Ugh...the mall

Today I'm writing from an annoyed mom state so watch out. :) Isabel and I went to the mall today because we had to get out of the house and it was raining. Also, I needed to get a couple things. While we were there we realized that everyone else had the same idea to go to the mall...it was chaos. People everywhere and not necessarily nice people. And stupid clothing racks everywhere! Why does Belk order that many dresses??? Why? No one is gonna buy all of those. Even the sales associates were complaining about them. People can barely fit through the aisles.

Also, JCPenny....I want you to know that the only reason I go in your store is because you are smack dab in the middle of the mall and I HAVE to walk through you to get to the other side. I am so tired of dodging jewelry, bags, and any other random crap you can put on a teetering shelf just to get to the other side of the mall!

To the lady at the Sephora counter: Do not speak to my child anymore. Please, I would prefer that you just smile and turn the other way. Has anyone ever told you that it is hurtful and rude to look at a small, self-conscious 4 year that got glasses 6months ago and say, "Well look at her BIG 'OL glasses!" Now I know you weren't intentionally being mean and you were commenting on the fact that she has glasses....like EVERY OTHER PERSON IN THE WORLD....but come on, they are glasses. They are children's glasses. They are not BIG OL Sally Jessie Raphael glasses.

Now...to the lady that has been shopping too long and won't get off her *bleeping* cell phone to notice that other people exist: When you are at the counter to make a purchase...get off of your phone. It's rude. Also, when you are making a purchase, please know that there are 2 lines and not just 1. You do not need to take up the entire counter with your pile of bags and stroller turned sideways. I had to squeeze by you to pay and while I paid your kid kicked my skirt and my leg the WHOLE TIME. Did you notice? No, because you wouldn't get off your *bleeping* phone.

Alright...I think I got that out of my system. :) Thanks if you made it through all that! Haha!

Enjoy your weekend!

Fellow adoptive family's Yard Sale in Raleigh!

Another family that is with our agency is having a yard sale on Saturday! They live in Raleigh and I know some of you guys are in that area and lots of you are in NC so I wanted to share so you guys could go support their adoption!! Her blog has all the info but it starts at 7am and it's on Mabry Mill Street in Raleigh, NC. (It is in the Wakefield area in a subdivision- you should see us by the fluorescent signs.) So, if you live in the area, go check it out and pass the info along to other locals.

I hope they sell a TON!

http://yestoadoption.blogspot.com/2010/07/reminder-raleigh-yard-sale-july-31st.html

Why are you adopting a girl?

This post is an answer to the same two questions that people keep asking Brian and I about the child we are adopting from Ethiopia. Some of you may already know but I thought I should go ahead and clear up any confusion on the matter. :)

-Are you adopting a boy or girl? Why?
-How old will he or she be? Why?

We are adopting a little girl. Why are we adopting a girl and not a boy? When we decided to adopt we were completely open to adopting a boy or a girl and to be honest, are still open to either gender. However, our living situation dictates differently. We live in a 2 bedroom house. Our daughter sleeps in one room and we sleep in the other. Since our adopted child will be sharing a room with our daughter, our agency requires that we adopt a child of the same gender as our biological child. I get it. Besides, now that I think about it, we already have tons of girl clothes and toys.

Our age parameters for our daughter are 0-2 years old. However, that 2 years goes all the way up to 35 months (just shy of 3 years old). We were open to adopting a child younger than Isabel. We wanted her to continue to be the oldest child and maintain the birth order that we have. Agencies and social workers recommend it and even require it. So, our agency says that there must be 12 months difference between Isabel and our adopted daughter.

So, there you go! However, we do not know how old our daughter will be when we get a referral for her....we just know that she will be somewhere between 0-35 months. :) Yay! Hopefully we will be ready to turn in our dossier soon so we can get on the waitlist too!!


Much love,

The $2,000 Tortilla Chip

I just read this post on Tom Davis' blog. It's written by a colleague of his but wow, it's a great post about perspective and need. Are we willing to step out when God calls us or shows us a need or will we just brush it off with the excuse that we don't have the money or the resources? I don't wanna live like that.

The $2,000 Tortilla Chip

Look at this!

Just wanted to post this! yay! There is another piece that got placed right after I took this pic too! I can't wait to see it all come together!

THANK YOU!!!

One Puzzle Piece at a Time

I am super excited to share with you guys our new fundraiser! Here's what's up:

We are finished with our education and our homestudy.

We are super super close to having our documents ready for our dossier.

But...we need $5,000 to send in with it.

We did need $5,800 to cover the USCIS (Citizenship & Immigration) application but guess what? God provided $800 last week and that's exactly the amount needed for USCIS!

So now we are in need of $5,000 and we need your help. We have sold everything not nailed down in our house (except for a glass coffee table that I keep meaning to put on Craigslist). After our homestudy is finished we will be able to apply for grants but the $5,000 must be sent in with our dossier in order to get our family on the waitlist! That is the goal. Once we are on the list, we just wait to get the referral for our sweet girl! This $5,000 enables us to be right in the place where God will lead our very daughter into our family!

So here is how you can help. This idea comes from another blogger that gave me permission to use her idea.

We purchased a 300 piece puzzle with a picture of a baby giraffe getting a big kiss from her momma giraffe. We are inviting you to "sponsor" a piece or however many you'd like for $17 (oops I'm bad at math..i should have said 17 instead of 16 to get to $5,000 and include the paypal fee) to be a part of bringing our daughter home! With each piece sponsored we'll permanently write your name on the back and put that piece of the puzzle in place. This puzzle will be a beautiful reminder of all of the people that helped bring her home. She will be able to look at it hanging in her room and see just how much she was loved before we even knew her name! She will see that God knew her name and had a wonderful plan for her!

We want to frame this puzzle in double-sided glass after it is complete so that we can see the WHOLE story and share it with her. We also love that Isabel gets to participate in this. She loves puzzles anyway but this one is going to be building FAITH and HOPE into our daughter that is so patiently waiting on her little sister. So, we will keep you all updated so you can see the progress of the puzzle.

So, there are two ways that you can give:

1. Through Paypal. Just click the little puzzle on the sidebar to go there!

2. By writing a check out to Reynolda Church with HUNT ADOPTION in the memo line. That info is also on the side to the right. If you give this way it is a tax-deductible donation. If you choose to do that, let us know by e-mail so you can be added to the puzzle too!

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful,

I know that full well. -Psalm 139:14

Here are the links to the updates to this fundraiser!

 Check out our Puzzle!

10 People
Wow!

Love,

Ethiopia Document Checklist is Shrinking!!

Okay I might just freak out a little bit here. I am looking at our dossier checklist and we have more stuff checked off than not checked off!! The main things left are some documents that just need notarization....oh and guess what I found out today?? MY NEIGHBOR IS A NOTARY!! For real, how awesome is that?! So, I'm going to go see her tomorrow. :)

Next up we need to get something State Certified which apparently is not too difficult and is pretty inexpensive. I still can't believe that Davie County would charge $25 per criminal background check (which takes like 10 seconds to look up) and the NC Secretary of State would charge $10 to state certify a document. Does anyone else think that's a little off?

So, we are completely finished w/ our education (online & workbook). I am mailing our WEWO (With Eyes Wide Open) workbook to AGCI tomorrow. We really have enjoyed that book and it's been really helpful but oh my goodness it has taken a LOOONG time to complete. I am happy to send it off. :)

And we are completely finished with our homestudy. Our social worker sent us a rough draft and it looks great (well I think so anyways)! She will send it to her office and they'll edit and then they'll send it on to AGCI so they can review it too.

Oh and tomorrow (or today actually....why is it that I always post stuff at midnight?) we are introducing the coolest fundraiser! I am so excited about it! Stay posted!

The 15 things I did in 3 hours

This week Isa is off at summer camp for 3 hours each morning. Until this morning, I had no idea how much I could do in 3 hours! Here's how it went down:

1. Dropped off sweet girl....after they peeled her off of my legs! She begged and pleaded for me to let her stay with me. She has been two other days this week and was totally fine. If she had stayed with me there is no way I would have accomplished all that I did for our dossier. So, the Lord is good and our preschool has the sweetest teachers. They carefully distracted Isabel by giving her a cool chore to do and she was in! drop off: arrived at 8:50...didn't leave until 9:00

2. Drove the speed limit :) over to the doctor's office for my 9:15am appt. to have my TB skin test read. NO TB! AND the nurse was awesome to get my 2 medical forms signed by my doctor. She EVEN found a notary in the office that seemed to be busy at first but when my awesome nurse sweetly told her what she needed, the notary got up and did her thing!

3. Called the Pediatrician's office again for that medical form...still not ready but they will get it finished and call ASAP.

4. Realize that I don't have the husband's employment verification letter and that it is in his car at HIS work all the way across town! Head straight there...9:40am.

5. Arrive and pick up letters. While I'm there I talk to my dad and make some copies of things since our copier is broken.

6. Off again! Stop by the bank to make a deposit to our adoption account!

7. Next stop: Goin' Postal to mail my new FBI fingerprints. ETA: 10:40am. Way cool British owner is super helpful and gives me a great deal to send everything safely FedEx.

8. Realize that I had no breakfast and could eat my hand at this point. So, I walk across to the parking lot to Panera! I even got a FREE strawberry scone! Oh, and an iced latte!

9. Stop by friend's house to say hey and debrief before next pick up. 11:15

10. Pediatrican calls...plan to go get letter! 11:40

11. Pick up baby girl right at 12:00pm! She had a great day!

12. Drive over to Pediatrican's office and pick up letter. 12:15

13. 12:30 Make it to drop off point to meet up with Social Worker to turn over the last documents needed to complete our homestudy!! She says CONGRATS and we're all finished. She's gonna send it off to get it all official and fancy.

14. Sit back down in car and take a deep breath.

15. Chick-fil-A drive-thru and HOME!


I'm off to take a nap. :)

Another T-shirt Giveaway!

I love giveawayS! Especially when they have to do with adoption and Africa! This giveaway is for a t-shirt that this family designed for their fundraiser. They are so so cool! Check them out!

http://marquezfamilyjourney.blogspot.com/2010/07/t-shirt-giveaway.html

This Week's Update

So, this has been a busy week. I thought I'd just write some stuff that we've been doing. :)

1. We had our very last homestudy visit on Tuesday (which I wrote about earlier this week). It will take a little while for it to be finalized and reviewed and notarized...maybe a month. Yay!

2. On Thursday we went to get our Criminal Background Checks. This has been a big deal because we have not been able to find someone to accompany us to the courthouse in the middle of a work day and the people at the courthouse didn't want to notarize it. A friend found someone to help us and she came and was great! However, the lady working in the office was not so great. Do you remember Roz from Monsters' Inc?? THAT is the lady that was there to help us...seriously, they must have modeled her after the lady in the clerks' office. Even though I had called beforehand about bringing a notary she didn't like the idea of it. I explained the importance of the notarization and she said, "well, fine then....it's up to you." So we fill out this form and she takes it to a computer. It takes her like 10 seconds and she puts a big stamp on it and signs it. (This apparently is valued at $25 per check) So, our notary asks to see her badge or something like that....you know because a notary is affirming that the person is who they say they are. So, the lady says, "We don't HAVE badges in this office." My notary says, "oh." What the crap? I mean seriously, who refuses to show their id when working in a govnt. office. Ugh. Anyway, thankfully we had a great notary and she said, "I know her...I've seen her in here numerous times so I'll notarize it." Either way, we finally got the checks...they are not on the proper form but they'll have to do.

3. We tried to go swimming twice....only to arrive and be turned away because of some kid pooping in the pool. Why don't you just put swimming diapers on your kid? I mean really...why is this an issue?? If your kid is sick...then please don't take your kid swimming.


4. I tried to get my medical form filled out but apparently they have to prove that I don't have TB so I'm going next week to make sure! :)

5. I found out that I am going to be teaching at just one school next year! Last year I was splitting two schools and it was hard to drive each day and keep up with both schools' meetings, emails, records, testing, etc. I am super thankful that I am going to be at the school I am! I really really enjoy it and I'm excited about the team I will be working with.

6. My daughter is fighting naps.....and I don't like it. :(

7. She also asked me today how babies get into pregnant mommies' tummies!! Ahhh! My answer?? God puts the baby there! He made you and allowed you to grow in my tummy! Let's hope she doesn't ask anything else!


8. I got to see my BFF! from growning up! :) This past year she has been living super far away in Asia and we got to hang out! We met when we were two and I just love getting to spend time with her again...it's so amazing to me that God grows friendship in people's hearts and it lasts and lasts. She is way cool and Isabel had a good time telling her all about her imaginary friends.




9. I also got to hang out with one of my old college roomies!! I hadn't seen her in a year! Craziness! We decided we should hang out again before 12 months go by.

10. My mother-in-law is way cool. She has introduced me to the Spin Pin! It's this cool corkscrew pin thingie that you use to put in your hair to hold twists and buns and stuff. It replaces like 15 bobby pins in my hair! You get two of them. You just spin them into your bun clockwise and spin them counter clockwise to get them out!



So there ya go! There's my update for the week! I hope y'all have a great weekend! I'm going to celebrate my grandpa's birthday and HOPEFULLY go swimming sometime!

Last Homestudy Craziness!

We had our very last homestudy visit tonight! I'm a little sad because we have really enjoyed our homestudy, mostly because our social worker is the coolest ever. But I'm super excited because we are even closer to getting on the waitlist! Tonight was so crazy though. Here's how it went down. (I should say that I did not take that picture...some local person did and posted it to the local newschannel website)


We started our visit in the living room. Isabel had just woken up from her nap so she was a little clingy and whiny. We finally convinced her to play with her legos and she was okay. Then we start noticing the wind blowing outside and super dark clouds hovering over. We kept on talking but then we started hearing the wind and a ton of rain. We all managed to stay calm and meterologist Brian decided to check the radar. Well, he saw a GIANT RED circle right close to us and said, "wow, this looks pretty bad." But I mean it's the summertime and we always get thunderstorms and we definitely needed the rain. As we kept going on with the visit, the lightning and thundering starting picking up ...so much that when it CRACKED right outside the window our social worker and Isabel both jumped closer to the other end of the couch! At this point we stop to really look at the trees. They are like bending over and twigs and branches are being thrown all over the yard and against the windows....the front glass door is being pulled open on its own. We close the front door and lock it. We all stand up to really look out the back and we notice this weird brightness outside and hail and then see swirly gusts and trees bent so far over that we thought they might crack. At this point we all said, "LET'S HIDE!!!" So, we all ran to our bathroom since we don't have a basement! Brian continued to check the weather and looked outside while we continued to answer homestudy questions in our bathroom while I sat on our toilet holding Isabel and our social worker leaned on our sink! Haha, it was really kinda funny. Finally it all subsided and we went back to the living room. Apparently it was reported that "rotations" were spotted in our area and a tornado warning was in the county next door. Craziness! Either way we are FINISHED with our homestudy!! I just have to go pick up some more paperwork to turn in next week!! YAY!!!

Link to a great post: Affirmation & Adoption

So, I want to link to a post that I read last night. It was written by a local friend that is also adopting from Ethiopia. When I finished reading her post I started telling Brian about it. She came up with a list of suggestions for how to better support and understand families that are adopting. I completely agree with it because I have felt the same way several times. Many people are not used to talking about adoption so they don't know how it affects our hearts. They might not know that we think about our little girl somewhere in Ethiopia all the time just like I thought about Isabel when I was pregnant with her. We wonder what she'll look like, act like, etc. I know that it is not visible and you can't tell that we are expecting another child. You can't see that next year we will be a family of 4 and not just 3. We will have two daughters. Isabel will be a big sister. Even though you can't see it all happening, we still would love for you to celebrate it with us! We are so thankful for everyone that is cheering us on!

So, here is her post: http://dean-machine.blogspot.com/2010/07/affirmation-and-adoption.html



Much love,

Kari Jobe music video

Over a year ago...gosh almost two years ago, I bought Kari Jobe's cd and listened to it every day on the way to work. It was one of the most healing and precious cd's I ever bought. I just love it and her heart for the Lord. She made a music video for one of my favorite songs from the cd. I'm not sure how long it will be up so go check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/karijobe

Ethiopian Restaurant Review

On Saturday evening we set out with two other fun couples (one that have recently adopted from Ethiopia and another that have adopted from Guatemala and are seeking the Lord about their next adoption). We went to Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant in Charlotte! For part of our education, we are required to try food from our child's culture and write about it. I have already written about it in our workbook but I thought I would share with you guys! Let me just that if you have never had Ethiopian food then you NEED TO TRY IT! It is sooo good...I'm not even faking it! It was legitimately really good. Brian ordered a lamb dish and some others ordered Doro Wat (that features a hardboiled egg and two pieces of chicken). I ordered the Special Chicken Tibs. It is a chicken dish that has a yummy sauce with small pieces of chicken, onions, green peppers, and other spices. To the side were two big dollops of hummus like stuff (I think one was made from chick peas and the other from lentils). They were both good but I preferred the yellow one. On the other side were....are you ready for this??? Collard Greens!!! All my family will be so happy to hear that! Brian loves collards but I NEVER fix them because they take FOREVER and make your house smell bad and I don't really like them. However, these collard greens were cooked with some type of beef instead of with pork and they were really good! All of this yumminess was on top of a big floppy sourdough-esque tasting piece of injera. It's kinda spongy and when folded looks like little towels. It's made from teff flour and it's yeast-risen. You just tear pieces off and use it to grab the other stuff on your plate! No silverware guys!! We brought some home as leftovers and Isabel LOVED it and was a little irritated that we didn't take her. We promised that she can go next time. :) So, here are some pictures! My fabulous photographer was present to take all the pictures. Hehe.

Our friends told us that this is a traditional table that you would sit at. The top would be lifted and underneath you'd find all the food! Everybody sits around it on little stools or seats.

Sweet Gotcha Day Video & Sweet Gotcha Day Fun

This sweet family that adopted with our agency (AGCI) too just posted their Gotcha Day video for their precious son. I dare you to keep a dry eye by the end of it. It is so exciting and encouraging to think that we will go to Hannah's Hope too sometime next year to pick up our little girl! I can't wait!




We also got to celebrate the Gotcha Day of our wonderful friends' son today. He is one cool kid and we are so blessed to get to celebrate with them. Poop in the public pool could not ruin the fun! Isabel had a great time with her friends on the slip'n'slide and the shark pool in their yard. Then we got to go eat and go back to their house for brownie sundaes too! We are so thankful for them. They have encouraged us and cheered us on and continue to do so! Love y'all!!
http://simplysmittys.blogspot.com/2010/07/happy-gotcha-day.html

Just Love Coffee Site!!

Just Love Coffee is a coffee roasting company that sells Fair Trade Speciality Coffees and uses the proceeds to help adopting families with their fundraising. They have approved us to work with them and they have created a cool page for you to go to and purchase many different types of coffee. If you are interested in buying some coffee to help us bring our daughter home please please check it out! http://www.justlovecoffee.com/TheHunts

I also posted a link on the side of my page in case you want to check it out later or send others to it. We are currently working to raise $6,000 that we would need to turn in by August/September. The sooner we turn it in the sooner we can get on the waitlist!! The $6,000 includes $800 needed for USCIS (that's immigration paperwork), an international service fee, and authenticating and translating our dossier. We know that it's a lot of money but we are confident that God will provide for this step just like He miraculously provided for our first HUGE step!

awesome 1st homestudy visit!

Really quick! We had an awesome 1st visit of our homestudy tonight! Love love our social worker! :) We're meeting again tomorrow night and then later this weekend and then next week too. Since we've already turned in all of our homestudy paperwork we will be wrapping this up super quick!! I can't even believe it!! Craziness!

We still need a notary that lives in our county to go with us to get our Criminal Background Checks notarized for our dossier. The lady that answers the phone at the Clerks office is not wanting to allow a notarization. Pray that we would have favor with her and that we could get these things finished up! I also got my fingerprints redone today. I put lotion on this time so that it would help pick up my fingerprints. I'm going to send those back to the FBI tomorrow! Pray they send it back quickly.

Lastly, all of this is happening super quick now. We are getting closer and closer to completing our dossier and homestudy now! As soon as we do and we have the funds raised to send in with it then we can get on that waitlist!! God has provided the money for us before and we are trusting Him to provide again for this step! Pray that we could find some really cool bands to play at our adoption party. We originally thought we'd be doing it in late August but I'm thinking we better move it up!!

Okay, Brian and I are going to work on our WEWO book now!!


Yay!!

4th of July Craft

Now if you know me you will know that I am not the "crafty" sort. I actually do not have scrapbooks or scrapbooking materials. I know, gasp! I have ribbon when I made Isabel's hairclippies when she was a baby. But, every once in a while Isabel will say, "Mommy, we need to do a craft." So, I muster up the courage to work on a craft. Last year a craft resulted in me getting hot glue stuck to my finger and a huge blister. Isa reminds me now whenever we do a craft, "Remember...don't use that glue gun, you could get hurt." Haha. Anyway, once we made a cute little Easter card with a bunny that we sewed backwards. I tried making way cool onesies and t-shirts w/ cool fabric but my sewing machine kept bunching up AND I got my finger stuck under that clampy, pointy thing that the needle is attached to! Seriously....I think you can understand why I stick to simple crafts that do not involve dangerous materials. :)

Well, Isabel really wanted to do a craft so I decided we should do a 4th of July one. Thankfully I found this cool idea for a patriotic windsock! It was soo easy and pretty cheap too! And it turned out really cute. We actually made two and hung them by our front door.
I used:
1 Sheet of Blue Poster Board (Cut it into a 13" by 6" rectangle...you'll probably need a ruler too.)
Red and White Ribbon (no I don't know how thick...I just looked at it and thought it seemed right)
A pretty decorative skinny ribbon to go at the top (some people use this stuff called rickrack..I don't even know WHAT that is. The lady at Michael's did when I asked but they were sold out so I found something else).
Pretty White Star Stickers (our's were even a little sparkly)
1 Red Pipe Cleaner (or whatever color you want)
1 Big Fat Glue Stick (Now I told you I don't use glue guns. I also don't like thick Elmer's Glue. I am a teacher and I am used to using glue sticks but I buy a special purple one that comes in a yellow and purple container made by UHUstic. It holds EVERYTHING! It's non-toxic, washable, and acid free.)

So, with no further delay, here is the result!!

Yay for easy crafts!!

Happy Fourth of July Everybody!!

Good news of the Day!!

Way cool news for the day! Are you ready??

1. We start our homestudy next week!! We have two visits (one on Tuesday and one on Wednesday)!

2. We have a place for our fundraising event and we get it FOR FREE!!! and it's WAY COOL!! The Old Winston Social Club downtown on Burke Street!! I had an awesome conversation with one of the owners and I'm really excited about this. More info and a date coming soon!

3. We got free tix for the Dash game tonight that includes parking and food!!

4. The people in the Sherrif's office were so nice and helpful and made an appt. very soon for me to get my fingerprints redone since the FBI rejected the first round.

5. We only have 2 online adoption ed. classes left!

6. I still really like my new Chaco's. :)


Yay for good news!!