said and done, our master bath will have a functioning shower, the four girls' new room will be ready to move furniture into, my new open kitchen pantry will be ready to stock, my new laundry folding area will be done in my laundry room and the ramp on our outbuilding that I DESPISE and have fallen down SEVERAL times, will finally be STEPS!!!  WooHOO!!!

Do you like to paint?  We have LOTS of painting coming our way!  The crew working here is only priming…..painting is up to us!  If you want to help, we'd love to have you!!!!

BRING ON THE HOMESTUDY HOUSE VISITS!!!!

The more I begin to think about it, the more excited I am that Neely and MinLan will be basically TWINS!  How fun is our life going to be!!!  We are already saying things like "the LITTLE girls"….EEK!!!!  So blessed!

Getting passports on Monday!

As soon as our home study is done and approved…looks like by the end of June/first week of July to be completed then a few weeks to approve maybe, we'll be filing our I-800!

Starting to wrap our heads around all that we need to put together for our dossier!

Our placing agency just returned from a trip to China to MinLan's orphanage!  Our social worker said they took video and pictures of MinLan and mailed them via snail mail yesterday!

Pray with me that that mail moves FAST!!!!!!

So excited to see those pics and video!!!

Thanks so much for all of your support! We can not thank you enough!  We are still selling bracelets for $8 each or $10 if we need to mail it to you.  Just leave a comment here!

We are coming sweet girl,
Mommy

Homestudy….

We are so excited to have our home study assigned!  Our agency requires the long list of required documents before they assign your home study to a social worker.

We have provided every requested document except for one personal reference, so our agency assigned our home study last week! WooHoo!!!

I emailed our social worker and she is excited to get started!

Looking forward to hearing back from her hopefully tomorrow to schedule our four visits.

Three of these interviews will be held either at our home study agency's office or a public location and the fourth visit will be held in our home.

We are in the process of getting our ducks in a row at home!  I feel like we have been in "end of year" mode…winding up Awana, Daddy's retirement and ballet.  Now we are ready to clean up, clean out and get ready for our home visit!

As soon as our home study is complete, our next step will be our I-800A.

The I-800A, basically says that we are eligible and suitable to adopt from a Hague convention country. This can take two to three months from what I have read. Ugghhhhhh……

Please continue to pray for us as we take this journey.  The fact that we already have our referral (most families get their child referral further along in their paperwork process), makes my heart hurt to bring MinLan home.  I feel like someone took Neely away from us and plopped her in China.

Celebrating Neely's first birthday today with family and friends, made us painfully aware that not only did we miss MinLan's first birthday but could likely miss celebrating her second with her as well.  It is hard to explain the love that we have for her already….

The kids talk about her all the time and include her in everything….

We now think in terms of five children instead of four….

We are dreaming about our future with her….

Now we just have to get her HOME….

We are coming sweet girl,
Mommy