Archive for fundraiser
New fundraiser!
Posted by: | CommentsIn addition to the coffee fundraiser that we have, we’ve started a new flower fundraiser through Flower Power Fundraising. What a great time of year for this! I’m so looking forward to picking out some flowers for the beds in the front yard. Our front yard needs the help, that’s for sure!!
Flower Power began as a joint initiative between Gardener’s Supply and Dutch Gardens, which are two highly respected and well-known companies. The prices are good, the quality of the flowers is great (I’ve ordered from both companies directly before) and we receive a whopping 50% of all sales! This could be so big in raising the a chunk of the remaining adoption funds needed.
Anyway, quick, shameless post, but as I’ve told my husband many times, for this adoption, I’m giving up the luxury of shame! I’m willing to do what it takes to bring that little boy home ASAP. =)
Here are a few of my favorites. Expect to see some of these in our garden soon. =)
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Progress
Posted by: | CommentsWe’re making progress on all of the paperwork that’s been consuming our lives lately! We went out the I-600A and our home study agency application with most of the paperwork. I have my physical tomorrow so that I can have my HS medical form filled out and can get a medical letter for Holt. Eliza’s physical is in early December, so should have her medical form for the HS done then. Steve’s in charge of his own medical paperwork, but I’ll probably nag a bit, just for good measure. =) I also submitted my passport application today, so that’s done!!
All we have left is the Prospective Adoptive Parent Questionnaires for both Steve and me to fill out, Steve’s employment verification letters (2), Steve and my mom’s physicals, the sworn disclosure statement for my mom (waiting for it to be mailed to us) and getting the house ready for the home study! We still have a bit of work to do on the downstairs from the flooding, but I don’t think it’s all that bad. A bit of drywall, some new baseboards and painting the floor. Not too bad!
One thing that needs to be done before the home study is to run cable from our living room into our dining room. Sounds weird, huh? We’ve decided to switch our living room and dining room, but Steve won’t allow the switch until we have cable in the new living room (current dining room). Once that’s done, we can switch the rooms, which is necessary because our guest room (to be N.B.’s room) has extra furniture and a HUGE rug stored in there, waiting for the switcharoo.
One amazing thing that happened today came in the mail. There was something addressed from our church, which I thought was odd. I opened it and found a check for $200 from our social justice committee. Wasn’t that the sweetest?! I was in shock! We feel so loved, welcomed and appreciated by fellow church members. Honestly, I don’t know what our lives would be like if we’d never found UCN.
Okay, off to make dinner for the girlie!
ETA: I forgot to mention one of the biggest blessings I’ve had lately. I’ve been getting to know two women that are also adopting via Holt and it has been SO amazing for me. It’s such a relief to be able to talk with people that not only know what you’re going through, but are going through it themselves at the same time! I’m hoping against hope that we all get to travel together!! Fingers crossed. =)
We’re off to see the wizard! I mean, notary!
Posted by: | CommentsSteve and I are off to have the adoption agreement notarized today! We had hoped to do it on Tuesday (and then Wednesday), but illness and late nights and work schedules necessitated putting it off. But it’s Steve’s day off, so we can finally get it done! Then it’s off to pick up Eliza from school and head to the post office to send off the agreement as well as a bunch of Etsy orders from my adoption fundraiser shops. I have two custom necklaces and five bibs going out today. Yay!
In case y’all haven’t seen them, please check out my two Etsy shops:
Next To My Heart (http://NextToMyHeart.etsy.com) :: Custom hand-stamped sterling silver necklaces and earrings
Pint Size Rock Stars (http://PSRockStars.etsy.com) :: Fun goods for the little ones in your life (and a few things for you!)
The PSRS shop is pretty bare right now because I have a craft show at church this weekend. Next week, though, I should have a bunch of new bibs in beautiful new fabrics, a few dolls, t-shirts, baby blankets and hopefully a few skirts!
Upcoming puzzle fundraiser
Posted by: | CommentsAs one of our (many) fundraising activities, we’re going to be doing a really fun one….a puzzle fundraiser! Here’s how it works:
We’ve bought a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle (that just HAPPENS to coordinate with how I intend to decorate N.B.’s room!) and we’ll be asking pretty much everyone we know to sponsor puzzle pieces for a small donation (suggested $5-10 per piece, but we’re not picky). When a piece is sponsored, we’ll write the sponsor’s name on the back and will add it to the completed puzzle. So if we have 50 sponsored pieces, we’ll put together 50 pieces of the puzzle. The puzzle can’t be completed until every piece is sponsored!
Once the puzzle is completed (yay!), we’ll preserve it using puzzle glue and will hang it in N.B.’s room. That way it serves as a constant reminder of everyone who helped us bring N.B. home! As he gets older, we can go over it with him and look at all of the names of people who loved him before he was even here.
I’m so excited about this fundraiser as it’s something that I think will last as a lifetime reminder of how amazing the people in our little pieces of the world are.
So the puzzle is ordered and should be here any day! Steve has worked up the wording for a little piece of paper we can give friends to introduce them to the fundraiser, so if we know you "in real life", you’ll probably be getting one soon. =)
In other news, we received Holt’s legalese adoption agreement and will be taking it to the bank to sign and have it notarized tomorrow (grrrr for bank holidays today!), so that (and the $300 application fee) will be in the mail and on its way to Oregon tomorrow! Yay!
Also, yesterday I found the fabric and some artwork that I want to use for N.B.’s bedding and general decorating:
http://www.quiltingtreasures.com/content2226.html
It’s an older collection (Fall 2007) and some prints are REALLY hard to find, so I’ve ordered a bit of one print already (25605, the block print), but am waiting to buy the rest until we’re closer to our next big fundraising goal ($14,500). The artist, Julia Cairns, also has a few prints commercially available, so I think we’ll be picking up one or two of those to hang. The puzzle we’re using for the fundraiser is of one of her pieces, so everything should coordinate really nicely. I’m so excited about it as I think it’s perfect for N.B.’s room. Love the bright colors and lovelovelove Cairn’s artwork. It’s boyish (whatever that means), but isn’t boring, and hopefully provides a bit of connection to his heritage. Plus it’s not too babyish, which is important since N.B. isn’t a baby! Hopefully it will last at least a few years. I’m planning to make a real quilt for his bed, so hopefully he should be able to have that for his entire lifetime, even if his decorating tastes change. =)
Home study orientation – check!
Posted by: | CommentsWe just got home from our home study orientation, which was good! We’re using United Methodist Family Services and we both had really good feelings about our social worker. Now we have a stack of things to do and paperwork to fill out in order to complete our home study application. Everything’s such a process! I’m glad it is, though. Definitely want to be sure that kids are going to good homes, not just A home.
Judging from the paperwork and the process our social worker laid out for us, it seems like if we really booked it, we could probably have this done in two months. I don’t think we’ll be on the fast track, though, as there’s just so much and such a limited amount of time on which to work on it all. I’ve definitely been burning the candle at both ends with working my business during the day and all sorts of adoption fundraising at night (sewing, making jewelry, graphic design for Etsy shops, coming up with new product ideas, etc). Not to mention trying to spend a little time with Stephen after he gets home at 11pm or later. I wouldn’t say I’m burning out or anything, but I’m definitely tired most of the time!
Speaking of fundraising, I’m creating a new Etsy shop to stock with my new hand stamped jewelry. I was up until 3am last night working on the graphics for it, but think I have something I’m really happy with. I’ll post when I’ve got that up and running with the necklaces, etc.
What a day!
Posted by: | CommentsSeriously?? I just lost my entire post. Got really excited to see there was an auto-draft, but it was only of the damn blog title. Tighten up, auto-draft! Okay, here we go again, in shorter format.
Today’s been one of THOSE days. Feel like i haven’t stopped moving. Still, some juicy tidbits to report!
Steve went to our intake appointment with the international adoption clinic pediatrician. All good things! He said that we had more info on N.B. than almost any child he’s ever worked with. Says he’s a bit surprised at his height and weight (he’s taller and heavier than what we would have thought for his age), but that he’s totally proportional and that his development seems right on target for a 2.5yo. We had thought he might be a fair amount older (3.5-4, maybe), and while that’s still a distinct possibility, it’s kind of exciting to think that he may actually be 2.5. =)
We’re still waiting to schedule our phone interview, but realized today that we hadn’t sent our family pictures yet, so I don’t know if that has anything to do with it. Luckily, an amazing family friend (yay, Seairth!) was kind enough to take a bit of time after work to take a few really great shots. I can’t wait to play with them tomorrow night in Photoshop! I’ll post my two favorites when I’m done and have sent them over to Holt.
Otherwise, life’s still crazy! We’re going out of town this weekend for a church training, so there’s still a lot to do to get ready for that. Eliza’s staying with my mom (we all live in the same house on different levels), so there’s stuff related to that. Plus getting our meal plan together for next month, redoing our budget to eek out as much as we can for the adoption fund, a church meeting, stuff related to the adoption fundraiser Etsy shop, etc.
Oh! Speaking of adoption fundraising, we received our very first donation today!! I’ve made a few Etsy sales, which have been awesome, but this is an honest donation from one of my mom’s friends! I almost cried when my mom texted me to tell me. =) So yay!! People believe in what we’re doing! That just makes me feel so amazing.
Okay, off to watch Heroes, make a meal plan and grocery list for October, write descriptions for the Etsy shop (and other random shop stuff), etc. So much for "down time". =) Talk soon!
Oh the many fees.
Posted by: | CommentsI’ve been asked when the different parts of the total charge are due. Since I hope this blog will be educational as well as a way to keep up to date with friends and family, I thought I’d break them down the best that I can. I’m inputting very rough estimates as to when I think we’ll have to pay them. Who knows if the estimates will be on point or not!
Application :: $300 :: likely the end of Sept :: Since we’re doing the Waiting Child program, we’re kind of going through the back door, so we’ve only submitted the WC application.
Homestudy (first half) :: $925 :: October 2nd :: The first half is due upon starting.
Homestudy (second half) :: $925 :: Early December :: The second half is due upon completion, which I estimate at 2-3 months.
Document fees :: $1000 :: on-going :: These are the fees we’ll have to pay for getting certified documents, complete with notorizations, etc. I’m hoping it won’t be quite this much.
Dossier :: $3000 :: Due when homestudy is approved by Holt (early January) :: This covers the various services that Holt provides in getting our dossier ready to send to Ethiopia.
Program :: $9690 :: Due when we accept our child referral (pretty much immediately after the home study is approved since we’ll already have been approved to adopt N.B.)
The program fee covers so much that I thought I should list it out separately. I should note that these services are preformed in Ethiopia and I believe this money goes to Ethiopia:
• background investigation and identification of child
• social services
• legal fees
• accepting legal responsibility for the child
• working with government and agency authorities
• translation
• child care, medical expenses (portions not covered by sponsorship)
• passport and U.S. visa fees in the child’s country
• in country travel arrangements and assistance A small portion of the fee will help develop Holt Ethiopian childcare projects.
So there it is! Those are the fees that are currently listed in our little fundraising vine graphic. These don’t include the travel costs ($5000-8000), the post placement social worker visits ($860) or the cost to readopt in the US (I have no idea how much this is). After accepting the referral of N.B., I’m thinking we’ll have a good 3-6+ months to raise that money. The fundraising fun just doesn’t stop around here! =)
The hardest part is done.
Posted by: | CommentsWe finished answering all of the questions, which is definitely the hard part. Though I still have to type it all out and flesh out some of the shorthand that I scribbled down during commercials. Fun! I hope to get that done tomorrow.
Also up for tomorrow is SEWING! I’m going to sew up more bibs. I have a stack of fabric and a stack of organic batting and I think they’re just dying to get sewn together. I’m not really looking forward to putting in the snaps, though. It’s just so loud with the hammering and whatnot. And so tedious. Wish I had access to a snap press. Seems like that would be easier! I AM excited about sewing, though. I sewed up two test bibs the other night to check the pattern. It had been the first time that I’ve sewn in quite a while. I sometimes forget how much I like it. Though I’m sure I’ll be changing my tune after the 200th bib!
That reminds me, I need to get to the fabric store this weekend to buy fabric for Eliza’s Halloween costume. She wants to go as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. Seems easy enough. Jumper dress in blue gingham, right? Not too bad. Also need to pick up some pretty corduroy so I can make my friend Mary’s daughter a few pair of elastic waist pants for school. Might as well whip up a few pair for Eliza while I’m at it.
Today I ordered supplies to make stamped metal jewelry as a fundraiser. I think stamped necklaces would go over well at our church. Since I don’t have to worry about pricing to accommodate selling wholesale, I think I can sell them at a price that’s affordable, but still have enough “profit” to make it a worthwhile fundraising activity.
Speaking of fundraising, if anyone’s interested in doing a Barefoot Books home party, I’m your gal! I can also set up an online event to compliment or replace a home party. Fellow adoptive parents, I do offer fundraisers as well. Both locally and online. Get in touch if you have any questions!
Okay, off to bed. So much to do tomorrow!
