Received PA Today!

We received our PA (pre-approval) to adopt Bao Xin Mei today and, like a friend in Maine, we didn't know we were waiting for it!! Here's a copy of the email:
The CCAA has processed the Pre-Approval (PA) for your family’s request to adopt Bao Xin Mei! The PA is issued once the information from the electronic acceptance has been reviewed and approved. Once the CCAA has fully reviewed your Dossier and application to adopt a specific child, they will issue the Referral Acceptance (RA). As a reminder, this step is currently taking anywhere from 2-5 months from the date of your electronic acceptance. There is no guaranteed timeframe from the CCAA on when your RA will arrive.

Now on to the RA review room so hopefully, God willing, that RA will come quickly! One step closer Kennedi!!

Donations

Want to say thank you to those who have donated to bringing Kennedi home! It's humbling to know that you all care so much for our family. We appreciate each and every one of you so very much! Cannot wait to be on that plane to bring our daughter home safe and sound!

Trip To The Pumpkin Patch

We Have An Actor On Our Hands!

Hello all! Last night Bradley decided he wanted to audition for the Christmas Play at church (each year they put on a big production with a play and singing). This year's play only calls for 1 child, a 8-10 year old boy named Micky who wants to be a hero. Bradley is only 7 and they said to have him audition anyway but I wasn't expecting him to get the part. Well, HE DID! They called today to let us know they chose him for the part! He is so excited, the little actor he is!!!! We are excited but this now means 4 nights a week of practice, 3 hours each night and 4 days of performances right before Christmas!!!! I guess that's what happens when you are an actor-LOTS OF PRACTICE! Our wait for China will definately go by quickly now because we'll be so busy to notice time going by!! :)

Pictures are of Katelyn at 6th Grade Camp, Tina and Katelyn getting baptized, Bradley playing soccer, and Katelyn's Birthday!

Donations Coming In!

Thank you so much for the two donations we recently received from the McLain Family and the Davis Family. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts and appreciate it SO much. The Davis Family, for those who don't know, were the first adopting family from our agency that I emailed way back when we started this process. Now we have become great friends even though we live across the country from each other (they are in Maine)! They received a referral the same time we did and we may get to actually meet and travel together! God is SO GOOD!!! :)

God Answers Prayers!

You'll never guess what just happened! As you know, we have been praying and thinking about fundraising because we still need $5000 for the adoption and now the holidays are upon us. The girls at work have been working hard to come up with a way for us to make some money and we are planning a yard sale/bake sale/candle sale in mid-November which will help tremendously-thanks girls! Well, tonight we just won a 2008 truck that they raffled off at the High School football game!!!! My parents bought us a ticket (didn't even know it) and we won! Now we can sell our car and make some money for the adoption!! Crazy the way prayers are answered! God told us we were meant to adopt a child, this child, and now he is providing the way to do so! How awesome is HE! :)
Update to this post..... my mom called and actually they won the truck. You see, Charlie (my step-dad) bought the ticket from Rotary Club which he is a member of. Because it looks bad that a member of the club giving away the truck wins the prize, he put the ticket in my kids' names thinking they'd never win. Well, they did! So.... my mom and Charlie want to sell the truck, take the money, and take an all-expenses paid family trip to Walt Disney World next year after Kennedi is home. That all sounds good but Mark is crushed. He thought he had a new truck (that he has been wanting since we've been married). Oh well, we are hoping they give us at least some of the money for China. We'll see....

Help Bring Kennedi Home

After talking to a couple of people about our need for $5000 more to bring Kennedi home, they both suggested we ask friends and family if anyone wants to help out. We have already spent about $22,000 on the adoption and are still short. After much hesitation, we decided to use "chip-in" to collect some needed donations. This was a hard decision because I don't want people to feel like we are expecting them to help or that some might feel that "this adoption was our decision" so we should just deal with it. But if you want to help out, here's a way. Click on the "chip-in" button above and it will direct you to another page to donate. Thank you so much for your continued prayers and understanding.

LOI

Received an email from AWAA this morning that our LOI (Letter Of Intent) was submitted electronically to the CCAA today! Let the offical countdown BEGIN! Average wait from today until Referral Approval (RA-our next step) is about 90 days.

Happy 11th Birthday Katelyn!

Yesterday we had Katelyn's 11th Birthday with all her friends from school and some friends from church. We went to Gymnastics Beat where Katelyn takes gymnastics every week and they were able to run around and have fun. The video is of Bradley cautiously trying to climb the cargo rope. This is all the video I took (I took many pictures though) basically so I could try to upload it here and make sure this works before we go to China! Anyway, the kids had a lot of fun!