Hello Hello!
We’ve been busy! Our home study has been completed, our mandated education is nearly complete and now we are awaiting our i800a approval from the USCIS. Between paperwork, running a household, fundraising, and trying to stay sane we could all use a nap (said every adopting parents I’m sure!).
In spite of needing a nap, remember my constant prayer? It’s simply that God would BLOW MY MIND throughout the entire adoption process, and I’d be cutting him short if I said he hasn’t done exactly that through each and every endeavor we’ve made thus far. He connected us with the very best social worker who completed our home study in record time (and well I might add). He’s provided the exact money we’ve needed when we’ve needed it. Our USCIS fingerprinting date happened to fall when Tad would be out of the country for work. We decided to risk it and just walked in hoping they’d give us favor – and they did. God is FAITHFUL. 
Currently we are gathering all the needed documents for our dossier and waiting for our i800a (I had a helper – see above). Once we receive that we can then submit our dossier and finally…wait. It’s strange to me that we want to ‘hurry up so we can wait’, but the sooner we start waiting, the sooner we can lay eyes on the face(s) that will soon be called ours.
So while we wait, we fundraise! We still need roughly $16,000 (Did you read that?!?! God has already provided us with over half of what we need!) $16,000 is still a lot of money, and we need help. Thankfully our next fundraiser lands you with a sweet portrait session with your’s truly out of the deal. 
As the picture says, for every $5 you choose to donate to our adoption between now and 9/20/14, your name will be entered another time into the raffle. A winner will be drawn on 9/21/14 and announced right here & other social media outlets. So PLEASE leave an email address in the message box while you donate. The prize is a 30 minute portrait session in the Ames/Des Moines area (a $135.00 value) and must been scheduled before the end of 2014. So come on all of you Christmas/New Year card loving peeps (or you ‘I don’t need photographs, but love adoption so I’ll donate anyway’ people) – it’s raffle time!!
PRAY:
- That God would continue to BLOW OUR MINDS in how he provides for us
- That Jesus would received all the credit for any accomplishments we achieve
- That we’d be able to compile all the needed notarized and apostilled documents in time so that when our i800a is approved everything is ready to be submitted
- That God would be caring for and providing nurture & protection for our future little ones
- That we’d get a nap
The Asay Placey 