Happy New Year!

In exactly two weeks, April and I will be on an airplane starting our journey to China.  In 18 days we will get to hold for the very first time our daughter, Primrose.  It is hard to believe that is has been 21 months since we began the adoption process.  It has been an incredible process, even with all of the hiccups along the way.  I highly encourage anyone who may be considering adoption.... DO IT!  Don't question whether or not to do it, you will rationalize yourself out of an amazing experience.

As we are just a few days away from 2014 I want to take this opportunity to say Happy New Year!  I want thank you, the reader, for caring enough to read our blog.  When we are in China, I will update regularly with all of our experiences with Prim and the local culture.

We got an update on Prim today, so that we would know what size clothing to take.  Here is what we found out, she currently weighs 23 pounds and 30.7 inches tall.  She will be 17 months old on the 28th.  According to growth charts, she is between the 25-50 percentile average growth.  According to the orphanage, she wears clothes that are suitable for 20 month old.  I was never good at clothing sizes when Belle was little, but this doesn't sound right to me.  So, even with the update we are still clueless about what sizes to take with us.  Oh well, we will just take what we can and figure it our then.

Last thing, and this is pretty amazing!  So we have been a little freaked out about expenses to travel and stuff.  We had taken out a loan for a certain amount that we thought would cover the remaining expenses.  When we booked our flights, it was about $1,200 more than anticipated.  Then when we contacted Lotus to book our in China trip, our estimate was high and left us with very little of the expense fund we are supposed to take to China with us in cash.  When we received our invoice form Lotus, it was approximately $1,000 less than expected.  So with our flights and in-country expenses, we have almost enough left over to cover our cash needed in China.  We also have enough to make up the difference in what we need from our canvas squares sales, small group love gift, and April's burlap craft sales.  Needless to say, we have all we need as far as funds are concerned, can I get an AMEN!

Now, we just need prayer.  Pray for safe travel.  Pray that our visas get back to us on time. Pray for Prim's transition to our family.  This will be overwhelming for her and I pray that it goes smoothly.  Pray for Belle's transition to Prim.  I know she is excited about her now, it may be different once she is actually here for good.  I have told her that she will be sharing her toys and stuff and she says ok.  The other day I told her she had to share my lap and she said, "Prim can sit on one side, and I can sit on the other."  This will make for one jealous Tinkerbell, our Yorkie.  Just pray for us in general.

Once again, Happy New Year!  Stay tuned for China updates.

Gotcha Day is Imminent!

Because I cannot contain my excitement, I have to type this while at work.  We just received an email that confirms our travel dates to go and get Primrose.  We are so excited that this process is almost over and after first seeing that beautiful face over 7 months ago, we can finally bring her home.

We will depart the US on January 10.  We will receive Primrose on January 13, exactly one week after Belle’s birthday.  Speaking of Belle, I think she is more excited than we are.  Every day she tells people about her little sister we are going to get after her birthday.

So, now comes the fun part.  Trying to figure out how to pack for 14 days, oh well at least we can figure it out over Christmas break.  Thank you for following our journey of adoption.  Be sure to visit our blog page regularly during Jan 10 – Jan 25.  I will be updating daily and with pictures of our angel in China.

Pray for us as we are about to finally go to China.  Pray for our transition with Prim and that is goes as smoothly as it can.  Pray for Belle as she will be away from mommy and daddy for 2 whole weeks!  Pray for April that she will be able to handle being away from Belle during this time.

From our family to yours, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 
Myke

Happy Festivus.... For the rest of us!

As we are approaching the holiday season, this episode of Seinfeld always comes to mind.  Any time family is gathered under one roof, anything can happen.  It is crazy to think that this will be my last Christmas with only one child.  Speaking of which, I have some great news on that front.

Tuesday (12-3) we received notification from the US consulate in Guangzhou that our Article 5 had been issued.  This is great news because now that means all we are waiting on is the CCCWA to assign us our travel date.  I talked with Steve at Holt and he said that as of right now, it looks like we will travel Jan 10.  That means that in approximately 5 weeks, we will be sitting in China about to receive our daughter we have been thinking about and praying for since first seeing her picture in May.

To say we are excited is an understatement.  We are already contacting the travel agency who is in charge of China adoption travel for Holt.  Now, our date is not official until the CCCWA assigns it, but Steve felt confident that would be our date if not earlier in January.

We have a slight dilemma though.  We are trying to figure out how to pack what we need to take with us.  Our church's "Sew in Love" group has donated around 40 blankets for us to take China to give the orphanage.  We have to pack all of our clothes and Primrose some clothes.  Not to mention we need something to occupy our time on the 13 hour flight to China, ok maybe we can get April some Valium since she doesn't travel well.

I wanted to share this update with you to let you know where we are in the process.  Thank you for following along on our journey.  I look forward to my daily China blogs and family pictures from China.

Keep us in your prayers.  I will update as soon as we find out our confirmed dates to travel.

"Chance" encounters

As I sit here and reflect upon what I would like to say I am thinking about a couple of events that have occurred in the past week.  First, last week one of my FB friends posted a link to a couple who is in the beginning stages of an international adoption.  I sent this person a message to encourage them and make a connection.  I always love meeting people who have adopted or who are in process of adoption.  It is exciting to see their excitement and they need encouragement as the drudgingly long paperwork trail begins.  I will share their information at the end of this blog so you can read their story. 

Today (11/27) we were at Red Lobster in Meridian when the following happened.  As the hostess was seating me, I was checking the time on my phone and she saw the picture of Primrose.  She asked it that was our little girl, and I was able to tell her our story of adoption and how we are about to travel to bring her home.  A few minutes later, the manager on duty came to our table and began to ask questions about our adoption experience.  He and his wife are talking about starting the process and we had a great conversation about adoption.  Needless to say, these two experiences are heartwarming reminders that there are MANY children out there who NEED a home and some families are doing something about it.  So what are you doing to help the orphans of the world?

Last week, thanks to a generous donation, we were had enough funds to completely payoff our adoption fees with Holt.  As we are just days away from finding out when we can travel to China, we still have our in-country travel costs as well as our international flights to fund.  Our canvas has many squares that need to be filled.  We have sold a total of 40 in the past couple of months and we are grateful.  However, there are still around 700 left to fill.  Our desire is to fill this canvas to show how many people were involved in helping to bring Primrose home.  Would you like to be a part of this gift of love?  It is simple, click the donate button on the right and send us a message about which color you would like to add to the canvas.  If you are uncomfortable with using PayPal, you can mail your payment to us and include a note to tell us what color you would like. Remember it's $10 per square and the color choices are in previous blog updates.

One last thing, if you know of or have any connections with discounted airline tickets or someone willing to donate frequent flyer miles please send them our way.  At this point, we will do whatever it takes to secure funding to travel.

Prayer:

•  Pray for us as we are getting all of our last minute preparations taken care of
•  Pray for Primrose, that she will be ready to receive us as her family and that she will adjust well
•  Pray for the 147 million orphans in the world who have no family, and will spending this holiday   season alone
•  Pray for the manager at Red Lobster we met today, that the Lord would direct he and his wife in this life-changing decision of adoption (sorry, I cannot remember his name or if he told us his name)
• Pray for the Brittany & Daniel Winstead (I mentioned them at the beginning) as they are beginning the process of adoption from the Philippians. You can read about their story here http://www.gofundme.com/5c7bxc

I hope you and your family have a great Thanksgiving!

The Satcher's 

New pictures of Primrose

After we received our LOA last week, we had a few documents we had to fill out and send back to Holt and one to the USCIS (immigration), this form allows Primrose to be acknowledged as a Satcher upon our meeting in China!!  Now, we are just waiting on USCIS to process the paperwork for us to be able to get our travel dates.  Well, this past Monday we received an update in our email about how Primrose is doing.  One thing that it said that made us laugh, “She is a little bit chubby, so she is wearing larger sized clothing.”  At least she is eating well!  Her favorite is congee with chopped meat. 

 

Below are the new pictures they sent us, again we are just so in love with this little girl and cannot wait to go and get her.  As I looked at the pictures, my heart broke over one especially.  I may be wrong, I hope I am, but if you look at the picture of her in her “bed” you will notice it appears that she is sleeping on a wooden slab.  Again, I may be wrong.  Either way, I am ready for her to be in her own bed in her own room.

You can help us make this a reality for our little girl.  First, I want to say a big THANK YOU to those who bought 20 squares on the adoption canvas, you guys ROCK!  It is easy, just click the “donate” button to the right and submit your order and let me know how many squares you want and what colors you want (see previous post for color options).  If everyone just bought 1 square, we would have our travel costs completely covered.  We have opted to not do the T-shirt or Coffee due to lack of interest and we could not meet the minimum order requirements.

Pray for us, here are our pressing needs:  the final push for funding, that paperwork will move faster than expected, that we can travel before Christmas, and pray for Primrose that her little mind and heart are ready for her forever family and she will have a smooth transition.

Love you all…..

 
Don’t forget, Nov is national adoption month!  What can you do to serve the orphans God has called us to serve?  Can you sponsor a child for just $30/month (that is less than the cost of one soft drink per day for the month)?  Can you help out another family who is in the process of adoption?  Can you be the voice to the voiceless?

LOA has finally arrived!!!

The moment we have waited the past five months for has FINALLY happened… we received our LOA!  What this means is that China now recognizes us as the parents of Primrose and we just need to sign off on that document.  Also, it means it is crunch time for us financially.  We have a small mountain in front of us that we need to conquer in order to be able to travel and pick up our little girl.  We have personally paid out close to $6,500 hundred dollars and are now trying to raise the rest needed.  Below are our current fundraisers, I hope and pray that you will do whatever you can to help us get up that mountain.

Mosaic Canvas – our canvas has approximately 700 squares left to fill.  Each square is $10 and you can pick which color you want your square to be.  (If we sold every square, it would cover our airfare and in country travel).

 

T-shirts – I posted about the t-shirts last blog update and only had 1 t-shirt ordered.  I need 13 orders before they can print them.  Remember, the t-shirt is $20 and I can deliver locally or add $6 for shipping.  I will “close” the t-shirt sales on Oct. 31 so go ahead and click the donate button and be sure to include your size.  For size options, see previous blog post.

 

Coffee – Once again I want to remind you of the partnership with Coffee for Hope.  Special brew prepared especially for adoption fundraisers, brewed in New Albany, MS.  $13 dollars per bag whole bean or ground, decaf available.  I will cut the coffee orders off on Oct. 31 as well.

 

I know I sound like a broken record, but we are longing for support outside of ourselves.  We have had a few fundraisers that were highly successful, but we still have a little more to go.  Pray about what you can do.  Pray for us.  If you cannot do any of these you can just donate to our fund by clicking the button and indicating it is a donation.  Every dollar helps.

Praying for a financial miracle..... The Satchers

Update of progress...

Hi everyone!

Today (9/19) is day 135 since we were matched with Primrose.  Since the time of our match, we were ideally supposed to receive our LOA from China in a matter of 2-3 months.  Because of the change in the computer system at the CCCWA in China, things have been slow.  I emailed Holt, our adoption agency, and asked if they have heard anything yet.  Kristen informed me that she HAS heard something.  The China team is working hard and pushing the CCCWA to speed the process up.  I was told that we should have our LOA no later than the end of next week!!!  This is great news!  This puts us one step closer to going and rescuing our little girl from the orphanage.

This news also puts us on the move to fund the remaining costs associated with our adoption.  All we have left to fund is roundtrip airfare for us and in country travel costs.  So, approximately $7,000 to $8,000 left to pay.  Below you will see a few opportunities where you can help us.  Please pray about what you can do.  If you cannot do anything financially, please pray for God’s provision.  Also, share our Facebook pages (mentioned below) and this blog so that others can be a part of our story.

I am excited to announce that we have partnered with Fund the Nations and now have a T-shirt that we are selling as a fundraiser.  The T-Shirt cost is $20 and the sizes are Adult Small – XXXL.  Youth sizes are a different color red and come in sizes Youth M – XL.

To order a shirt, click our “donate” button to the right and include how many you want and the sizes you need.  Please be aware if you are not local and want it shipped, it will be an additional $6 charge (Priority Mail).  I will announce when I will be “closing” this sale in order to place and deliver the shirts.

We are still selling squares on the adoption canvas.  They are now only $5 a square.  Here are the color options once again.  Remember, you choose the color and message you would like to go into the square on the canvas.  If we can sell out of the squares, we would be about half way to our fundraising goal.

 

I mentioned that we were selling coffee a few months ago with no takers.  I would like to offer the coffee once again.  It is a special brew made specifically for adoption fundraisers by a coffee company in New Albany, MS.  The bag of coffee is $12 and can be either in bean or ground form.  Prim’s Brew is only available in caffeinated but there is a decaffeinated coffee available as well.  Again, if you are local I can deliver it to you, but if you need it shipped add $6 (USPS priority mail).

Be sure to check out our NEW fundraising page on Facebook called Prim’s Journey Home.  Our friend, Laura Causgrove has graciously set this up for us as well as a couple of fundraisers.  On this page you will be able to find a link to a Scentsy party and a really cool ginormous blanket you can purchase as well.  The T-Shirts and Prim’s Brew Coffee will be available on there as well.

Thank you all for reading this and for caring about our journey.  God bless each one of you.