Sunshine on the Horizon

After 3 ½ very long years, Deb and I took steps on Wednesday that will put us closer to bringing our daughter home than ever before. As many of you are aware, we made the difficult decision a year ago to switch our country program from Albania to China’s Waiting Child program. With this transition comes a new set of required documents and forms that will allow Bethany Christian Services to access the Waiting Child Portal and begin matching our profile with a child. This is extremely exciting and a relief as it is one of the final hurtles to receiving a referral.

We are thankful for many of our friends in the Adoption Community who have supported us by providing referrals and resources. We have been in contact with medical professionals, education experts and social workers to make sure that we are prepared for any and everything. It has been tough, but we were very blessed to get everything in.

So Bethany Christian Services will now be reviewing all of the documents and beginning to search the portal for a little girl that matches our profile. Could it be in the next month? Yes. Could it take a little longer? Sure. We will still be waiting, but we will let you know as we receive referrals.

The burden now turns to logistics. As we await the referral, we will now need to begin to raise the funds necessary to travel to China and pay the necessary Agency/Country fees. Our goal is to come out of this experience with as little debt as possible. This has been difficult to date primarily because I had nothing concrete to share with everyone and could not in good conscious ask anyone to support us yet. Some of you have been generous and we have seen some small donation come in . . . thank you. However, many of you have asked how you could support us, to which I said I would let you know when the time was right. Well . . . the time is right. Below is a breakdown of what we will need to raise in order to bring Sunshine home without pulling money out of our 401K or building further credit card debt. Please prayerfully consider how you can help. (James 1:27)


Breakdown of fees . . .

Agency fees - $2500

Country fees - $7000

Travel to China – (+/-) $8000

Travel within China – (+/-) $6000

Total - $23500

How you can help . . .

- Pray that God will provide all funds we need.

- Purchase coffee from Just Love Coffee. The donate $5 from every purchase to our adoption efforts www.justlovecoffee.com/sunshinefund
- All donations can be made through ICARE International. ICARE is able to collect donations and provide receipts for tax purposes.

Make checks payable to: International CARE, Inc.
Mail donations to: International CARE, Inc. c/o Ruiz adoption PO BOX 1603 Bel Air, MD 21014

**Please do not write your name in the memo line as the IRS does not like that. Please enclose a brief note informing the processors that you are making a donation to the Sunshine Fund - Ruiz adoption.

Progress . . .

So much has happened since we decided to pursue "Sunshine" in China. God has led us down a path only He could devise. Yesterday, Deb and I spent the whole day running back and forth from Harford County to Crofton and Annapolis completing the paperwork for our Dossier.

What does this mean? Well, it means that our paperwork will be sent to China for approval within the next few weeks (after translation). Once approved, we can be referred a little girl once a match is made. This puts us back on track for a realistic waiting period. I'll try to keep you all updated on when the next big step occurs.

In other news, God has been doing so many great things at Mountain Christian Church and in Harford County. Two weeks ago we kicked off a new ministry called The Father's Heart. This ministry will focus on educating and encouraging MCC folks to foster and/or adopt orphans here at home and abroad. We had over 75 adults at the kick off meeting from all interest levels and experiences. There is a great deal of excitement around the ministry. So exciting!

Please pray that the paperwork goes through the system quickly.