What a great day!

Yesterday was long, but good. It started out with an incredible update on Theo from a therapist who was recently hired to work with some of the children. You can support therapy for the kids through Maya's Hope! Theo is not one of the children receiving regular therapy because there are other children with more desperate need right now, but he was able to be evaluated.

It was really great news! His cerebral palsy affects one side of his body more than the other, and the stronger side is in generally decent condition.  That is amazing, because we had been under the impression that he had triplegia and didn't have much use of either of his legs. He does have some joint problems in his hip, which we expected from the amount of time he spends in the same position without stretching and that he is an older child who hasn't had therapy. He does have some atrophy on his weaker side, which we could tell from photographs, but he is able to use all of his limbs to some degree.

We are just amazed. With adoption, you really have no idea how accurate medical records will be. Often they are breadcrumbs, hinting at bigger or different problems. Sometimes concerns are overstated or files are mixed up. You really never know what you will get, so it is best to be prepared for the worst and pleased if things aren't what you prepared for. It is still quite possible that we will find something we weren't expecting. Most of our assessments have been based on photo or video clips, so hearing from someone with expertise who has been there and cares about the kids is just beyond great.

We received a new picture of Orion too! I love his sense of humor. He is wearing a caregiver's vest, which is part of their uniform.  He kept saying that he must be in charge since he was wearing the vest. I love it!  He is pretending to read in the picture, but who knows what he will be able to do once he is here! We know these kids are going to do great things!

It was a good thing that we had such a great start to the day, because the rest of it was spent on a long but productive slog to enable us to mail out our completed documents.  Have I talked about the notary > county certification > apostille process before? It is long and tedious, but a necessary step to validate all of our documents. We were holding completed documents from several different counties that all needed to be checked out. Some counties are wonderful to work with. They have quick, cheerful clerks who do their jobs well. Other counties aren't so great, but in the end you get what you need.  One of the counties was the latter. But I got what I went there for and right now that is what counts.


This will be my last plug for our t-shirts! The sale ends Sunday night. We are really close, and I hope we will hit fifty shirts! We will go back to our VACATION GIVEAWAY next week, so stay tuned if you want another chance to win!

https://www.bonfirefunds.com/bloom-adoption/?r=19547
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All of the families on THIS PAGE still need our support! I know money is tight, and there is so much need.  Little things like sharing fundraisers on your Facebook page don't cost anything, but that support means so much to families.  It helps us keep fighting for these kids when we see how many other people care about them too!

Here is another need.

The Claus family is SO CLOSE to hitting a matching grant. Their FSP needs to read $3840 for them to gain an additional $1000! Isn't their son precious?

http://reecesrainbow.org/57886/sponsorclaus

They have another fundraiser here too!

http://insearchofpearls.blogspot.com/2013/11/piece-of-puzzle.html