Oh Sacramento!

In mid March my friend Brandyn and I finally finished our Dossiers!  This was a huge accomplishment for us.  We spent over a year compiling stacks of paperwork. One packet for the US, and one packet for Haiti (the Dossier is the Haiti packet).  Every paper needs to be notarized, State certified, and then authenticated by the Haitian consulate, before it can be translated and then finally sent off to Haiti.

We decided instead of mailing and waiting for the State certification that we would take a little road trip to Sacramento and get it done then and there! Thankfully we arrived with plenty of time to spare because we ended up needing every minute.  We soon discovered that each of us had 2 documents that had not been properly notarized.  We had to book it on foot to the UPS only to find that the notary's stamp was expiring within the nest few months.  This would not work for us.  Thankfully we found that we were both fast-walkers! We made our way from L and 10th to Q and 18th, got what we needed and headed back to the Secretary of State office.  Here we are- papers in hand,
exhausted but still smiling.  Rejoicing in the fact that we have moved one big step closer to bringing our children home!!!

That was trip one.  I honestly cant even remember why we had to go back again.  But we did, and this time we knew exactly where we were going and what we were doing. Ha! We arrived at the office confidently with papers in hand, only to realize our papers were never even stamped by the notary! Our notary was getting married the following week so we'll chalk it up to that.  But what was our excuse?! Somehow neither of us noticed.  So back to the UPS on Q and 18th, and back to the Secretary of State. You do what you gotta do.  We enjoyed a meal together and headed home. My heart has been beyond grateful for the gift of my dear friend Brandyn.  The Lord paired us perfectly together and it has been such a blessing for our family to be on this journey together .

Here we are looking a little more refreshed and ready to ship out our completed Dossier!

Sometime in the middle of waiting for our Dossiers to be translated, authenticated, shipped out, and legalized in Haiti we found the twins.  And once again I had to head up to Sacramento.  This time we made it a family trip of it.  We went up to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, headed over to visit our dear friend (who had been hospitalized for over two months) and his precious family.  Spent the night with another family friend and hit the State Capitol on the way home. 

I didn't know you could walk right into the State Capitol for a tour.  You can! And we did!

Got our documents for the twins!!

 

Our mini date at Estelle's

Not far behind was trip #4.  This time Brent and I made a date of it.  We got a call on a Tuesday morning, saying that one of our papers needed to be corrected.  I was in the theatre with the kids and Brent was having coffee with a friend. As soon as we were done we dropped the kids of with Grammy, hopped in the car and rolled out.  We found the most amazing little spot called Estelle's Patisserie Bakery and Espresso Bar. Had a quick drink and pastry and got it DONE!


And now last but not least.  I had the privilege of traveling with my friend Amber who is adopting from China.  They just finished their Dossier and she mentioned she was going to head up to Sacramento to get papers certified.  I blurted out, "I'm going with you!!" I was so excited for her and thought, hey I know how to get there, I know where to go if we hit any snags, and it'll be fun.  Well, she had no snags, and I actually missed our exit and got us turned around, but we did have FUN!

Yay!!

And this my friends is Estelle's pastry case. We had a perfect little lunch and bought little cakes to take home to our families!

The June Game Changer

Every Monday our amazing agency coordinator sends all the Haiti families an update. Sometimes it's International news, or new paper work requirements, or upcoming adoption webinars, and every now and then it's news that someone is going to get their kids soon.  Well, as it always does, Monday came around, and I was feeling particularly cynical towards the waiting period we are in. We are waiting for our referral- a picture and some information of the child we have been matched with by our agency.  When Brent came home from work he asked, "Hey! Did you read the update?" To which I replied, "No. It's nothing...it's always nothing...nothings moving...blah." He thinks I should read it, and I comply.

As I scan through the paragraph headings I see, "Waiting Children...we have 6 profiles for children in Haiti...and just added twins- ages 7 1/2."  From that very moment I was gripped.  Then, I panicked, thinking, "Oh no! I should've read the email earlier...what if I waited too late?"  I immediately began to pursue them.  I requested the password to view the children, but it wasn't working. I was dying to see them.  That night was our eldest son's championship baseball game and I left my phone at home so I wouldn't be obsessing about the password coming in. But the whole time I was talking with the Lord in my mind.  "Lord, are these our children? Could these be our children?? Could they be a girl AND a boy???"  I would head to the stands when he was up to bat and then was off again pacing and praying.  We came home, and no password. It was very late at this point and early morning on the East coast but I emailed our agency coordinator to request the password and waited up just in case she might see it at 2:00 am and send it to me. Ha!

I finally went to bed and woke up early the next morning to a whisper, "Hey babe, Michelle sent the password".  I flailed over the bed grasping for my laptop with one eye half open, slurping the drool from the corner of my mouth and half asleep rasping out, "Quick! What is it? What is the password?" (I had my husband proofread to make sure I wasn't over-exaggerating.  He laughs and starts flailing his arms around making unintelligible noises. Yep, that's how he remembers it too.) I'm sitting up now, eyes almost fully open and as I type in the password I'm already starting to cry a little bit.  I scroll through pictures of many dear, precious faces and then I see a boy.  I begin to sob and sob.  I click the button to "learn more" and he is a twin. I can not find the other picture, so flailing mode again I cry, "The phone! Please give me my phone! I need to call the office".  At this point, Brent is excited in his heart too, but all he is doing is anchoring down for me.  We both know there is NOTHING at all that makes these kids ours.  I have not even seen a picture of the second child, and he sees the mama bear in me and he knows my heart is already gone.  It did feel a little out of body, and I can remember sort of seeing myself and saying, 'Fool! You need to calm down!' But I couldn't. The urgency really felt so strong.  I call the agency and they help me find the info, and lo and behold- A boy and a girl! Through tears I say, "We want them! We are more than interested in pursuing them.  We absolutely want them." I still had not seen the picture of the girl.  Right after the phone call, the info came. I saw them both and I was in awe of them. I sent out two more emails and left another phone message making it very clear that we wanted them. And long story short we waited for what seemed like forever to hear a clear word back.

And here is the game changer.  We were no longer waiting for a match to be sent to us.  We were now on this uncertain path, pursuing two specific children. We wanted them. We didn't know the process for waiting children.  We didn't know how many other families were possibly just as interested as we were.  We did know it was probably more complicated than we thought.  I knew we just had to wait and I knew that if these children were ours that there was nothing that could stand in the way, and if they weren't, then no amount of prying and pushing or pleading could make them ours.  It was really only 3 days waiting, but I needed those three days to surrender and commit my heart to trust. Finally we received the call that the twins were ours!!!  And again, with the tears!  Our hearts were overwhelmed and now my sweet, strong-for-me hubby was fully rejoicing too! So we continue now to wait and pray.  Please join us in sharing in our joy and praying that our children can be home with us soon!

Our Adoption Journey

In some ways it feels a little late in the game to start blogging now. But as I look back on our story up to this point I think, "Why have I not been sharing this amazing journey with anyone and everyone who may hear it?" For some things it truly is better late than never and I think this is one of those cases!  I will post more blogs later about how we got to this point, but for now I will share where we are currently.

Our happy family of five is soon to be The Seven Stahls!  In early June we received the glad news that we will be welcoming TWINS in to our family!! Seven year old siblings, a boy and a girl.  A son and a daughter.... We are so amazed and overwhelmed at this reality of ours. It has been a month now that we have known of them.  I will sit and stare at their pictures, and pray for them, and imagine being with them around the table, and smile. And I realize again these are my children.  Sometimes I try to resist that truth from sinking in because it becomes more painful each time.  Knowing that they are ours, but they are not yet ours.

It's funny... I wrote a song about seven years ago inspired by the movie Dandelion Dust (An adoption story written by Karen Kingsburry). I had heard the story from a friend of mine who was co-producing the movie and he asked me to take a stab at writing and submitting a song for it.  I did.  I remember being so moved.  When I sat down to write, the entire song came at once and I sobbed over the piano.  They didn't use the song for the movie, which I was personally fine with, but I often wondered why that song was given to me and why it had such a deep impact on me.  It felt weird that it seemed to not have any purpose outside of that moment.  And even throughout our journey so far, it hasn't really seemed to really click or connect until now.  Now I get it.  It's my song.

This is turning out to feel a little heavier than I thought...sorry.  The joy and the pain are both very real.  They are a real part of life and a real part of adoption.  The pain and sadness is there, but the joy we feel now and the joy that is set before us is truly greater than the pain. So I guess we are over-joyed! There is a bridge in the song I wrote that carries the hindsight perspective: "Now I see that it was You (God) who was holding tight to me. You are hope and You are love." Our strongest grip of hope and sacrifice made for love is nothing compared to His.  He is our joy.  He is the one who holds us together and will bring our children all the way home!

Yard Sale, Banquet, and Booth Oh My!

This summer will not be soon forgotten by the Stahl family.  We have been overwhelmed by the generosity of our dear friends and family giving of their time, energy, money, and creativity.

Early in the month of June I received several calls asking if we were going to be hosting anymore yard sales. (We have made over $5,000.00 in yard sales over the last year and a half!) So after receiving the calls I thought it must be time to hold another one.  I put the word out and received a ton more donations, and many sweet friends  came to help sort and set up through out the week for a Fri-Sat sale.

Friends make everything better! These fabulous gals came and helped sort and set up for the yard sale!

Our friends the Lindvalls dropped off a generous truck/van load of donations!

Family photo op...posing with random stuff :)

After a week of preparation and two days selling, our final number was $800!!! Which is amazing for a yard sale. But to be honest, as silly/embarrassing as it is, I was feeling a little disappointed. These were my reasons: It was the first one we’ve done that made under a thousand dollars.  I had put the most work in to this one and was feeling so proud of how organized I was.   I was expecting all my extra efforts to pay off.  It wasn't all that bratty though.  I was also bummed for the people that gave so much! I wanted to sell it all, and make them feel blown away and so excited about how much their donations helped.  I really just needed to STOP all the analyzing.  At the end of the day, I put my tired feet up, ate a scorching hot donut, got over my self and and humbly gave big thanks to God for His faithfulness and provision.  I thought of all my sweet friends and the fun and laughter we shared together throughout the week and everyone who gave donations or just showed up to say hello or shop at the sale and felt truly happy.  Once again I was reminded of the tension between results and process, and how easily I can get overly focused on what I would consider the main point to be and forget about all the blessings in between.  And plus it's just a really good idea to trust God and be grateful! I am thankful for the grace and love of God towards me even when I'm being really petty.

The following morning something so precious and powerful happened in my kitchen. My daughter came over to me and with a fierce love said, "I will give everything I have....everything until my sister can come home!!"   She marched down the hall to find her change purse. She pulled every bill out one by one looked at it and put it in the donation jar.  I wish I could have captured the purity of her heart and the resolve on her face as she gave everything she had.  She dropped in the last dollar and turned around.  She had a sweet proud look on her face for a second or two, and then just burst into tears.  "I want my sister!!!  Why can't she be here!!! I don't want her to be apart from us!!!"  She ran into my arms and I just held her as she cried.  We prayed together, wiped away the tears, and counted the money.  I have no idea how, but that little girl put over $60.00 in that jar!

She wasn't done just yet.  She found her brothers and called them over to give as well.  My children put a hundred dollars into the jar that morning!  Brent also sold a handful of the yard sale items on craigs list and when it was all said and done we had a grand total of $1,095.00!!!  Not only had we raised our total but we all felt stronger as a family unit through all the hours, efforts and sacrifice given together towards bringing our whole family together. 


The following weekend was our annual adoption celebration.  This is such an amazing evening!  We had more donations than we knew what to do with, friends helping set up, tear down, run sound, decorate, organize, cook and serve food, and a house full of generous loving people who joyfully gave over $17,000.00 for families adopting at Radiant church!!! We are just blown away!

Prepping the fabulous food!

Sweet friends volunteering to serve during the celebration.

A very full house!

We announced to everyone that night that we had been matched with the twins.  The place erupted with cheers, and my face erupted with tears.  I can hardly believe the community we have sometimes.

Catalina baked, oh...about a million cookies! What I wouldn't give for an Earl Grey shortbread right now.

Ok! To follow up the amazing adoption celebration that followed up the perfect yard sale we were given a firworks booth.  That's right, a fireworks booth.  There are three families in our church right now that are adopting internationally and this booth was donated to us to help raise funds to bring our children home. We all feel so honored be on this adoption journey together, and we were able to raise about $4,000.00 PER FAMILY!   We spent four days and nights together loading, unloading, laughing, sweating, drinking lots of water and selling our little pants off.  We had a blast together and SOLD OUT by 6:30 on the 4th of July. We had so many volunteers, who showed up with amazing hearts and attitudes to work in the ridiculous heat, friends and family who helped love and take care of our kiddos, and to top it of ABC channel 30 showed up to interview us! (here's the link to the interview) By the time the interview aired, we had already sold out.  I thought it was pretty cool that the Lord just wanted to tell our story. This is what actually prompted me to start blogging.  I realized the Lord wanted our story to go out.  I only had selfish reasons for not sharing our story.  I decided that day to lay my self centered reasoning aside and open up believing that the Lord could somehow use it for his greater purposes.  He is really good at taking the little that we give Him and making it go a long way!

Our first day.  Getting the hang of it!

Sweet friends showing up to make a scene!

Loading and unloading all of it, every day!

Volunteers!

Volunteers!

And more volunteers!!!

Can you read that shirt??? It says "I LOVE ADOPTION" and it's true!

Philippians for Families

Philippians For Families is a project still in the making! I hope it will a be a blessing and a resource for many.  I get really excited when I think about family.  When I read the scriptures, everything points to it;  from the the very beginning when God the Father is building and preparing a home for his kids, to the very end when we are all together around the great banqueting table. The promise has always been a family.  Through it all He is making away for every one to come and belong, to find a home in Him.  I love it!

If you're interested in learning more about Philippians For Families, this video gives a good explanation of the project.



I hope it will be complete and available soon.  When it is, all funds will go towards helping with our adoption fees!

*This fundraising campaign from the video has already ended.

Contact

If you have any questions or comments about our adoption story please feel free to email me: monica@monicastahl.com