The Apparent Project Partnership - Part 2

The Bracelets are here and WOW…they are beautiful!!  These will make perfect Christmas gifts for any female on your list – Teachers, Mothers, Daughters, Sisters, Nieces, etc.  They also make great Stocking Stuffers!

 

Most of the 150 bracelets we received from Haiti are multi colored in nature like those pictured above.
 
These bracelets are one of a kind, handmade, up cycled, and not only helping Haitians keep their current families together; you are also supporting our adoption from Ethiopia.  You can read more about this from our previous post.  You might ask…where are you in that process now?  We are currently #17 on a list to receive a referral for our son.  We are hopeful that this wonderful phone call will come before Christmas, but if not, we are very expectant that it will be by the end of January.  So we thank you in advance for helping us bring our son home. J

Each bracelet is $10.  To place your order, you can email Jaclyn.cooper@ymail.com with your name and address where you would like your bracelet(s) shipped.  If you live in the Topeka, KS, area we will deliver  them to you.  If you live outside the Topeka area, please add $2 to the total cost for shipping.  If you have specific requests for bracelets, please let us know in your email. 

We can also accept orders via Facebook if that is easier for you. 

Thank you, God Bless and Merry Christmas!!! 

The Apparent Project Partnership

I am super excited to share our latest fundraiser with you as I think this is the best one yet!  We are partnering with an inspiring organization called The Apparent Project to bring these beautiful, one of a kind bracelets to YOU.  

The Apparent Project, based in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, exists to give parents jobs in order to keep their families together.  

You may be surprised to know that very often a child in an orphanage is not there because his or her parents have both died or abandoned him/her. Too often families are forced by poverty to place their children in the care of an orphanage. Many moms and dads desire to keep their families together but due to extreme poverty and harsh living conditions they are unable to do so. This happens around the world.

The Apparent project is working to change that it Haiti.

"In Haiti, poverty and the legacy of slavery have caused a staggering culture of child abandonment and male neglect of family commitments. 70% of labor aged Haitians are unemployed, while those who are employed earn an average annual wage of $400". - The Apparent Project

Because there are still an estimated 147-153 million orphans worldwide there is a great need for families and individuals to foster, adopt, or provide orphan care.

That brings us to our fundraiser! The parents of The Apparent Project make a variety of beautiful handcrafted goods including jewelry created from handmade paper beads.  The paper is mostly from repurposed cereal boxes.  We will be selling bracelets made by the women and men of The Apparent Project. Each bracelet is unique and comes with a card featuring information about the artist who made your bracelet.

Bracelets are available for $10. The best part? You will be helping TWO ways.  Your purchase provides jobs (and keeps families together) in Haiti AND helps us bring a child OUT of an orphanage to his family! How often does $10 do all that?!

If you would like one (or more!) of these gorgeous bracelets contact us through email (Jaclyn.cooper@ymail.com), Facebook, this blog, call us, etc.  We can ship too! Just add $2 to cover shipping costs please! 

• Spread the word! Let your circle of friends, church, bible study group, work, anyone know about these bracelets. They make great Christmas gifts, teacher gifts, co-worker gifts, etc. 
• Pray! Use the bracelet as a reminder to pray for orphans, our adoption, and the families in The Apparent Project! 

Thank you so much for your support and prayers!!

Prayerfully Waiting

I realize it has been 3 months since our last posting here and I thought I should write something to remember what was happening when we look back at this part of our journey.  Even as I type this though, tears fills my eyes to think that we are able to document everything on “our” side of this journey, but our son won’t have much to remember his side, and that is what is really important…

Has he been born yet?  If so, what is his story?  Is he okay?  Does he have someone to comfort him when he cries?  Does he have someone to feed him when he is hungry?  How is his birth mom doing?  Is she still alive?  If so, how do people in her village treat her?  How is she handling her decision?  Where is our son’s father in this?  How is he handling everything? 

Father God, please protect them all and give them your comfort and peace. 

So I almost have to focus on the paperwork and life here in our current family because the emotions are so overwhelming.  So this is what we have been doing the last 6 weeks or so…

Since we moved to Kansas, we needed to update our home study to reflect this change as well as the job change for Josh and me staying home now.  So we applied with a wonderful Christian Agency called Lifeline Children’s Services to do this update for us.  We got fingerprinted downtown Topeka at the police station and had them sent off to make sure we weren’t felons anywhere. J  Our home study update has been drafted and now we wait on the state to send back the fingerprinting clearances so the home study can be completed. 

Our USCIS approval to adopt an orphan from Ethiopia has also recently expired (since we have been in this process for over 2 years already J).  So, we had to send in an extension request, with a ton of paperwork, for this to be extended and we get to be re-fingerprinted by the government next week.  So, next Thursday, Josh and I travel 90 minutes to Kansas City, MO to the USCIS office to have our fingerprints taken electronically and then sent back to the US gov’t for approval. 

As far as waiting, as of today we are officially number ….

on our agency's wait list for a referral. 

We are still hopeful that in the next 2 months we will receive our referral call, meaning that we will be “matched” with our son.  This is when we receive a picture of him, any medical history and background that is available.  Of course, that background info will be his information to share when he is older if and when he is ready.  But that will be an exciting day for us.  As I was talking this over with a friend yesterday, I guess you could somewhat compare it to the day a child is born, as now we have an actual face to be praying for.  But in actuality, there is really nothing to compare the excitement of this day to.  We are really looking forward to our referral day phone call!!

And… commence the prayerful waiting…  Thanks for praying with us!!

Transitions again

The June update came out yesterday and we moved up 3 spots on the list this month to number….

 

Thirty-one is a good number for us right now.  Honestly, I am glad we didn’t move up any further right now because the Cooper family is in the midst of some pretty big changes – none quite as big a deal as bringing a son home from Ethiopia – but big changes nonetheless.

Last month, Josh and I traveled to Topeka, Kansas to visit with members and staff of Grace Point Church, where Josh was interviewing for a campus pastor position for a soon-to-be launched satellite location in Topeka.  We absolutely fell in love with the people of Grace Point and with the area.  The entire time we were there, we felt God’s presence, peace, guiding and comfort in that this was a perfect fit for Josh and for the church.  After 4 days of interviewing/ meeting lots of really cool people, Josh was offered the position.  The next morning, we accepted and started our short search to find the perfect house.  That afternoon we made an offer and it was accepted a little while later. 

Back in Zeeland, we put our current home on the market and had 5 offers in 48 hours.  So, our house is now “pending” and we are waiting for a closing date to depart Michigan and make the 12 hour journey to Topeka.  Most things are off the wall and numerous boxes are packed.  Josh has completed his time serving as an Associate pastor at Compass, our church home the last 3 years. 

Many have asked…so how does this move effect your adoption?  We are staying with our current placing Agency in Jenison, MI, Adoption Associates. However, since we are moving out of state, we need to complete a new homestudy in Kansas as well as many forms in our dossier.  We have a found a Christian agency in Topeka that has agreed to update our homestudy and I will be extra busy after the move updating forms galore once again. 

But we are so confident that we are following God’s will for our lives.  And there is so much peace in this knowledge and faith.  Thank you, God!

Wait List Update

We received an update from our agency this afternoon and we are number 35 on the list. 

 

We moved 12 spots in 1 months’ time.  YEAH!!!  Fifteen children were referred to families this past month from Ethiopia.  Please pray with us for these families as they prepare to travel in the next 2 months and of course for these children.

The agency also said they expect to have an additional 15 referrals soon.  Our agency is now saying that we should expect another 5-7 months before receiving a referral.  Getting closer....

All about Ethiopia

Ethiopia Facts:

Official name: Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia

Size: about twice the size of Texas

Capital: Addis Ababa

Climate: Moderate in highlands; hot and dry in lowlands

Languages: Amharic, Arabic, English, Oromigna, Tirigna, others

Currency: Birr ($1 USD = 18.50 Br as of March 28, 2013)

Products: Coffee, cereals, sugarcane, oilseeds, honey

 

Ethiopia Facts for Children:

School:

• Because much of Ethiopia is rural, kids who attend school may have to walk several miles each way.
• Unlike in most African nations, school in Ethiopia is free. However, many kids work to help support their families. Less than half are still enrolled by grade 5.

Play:

• Gebeta, a game of strategy, has been popular for hundreds of years. It is played using seeds or pebbles and a board with rows of cups.
• Many kids learn the lively and irresistible eskista dance, which is performed almost entirely with the shoulders. Soccer is the most popular sport.

Family:

• Most families live in rural areas. It is common for an extended family to live in a cluster of houses and farm together.
• Traditionally, parents and children do not share a last name. Most kids take their father’s first name as their last name.

Favorite foods:

• Injera, a pancake-like bread that is used to scoop up spicy dishes such as doro wat (chicken stew) and mesir wat (lentil stew).

Sources: http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0932441.html; http://www.timeforkids.com/destination/ethiopia; http://coinmill.com/ETB_USD.html#USD=1

On the Wait List!!

I checked my email today before I headed out for work and lo and behold, I received an email from UPS.  Our Dossier had arrived at Adoption Associates in Jenison meaning that today we were added to the official Wait List.  We are currently family number

in line to be referred a child from Ethiopia.  We are being told to expect a 9-12 month wait to receive a referral.  But today is a good day.  We are on the list and can start the official waiting this time around.  And we know this is where we are supposed to be.  Faithfully waiting…

After the referral, we are told to plan on another 4-5 months total before our son will be able to come home with us.   Approximately two months in to that waiting, Josh and I will get to take a trip to Ethiopia to meet our son.  Then the second trip there, we will be able to bring him home with us…forever…to be part of his new forever family.

Mailbox Stalking Paid Off

Yesterday, Josh called me at work to give me the normal update on the content status of the daily mail, the same thing he and my Mom have been taking turns doing on their appointed day for the last 12 days or so as we stalked the mail for the final piece of paperwork to arrive so we could complete our dossier.  He started the conversation out, “So, how is your day going?”  My heart nearly skipped a beat as they have both been instruction to respond to my hello with a “Yes” or a “No” as they know why they are calling and what I am expecting (i.e. needing) to hear.  Finally, he told me, YES, it came.  The USCIS approval form came in the mail!!!!  (For those other parents in process out there who had to send paperwork back to USCIS for an update, it took 17 days including 3 weekends as it arrived there on a Friday morning and back home on a Monday afternoon.)  This final piece of paper is our approval visa to adopt our son from Ethiopia and we needed this as a part of our dossier.  Yeah!!

So then, Josh came to work to have my co-worker notarize two final documents.  Then I made final copies of the whole dossier of 24 notarized documents.  This morning, Josh and I found our way to the Office of the Great Seal in Grand Rapids, located in a mall of all places, to have the first two documents “sealed”.  And then this afternoon, I prepared the packet to be mailed to a courier service to have them walk our dossier through the US Department of State in D.C. as well as the Ethiopian Embassy in D.C. Here is a picture of our packet before I sent it.  This is the last time we will see our documents. 

 

After this is done, the courier service will mail the dossier back to Adoption Associates in Jenison and they will mail our dossier to Ethiopia and then….. we will be on the WAIT LIST TO RECEIVE A REFERRAL!!

Now I know it sounds like a whole lot of excitement to just start waiting again, but we have been jumping through a lot of hoops that last 3 months in order to adopt from Ethiopia as opposed to Lesotho and we are finally really close to having the major portion of the paperwork complete.  Praise God!!

On the Move Again

I just received a call that our home study update is complete.  With any luck, it will be in our hands Thursday and then off to the USCIS (United States Citizen & Immigration Services) center where they will update our orphan visa approval cable and send it to ETHIOPIA.  After this has been updated, we can complete our dossier and then have it sent to Ethiopia to patiently wait for a referral for Baby Boy Cooper.  He is getting closer....

“If it seems slow, wait patiently, for it will surely take place.  It will not be delayed.”  

As I found the waiting very frustrating today, a fellow adoptive Mom offered the following verse as encouragement. 

But these things I plan won't happen right away. Slowly, steadily, surely, the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled. If it seems slow, wait patiently, for it will surely take place. It will not be delayed.

Habakkuk 2:3 (NLT)

I hope you find this verse encouraging as well.  I now have it posted in my cubicle at work.  God is in control.   

What a Beautiful Story

Please take the time to watch this inspiring story.  Click on the link below. 

I Like Adoption

Change, Change, Change...

A lot has happened since the last time we wrote anything on the blog.  Since July we have been waiting to hear word of another matching meeting in Lesotho but every month seemed to come and go.  On December 1, the Lesotho government decided to join the Hague convention for international adoptions.  I am sure there are others out there that could explain this better than me, but from what I understand, they are trying to protect their children from trafficking.  What it means for adoption agencies and prospective families is more paperwork and higher fees, etc.  With all this said, the Lesotho government also asked for 3 more months of a break from meetings to work on getting their new system in place in Lesotho.  All of the above brought many new questions for us, including whether or not our current placing agency would really be able to finalize our adoption since they are not a Hague Accredited agency.

After a lot of discussions and prayer, we decided to walk away from our investment in a potential match in Lesotho.  It felt very much like what I imagine a miscarriage to feel like.  …All the expectations of a son from Lesotho, imagining what he would look like, imagining traveling there to bring him home.  

…None of that will happen now.  But…unlike a miscarriage, we are moving full speed ahead.

For the last month, we have been diligently working on updating paperwork with Adoption Associates in Jenison, MI (our new placing agency) to have a new dossier sent to… Addis Ababa, ETHIOPIA!!