Matching Grant and Little Pim Thank You Giveaway

I am so honored to announce that we have been awarded a matching grant by an amazing anonymous group to help us get Barton home. We need our FSP to read $28,450.50 to meet the $550 grant. You can go HERE to donate. Right now it is at $27,900.50. We have two weeks to raise the money for this grant. This is a huge help and we are so thankful for it! The total amount when we meet this grant will cover more than an entire plane ticket! Wow!

As our thank you to everyone helping us meet or match this grant, we are going to give away 3 Little Pim discovery sets. Each set has 3 DVDs and a small stuffed panda. We will be giving away 1 set in English and 2 sets in Mandarin Chinese. The set in English is great for newly adopted kids. We bought one for our kids! The Mandarin sets could be used for young adopted children to maintain some of their first language, for excited new siblings, or just as a fun introduction to the language.

I will tell you guys up front that I *love* Little Pim. I have used the French language discs as part of an early elementary language study program for some of my kids. The background music is soothing and calms kids (and mamas) down. The vocabulary focuses on daily activities and objects young children will encounter. It is gentle. I love gentle! I am happy to answer questions you might have!

There are a few ways to be entered. For every $5 donation, you are entered once into the giveaway! (2 entries for $10, etc.) You can also be entered for sharing our blog post or posting about it on your own blog. Any donations, sharing, or posting within the next three weeks can be entered into the giveaway, to make sure we can thank everyone who is helping us bring Barton home! Don't forget to email me at kayleighbloom@gmail.com with Thank You Giveaway in the subject, your receipt or a link to your shared post or blog in the message, and whether you want English or Chinese so that I can enter you! (And so I can thank you!) Go HERE to donate!

Plus, here is a picture of Theo enjoying his first birthday in America! A full birthday post will come in a few days after I have finished wiping frosting off all the walls and cleaning up wrapping paper!

Barton Is Worth It

I have been putting off writing this update. Barton is not home yet. We have not passed court. The court requested a second date to call extra witnesses and do a few other optional things that most courts decline to do. These are extra steps the court is requiring from the country, not for our family. We understand that this is the first time this court has done an international adoption, so they are making sure they cross and dot every letter. The second court date is scheduled for the end of July. It will be in a few days.

We are very sad and frustrated for Barton. Our facilitator and his teachers were able to explain what is happening, but he was disappointed. His teachers have said they have seen him open up a lot since my husband first started visiting, and one of them has requested to make a statement about that at court. We have so much waiting for him here. Our children keep asking about him. The staff at our school can't wait to meet him. There is a hole in our lives, waiting for him to come home. It is so hard to know that our other boys have been home for more than a month, and we don't know yet when he will be here. It has been especially hard for my husband to be there and be so happy to spend time with him, and then say goodbye one more time.

In addition to the emotional difficulty with another delay, these extra trips have been a logistical nightmare. We will now have three extra trips for my husband to make since we have brought the other boys home. He is getting closer and closer to eating up the last of his FMLA time, even though he is coming home to work as much as he can between those trips. At close to $1000 each way, each time he has to make another trip, these have been a huge extra expense. After recent events, airlines are canceling flights to the airport he had been traveling in and out of. He now needs to fly in and out of the capital, requiring extra travel time. The flight for the second court date was cancelled very close to his departure, and we are thankful we were able to get an alternative flight on such short notice. We had scheduled medical appointments for the other boys based on when our children's hospital had openings with multiple specialists, and it has taken some juggling to make sure those run smoothly now that my husband may be traveling during those times.

It is worth it though. I can't say that enough. He is worth all of this. It has been hard, and we aren't done fighting for him yet. But we would do it all again in a heartbeat.

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You know who else is worth it? These three amazing boys that we have been watching grow and change every day. We are still cocooning and still enjoying our honeymoon while we learn more about each other.

I have so much more to say about them, but they are too busy climbing all over me right now for me to say anymore. So I will leave you with some pictures and a couple videos of how things are going.

Theo and Orion were very amused that their crazy American mother gave them root BEER. I tried to explain it was soda but that part was lost in translation.

I have to say again, we have the handsomest sons in the world! Theo really wants his friend (Tania on RR!) to have a family too. Orion would spend the whole day playing outside if we let him.

And here is just a sneak peak of all the amazing things ahead for Evan. He is knocking our socks off every single day!

I have so much more to say about how well they are all doing, but it will need to wait for next time!

These Boys Are Amazing!

I have been SO busy and SO happy with our new sons. They are just great. We are having so many new experiences every day. My husband is back in country for court for Barton. He will be coming home during the ten day wait because he will run out of leave otherwise. Yep, he will have spent three entire months in country by the time this is done - twice as long as most people take. That doesn't even include the time spent waiting at home for Barton's court date.  It has been a long journey.  We have a $500 matching grant that our FSP account needs to read $26,728 to meet. To be fully funded our account needs to read $29,277. These delays have required four extra flights during the expensive summer months, extra money for transportation and lodging, etc. We haven't included any of the lost income in our fundraising totals, but as you can imagine three months of lost salary has been a big hit. Evan's condition is miraculously good for his size at his age, but we are already seeing many expensive specialists to check up on things. Any donations to our account HERE are greatly appreciated.

Now for the good stuff - pictures from the last month!

Evan, Theo and Orion are doing so well. I am so thankful to have each of them in our family. They are adjusting so well. We are working on new skills with Evan, but mostly just loving him more than words. He is such a treasure. Theo and Orion are playing all the time and asking every day to practice for when they start school at the end of the summer. I am constantly surprised by how many things Theo can do for himself when he tries. Sometimes it takes a little prompting because he isn't used to doing those things, but I think he is definitely capable of more than anyone realized. Orion is so proud of all the things he can do and loves to have someone to show them off to. He is also so sweet and gentle. They are great kids.

They all love spending time outside. We have had a few impromptu picnics. Theo loves having the chance to play with sticks and dig in the dirt too. Evan would cry when he was outside when we left the orphanage. Now he laughs and lights up when we take him out. Orion is always very busy building something. They are so much fun to be with.

Evan has been having a lot of appointments. So far the ENT removed huge impactions in both ears, we have done tons of lab tests with really great results, a full skeletal x-ray showing contractures, some hip degeneration and a bone age 3 years younger than his chronological age, and a swallow study with no aspiration. So much to be thankful for there. Here he is with Orion at one of his appointments. We have 8 more specialist to see in the next month.

The boys loved their first 4th of July. Independence Day indeed. We watched fireworks by the river and ate fried dough and had a great time. They even ate at McDonalds for the first time on our way home. I LOVE how excited they are by everything. These boys love life and everything it has to offer them. I can't say enough how awed I am by them.

We all can't wait for Barton to be here too. Orion and Theo ask me all the time when he will be sleeping in his bed and if he will go to school with them. They also ask about all of their friends who are still at the orphanage. I know people are wary of older kids. Ours are all wonderful and I can't imagine any of them being left behind for the rest of their lives just because they weren't chosen when they were younger.

Gene ages out very soon, but he is not scary. He is small and frail.

http://reecesrainbow.org/52866/gene

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The boys ask me about their friend Gideon and if he has a family almost every day.

http://reecesrainbow.org/70012/gideon-2

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Denzel was in the same room as Evan. He needs a family desperately. He was so alert and responsive and alive. He needs someone to give him a chance. He needs a bigger grant.

http://reecesrainbow.org/65205/denzel

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This girl is such a sweetheart. Kendall was in the playroom with my husband and Evan one day when Evan wasn't feeling well. She crawled over to check on him. She is learning to stand!

http://reecesrainbow.org/59320/kendall

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Vance is so full of love. He was so sweet and gentle and happy to get attention.

http://reecesrainbow.org/56885/vance


Please share any and all of these children. They need families.