Category: Adoption

Apr 17 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

Thank-you! T-shirt campaign a success!

Posted in Adoption, Fundraiser, T-shirts, BeTheGood

ThankyouThank-you so much for your incredible support of our t-shirt campaign! It closed on Sunday night and we blew our goal of 50 shirts out of the water. In just two weeks, we sold 87 shirts and raised $1430! It’s truly amazing what a network of friends and family can do!

I spoke to our Booster campaign manager and designer at the start of the week to fine tune our design and ink colors. As of yesterday, they were off the printer and should be shipping soon! A few people have asked about purchasing shirts after the deadline. This isn’t possible but we might consider one last, fast campaign just before we travel.

And about that…

We’re getting closer! Our fingers are crossed that we’ll hear good news about our next steps any day. When we do, we’ll let you know!

 


Apr 10 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

50 days-50 shirts

Posted in Adoption, Fundraiser, T-shirts, BeTheGood

fiftyforfifty

 

Today makes Day 50 of our wait for the Letter of Approval (LOA). The LOA is likely the most important adoption milestone to achieve because it means that China has reviewed our entire dossier. The wait for LOA varies….alot! Some people get approval in as little as 30-something days. Others wait more than 100! We are hoping to receive our LOA any day. 50 already feels like much too long. Once we receive LOA, the next stages seem to move much faster. Most people travel between 8 and 10 weeks after they receive LOA. IF we receive our LOA by the end of April, we’re hoping to travel some time in July.

Our sights are also set on another 50 and that’s reaching our goal of 50 t-shirts. Our campaign closes in just 4 days! If you’ve already ordered, thank-you so much. If you’ve shared our campaign, we also truly appreciate it! If you have any other networks or haven’t shared yet, please help us spread the word. We’re just THREE shirts away from 50!

Here’s the link to our Booster t-shirt campaign:  https://www.booster.com/ayersadoption


Mar 31 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

T-shirt fundraiser launched

Posted in Adoption, blogging, Fundraiser

While we anxiously await word from China, we’ve been busy! My family and friends in Frankfort threw us a beautiful adoption sprinkle and I’ll catch up this week with pictures. Just today, we hosted a shower for my newest nephew-to-be.  We’ve also been working on over a dozen adoption grant application-oh and working and keeping up with a very energetic sister-to-be. In the midst of this, there’s big t-shirt news! We’ve launched our first Booster campaign and could use your help. From the start of our journey to Eli, this quote has been meaningful to us. We finally took the plunge to make it into a t-shirt. Booster campaigns are a way to crowd-source t-shirts. We need to sell at least 20 to print but have set our goal to 50. We have just a couple weeks to meet our goals and then the t-shirts will be printed and shipped. Can you help us by sharing this link? To meet our goal, we’ll definitely need to widen our circle. We know so many people who live their lives with this intention so we hope it will be fitting for a wide audience.

Ready to check out our t-shirt?

ayersboostertshirt tshirtcloseup

 

 

Here the link to our campaign: https://www.booster.com/ayersadoption Join us in sporting this reminder to BE the change and please share this link with your networks. We cannot say thank-you enough…but we’ll try!

 


Feb 15 2014 2Commentsby writekara@gmail.com

We are DTC!

Posted in Adoption

Valentine heart reads DTC 02-14-14

 

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, we received some fantastic news! Our dossier (the GIANT package of documents) is officially officially DTC or Dossier To China. This means the documents were processed through all channels of authentication on the US side and are now on their way to China. This is a huge step in the adoption process and we hope the rest of the several steps to go move quickly.

What’s next?

Our next acronym target in the language of adoption is to be LID (Logged In Date). This means that our dossier has been received by the authorities and logged into their systems. We would love to see this happen in the next 10 days or so.

How’s Eli?

 

 

We wish we knew the answer to this question each and every day.

While we can’t request any new updates right now, we have been doing our best to get to know Eli in other ways. For Valentine’s Day, our family celebrated by eating a Chinese buffet. The food choices were labeled so it was a good way to try new things and try to remember what we liked. One of Eli’s profiles said that steamed buns are among his many favorite foods! We all had a chance to try those and other foods on Eli’s favorites. The steamed buns were not quite as adorable as the pig ones pictured here but they were still tasty. Even Hannah gave them a whirl!

steamed buns decorated to look like pigs are pictured

Another piece of important mail also made its way to China-and even Eli’s province-today. We’d nearly given up hope on the care package we sent at the very start of the year. It typically takes a little under two weeks for packages like this to reach our courier. We’re guessing that the mail was delayed or slowed even prior to the Chinese New Year holiday. After over 4 weeks, our package showed up an

d the kind woman who serves as a go-between added the items we requested (a bag with a note that includes Eli’s picture and a note labeling it as his personal property and a USB drive for pictures the orphanage may have taken of him over the years). We also sent a Bengals fleece shirt, a ninja turtle t-shirt and toy, a slinky, a tiny Iron Man toy, Eli’s dinosaur from my Aunt Kate and Uncle Glen, tea for the nannies, and suckers for other children in Eli’s room or foster home. Our note was signed from friends in the United States. We’re working on our official introduction to Eli, which will include a book of pictures, when we receive Letter of Approval (LOA).

contents of care package

 

We hope the package makes it to Eli but we know it’s never guaranteed. Some orphanages keep the packages-including picture books that introduce families-until the day the child is adopted. Others take pictures and videos as the child opens them! Hopefully, Eli will get our package sometime in the next few days and he, his friends, and nannies will like it.

Thank-you all so much for your support and encouragement on our journey. I hope we have more good news to share soon.

Kara


Jan 20 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

Dossier out the door

Posted in Adoption, Fundraiser

In the midst of a all the snow Friday, our family made the trek to Columbus to get all of our dossier documents state sealed. This is a HUGE step in adoption.

What is a dossier?

The dossier is a set of documents used to describe our family to the foreign courts. Our homestudy is part of the dossier but there are around 19 other pieces!

What’s in a dossier?

Our dossier included birth certificates, our marriage certificate, letters from our employers, financial forms, police clearances, medical forms, our homestudy, passport pictures, additional pictures of our home, our immigration approval, and a letter of our intent to adopt Eli.

How is a dossier prepared?

Completing a dossier is yet another reminder that it takes a village to adopt! Several parts of the dossier required us to rely on someone else to help us with its completion. Small hiccups can be pretty nerve wracking because Eli is on our minds day and night. We don’t want him to miss out on any more opportunities. We know a school year is ticking by and we’re just….eager. Collaborating with so many through the process has also reminded us how grateful we are for others time and attention. We know paperwork isn’t fun…for anyone. These forms are generally more complicated too because most have to be notarized-or signed in front of a notary. After this step, Adam took every document to (3!) different county offices to confirm our notaries were the real deal. AFTER that, we headed to Columbus for our state seals. None of this can be done in too much advance because some documents must be no more than three months old by the time they are processed in China.

After we admired our shiny, gold state seals, we headed STRAIGHT to the post office and overnighted our dossier to our agency. They will help us obtain federal seals and then, it will be off to China!

What’s next?

Adoption is alphabet soup. There’s always a new acronym to look forward to….Right now, we are waiting to officially be DTC (Dossier to China). After that, we’ll be waiting to hear our dossier has been translated. The entire 40+ page document has to be translated into Mandarin. THEN, we’ll be waiting for the ever-coveted Letter of Approval (LOA)…there are many more steps, but we are making progress!

While we wait and wait…we’re reminded that Eli has been waiting much longer…for a family, for a home, and for a future. Other orphans-especially those with disabilities-are doing the same. I found a quote today from Helen Keller that was perfect timing…We hope Eli remains brave and we’ll work on the patient part.

Introducing another next step…

Bravelet red bracelent with inscription Be Brave

In celebration of completing our dossier, we’re launching a new fundraiser. You can now purchase Bravelets to help us bring Eli home. Bravelets are bracelets, rings, and necklaces with the inscription “Be Brave”. Everyone can use the reminder and we loved having the opportunity to select colors specific to our cause. The support and love that so many have shared as we fundraise has been incredible. In the next few months, we’ll try to offer some options where you, too, can get something awesome in return for your support. Bravelets are the first of a couple things we have in mind!

We’ll receive $10 for each Bravelet purchased from the Bravelet page we created. We have several options. Just make sure you are within our page if you’d like to support our cause. Here’s what your page should look like and here’s the link: https://bravelets.com/bravepage/ayers-adoption

Please share our Bravelets page with your village. We appreciate your help, support, and purchases. So much!

Bravelet website for Ayers adoption

 

BeBrave


Jan 12 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

Amazon Store Now Open

Posted in Adoption, blogging, Fundraiser

Update: Since publishing this post, I realized that the footer widget doesn’t work well. Instead, I set up our own Amazon store. This allows me to add more of our favorite items and categorize them. You are actually shopping through Amazon….just with a link that let’s them know we shared the product with our recommendation. Visit our store here. 

Polishing the blog tonight in preparation of a few exciting things to come. It seems each day brings more items on our adoption to-do list. While still juggling our jobs, we’ve done something each and every day this week. On Friday, we got a few more items notarized and had our blood taken for our doctor to complete the last (fingers crossed) medical form. In addition to the paperwork, we’re also finalizing plans for additional fundraisers. Unfortunately, we were not selected for a grant that we’d been very hopeful to receive for a few months. The news was disappointing but just instilled a greater clarity that we are meant to pursue different avenues in our journey to bring Eli home….we were meant to be more creative, to reach out to more people, and to work harder. He’s worth it….and then some.

I’ll launch a couple of more formal items in the coming days/weeks, but I’ve also added a widget to our footer with a few of our current Amazon favorites. We *love* children’s books around here. My child psych background paired with Hannah’s love of reading since birth means we analyze enjoy a large number of books. Each week or so, I’ll share some of our favorites in the footer below. Some are related to adoption, disability, emotions, self-regulation, and learning about the Chinese culture. Other books and toys are just for fun-those are important too! The widget should be a fun way to share recommendations while also earning a small commission if you decide to purchase by clicking on our links.

Interested in checking out our first installment? There’s everything from bugs to our favorite Llama books! Just scroll d-o-w-n to check out the Amazon widget in the footer.

We wish you a wonderful weekend and if you are from the Midwest, hope you, too, are enjoying the great thaw!

Kara


Jan 03 2014 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com
finding ad page

Building a History

Posted in Adoption

It’s amazing to me that Eli lives almost exactly on the other side of the world. Yet, our weather is shockingly similar. Right now, it feels like just 1 degree here in Cincinnati. In Eli’s province, it’s also freezing-just a tad colder (at -1). I’m starting to understand the sentiment “living in two time zones” as I frequently find myself checking the weather where Eli lives and thinking about what he might be doing. Does he have warm clothes? Is he giggling with friends? Sleeping well? Eating something he loves (which we’re told is nearly everything)?

At this point, we are somewhat used to not knowing…there are so many things we will never know. Harder yet, there are pieces of Eli’s history that he will never know. What would it be like to know nothing of where you truly came from? What would it be like to know even your birthday was very unlikely your actual date of birth? We feel it’s our obligation to track down everything we can so that someday-we can give Eli each and every bit of knowledge we know about his past. Many other adopting families share this desire and one of them pointed me in the direction of a man who locates the finding ads of abandoned children.

What are finding ads?

Since around 1999, China has been placing pages of finding ads for children who have been abandoned. It is illegal to place a child for adoption in finding ad pageChina so families often desperately enact plans to leave their children in a very public place-in hopes they will be found as quickly as possible. Some children are left with notes, money, or even family momentos. Due to the threat of legal action, there are typically no ties to the birth parents. The finding ads are intended to give family members one final chance to come forward and reunite with the child. After the ads have run, the child is issued a certificate of abandonment and can then be adopted. This single piece of paper seals their status as an orphan while opening their future to the possibility of adoption.

Was an ad placed for Eli?

Just a few hours after submitting my request, I received a response from the man who locates these newspaper ads. Eli’s ad has been found! It will include what we believe will be the earliest picture to date (and likely that we will ever have) of him. Even in our 6 inches of snow, we’ll definitely be checking the mailbox diligently because we can’t wait to see his sweet face. Most importantly, I’m excited to have this bit of Eli’s past to share with him. In scanning his files for the necessary information, I also located the public place in which Eli was found on a google map. We’re not permitted to share his province or finding location. The spot is just about an hour from his orphanage though so I’m hopeful we’ll be able to visit (or may even have to for paperwork) when we travel.

It’s hard to admire a bustling, urban area from the pixelated screens of Google Maps. Still, it’s so easy to see that Eli’s homeland is beautiful. Even in populated areas, there are rounded green areas with twisting sidewalks and smooth lines of waterways. There are tall buildings and long rows of smaller houses. I plan to take as many pictures as I can but I have a feeling even Eli will appreciate my aerial Google view of his homeland someday…at least I hope so.


Dec 31 2013 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com

i800a approved!

Posted in Adoption

graphic reads i800a approved

i800-what you say?

i800a…It’s adoption-speak for one of the longest phases of the international adoption process. The i800a is a form sent to the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Since I haven’t been the most timely blogger, let’s take a brief stroll through our adoption memory lane. Our i800a was received (via a lockbox in Texas) back in October. On November 14, the three of us hit the mean streets of downtown Cincinnati to get our fingerprints done at our local immigration office. It was scheduled to be a school day for Hannah but she ended up joining us due to a self-described “porcupine in the throat”. On December 23, Adam and I were excited to see an envelope from immigration. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a request for more evidence. Our agency caseworker contacted immigration on our behalf and our application must have been approved later that day. We received the hard copy today!

So what does this mean?

It means that we are (tentatively) approved by US Immigration to adopt a child from a Hague convention country (which includes China). The i800a approval specifies the age, disability, and even gender of the child we are approved to adopt. It’s a big step because the wait for this approval is one of the longest parts of the process. We still have LOTS to do but many of the other steps will (hopefully) move faster.

So what’s next?

We’ve officially entered panic mode as we try to get our dossier completed as quickly as possible. The dossier is a compilation of a number of documents-everything from letters from our employers to medical check-ups. These have to be notarized and then authenticated at a state and national level. It feels a little overwhelming but I know we can do it. Should you be one of the fortunate few we’ll be hounding for paperwork, please forgive/understand. We don’t want Eli to wait a moment more than he has to.

I hope this adds a little clarity to this phase of the process. Questions are always welcome. If you wonder, feel free to ask.

Next up: a fundraising update. Stay tuned!


Dec 30 2013 0Commentby writekara@gmail.com
picture of small child smiling and giving peace sign

Updates on Eli

Posted in Adoption

Our family just wrapped up an epic Christmas-celebrated no less than SEVEN times with family members and friends near and far. We are thankful, happy, full, and a little exhausted! While we had an amazing holiday, Eli was never far from our minds. I cannot wait to have even more turtles, ponies, or whatever he loves circling our tree and our fireplace really needs that fourth stocking. Even Hannah thought of Eli often this month. Her most memorable time being a false identification after swim lessons. She thought another child might be Eli and was suddenly extremely excited! In trying to head off what could be a pretty embarrassing/confusing situation, I tried to tell her quickly that A) That wasn’t Eli and B) We should not go embrace the child without asking! Hannah somewhat got the message and said, “Oh-are we not allowed to take kids?” She keeps us laughing…and alert!

A little before Christmas, an amazing surprise popped up in my inbox-an update on Eli. The adoption world is tricky. There’s a process for EVERYTHING. You are only allowed to request updates every few months. Each update also typically comes at a cost. We’ve been working hard to save and fundraise so while I’d love to request an update every day, we try to have some restraint! Updates also come with measurements, which can be helpful for planning everything from clothing sizes to car seats. After some serious practice in self-control, we finally submitted our request for an update around Thanksgiving. We were so disappointed to have our e-mails returned as undeliverable. I turned to our agency. They once again saved the day and I had an update by the next morning!

Our first realization was this: He’s grown so much!  From the pictures and reports, it looks as though Eli is no longer in foster care and is back in the orphanage. This sometimes happens when a child is matched with a family. It could also be just part of a transition period or some children come and go from the orphanage to foster homes pretty frequently. It’s tough not knowing…..What I do know is that Eli has lost his front teeth! His nannies report that he is active, smart, and helpful. He is protective of younger children and loves the playground. His giggles are apparently contagious and I can’t wait to hear them echo our halls.

I’m eager to share several other updates in the coming days but I’ll start with the very best-new pictures of Eli:) picture of small child smiling and giving peace sign EliUpdate2

 


Nov 02 2013 1Commentby writekara@gmail.com

It takes an OI Village

Posted in Adoption, Fundraiser

As both parents and community members, we’re firm believers in the phrase, “It takes a village.” We see the positive impact that our friends and family have on Hannah’s growth and we’re so eager for Eli to join our circles. We submitted our immigration paperwork (known as the i800a in adoption lingo) exactly 2 weeks ago. The immigration process takes 70 days on average but we’re hoping to be on the faster end of that average!

In the meantime, we’re hard at work with grant writing and fund raising. Just this week, our friend Joe Hall kicked off an amazing matching grant campaign with THIS post. Our AdoptTogether profile is now live and we can accept tax-deductible donations. If we can raise $2500, Joe has offered to match that amount! It’s an incredibly generous offer that has really excited me-and so many donors-to meet our goal. Each and every gift, share, or positive thought helps and we are so thankful.

When people blog and talk about adoption from China, they frequently use analogies about the threads that weave us together. Red thread is particularly symbolic. Joe’s campaign is another reminder of the strong ties within the disability community and how fortunate Eli will be to learn from so many role models. Like Adam and me, Joe also has OI. We met during our time with National Youth Leadership Network and then later at OI Conferences. Ahead of his time, Joe developed a social media site for people with OI called “OI Village”. It’s since dissolved and I couldn’t even find any vintage remnants but it was pre-Facebook boom and such an innovative way to tie our community together in a social-not a medical-way. Joe has since built a successful career using his Internet ninja skills. He’s applying those ninja skills to help spread our story and cause. People with and without OI have joined to help us bump that thermometer up. As of tonight, we’ve hit $1908 (towards our matching grant campaign)-almost there!

If you’d like to help us meet our goal and double your donation, click HERE to donate through our AdoptTogether account.