Try, try again!

That will be the theme until we come home with our girl! :)

We just sent OAA updated paperwork that will arrive by Monday. They are going to resubmit our dossier in the next week or two.

We're hoping and praying that it gets accepted this time. We'll let you know as soon as we hear something.

God bless,
Phil & Amy

Not an easy process...

We just heard from OAA yesterday that our dossier was rejected by the Kazakhstan consulate in NY. Not only that, but every single dossier OAA sent to the consulate in May was rejected. Apparently, they are significantly reducing their flexibility on inconsistencies to minimize the number of newly accepted dossiers.

Not happy news, but we're patient and we know this will happen. What's really tough is that we have a ton of paperwork to redo now...gotta love that :)

Thanks for continuing to read our blog and God bless!

Phil & Amy

Another chance to talk about adoption...

I mentioned in the last story that CNN interviewed me to talk about my commute and how one of the deciding factors to switch from driving to mass transit was the cost savings, which would directly go toward our baby. Well, here it is! It aired this AM on CNN.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2008/05/30/holmes.alternative.commuting.cnn

Phil

One step (and 2 TV appearances) closer to bringing home our baby!

Hello!

Quite a bit has happened over the past few weeks. First off, we went eBay-crazy to sell items that had been previously donated or failed to sell in the garage sale (see last post about that). Well, we raised about $200 from the garage sale and we've already raised $350 online since then! Plus, we have about 5 more things posted now (including a boat) and they're at about $400. We might raise about $1000 total this month. Praise God for that one :)

For anyone else raising money for their adoption (or any reason, really) - as long as you have some time pack and ship out items, you should definitely look into the eBay sales (or half.com if you primarily have books, CDs, and/or movies). You would be absolutely amazed at how many things you have sitting around that you can let go of that have serious value to others. Here's an example...someone donated a LeapFrog Leapster to us and included the case. When I posted the Leapster system, I forgot about the case and just mentioned the system. Turns out, people want this case! The thing is light as can be, but it's probably going to sell for $10-15. That's what I mean...you just never know.

So, the other updates... :) We had some changes happen at OAA (our adoption agency) and we now have a new contact. She has been great. Right after she started working for us, I set up a call with her and went through a few things that are on our minds. Specifically, we had been in translation for 8 weeks (!) and hadn't received one actual update on progress yet, other than the fact that new forms were needed. Well, she jumped on it and got an update from our translation contact. TRANSLATION IS DONE!!! Yes, that's right! Well, we did need to update 4 more forms, but, thank God, it only took us one day to get all the forms notarized, apostilled, and mailed out. We are so happy to hear progress...it's been a while.

We finally have some idea of a timeline. BUT...we have been informed that Kazakhstan views adoption as a very private matter. As a result, we can't post dates while this is still a public blog.

However, we will soon make this a private blog. That's really for your benefit as well as ours, so we can post all possible information without having to worry about posting too much. PLEASE EMAIL US (philweinmeister@yahoo.com) IF YOU WOULD LIKE ACCESS TO THIS BLOG ONCE IT'S PRIVATE. If you forget, no big deal, you can request it after the changeover. However, we'd like to be able to give you access without you ever having to ask for it :)

By now, you're probably wondering what I was referring to in the title of this blog. Well, take a look for yourself!

http://www.cbs46.com/video/16077222/?taf=lnta

Here's what happened...

First, I prayed many times that God would give a voice to share the wonderful story of adoption with others. Then, a few months ago, I saw a link on www.14thstreetbridge.com that suggested sending in a few words about how my commute has changed. I decided to send them a few sentences on how I decided to start taking the bus after we realized how much we'd be able to save for the adoption as a result. I got an email a few weeks later asking if I minded my story being passed to the organization's public relations team, as they really enjoyed the story. Of course, I didn't mind. Soon after, I got a call from the PR team letting me know that CBS46 wanted to interview my wife and me! Within about 5 hours, we had done the interview and it aired. That's what you see above. Pretty cool! :)

That's it. That is, until I got a call from the PR team letting me know that CNN wanted to cover the story as well! Craziness!! Just a couple days later, CNN came to my workplace (EarthLink) and spent the afternoon filming and interviewing me. This is definitely a clear answer to prayer. It's just not a cute saying that prayer and a bit of faith can make miracles happen. And I do see this as a miracle...having a voice to others to show our joy in changing our lives to be able to bring home a little girl without a family to comfort and love her...

I'm not sure when the CNN video/article will appear, but I'll post it immediately!

Thanks to all for your prayers and your interest in our adoption journey. I'm constantly overwhelmed by strangers' interest in this little girl. I met a bunch of people at my work through the interview and they sincerely wanted to know about this...What will her name be? How old is she? Do we have a photo?

I think our baby has been adopted by my work family as well!

God bless,
Phil and Amy

Yard Sale - Again!

Hi everyone,

Most of you probably know that we had another fundraiser yard sale last week. Well - it was a complete blessing in an unexpected way.

First off - our friends were amazing. It's really touching when people give up something for friends. People gave up things for us to sell and people gave up their time. Our friends Doak and Vanessa gave up Friday night and all of Saturday for us.

Things started off slow, but picked up around 9am. We were getting a steady stream of people until 11 or 12...then the rain came. That pretty much ran off anyone else that had planned on stopping by. We found out later that 3 or 4 other (bigger) neighborhoods were having yard sales the same day. Altogether, we raised a few hundred dollars.

However - that's not it. At the end of the day, a truck came by to pick up anything not sold that we wanted to donate. We were so happy to find out that the remaining things went to a Christian ministry set up to help men recovering from substance abuse. They told us that everything we had for them was extremely needed, even down to an old, stained couch. They said the couch would be gone right when it hit the floor. They have a thrift store and all proceeds go to help the recovering men I mentioned. We were fortunate that day to clearly see His plan unfold in front of us.

Plus...there were a bunch of things that we kept from the sale that we'll be able to sell online. So...a few hundred dollars might turn into a few hundred more!

We want to thank everyone who was connected (in any way) to the yard sale...Thanks!! We really appreciate it.

Quick adoption update - There is no update :( We are still in translation and still patient. We'll let you know when we hear something!!

Love,
Phil & Amy

GREAT NEWS!!!

Hey everyone,

I don't have much time, so this post will be short. This past week has truly been a roller coaster of adoption news. Emotionally, it hasn't been as tough as it could have been and all that credit goes upward :)

We found about a week ago that the Kazakhstan consulates have stopped accepting new dossiers due to an internal review. That's about the last thing you want to hear during this process - that some step along the way is completely blocked. We prayed about it and had a calmness, knowing that God is completely aware of the situation and completely aware of who He wants to bring to our family.

Exactly one week later...we find out that the consulates have reopened or will be reopening soon. That is awesome!!

Oh yeah - if I hadn't mentioned it already - we got confirmation that our dossier is currently being translated.

This is really happening! :)

Love,
Phil & Amy

Delayed (again)...but not discouraged!

Hello!

Believe it or not, we ran into another paperwork delay. Three weeks after submitting our "final" paperwork, our OAA informed us that the translator and/or the consulate want five additional documents updated to ensure they won't expire. It's definitely frustrating, since it seems like we just completed them (and we did - it's only been about 4 months). We could let it get us down, but we're not. Amy's a bit bummed, since she is just so ready to be a mother today. I love that she is overflowing with that love and I have tried hard to be a point of stability and comfort for her throughout these delays.

We have been praying for God's will and we both know that he is ultimately in control of things. Put those together and it means that we have no reason to be upset or stressed out right now. I'll admit - we both want to bring home our baby more than anything - but there's no possible way that our idea of the perfect path matches God's. :)

We continue to be blessed with documents coming and going much faster than expected. For example - we needed to get a new marriage license (which stinks, since it costs $65 for just the document....then add to/from shipping plus $10 for the apostille!) and we were told that it would take 5-10 business days. I ordered it on a Tuesday afternoon. It arrived on Thursday morning!!! I have no idea how that's even possible, but it's awesome.

Our friends have been so supportive recently and that has been awesome, too. We have had a few fundraisers recently (which I'll probably get into more in another post) and people have been so giving and selfless!

Thank you for continuing to read this blog and share a part in our lives. Please know that even though we may not talk to you often (or ever, if you happen to be reading this and you've never met us), we appreciate your interest in this child's life so much.

God bless you,
Phil