It’s been a crazy last couple of months, which I’ll use for an excuse for not updating this blog for awhile. We definitely had some highs and lows during the last portion of our paperwork, but things did work out. Originally, we had to get all of our paperwork complete and to our agency at CWA on July 16th, however a week or so before that date we scanned and sent in a pdf of all of our documents for review, only to find out that nearly every document had to be redone! It was devastating. It turned out that we didn’t sign our full  middle names in all of our documents. As a heads up for anyone working on their dossier – make sure that your name matches your passport exactly. If the printed name on your passport shows your middle name, make sure you always have that in your documents whether or not you are referring to yourself, or if someone is referring to you in a document. For example, Lindsey and I had to get our employment letters redone because our companies did not refer to us with our middle names. Luckily for us though, just about this time, CWA shorted the amount of time they needed to translate the papers, giving us until August 16th, instead of July 16th, to turn everything in. On August 2nd after running around downtown all morning and getting everything authenticated and apostilled, we emailed our documents a second time. We were good!

The next day I FedEx’ed everything to CWA to get our documents translated and soon after as I said above, we found out our documents were on the way to Ukraine! We are now patiently waiting for our registration date of September 16th to pass. After that date we should learn our travel date which should be about four to six weeks out. We’re anxious to get this show on the road and pray that we get a travel date in October. We’ve been catching up on blogs and it seems like a lot of people are getting their travel dates about a month after their registration date. We did pre-register for Ukraine, which CWA is no longer offering, so hopefully that will speed this process up a bit.

We are in this weird spot where there’s not much more we can do, but enjoy our last couple of months of being without a child and get ready for our travel. God has been very good to us, and has provided all of the finances to pay our last agency fee! We’re not sure how we’ve managed to save so much money. It truly is a blessing.

This has been such a long journey, but we’re getting closer. Thank you everyone for all of the prayers and support!

THANK YOU to each and every person who made our “Running With a Purpose” fundraiser possible!  Your love and support helped me complete the race step by step.  There were lots of special memories that I want to share with you and to record to share with our little one when we bring him/her home. 

Scott and I traveled to Indianapolis on Thursday evening and hung out with our niece Reagan on Friday when my sister Janel and brother-in-law Travis were at work.  When they got home, we met my Dad, Mom, and Uncle Steve downtown to pick up our race packets and to carb load during dinner.  We spent the night in a hotel suite that we shared with Dad and Uncle Steve.  There were three beds and a fireplace!  We live the high life, haha- just kidding!  

We woke up early Saturday morning and got ready for the race.  The hotel was close to the start line, so we waited until about 15 minutes before the race started to go join the crowds.  If you have never experienced the Indianapolis Mini Marathon, it is an exciting event!  There are about 35,000 participants.  The excitement really builds when all 35,000 of us are squeezed in 10 city blocks and there are beach balls being thrown around the crowd!

So, the most special memories came during the race.  I made a sign and pinned it to my back to acknowledge my motive for doing the race.  It said “Racing to bring home our Ukrainian orphan”.  There were about 15 people who patted me on the back- as they passed me, haha- and wished me luck.  Also, on the fourth mile Scott texted me and told me that we had just gotten all the miles for the race sponsored.  This brought tears to my eyes!  There were three people who even came alongside of me during the race and talked about the adoption process for a couple of minutes.  It was awesome to use this opportunity to spread the message about adoption.

As I was running and panting, and looking forward to sitting down and resting, I came upon Victory Mile- the last mile.  The streets are filled with people cheering you on.  As I was looking at all the racers around me and who did I see, no one else but my Dad!  He had started before me and I had caught up to him on the last mile.  We were able to cross the finish line together, step by step, creating another special memory.

Here’s some pictures from the race.  Enjoy!

I’m not sure what it is, and I struggle with it every day. He has pulled me through every struggle I have ever been through. He has a perfect track record of always being there for me. Yet, every day I sit here and worry about things. I question why He puts me in situations and I question His reasoning. I question Him, as if if I know better. I love Jesus so much, but it scares me that I doubt the Creator.

Lord, pray that I can stop worrying and that you can give me a peace that only you can give. Help me wake up each morning and give glory to you and no one else.

Help me not fear men, but fear you. Amen.

We are chugging along with our adoption.  This whole journey has definitely been a test of our faith.  If we could do things OUR way, the process would move quicker and would be a lot more smooth.  But, then, where would there be room for God to work?  If we do something that we are capable to do with our own hands, then we would be more likely to give ourselves the glory, rather than God.  Therefore, we are trying to trust Him with each step of the process and let Him work through it, including the fundraising.

Our flower bulb fundraiser ended successfully!  A big THANK YOU to everyone who looked at the brochure and made an order.  If you missed out on that fundraiser, or are looking for a way to get involved, we still have the “Running With a Purpose” fundraiser going on.  We have $770 $260 of sponsorship for the half marathon that we are looking for.  Would YOU consider being a sponsor? Now is the time for all you blog-lurkers to step out of the shadows and make a difference! We know you are out there   Here’s the details:

On May 8^th, 2010 Lindsey will be running  a half  marathon in Indianapolis, Indiana. We would like to dedicate this race to our soon-to-be adopted child. In order to do this, we are looking for a sponsorship of $100 for every mile of the race. Each mile can be a combination of sponsors of different amounts (we can match up sponsors), or one sponsor in total.

The following miles are still available for sponsorship:

Mile 1 (fulfilled)- Jerry & Carrell Howell (PapPap and Grandma)

Mile 2 (fulfilled)- The Hampton Family

Mile 3 (fulfilled)- Michelle Rebman, The Hesterman Family, Stacey Jones

Mile 4 (fulfilled)- The AbuShahin Family

Mile 5 (fulfilled)- The Fisher Familey

Mile 6 ($50 available)- The Richard Howell Family

Mile 7 (fulfilled)- anonymous

Mile 8 (fulfilled)- The Gudeman Family

Mile 9 ($60 available)- The Burton Family

Mile 10-

Mile 11- (fulfilled) – Malissa Frost, The Menke Family, The Kauffman Family

Mile 12- (fulfilled) – Nelson/Moore family “Feel the burn!”

Mile 13- ($50 available) – The Woody Bunch

Thank you for your consideration of being a part of our adoption journey!

Donations can be given to us or tax deductible donations can be made visiting this website:

https://www.cwa.org/DonationForm.aspx

Under Specify Donation, select General Fund: Adoption as the project type. Under Choose Person, select CWA Family and enter the following:

Scott and Lindsey Howell
2130 Water Crest Lane
Columbus, OH 43209

***Please contact Scott or Lindsey to identify which mile you would like to sponsor at scott@scotthowell.ws or linbin28@yahoo.com  or by phone at 614-302-3679.

One of the biggest challenges of our adoption, and one of the reasons most people don’t adopt, is finances.  Most international adoptions can cost over $30,000.  This is where YOU can make a difference!  We have two special fundraisers going on right now and we’d like to ask you to join us in our adoption journey by participating in one or both of them.

Flower Bulb Sales

Are you in th e process of planning your garden or landscape?  Or have you been jealously watching your neighbor’s daffodils and tulips spring up and start blooming?  We have a brochure full of colorful bulbs that will bloom into beautiful flowers.  The brochure also includes a hanging strawberry plant and a hanging cherry tomato plant.  You can view the brochure here:

http://www.easy-fundraising-ideas.com/downloads/fundraising-flower-bulbs.pdf

Orders should be placed by April 16th and you can email them to scott@scotthowell.ws or linbin28@yahoo.com or by phone at 614-302-3679.  The bulbs will be delivered in the beginning of May and we will hand deliver any orders from the Central Ohio area and any orders from the Indianapolis/Rensselaer area.  If you live outside of these areas, we just ask that you add a $5 shipping fee to your order.  There is no sales tax.

Running with a Purpose

Flowers not your thing?  Check this opportunity out!

On May 8^th, 2010 Lindsey will be running  a half  marathon in Indianapolis, Indiana. We would like to dedicate this race to our soon-to-be adopted child. In order to do this, we are looking for a sponsorship of $100 for every mile of the race. Each mile can be a combination of sponsors of different amounts (we can match up sponsors), or one sponsor in total.

The following miles are still available for sponsorship:

Mile 1- Jerry & Carrell Howell (PapPap and Grandma) Mile Fulfilled!

Mile 2-

Mile 3-

Mile 4-

Mile 5-

Mile 6-

Mile 7-

Mile 8-

Mile 9-

Mile 10-

Mile 11-

Mile 12-

Mile 13-

Thank you for your consideration of being a part of our adoption journey!

Donations can be given to us or tax deductible donations can be made visiting this website:

https://www.cwa.org/DonationForm.aspx

Under Specify Donation, select General Fund: Adoption as the project type. Under Choose Person, select CWA Family and enter the following:

Scott and Lindsey Howell
2130 Water Crest Lane
Columbus, OH 43209

***Please contact Scott or Lindsey to identify which mile you would like to sponsor at scott@scotthowell.ws or linbin28@yahoo.com  or by phone at 614-302-3679.

This is very exciting for two reasons. First, we finally have a definite date from Ukraine of when all of the paperwork is due; there is no more guessing. We will travel to Ukraine shortly after that. Second, it’s very likely we will be in Ukraine during our two year wedding anniversary! (October 18th) What a wonderful way to spend such an occasion! Looking back on this entire experience we really were hoping that we would travel in the summer, but we will just have to be a bit more patient. Given that we officially started this process last August, we’re a bit over the year timeline, but God has a child picked out for us this Fall and the countdown can begin!

Even though our date falls in September, our dossier is actually due at our agency two months prior on July 16th, 2010 – My 27th birthday! This gives CWA 60 days to translate and prep all of our documents before sending them over to the Ukraine.

On a side note, a week or so ago I added to the side panel of this site, a link and instructions on how you can help us financially during this time. The good news is, we have a little more time to save than we anticipated, but we still have a long way to go. Our agency fees are paid, however we still have the large international fee to Ukraine which is approximately $14,000, a “relief donation” to Ukraine of $1,000, suggested $9,000 cash to have on hand for living expenses in Ukraine, and approximately $3,500 for travel expenses for our international flights. This is a lot of money, but we have full faith God will help us save every penny. To all of those who have already donated to this cause, we thank you!

If you feel led to be a part of our adoption financially, please click here.

Under Specify Donation, select General Fund: Adoption as the project type. Under Choose Person, select CWA Family and enter the following:

Scott and Lindsey Howell
2130 Water Crest Lane
Columbus, OH 43209

Your gift to us would be greatly appreciated! (and also tax-deductible through the link above). As a heads up, we are also planning on having a few fundraising events over the coarse of the spring and summer. Details on how you can help sponsor Lindsey during an upcoming half-marathon will be announced shortly.

If you can’t offer to help financially, please know there is also other ways you can be a part of this adoption! We consider this adoption a ministry, and we are always in desperate need of continued prayers that this journey continues as smoothly as it has.

First the good news – we have completed all of the Pre-Registration documents for the Ukraine’s State Department for Adoption and Protection of the Rights of Children (SDAPRC). This includes our home study report. Since my last update the report itself has been drafted, reviewed, revised and finalized by Adoption Circle. With much enthusiasm we are happy to announce we are officially done with that portion of the adoption. This document is what has been required along with several power of attorney forms, in order for us to successfully pre-register for the SDAPRC in Ukraine.

In order to finalize all of this however we had to get all of our documents notarized. Then, after they were all notarized, we had to get all of the notaries authenticated at the Franklin County courthouse. And once everything had been notarized and authenticated, we had to get each portion apostilled at the Secretary of State. An apostille is an international notary that has to be stapled to each document that will end up in the Ukraine making each paper official. I will say this – kudos to Lindsey for getting all of this done on her lunch breaks. We are very fortunate to live in Columbus. With her working downtown it is very convenient to get these kinds of details completed. From what I believe you can only get paperwork apostilled in the capital. I can’t imagine what we would have done if we lived hours away.

With all of the above complete, there’s still a few steps. First, all of this has to be translated into Ukrainian (or whatever language it is they speak over there). To do this, we actually sent all of the documents over to our agency at CWA. Thanks to the second half of fees that are due to our agency at this time, they will translate all of our documents into the correct language and send it to the SDAPRC themselves. Here’s all the paperwork we sent over:

View Full Album

So where does this leave us? Our documents are on their way to CWA at this moment and should arrive Tuesday. Though we are not sure how long it will take to translate the documents, we’re hoping it will be soon. Once that is done and it is sent to the Ukraine we will wait patiently for the SDAPRC to assign us a specific date at which our full dossier Ukraine paperwork is due in country. We have noticed on adoption blogs that it seems that once Ukraine has our paperwork and we are “officially” pre-registered, that our registration date could be at most six months out.  But the date could be sooner, who knows. We’re not entirely sure at this point. Let’s say just for conversation’s sake, our registration date is six months out. If that’s the case, our registration date should fall around August. If say our date given was August 1st, this would mean our travel date would be 10 days to 2 months after that date. From most blogs we have read, it really has been a just a couple weeks or so after the registration date that families were informed of their court date to travel to country.

If all of the above scenarios are correct, our worst case scenario would be that we would travel to Ukraine in October. Again, that’s worst case, meaning if our registration date is six months from now, and our travel date is two months after that. There’s still definitely a possibility we will get our registration date sooner and our travel date will be within approximately 10 days instead of a couple of months, which seems to be the case for most families. October isn’t so bad.. that would be around our two year wedding anniversary. But we will be keeping our fingers crossed that things move a little quicker. On a side note, we will be sending out another copy of our home study this week to the USCIS to await final approval from the United States government. Once they receive our home study, it takes about three months to get U.S. approval. Because of how pre-registration works in the UA, this shouldn’t change our timeline.

If you would like, I ask that you pray that CWA translates our home study as fast as possible and sends them to Ukraine. If they take a month or two to translate, that’s additional months added to our worst-case scenario of traveling in October. We don’t want to push this into the end of the year!

With God’s grace, I’m hoping we can hit a home run by fall.

With all of that done we were finally able to schedule our Home Study with Adoption Circle. This is the last step needed to complete our I-600A that we submitted to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services back in October. The Home Study is really in three parts. First being all of the paperwork and background checks we completed. Second being, today, when we visited this morning the offices of Adoption Circle for an interview with our social worker. During this time she got caught up on where we were in the process, and where we answered several misc. questions regarding why we were adopting, etc. It wasn’t a bad visit at all, and fairly laid back. For some reason I think we felt like we would be entering into some sort of interrogation, but it couldn’t have been further from it. If anyone reading is about to start a home study, whether for domestic or international adoption, take a breath. As long as you have all of your ducks in a row you’ll be fine.

Part three of the home study actually continues tomorrow. Our social worker will be making the trip out to our apartment for further individual interviews, as well as a safety audit. We’re a little nervous about this, but for the most part our house is still in pretty good order since our fire inspection. Really, I think the purpose of this visit if anything is to make sure we don’t live in a dysfunctional home with 100 cats or something. I’m sure we’ll be fine.

From these two visits today and tomorrow, the home study report will be written, checked over, sent over to our case worker at CWA, checked again, finalized, notarized, and apostilled. We weren’t sure how long it would take them to actually write the home study, but we were told today that it would take about two weeks. Honestly, it’s almost a surprise to us. If we have our home study copies ready by the end of this month we’ll be ready to finalize our U.S. paperwork and wait for approval from the USCIS. It could take up to three months from the time we send in our paperwork to get final approval from our government, but from the sound of it, we’re told we shouldn’t have to wait that long. (Knock on wood… we’re ready for delays if they come up).

Here’s another exciting bit we’ve learned. Obviously once we get U.S. approval we start working on our dossier paperwork for the Ukraine government. In the past we had learned that once we complete all of the dossier the next step would be to send it over to the Ukraine and wait about 2 to 3 months for Ukraine to approve us and send us a travel date. Well, now we have learned that Ukraine has just started a pre-registration process where first all we need to do is send a copy of our home study report and a Power of Attorney. After that is sent in, there has been reported cases that after just 10 days or so (not 2 to 3 months), Ukraine will give you a travel date with a month notice. With the pre-registration process in place they let you bring the remaining paperwork with you on your trip. This quite frankly is amazing. Now, I know God might put delays in our path regardless, but with this latest development of how fast things are moving we could be seeing this adoption being finalized a lot sooner than we had expected. For the longest time we had things planned out for June or July, but June might now be the very latest with April/May looking more like a reality.

We’re trying to not get too excited, because we know delays are inevitable in international adoption, but it’s exciting to hear how things are speeding up. It’s a little scary too though, as we have a lot we need to complete to get prepared to bring a child into this home, and we still have a lot of money we need to save. But whatever happens, I’m sure God will get us through it, even if we still end up making our trip in the middle of summer.

So things are shaping up well. It’s also exciting to hear on the news tonight how several orphans from Haiti were able to get their adoption expedited and are now with loving American families. I really am happy to see how international adoption is becoming a national subject.

To wrap up, please continue to keep us in your prayers as we still have several decisions to make while we get ready for this change in our lives. As well, for those who know them, keep the Yoder’s and the Goodman’s in your prayers as they get closer and closer to their respective adoptions.

Now, I better start helping the wife clean this place for tomorrow.

It could be interesting. Already I am feeling the need to make some very drastic changes in the coming year. I’m at peace that I will make the right decisions and that when I look back on 2010 a year from today, hopefully I’ve done what I’m supposed to do and I have met any goals I set out.

And really that’s about it. I’m getting hungry so I’m going to wrap this one up. Adoption process is going well. Awaiting one more piece of paperwork to come back so that we can start our home study interview. We recently completed our CPR classes and fire inspection.

So anyway, I hope everyone has been having a great holiday season. So long, 2009. Here’s to 2010. Happy New Year!

On November 22nd, NewLife Community Church held a Concert for Adoption.  Scott and I would like to personally thank every person who attended the concert.  I know that it takes a lot of effort to get yourself and other family members out of the house for extra church events like this.  Scott and I were very excited to share our story with you and to have you become a part of our journey.  There were so many hands behind the scenes that made the night possible.  Thank you, thank you, thank you to all the people who brought desserts, served, cleaned up the church afterwards, those who gave sacrificially, those who shared their talents with us, those who told their own adoption stories, and to those who shared the evening with us.  We feel that adoption is truly at the heart of God and we enjoy sharing that excitement with other people!

The second thing that Scott and I are truly thankful for is the staff and leaders at NewLife.  This church has brought us so much closer to God and aided us in attaining a more intimate relationship with Jesus.  I truly respect each of the men on our deacon team and trust my spiritual development to them.  I’ve never met another group of men that were so dedicated to the cause of Christ.  It is a true privilege to be a member of a church that has such a strong leadership team.

Thirdly, we are thankful for the role our friends and family play in our life.  We would not be able to do the things that we are doing each and every day if we did not have the support of our friends and family standing behind us and praying for us.  It’s so nice to see our friends each Wednesday night and to share our joys and struggles with them.  Our family members are always just a phone call away and their love for us is so evident.

There’s so much more that Scott and I recognize in our lives that we have to be thankful for.  Even though you have changed your holiday decorations and started wrapping Christmas presents, I would encourage you to think of the things that you are thankful for in your life and then go and find someone to tell those things to and share in the joyful feeling that it brings both of you.

As far as the paper pregnancy is concerned, we are still in the waiting phase.  The Time Warner Cable guy is supposed to come on Wednesday to set up a home phone line and then we’ll child proof the house and be ready for our fire inspection.  Our CPR training is scheduled for Monday, December 21st.  We are still waiting for our Ohio child abuse report to come back.  The only other paperwork that needs to be done is to get an employment letter from our employers, get a signed copy of our tax returns, and prepare a copy of our personal financial statements.  I suppose I’m in charge of the last two things on the list.    Keep praying with us for each step of this process, the child whose life will change next summer when we bring him/her home, the other couples in NewLife whom God is pricking their hearts for orphan ministry, and the orphanages in the Ukraine who are being hit hard by the flu epidemic.

I thank my God every time I remember you!  Thank you for your goodness and love towards Scott and I.