Reece's Rainbow Reunion!

It's been awhile since I've posted, but we just got back from our first vacation since before Asher came home and I wanted to share it with you all!  We were so blessed to join other adoptive families and advocates in Kentucky this year for the Reece's Rainbow reunion at Jellystone campground.  It's been many years since we've gone on an actual vacation.  I don't count our adoption trips because those were long, stressful times in another country, where we were on a schedule and adding another child to our family.  This was our first trip as a family of 7 that was meant for fun and relaxation and it was amazing!

We drove 6 hours to Mammoth Cave, KY and I was SO excited to finally meet all these incredible families in person!

I can't describe the feeling of seeing the beautiful faces of so many children that I've prayed for, cried for, and loved from afar.  I've seen some of these children's photos when they were still a world away, in an orphanage, looking sad and alone.  It was an incredible blessing to see those same faces, laughing and thriving!

It was also so awesome to see one special little boy who we had the pleasure of meeting at Hannah's orphanage when we were there to bring her home.  I remember seeing his sweet face and holding his hand, my heart aching seeing him and all the other children wishing for you to take them home.  The only thing that helped was knowing that his Mama was fighting to get to him and would be bringing him home soon.  Now he is a treasured son and it was so wonderful to see him and Hannah together again, with their families, and so full of joy!

We were so excited to be able to meet Auntie Andrea, THE Reece, and many more friends!!

This trip was so very needed and we were so blessed to be able to go this year.  We are so thankful to be loved and cared for by our family and friends, but when you are surrounded by other adoptive families who are all in the same place you are or who have been there and done that, it's like balm.  It's like a hug.  It's feeling like you belong.

We are SO thankful to Andrea for being the incredible warrior she is for all the precious kids of Reece's Rainbow and for working so hard to give us all a place to gather every year so we can rest and recoup.

Blessed,

Carly

We did it!

It's been an incredibly stressful and emotional couple of days, but with incredible help from family, we have booked our flights and the countdown begins until we travel.  We ended up having to push our trip back a week, so our new dates are: flying out on the 30th, Gotcha Day on the 2nd, CA on the 12th, and flying home the 15th.  There were still a decent amount of seats left on both flights, so we were able to pick where we sit which is a huge blessing.  Now we just need to get a bunch of last minute things done, including a 24hr EEG for Asher :p  We could definitely use your prayers as we get everything done and prepare to leave.  Please also pray for Hannah, as her whole world is about to change.  Thank you!

~Carly

Update

We have travel approval and our Consulate Appointment is scheduled for November 3rd.  This means we will be flying out on October 23rd and meeting Hannah on October 26th!  We are struggling with our final costs though, and are much shorter in funds than we originally thought.  I know this is God's will and He will provide, but being this close to travel and this short on funds is scary.  Will you pray with us?  We need to come up with around $4,000 in a little over a weeks time.  Thank you for your continued support and love.  God willing, we will have our girl in our arms very soon and she will not face the horrible future of aging out.

~Carly

Update

Just thought I'd let you all know where we are in the process!  After receiving our I800 approval we were issued a GUZ # from the NVC (National Visa Center) that allowed us to fill out an online application for Hannah's visa.  That paperwork was then sent to China where an Article 5 will be issued.  Once that is dropped off/picked up (I'm told it will be September 29th) we will officially be in the TA (travel approval) wait!  There are upcoming holidays in the end of September and the beginning of October that will delay our travel and possibly delay us in getting TA, but I'm fairly confident that we will be traveling in mid to late October to bring home our girl!

We were excited the other day to receive all 7 of our passports back with our fresh 10 year visas in them!  All the kids and my brother-in-law will be traveling with us this time and I'm really excited.  It was incredibly hard to be away from our boys a year ago when we were in China to bring Asher home.  It's CRAZY that we will be in China pretty much one year from the time we were there last year!  If things get pushed back enough, we could potentially have close to identical travel dates.  We left last year on November 7th, Gotcha on the 10th, and CA on the 19th.  I definitely don't want to wait until November to meet our sweet Hannah, but if we have to, it would be pretty cool to have the dates be so close.

We have also finished our puzzle thanks to the generous donations that came in through our GoFundMe!  We are now roughly (it's pretty impossible to be exact at this point) $7,000 from being fully funded.  That is still a large amount, but our awesome God knows what He is doing and nothing is too big for Him!  We are SO thankful for the outpouring of love, support, and donations.  It has truly touched our hearts and we are so excited to share photos with you of Hannah in our arms.  It has been the body of Christ that has made all this possible!  We love you all!

~Carly

Update

We received our I800 provisional approval today!  We are moving very quickly and will be applying for Hannah's visa at the end of the week.  After that, we will have Article 5 and then wait for travel approval.  Because there is a holiday at the beginning of October, we will not be traveling until after October 13th, which is good because we got some disappointing news today.  After the long application process and waiting 90 days, we got a letter from Show Hope telling us we did not receive a grant.  This is very hard news, but we have faith in God's plan.  We still have puzzle pieces available to sponsor and will will be praying for God's direction for the rest of the funds.  Will you pray with us?  Thank you!

~Carly

Exciting news!

We received soft LOA yesterday!!  This means that China has officially approved our family to adopt Hannah and we are just waiting for the formal document to get to our agency.  That went crazy fast!  With Asher's adoption, it took right at 60 days for us to receive LOA and at that time that was pretty fast.  This time it only took around 14 days!  Because Hannah is aging out soon, the CCCWA is moving her file through faster than normal to make sure we have enough time to get to her before her birthday.  This is such exciting news and I honestly didn't expect it to come quite that fast.  We are still around $10,000 short of being fully funded and we won't hear back until September sometime about the two grants we applied for, so we are just trusting that God has a plan for these funds to be available when we need them.

We did have a very generous anonymous donation of $500 so we were able to add more pieces to our puzzle!  We have 88 pieces left that need sponsors and we would be so blessed if you'd consider being a part of this journey to bring Hannah home.  Will you share with your family, friends, and churches?  This is a great opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus and give a precious orphan a forever family.

We love you all!

~Carly

Puzzle update!

Our dossier is officially in China as of Monday!!  Now we wait to hear that it has been logged into China's system, and then we wait to hear it's been approved.  The timing on this part of the process is completely up to the CCCWA (China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption) and has no rhyme or reason.  Our agency has asked for them to speed our process up because Hannah is aging out, but it's up to them whether or not they do it.

Barring some unforseen obstacle, we are roughly 2 months away from travel and still several thousand dollars short of being fully funded.  We recently found out about another grant that we are eligible for and we were able to get our application in right before their last deadline for the year.  We are now waiting to hear back from them and from Show Hope.  Other than that, we only have our puzzle fundraiser that still has the ability to raise more funds for us.

We just received a few more generous doantions and that leaves us with 140 pieces that have yet to be sponsored.  At $10 a piece, that has the ability to bring in $1,400 and that is a huge amount for us.

If you would like to be a part of this journey to Hannah, and sponsor a piece (or pieces!), all you have to do it click on the Paypal Donate button at the top left side of this blog page.  You can email me at carlyduvall1628 at hotmail.com to let me know what you'd like me to write on the back of your piece(s).

I will leave you with an updated picture of Hannah's puzzle.  You can finally see mama panda's eyes! :)

~Carly