Home and Complete

Well it sure has been a long time since Blog updates. We enjoyed blogging while in China this summer/fall and now we will have our China travel blog made into a book and CD. As far as what else to say...........................2 words come to mind.....HOME & COMPLETE! OK 2 more words..............THANK YOU! Yes we are home and yes our family is complete but most of all Thank you to so many who helped us, who supported us, who were there for us through it all. 7 days till Christmas so no more updating blogs gotta go get things done but again thank you and HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!

LOA

Our LOA IS HERE 5/28/13!!!!!!!
Ella we are coming soon sweet love! And thanks to a long productive day so is your care package (thank you TK)!

Mother's Day 2013

Mother's Day had it's years of being tough for this Mama who longed to be just that..............a Mama! This year I am over the moon to say I am a mother of two.........Yup two precious girls.

We shared the news with our Mothers on Mother's Day!

The 3 of us are beyond excited to finally say...............

Dreaming of a sister is no longer a dream!!

So many have helped us, so many have supported us. Thank you for it all, you know who you are!!

Now we know you just wanna see pictures huh? Unfortunately we can't yet. China is strict about sharing on ALL social media etc. The wording we have is....It makes China nervous at best and angry at worst and could jeopardize the delicate sensitive adoption situation........so for now we share our news with this - Thank you and OMG YAHOO we have TWO daughters!!!

p.s. Thank you - Many are asking about another benefit tag sale and yes we are considering another benefit tag sale this summer to help bring little sister home!

Little sister is coming home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

2013

2013 - looking forward to it ;)

busy busy but hi

Yes it is busy busy here and blogging is much less.  I don't see that changing anytime soon but wanted to say hi ;)

If you can please take a moment to help. Thank you!

we petition the obama administration to:

Support HR 4373 and S 3616: Help make adoption affordable; keep the tax credit and make it refundable

Help make Adoption Affordable

The average cost to adopt a child is any where from $25k- $35k or more. Currently, The 2012 Tax Credit is not refundable for adoptions initiated after 2011, which means a large number of families are/were not able to get any of the $25k- $35k back and possibly prevent people from adopting a child at all.

In 2013 it will revert back to a maximum tax credit of $6,000 for parents adopting children with special needs only and there will be no adoption tax credit available in tax year 2013.
We are petitioning to make the adoption tax credit permanent and refundable, so that more money is available to families allowing them provide a financially stable home to the adopted child.

Currently, there are two bills HR 4373 and S3616 that support this petition.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/support-hr-4373-and-s-3616-help-make-adoption-affordable-keep-tax-credit-and-make-it-refundable/GknZZR2H

Cinderella Moon

OMG I am so excited to see this!!! Half the sky blessed us and cared for our daughter until we could. I am so thankful to them! I loved when I read the below from the actress:

Click here to buy now:

One half of all proceeds from Cinderella Moon sales made through Half the Sky will be spent by the foundation to create as many real-life Cinderella stories as possible inside Chinese orphanages.

Some time ago, I told you about a new movie made by my husband, Richard Bowen. Cinderella Moon was inspired by our Chinese daughters and is dedicated to Half the Sky. This gorgeous film – a fairytale for the whole family – brings to life the world's first telling of the Cinderella story. The movie has played to sold-out film festival audiences and received ecstatic reviews..."Magical. Sheer entertainment. A richly told girl-power fantasy guaranteed to enchant tots and parents alike." – Variety

Well, we want to get the word out about this wonderful and little-known part of our children's heritage. And we just don't want to wait anymore to share it with our Half the Sky family.

So here comes Half the Sky's holiday gift to you:
For a limited time only, you can buy Cinderella Moon only in our Half the Sky store at a ridiculously low price.

Watch the opening scene (in Chinese with subtitles) here:

Watch the English (dubbed) version here.

PLEASE PASS THIS MESSAGE ON! With love,

Jenny

Half the Sky Foundation
715 Hearst Avenue, Ste. 200, Berkeley, CA 94710
+1 (510)525-3377 www.halfthesky.org

big smile to see sister already added to our family in more ways than 1 ;)

We have an LID

LID in the China adoption world is LOG IN DATE
it means finally stacks and stacks and stacks of paperwork has been completed and China has it all and they have logged it in and given you a date to celebrate that huge accomplishment.  Ours is 08-06-2012!!!!!!  I will have to post again soon about what happens next................

Where have we been, What is new

Some are asking the questions....Where have we been and what is new so I thought I would write a quick update. Dreaming of a sister is still full speed ahead. I am finding full speed is not as easy as I thought. We are buried in adoption paperwork right now. The process this time is very different and we have many hoops to jump through but all is moving along. We still don't have a date yet but that is OK we are enjoying life while doing paperwork and finding creative ways to do our best to cut corners and save money for adoption # 2. We have about 12 people asking us if we would consider another dreaming of a sister adoption fundraising tag sale. They have items they want to donate. My 1st thought is WOW that is so beyond generous. My 2nd thought is OMG another tag sale? Did you see those pictures and how much stuff we had!! The task of storing it until the tag sale was such a challenge not to mention cleaning it, pricing it and setting up. BUT ya what..................How can I even begin to mutter a complaint about the generosity of people and a challenge? I say challenge OK bring it on! We will face the challenge and appreciate every single bit of help,love and support. So the thought process begins for tag sale #2 (on a bit of a smaller scale than # 1) and at the same time the adoption paperwork for sister continues and hopefully late 2012 will bless us with a sister.

Tune in or set your DVR

NEAR and DEAR to my heart! Tune in or set your DVR. My life would not be what it is today without the miracle work of Half the Sky! Many of you know Laney is a half the sky miracle herself!

http://halfthesky.org/en/children/stories/2406?tr=y&auid=10275927

CNY 2012

Chinese New Years Day is January 23, 2012 and it marks the 4,710th Chinese New Year! This year it is the year of dragon! The dragon stands for power, good luck, success, and happiness.  Happy Chinese New Year to so many near and dear to our hearts.

touched by adoption

How did it go

So many people are asking ........ "How did it go"? Sorry it is taking awhile but oh my we are exhausted but with that said we are also thrilled to say......................it was a huge success. The past 3 months of gathering donated items was not exactly easy. It was clean, tag/price, find a place to store, clean, tag/price, find a place to store and repeat and repeat and repeat 1,000 + times. It was pure and utter craziness at times BUT look what happened. We raised a boatload of money and all for soul sister waiting China. So many people helped it was awesome. SOOOO SOOOOO awesome! It brings tears to my eyes to think about how many hands were involved and lets lay it all out there...................WE NEVER COULD HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT ALL OF YOU! Our "dreaming of a sister" fundraising tag sale raised $5,500.00! THANK YOU just does not feel like enough but THANK YOU!
pictures can not possibly show you how much stuff we had but here are a few:

full, busy and excitied

Just thought we would say hello and tell everyone we are busy busy getting ready for the big "dreaming of a sister" fundraiser yard sale.  Our home is full (OK overstuffed really) but how cool is that people have been so generous with donation items.  We are excited for the event (OK tired) and excited.  Thank you everyone.  Come shop or send shoppers you may know.  We will keep you informed on how it goes.  Hope it is a big hit!!

how is our tag sale fundraiser going

Some people have asked .......how our tag sale fundraiser is going?  Well we are truly blown away with the kind, generous, caring people in our lives.  Some lifelong friends, some new friends, some great family and some even strangers.  So many have gotten involved and  we thank everyone for making this fundraiser amazing!

**We will most likely make October 1st our date for the end of tag sale item donations. It has been amazing and we have tons to price/tag etc... Amazing donations!

Now we need people to shop shop shop.  Please pass along the dates of our tag/yard/bake sale:

Friday, October 21st 8am – 4pm

Saturday, October 22nd 8am – 4pm
Sunday, October 23rd 8am – 2pm

Fundraiser tag sale DATE

We have picked a weekend for our “Dreaming of a sister” fundraiser tag sale!

Friday, October 21st            8am – 4pm

Saturday, October 22nd       8am – 4pm
Sunday, October 23rd          8am – 2pm

If you would like to donate items to be sold please contact us to pick them up (e-mail us, post a comment on our blog or call us).

Please come join us if you would like to purchase some items that weekend.

Others neighbors are also planning tag sales that weekend and we are planning some other fun events for the weekend so stop by!

Lastly tables and easy up type cover tents are needed if anyone has any they could loan to us for the weekend that would be so helpful. THANK YOU!

1st post - BIG NEWS - why fundraise

We are taking a "Flying Leap of Faith" and we invite you to join us!  We have decided to bring a sister home to Laney!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It is time to take big steps to making our dreams come true BUT we cannot do it without you!  

Our adoption process with Laney took almost 4 years!!  Her sister will probably be home with us MUCH SOONER than that long wait.  Maybe even within 12 months!  The good news is sooner rather than later a little girl will be out of the orphanage, into our loving arms and she will have a family. The challenge... this good news of sooner leaves A LOT less time to save all the money we need. We do have faith we will be able to do what we need to bring her home. One of the ways we are doing this is by putting our faith into this very letter. Truth is… we dislike fundraising. But, we know, in this case, that we must swallow our pride and have the courage to ask others for help.  So, in addition to scrimping and saving, we are dollar by dollar fundraising our way to Laney’s sister.  So would you consider being a part of something great?  As we gear up for some fundraising events?

You may ask why all this fundraising? Some might say “geez, they want to adopt but they can’t afford the adoption”? It’s a fair question… so let us try to answer.  Yes… God has set it on our hearts to adopt a sister for Laney. We don’t know her yet, but we dream of her and everyday she is growing in our hearts. We know this is the plan for our family!  But, not too many people have the money sitting in their bank account to cover the cost of adoption. Did you know adoption costs between
Twenty to Thirty Thousand Dollars!!! Many people ask … "Why does it cost so much?" Believe us we wish it didn’t but wow it sure does! You must pay for so many services. The adoption agency is a service that makes sure you have the mounds and mounds of paperwork just perfect for travel to China, they arrange travel, they schedule all the government appointments, they have staff to help while we are there. We pay the Chinese government fees for all the paperwork they must process. We pay the US government fees for immigration processing, home studies, fingerprints, and tons of forms. Notarizations, certifications, authentications, social workers, agency fees, dossier fees, pre placement fees, government fees and post placement fees. And the list goes on and on.  We hope this helps people understand. And we hope everyone knows that we are SO grateful for every person, every family, and every friend that helps along on this journey.

SO we ask you again......Would you consider being a part of something great? Join us for our first fundraising event:  A huge tag sale for a cause! 

We are working on putting together a giant tag sale to help bring Laney’s sister home to her forever family.  We have opened a designated account solely for adoption (Thank you Jo for the 1^st deposit into this account J)!  This account will be used solely to reach the goal of bringing Laney’s sister home.

SO ARE YOU READY TO DO SOME SUMMER CLEANING? Do you want to clean out, get rid of, simplify things; well you can do all that while helping our little girl come home.  Please consider these things:

·          Gather all the things you were considering selling, trading, donating or tossing.  Furniture, toys, clothes, household items, electronics (anything really that is in decent selling condition). Make a pile and set it aside. We will make it easy! Drop it off or we can arrange to pick it up and feel good about having a hand in making family dreams come true!  We will sell all these items at a giant tag sale later this fall and all the proceeds will go to helping bring Laney’s sister home.

Thank you to those who are already working on:
 ·         selling items on Craig’s list and donating a portion of the proceeds.
 ·         selling items at consignment stores and donating a portion of the proceeds.
 ·         selling old gold jewelry they no longer wear and donating a portion of the proceeds.

 ·         Having tag sales in other states and donating a portion of the proceeds.

We created this very fundraising blog and it will be updated with events and information and it even has a way to donate securely!

We have wonderful family and friends working on future fundraisers also.  More to come on events like:
·         Eat out fundraiser
·         Puzzle fundraiser
·         Benefit show fundraiser
·         Bake sale fundraiser
·         Oh and any other fundraiser ideas are welcome!

If we missed any family, friends, coworkers, neighbors please share this.

Lastly thank you for taking the time to consider helping make dreams come true.

Mark, Kelly, Laney (Maui & Tiki too)

Please e-mail, post a comment on our blog or call us if you have any questions.