Love Crosses Oceans

Our shirt design is ready, and I love it!  I hope you do, too :-)  Love, love my oceans and can't wait to see my children playing together at the beach one of these days, and it just came together so easily with this verse that seems to follow us through both adoptions.  Without further ado, here they are!

The shirts come in Adult, Youth, and (yes!) Toddler sizes, and you have a choice of Jade or Charcoal colors.

If you order a jade toddler shirt, keep in mind the shirt color is a little lighter due to availability in that size bracket.  Here is the toddler jade version:

Adult shirts: $18 each or $20 shipped

Children's sizes: $15 each or $17 shipped

We will place one large order later this summer and deliver/ mail the shirts to you.  Because we are using a local company, we anticipate a good turnaround time once the shirts are printed!

Now for the fun part!  

To order, comment on this post or email me at elizabeth@norrisfamilyins.com!  

One Year!

Vivienne has officially been with us a year!  It's been only a year since God blew us away with His grace, when a little girl just barely 24 months old walked into a hot, red room holding her caregiver's hand.

It's such a sensory memory, the heat of the room, the red paint, how solid and warm she felt in my arms, her scent, her damp hair, and those sweet little hands.  Yes, she was afraid on this day we celebrate- how on earth could anyone prepare a child to start their day like any other morning, and drive literally down a mountain side and into this city of about 8 million people, with the clothes she wore, a starter kit of the formula she was used to, and a little bag with our care package items inside?  How do you explain that everything is going to be okay, even GOOD?

Time.  A week, 2 weeks, a month, 3 months, 6 months...12 months.  "You can trust me."  "I love you."  "Mama helps you/ Daddy can do it."  Over and over and over.  We celebrate gotcha day!  It was the beginning of us together!  We "got" each other, all of us.  We became mama, daddy, and daughter that day.  She fell asleep in my arms before she finished her bottle that first night, which as the time was amazing (even if her utter exhaustion might have contributed!).  We waited 15 official months and prayed for her before we knew her face.  We set up the nursery and nested like crazy.  Thousands of miles and dollars and tears, sleepless nights, and joyful anticipation went ahead of that day.  Even going through the adoption process again now, and although  I'm quick to look again to the barriers we still have to climb, I have this constant reminder playing at my side (okay, on me lol!) that not only was she "worth the wait," she's worth it all and more, over and over again.

This girl is fun, adventurous, generous, compassionate, smart, and sweet!  She loves with her whole heart, and I am so excited to see her grow into the person God made her to be. 

We are blessed beyond measure to call her our daughter.

For this child I have prayed, and the Lord has granted my petition that I made to him.

1 Samuel 1:27

I800a Time!

Our home study has been finalized!  Our agency submitted our application to adopt a child from China to U.S. immigration, and in the last two weeks we've received both our receipt and fingerprint appointment.  Yes, more fingerprints!  This time we get biometrically fingerprinted at the immigration office in New Orleans.  Anyone else ever wonder why all fingerprints would not be considered "bio metric?"  Am I being too literal?  :-)  Although the state and federal levels have run our prints, immigration also needs prints as part of approving us to adopt internationally.  This entire approval process seems to be taking 30-45 days total lately, which is faster than two years ago!  Once we have approval from immigration, we can send all our dossier documents through the certification and authentication process, preparing the entire packet for it's trip across the ocean.

Time to celebrate this milestone and welcome summertime!

• It's finally adoption shirt time, and I am so, so excited about these!  Be looking for a new post soon with design photos and purchasing into! 

• And until then, a friend is throwing a Jamberry nail party on Facebook, benefiting our adoption.  If you haven't been added and want to start off the summer with super cute nail wraps, let me know!  Here is the link if you just want to shop: 

http://tonyasmith.jamberrynails.net/party/?uid=3a3ce681-4cee-43f7-b24c-e482398fd2c6

Finally, I am also very excited to announce that we were approved by Adopt Together!  This allows for tax-deductible donations to be designated to our adoption through the Adopt Together button on the right column of this blog.  If you look at the tabs on the Adopt Together website, you can learn more about how this works.  While we hope to offer fun opportunities to help, we personally have had times when we preferred to give a small amount to a family's adoption rather than make a purchase.  There's absolutely no expectation, only our sincere appreciation if we even make it on anybody's "to think about" list.

If you are following our progress,

Adoption costs covered to date: $6,805.75
Next milestone in costs: $3,857.75

And just because she says it so well, I have to include a link to an article written by one of the women who encouraged me to look deeper at our desire to adopt a couple years ago:

http://showhope.org/guest-post-stefanie/    

April showers after all!

Thank you for being so patient while we "recovered" after the yard sale!  Made possible by many of you (thank you over and over!), the sale was great!  Together with savings, we were able to cover our upcoming dossier preparation costs, which is really wonderful...because we recently received news that it is indeed time to get our dossier together!  More on that in a separate post in the next day or two.

      

While the original plan was to do a Friday/Saturday event, for logistical reasons we had to let that balloon fly away.  We decided to try Saturday/Sunday, with a late start Sunday so we weren't yard selling in place of church...optimistic, but it's what we came up with in a pinch!  Saturday morning started out so...mmm, quiet.  Our ads and signs were all there...The weather was gorgeous...The neighborhood sale this coincided with is always so big that finding parking can be a challenge.  Not so much this year!  I have theories, but I doubt we ever will know why- It was just plain slow.  Steady though!  From 7:00am until late afternoon, we had people here.

It's okay if I don't see another moving box for a few years.

Sunday- ah Sunday- well, we knew it could be tough.  But until just before the sale, rain was not in the forecast.  Certainly not the storm that blew through.  It was just one of those mornings.  First of all, we were dressed and ready for an 8am service (um, it's a 7am service).  Then, we heard the rain- and wind- blow in.  We ran outside to secure plastic coverings that had broken free, items under the carport were literally flying off tables...Vivienne, meanwhile, is joyfully exclaiming "Rain, Mama!" and trying to play in the downpour...Anyway :-)  The rain was supposed to end at 10am, coincidentally our published starting time- hopeful, right?  Not so much.  When it finally did stop for good, the wind made itself at home for the remainder of the day.  Rick Warren (Saddleback apparently broadcasts live) chose this morning to discuss God's timing and His provision :-)  It was an interesting morning...and afternoon, and we spent the day in single digits for visitors.

Just hanging out mom.

See?  We tried to prepare!

I really don't know how it happened, except that every dollar adds up, but by Sunday afternoon we were ready to send a check to immigration and send our dossier through the authentication process.  Not only that, but we learned that an adoptive family at our church organizes a big garage sale here in town every year.  When I say big, I mean they keep a warehouse big.  They collect all year, and the proceeds go to provide for children living in an orphanage in China.  SO all those items you donated, sold at our own sale or not, seem destined to bless!               

Balloons- entertainment AND a toddler tracking device!  Who knew?

Relaxing with Aunt Rachel after the sale

Okay, so this one is from the day before set-up day!  I thought we could use some special time before all the commotion.  Little did I know this child would be totally into the event!!!