loved...

Violet's dance BFF!

Do you ever feel overwhelmed with support and love? That was us Thursday at Chick-fil-A. We held a fundraiser there and so many people came to support us by participating! :) We hung around most of the day. We saw friends from our time serving in student ministry at Team Church in Matthews who we had not seen in probably 8 years. We saw friends from LifePointe too. One lady had watched Chloe and Violet every Sunday while they were little and got to see the girls for the first time in several years. I even saw a teenager who I taught in preschool as a 3-year-old. I'm not ashamed to say he was totally one of my favorites!

Of course, we saw many friends who came from New River Church, where Kevin is the student pastor. We saw friends from dance class, Upward Cheerleading, neighbors, you name it. Not to mention the many we never got to see who went through the drive-thru. We can't thank you all enough for supporting us the way you do!

My friend Erin just wrapped up her Jamberry Fundraiser Party. God used that party to bless us with $200! It was so generous of Erin AND especially her friend (who I have never met) to offer to hold a fundraiser for us. It's obvious to me that God is in our adoption process by the way things just fall into place.

Our community is holding a garage sale next Saturday, May 2nd. Several friends have donated items to our family's sale and many more are bringing stuff to us this week! So, if you are in the Lake Wylie area next Saturday, come check out the Autumn Cove garage sale from 7 am to noon! The girls are planning to do a bake sale in our garage... A friend's Bible study group is baking cookies and her daughters have offered to come help the girls with the bake sale.

We are loved. Our children are loved. Our future child is loved. The best part about this love is it comes from an overflow of love from our amazing Savior. So many of the people supporting our adoption are Christ-followers. They understand unselfish and sacrificial love because it has been displayed for them through their relationship with Jesus Christ. I cannot WAIT to extend that kind of love from us, from our family and friends to our kiddo who is waiting for us!

Adoption paperwork update! We are officially finished with our dossier. We visited the local Citizenship and Immigration support center in Charlotte to have our fingerprints electronically scanned the other day as the final step in our I800a application. After our I-800a form is approved by Homeland Security, our adoption agency has offered to notarize and apostille that document. So, that's a blessing as it saves us money and time. In about 2-3 weeks, we should hear back from Immigration regarding our I-800a approval. By that time, our dossier translation should be complete and our dossier will finally be ready for the trip to Bulgaria. After roughly another two weeks for the Ministry of Justice to review our document, we will be on the waiting list to adopt a Bulgarian orphan! At that point, it's a waiting game, and we just have to keep our paperwork up to date while we "wait by the phone" for the call from our adoption agency.

I am truly shocked that we have made it to this point! It really seemed like we would never get here. Thank you again for all your encouragement and support. Enjoy these pictures from Chick fil A! We loved seeing you all and wish we could have talked more with each of you!