Days 1 & 2 - Leaving for the First Trip

May 4-5, 2012 Happy Birthday, Tim!!!  (May 5)

 Please pardon the length of our trip posts if you aren't into lengthy reading. This is going to serve as my journal for our trips and as a way to keep the fam updated back home.

 Our trip began with our very first flight ever. The first leg  was a short flight, so it broke us in, I guess. We parked at a place away from the airport and took a shuttle. We were the only two on the ride and told the driver this was our first flight. He said, "You mean from this airport?"  We said, "No, first flight ever."  He was almost speechless. I couldn't count how many times he said "uh" before our 5 minute ride was over.  He even offered to stop on the way to get us a beer to calm our nerves. I almost laughed out loud. I believe that was the first time (except for restaurants) that someone has ever offered me a beer.  We declined, and he commented that we seemed awfully calm for a first flight. The further into this trip we get I know why. I truly believe we have quite a few folks sincerely praying for us. 

 We made it through checking in our bags and getting our boarding passes. We went straight through security and found our gate with about 30 minutes to spare. This first plane was a little tight, but we really didn't have anything to compare it to. The only glitch as we boarded was that we realized our seats were not even close to each other...about 7 rows apart. The flight attendants heard us and asked again where our seats were and said that someone would probably be willing to switch.  (It was a sold out flight.)   Would you believe that the young lady in front of me (making our way down the aisle), turned around and said she would be more than happy to swap with Tim as her seat was next to mine. (Thank you, Lord!)  As it turns out we had the aisle between us, but that's way better than 7 rows!

As soon as we got in the air, they came around offering beverages. Almost as soon as everyone had one, they began making rounds to collect the empty cups. I did grab a snack from our bag since we had missed lunch. Then we began our descent and were on the ground. Quickest 1 hr 19 min I can remember. 

As we got into the terminal, Tim told me I had something on the back of my pants leg. I found a restroom and discovered a large area of a thin layer of white chewing gum on my black pants.  Great!  After much scrubbing and picking, I got most of it off. Later, you couldn't really tell it had been there. We walked to the other end of the airport and checked in. The lady asked if our seats were together (you'd think we would have checked this time).  They were.  She asked if we had boarding passes for the next flight and if our seats were together. They were not. She said, "Let's fix that."  So she changed our seats to be together. (Thank you, lady.  And thank you, Lord.)

We settled in with about 30 minutes again. Time enough for another bathroom break, a couple of phone calls, and a few minutes of charging the phone. We boarded the new plane. This time we had two seats to ourselves...a window and an aisle. As I settled in my seat, I saw that I still had gum on the back of the other leg.  Oh well!  

This was the long flight: almost 9 hours.  I was surprised to find that I enjoyed looking out the window. We saw Newfoundland, Ireland, and England go by.  We missed most of the rest.  Although long, this flight was the most comfy. We had a snack, supper, and a breakfast snack. All of the food was actually very good. They were also often coming around with more drinks. Besides cokes, I enjoyed some orange juice and a hot cup of tea, and I tried the coffee--a little strong for me.  We watched movies and slept some, but I found I had over-planned my bag of activities.  I especially liked watching the animation on my personal TV that showed where the plane was on the map and how much time was left in the trip.

 We landed in Munich and almost sprinted to our gate. This was our shortest layover, and we had to get from gate 1 to gate 38. We arrived with about 20 minutes before boarding began. During that time we met a guy there from Tennessee. He was part of the national guard and on his way to Sofia like us. We talked a little and he gave us a few suggestions of things to look for, places to eat, etc.

 Our last flight was a much smaller plane but roomier than the first. It took about 1.5 hours to fly to Sofia.  We looked down at the Alps with snow still on them.   Beautiful.  When we arrived, we went through the passport clearance and claimed our bags, no problems.  Then we hit our biggest glitch of the day.  We went through the door to exit into the waiting area.  People were everywhere waiting for someone from our flight. We looked for our greeter who was supposed to be holding a sign with our name on it, but he was nowhere.   We waited and waited.   Then we called our social worker...twice.  We waited 4 hours before he came. Turns out there had been a misunderstanding about our arrival. He thought we were coming in tomorrow like most folks, but we came a day early because we were having a hard time getting a clear answer on whether to arrive Saturday or Sunday. So, we just picked the earlier date because we were running out of time to book the flight.  While we were waiting, we met yet another Tennessean. He, too, was with the guard, and he and his wife work at the US Embassy.  Before he left (and since we were still waiting), he gave us his number and the number at the embassy in case we never got picked up. That was VERY reassuring!  (Thanks AGAIN, Lord!)

 ANYWAY, our contact guy did make it and took us to our hotel.  Then he gave us a quick overview of downtown Sophia. We set out and had Tim's birthday dinner at an outdoor cafe.  Okay, so pizza isn't exactly authentic Bulgarian cuisine, but it was a little different from anything we've had back home.  Before we were finished, two ladies were seated at the table 3 inches from ours.  We began talking, and learned it was their first day in Sophia, too.   They were from Australia.  Then she asked if we were Americans.  I asked if it was that obvious.  She laughed and said that Tim's "ma'am" had been a dead giveaway.  (He called her that to get her attention to ask her a question.)   Then she asked if we were from the South.  Turns out she had been on an "Elvis vacation" to Memphis and also went to Nashville for her dad's love of country music. Afterward, we decided to skip dessert for tonight, but tomorrow we are heading back for some Italian ice cream...that will probably BE lunch.  Heehee.

It's Time!

I've been meaning to blog as we prepare to make our first trip, but this place has been a madhouse of activity.  Now, all preparations must stop where they are because we leave tomorrow!  We are very excited, anxious, and nervous all at once.  The boys want their new brother and sister to come home, but they don't want us to go.  We are a strange lot in that Tim and I have never gone away overnight before.  Oh, the boys have spent the night at Memaw's without us, but we've always been about 5-10 minutes away.  This is new on SO many levels.

We came up short on our fundraising as you can see.  About $8000 short.  AND it seems our original estimate may have been low.  Whatever.  We are on this journey with a fixed purpose in mind.  God is going to provide.  I don't know when, and I don't know how, but I know He is trustworthy.

We have the house being looked after.  The kids are being looked after.  The gifts are purchased and packed.  We have plenty to do on the plane.  We have the right number of luggage pieces and currently come in underweight.  We have our reservations and itinerary.  I left school work for the kids.  We have Memaw ready to Skype.  (That means I set up a webcam for her and showed Colton how to use it.  hee hee)  I think we just have to actually GO now.

Please pray for our journey.  We are still a little nervous (but more excited than before) about our first plane trip.  Pray for Colton and Eli who are sad to see us go.  Pray for our mothers as they worry about us.  Pray for the officials we will encounter that we will find favor with them.  Pray that we don't mess up being in a different culture with a different language.  Pray that the kiddos are ready to accept us.  They do not know that we are coming or even that they have been matched.  I so hope they show excitement at the thought of becoming part of our family.  I hope they are a little sad to see us go but excited about our return to get them.  Pray even that we have free wifi where we are staying so we can Skype the boys every night.

I hope to blog while we are gone because I know how much I have enjoyed reading this part of other people's blogs.  We'll see what kind of wifi is available where we stay.  A LOT depends on that.

10 Years Old!

I can't believe it has been 10 years since I had my first precious baby.  You have to give credit to the poor, unfortunate, first-born children.  They have to break in the new parents -- and not just to being parents but forever.  He was my first baby, my first toddler, my first preschooler, my first homeschooling student, and my first 10 year-old.  With him, I will have to figure out how to parent a teen, homeschool high school, prepare for college, teach him to drive, let him date, and let him go.  Wow!  If a baby book is meant to be a record of firsts, it really should document every second of the firstborn's life!  He has to survive parents who don't truly KNOW what they are doing.  Every child that follows has a parent with a little experience.

Thank you, Colton, for being patient when we mess up.  Thanks for giving us a starting place for how to parent the rest of the kids.  You're a great son and a great big brother.

On the adoption, our fundraising is progressing.  At this point we have raised about $2400 out of the $13,500 we need before the first trip.  I've already applied for 3 grants.  It is my prayer that fundraising will get us through the first trip, and grants will get us through the second.  I'm taking the weekend off to celebrate Colton's birthday and to let my brain cool off.  I was really close to overheating from so much processing.  I'm still making lists of things to take on our trip, how to travel, what needs to be done before we go, what needs to be done between trips, etc. -- not to mention the usual whirlwind of doing school, church, and other activities.

We have really gained support since receiving our referral.  It's true that the process becomes more real to others when there are cute little faces looking back at you.  I'm already getting concerned about meeting them.  Will they like me?  I know they will like Tim -- everyone does!  Will they WANT to be in our family?   What gifts would they enjoy at their age?  What will we do together for our visits?  What if I forget to say something important to them.  How bad is it going to hurt to leave them there and come home?  Whew!  Makes my head spin.

TEAM UP

LATEST NEWS

For anyone just joining us, we have been on an adoption journey for almost 5 years.  We have now been matched with a beautiful brother and sister in Bulgaria.  These children deserve a chance to have a loving home where they can grow up feeling safe, secure, and wanted.  We want to provide them with that kind of home.  Our boys Colton and Eli are already very excited about their new brother and sister.

If you are familiar with international adoption, you know how expensive it can be.  While some of the fees have already been paid, we still have many more to go, not to mention the cost of traveling there twice.

COUNTING THE COST

We have worked through many, many fundraisers so far including 28 yard sales.  We’ve made things to sell and worked odd jobs.  While we don’t mind the work, we are now pressed for time.  We need roughly $13,500 before we can begin making travel arrangements for our first trip.  Most grants that I can apply for, now that we have a referral, would take 1-3 months to respond.   I’ll still be applying to them because we will have another $13,500 due by fall.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

What we are doing is asking our friends and family to TEAM UP with each other to help us make this goal.   We are asking you to be a Team Leader and share our story with at least 9 other people who might like to be a part of helping us bring our kids home.  Ask those 9 people to join you and your team in donating $10 each (more or less won’t be refused).  If you could do that, your team would have generated $100!  If we can find 135 people to be Team Leaders (and everyone participates), we will reach our $13,500 goal with ease.  As much as I hope everyone can help, I know some people truly can’t.  So if you happen to be someone who can do more than $10, that would be awesome!  Ask your team members to try to let us know in their transaction that they are donating through your team (write it on the check, comment in PayPal, comment on my blog, email me, etc.)

HOW TO BUILD A TEAM

Here are a few ideas of how to build your team…

1. You can print copies of this post (or your letter or email if you got those from us) to give to your friends, coworkers, neighbors, Sunday school class…whomever.  You might want to edit out the "How to Build a Team" section -- too much information.
2. You can make a request on Facebook for people to join your team.  For example…
• Some friends of mine are adopting 2 kids and need to raise a lot of money fast.  If you could donate just $10 to their cause you can go to the link below.  I’m looking for at least 9 people who will join my team in supporting them.  Let me know if you are interested.  If you do donate, please let them know you are supporting through my team.
3. You can send out an email using something like this…
• Some friends of mine from church (work, etc) are adopting two kids from Bulgaria.  You can read more about their story here (thedemossfamily.blogspot.com).  They’ve asked me to team up with a few friends to help them raise money.  I need to put together a team worth at least $100.  Could you put in $10?  You can donate by PayPal on their blog or mail it to the address shown there.  Just look for the blog entry titled TEAM UP.  You can also read more about this fundraiser there.  Just let me know if you can’t so I can look for another person.   If you do donate, please let them know that you are supporting through my team.

If you get more than 9 people responding on Facebook OR  if you can think of more than 9 people to send an email to OR if anyone wants to donate more than the requested $10, all the better!!  Anything above our first goal will go toward the final goal.

DONATIONS

Your donation can be made in one of three ways:

1. If you have the opportunity, give it to us personally.
2. Send a check to us at 3438 Leslie Ln., Murfreesboro, TN 37128.
3. Use the “Donate” button on the right to pay with PayPal.

Please help bring these beautiful children home.  Share our story and make donations as soon as possible.  We are setting April 15, 2012, as our goal for raising these funds.  Again, as soon as we have the funds, we can arrange our trip.  Any funds that may come in later can still be used for the final fees and 2^nd trip, but remember we MUST have $13,500 before the 1^st trip can be scheduled.  Hopefully we can raise the entire $27,000 and make this our last fundraiser!  Feel free to share our story with more than 9 people or share through email or Facebook.  You might even make sure you have your team built and then post it on Facebook for anyone else who might be interested.  If one of your team members wants to start a new team, that will work too!  Any way you can reach people to join our cause would be greatly appreciated.

With all our thanks,

The DeMoss Family (Tim, Libby, Colton, Eli, M & V)

My Plan or God's Plan

For those of you who have recently joined our story (and don't read a person's blog entirely from the beginning to "catch up" like I do), let me give you an update on where our journey has brought us so far and our most recent twist.

May 2007 - We attended our first informational meeting about adoption.

Aug/Sept 2007 - We committed to adoption.  We began fundraising first rather than applying.  The plan was to adopt 2 girls preferably sisters.

April 2008 - I started this blog.  By that time, we had decided on names for our girls:  Keely Page and Maggie Elizabeth.  We wanted them to be between the ages of 1 and 5.  We were still researching countries and agencies.

May 2008 - Bulgaria was chosen.

August 2008 - Agencies were unofficially chosen.  Miriam's Promise would be the homestudy and post-placement agency.  All God's Children International would be the placing agency.  We began paperwork for home study.

November 2008 - Changed agency choices.  We now planned to use Heaven Sent Children for the home study and post-placement study.  We also planned to use Christian World Adoption as the placing agency.

May 2009 - Changed one of the names from Maggie to Mattie.

November 2009 - We made our final change of agency choice (actually applying this time).  Our official placing agency would be Tree of Life.  Application submitted with Heaven Sent to officially begin our home study.  We requested 2 girls between the ages of 2 and 7.

June 2010 - Submitted our dossier.

Dec 6 2010 - We were officially registered in Bulgaria.

August 2011 - Updated home study and USCIS.  Changed the ages from 2-7 to read a birthday after "such and such".  This would make the oldest possible age at most 6 months younger than Colton.  It would also allow the maximum age to rise as Colton gets older.  After much hesitation, we also indicated we would be open to considering boys...but we continued to refer to our future kids as "the girls" anyway.

December 2011 - Finally finished renewing our USCIS approval.

February 2012 - MOJ asked our agency if we would be interested in a sibling group of 3.  We were interested but felt it might be more than we could take on.

So that brings us to March 2012.  Last Thursday, I emailed our social worker to ask her a question about a couple of kids she had sent out an email about.  Not really expressing interest, just curious.  She answered my question but told me I couldn't ask for them because we had a referral coming.  WHAT?  At this point she only knew that we had been matched but knew absolutely no details.  Friday, we got the details.  It shook me a little because it wasn't our plan.  It wasn't the little picture I had created in my head of our lives.  I had pictured 2 cute little girls:  one younger than Eli...maybe both.  Not the case.  Are you ready for this?  We were matched with a brother and sister.  Did you catch that?  WE HAVE A REFERRAL!!!!!  The boy (M) is 9, and his sister (V) is 7.  In fact, she turned 7 just four days before Eli did.  We had always joked that one might be close to Eli's age and we'd call them twins.  So now we have twins (four days apart) -- Eli with his red hair and V with her long beautiful black hair.  I can't wait to start braiding!

Now, I posted all of the history up above to show you something.  We have had our plan for quite a while.  This brother/sister duo is not what I had planned.  They are not what I had pictured.  In my head all my thoughts centered around 2 little girls.  I had their room planned somewhat.  Their ages varied from one day to the next, but that was the most significant detail that was unknown.  When I received the pictures of M and V, my first that was "What?  A boy?"  Would you believe I've actually had that reaction before?  When we were planning a family, we casually talked about future kids' names.  The first one we picked was a girl's name.  When we found out we were finally expecting, we came up with a boy's name but mostly focused our talk on the girl we felt sure we would have.  When the ultrasound showed (very clearly) that we were going to have a boy, we were stunned.  "What?  A boy?"  It took us a good half hour or so to wrap our brains around the idea and decide life would be alright with a boy.  Next Colton comes along, and we fell head over heels for him.  God knew best.  He had a plan better than ours.  Fast forward to our referral.  It felt the same way.  Knowing how everything worked out so well last time, we knew we needed to seriously consider embracing this change.  When I told Colton that we had received a referral, I told him that this wasn't exactly what we had planned, but that I didn't want to get so focused on my plan that I missed out on something God had planned ('cause I know He is a much better planner than I ever thought about being).

We did take a couple of days to think about it, talk about it, pray about it, and talk to a few other folks about it.  I even spent some time staring at the boys' room trying to figure out how to put 3 boys in there.  Long story short, we decided that these indeed were our children.  We are so excited!  Colton and Eli are so excited.  They keep looking at the pictures over and over.  They tell everyone.  They keep asking why we can't leave now and bring them home.  For those of you new to adoption, I can't post their pictures or names or detailed information about them here.  Friends, I also can't email anything to you.  But if I happen to see you in person, please ask to see my pictures (like I won't offer)!  I have 77 of them on my phone!

The next step?  Major fundraising fast.  Big payments are due before we travel, and we have some expensive travelling to do.  We are tentatively planning to travel in early May.  It would have been sooner, but Tim needed to stay at school through the kids' state testing week.  Then we come back and apply for as many grants as possible, do some more fundraising, get the house ready and travel again.  The second trip may be some time in September or October.  Then the new roller coaster ride begins.....

Did I mention they are beautiful????

Closer

Told you I wouldn't make it back on here before Christmas.  We are now entering what I call Birthday Season.  Counting our extended family, we have birthdays every month from January through October.  For the 4 in our actual household, we run February through May -- one per month.  Eli's is next week.  He'll be 7.  It's hard to believe that we went to our first informational adoption meeting just a little after Eli turned 2.

School is going fine.  I'm still working on pacing ourselves and trying to balance school with housework, adoption work, and just-stuff-I-really-wanna-do.  The boys are doing well academically.  Of course, I'm their mom and teacher, so I think they are brilliant.  I must confess that I have to continually remind myself that they are kids and that they are not me.  Sometimes they have a different perspective about school than I did at their age. I probably need to cover our school time in more prayer than I do.

I'm still working on that weight loss thing.  My contract with Curves is almost up.  I wish I could go regularly, but I just can't.  We are too crazy busy.  So I'll be glad to quit making monthly donations to their company. ; )  But I absolutely MUST find time to exercise on my own and find a way to make sure I stick to it.

The boys are getting restless about the adoption.  I can't say I blame them.  It must look like we are all talk and no action.  They want the girls to hurry up and get here.  We actually did get a call recently asking if we would consider a sibling set of 3 instead of 2.  Of course, we would consider it!  And we did consider it.  And it hurt really bad to say that we didn't feel we could support 3.  It's not that I don't trust God's provision.  I've always trusted that He will provide the funds for our adoption fees, travel expenses, etc.  But, Tim's a teacher; I stay home; our income is what it is.  To adopt ONE more child than we have right now would not be a huge blow to our budget.  To adopt 30, would be a huge blow.  It would be insane and impossible.  So somewhere in between 1 and 30, is a line where just one more is too many.  I don't know how to find that exactly, but right now it feels like that line is between 2 and 3.  TWO is okay; THREE is too many.  It was tempting to say yes just to make the process finish and go away.  When I was pregnant, I tried to "enjoy" every moment of the process...knowing that it was temporary.  Now, I'm like the woman who loves her babies but hates everything about being pregnant.  I am not enjoying being paper pregnant.  I just keep telling myself that this too shall pass.

It does show that our papers are before the MOJ, and they know our names.  They are trying to match us.  So maybe Keely and Mattie will be here before too much longer!  Guess I'd better get back to my fundraising!

Happy Valentine's Day (a little early)

Back on Track (One Year Later)

Finally, we have our immigration papers updated.  Last time I posted (I know, it's been awhile), I was about to head back to Nashville for yet another set of fingerprints.  Good or bad, USCIS only makes you re-do them once.  So if they were bad again, it really didn't matter.

Since then, we went back for the fingerprints, got our I-797C (immigration approval), printed off another document saying that the I-797C is "True and Accurate", had that notarized, and had the notarization certified.  Today, we made the trip back to Nashville to have the certification of the notarization apostilled by the secretary of state.  Are you following?  The US government issued the I-797C themselves; you'd think that would be official enough.  Oh well, I'm learning to just jump through the hoops.

Tomorrow, I make sure I have scanned all parts of this document before mailing it to our agency so they can send it to Bulgaria.  Then I will email scanned copies to both of our agencies, and begin focusing again on fundraising.  Has anyone done any fundraising near Christmas?  My gut instinct is that it is a bad time of year to ask for donations.  After all everyone else is also asking, and there are Christmas presents to buy, etc.  I know folks are supposed to feel more giving at this time, but still.

I guess this all means we are back on track -- through with updating and back to waiting.  By the way, today marks the 1 year anniversary of our being officially registered in Bulgaria.  Maybe we are getting close to a referral.  At least we are a year closer!  LOL  My thoughts bounce around from being excited to feeling not ready; I'm scared to go, but I want the process behind me.

Just in case I don't post again before Christmas, I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas season.

• Enjoy your family.  
• Don't rush through the holidays.
• Make memories.
• Start a new tradition.
• Focus more on others than on yourself.
• Remember it truly is better to give than to receive.
• And remember that it isn't about the gifts we exchange but about the Gift we were given over 2000 years ago when Jesus Christ was born.  (If you don't know Him personally, accept His gift this year above all others.)