Thirty-One.

Thirty-One.

That's the magic number right now.  31. 

For those who haven't heard, we received our i-600a approval from immigration on November 8th, 

which means on November 9th we were placed on the waiting list for our adoption!  And we're #31.

Then today we received our third set of fingerprints, needed for our dossier.  That's a big sigh of relief as it's the last bit of paperwork we needed to have processed.  

So that's our current update!

We have a date!

If you check out our timeline page, you'll notice I finally updated it.  You'll also notice I updated it into the future.  That's right friends - we have our biometrics appointment set!  I'm not sure what is normal as far as timelines go, but we were told this whole process is backlogged and could take several months.  So far, it seems as though we're moving along just fine...  =)

Stage #3!

Stage #1 is the picking the agency and applying.  Check.
Stage #2 is the home study....paper chasing, home visits, interviews, etc.  Check.

We received our finalized home study in the mail last week and officially moved onto...

Stage #3 yesterday: send in application to USCIS!  Moving onto this step alone drained our adoption account by thousands of dollars.  I cannot tell you HOW THANKFUL we are for all the donations of prayer, money, yard sale items, etc from our friends and family that enabled us to pull this off.

We'll be waiting 2-3 months for approval from USCIS and then we will be officially approved to be matched with a child.

BRACELETS!
In the meantime, we're still selling our "Pearl of Africa" bracelets!  So far we've sold over 50 bracelets so a HUGE THANK YOU to those of you sporting these beauties for our cause.  We now have new colors available...TEAL and AUTUMN RED (pictures coming soon!).  Feel free to visit my etsy store to purchase, or arrange with me via email or facebook.

MONSTER BAGS!
I'm also selling these cuties!  Hand-made by me (please don't analyze the stitching), these little guys come with 5 twistable crayons and will perfectly fit coloring books or construction paper (not included).  My kids are currently using them for their art supplies.  =)  Below are the monsters I have one hand, but I can make a limited number more, with your choice of bag color and monster color.

Pink Monster...$10  -  Qt. 1

Freckled Monster...$10 - Qt. 1

Blue Monster...$10  -  Qt. 1

Leave a comment or email me at beecurrency@gmail.com to let me know if you're interested in a bag!  Thanks!

Yard Sale #4

With the combination of cash donations and yard sale earnings, we made $352!  We also sold another 5 bracelets last week, for a total deposit of $402.  Yay!!

When it rains, it pours....

....in a most wonderful way.  =)

Since my last post, we've sold another 8 bracelets and received two checks in the mail, one from wonderful friends who continue to encourage us, and another from a complete stranger.

Thank you, thank you!!

BAM.

If you've been watching our little (actually, it's rather big) thermometer to the right of our page, you may have noticed it jump up over $1000.  =)

I deposited all the bracelet money plus a very generous donation from my younger sis plus money we personally had set aside and BAM....it totaled $1031!!  We've almost reached our half-way mark!!

Drum roll please...

As of today we have sold THIRTY-TWO bracelets!!  And many have been sold to people we've never even met.  Speaking of, if your bracelet led you to this site,welcome!  I just want to thank everyone who has already purchased a bracelet (or two...or five...or eight..).  It truly means a ton.

Oh, and again, a big huge thank you to my friend, Michelle, who spear-headed this fundraiser and took on all the costs of the materials so that 100% of the proceeds would benefit our adoption.