Adoption by the Numbers and Where we are in the Process

Since we are doing some fundraising for the adoption of sister six, I feel it is only fair to offer numbers for those who are generously donating their hard earned dollars.

Adoption costs are not something most adoptive parents like to talk about. However, it only seems right to show others how a normal family like ours can "afford" to adopt.

Ruth's adoption cost was $35,000, including our two and a half weeks of travel in China. We received $5,000 in grants, $10,000 from family and friends through donations and fundraisers, and paid the remaining $20,000 out of our income/savings. A large portion of what we paid came from my sign painting business which I closed after Ruth came home.

We anticipate that sister six's adoption will be right around the same amount, perhaps a little less since we do receive a small discount on our homestudy fee and some of the paperwork we do not need to purchase a second time.

So far we have paid $4,700 in fees. We recently received a $1,000 donation for which we are tremendously grateful. That will pay for our immigration fee (around $700) and the cost to certify and authenticate all our documents for our Dossier which will go to China.

After we are matched we will have a large bill, around $12,500 and then a few months later we will pay our travel fees which will likely be around $10,000.

We are currently selling t-shirts from Bonfire. The more shirts we sell the higher dollar amount per shirt we receive. If shirts aren't your thing, I am also planning a silent auction of my hand-painted signs (including FIVE custom signs) and canvas prints and framed photographs from my sister, Stacy's, gorgeous landscape photography. The silent auction will be all done online and will hopefully take place in late September or early October (so you can give these as Christmas gifts).

If at any time you feel led to give a donation directly please send me a message and I'll let you know how you can do that.

We also will plan on hosting an event at some point. Plans are still in the works for this, but I'll be sure to keep you updated.

Now, where are we in the process? We just finished our last homestudy visit! Hooray! Our social worker is aiming to have our homestudy written by the end of August! After that is officially done, we will send it and some other documents to receive immigration approval. While it's hard to say how long all these things will take to come through, we are cautiously optimistic that our Dossier will go to China in October. At that point, we will wait to be matched!

We appreciate all of you. Some people do not receive as much support for a second adoption as they do for their first but we must have the best friends and family in the world because we've felt that everyone is even more supportive and excited this time around.

Thanks, everyone, for your continued support!