First off – we have Daniel’s middle name chosen! His name will be Daniel Stephen (spelling still TBD). Daniel means, “God is my judge.” Stephen means “victor, crown, wreath, honor…” Together, they mean either “God judges me victorious” or something along those lines. Any way you put those names and meanings together, I love it. The name Daniel also honors his birth names. Daniel in the Bible trusted God even through adversity. And Stephen in the Bible had a gentle, forgiving and incredibly strong spirit.
Awww… It’s growing harder to let him live away from me. We are praying this red tape away as fast as possible. Pray with us that the paperwork will be speedy!
Daniel one year ago
Daniel’s adoption paperwork is crawling right along. The homestudy is finished. We have applied for permission to adopt from US immigration (USCIS). That takes a couple months to get an answer from and had its very own fingerprinting appointment in downtown Portland. Our medicals are done, a bunch of paperwork from the social worker is complete and notarized and the whole stack (roughly an inch thick) has been apostilled (special authentication) and mailed to our adoption agency. As soon as we get that approval from USCIS (hopefully we filled out all our paperwork correctly and they don’t have any problems!), then everything will get sent to Daniel’s country of birth to be translated and submitted to the government there.
Once the paperwork is submitted in country, we have to wait for a signature. Once we have that signature (usually takes a month-ish after translation), then we will get travel dates for trip 1! That’s looking like anytime between May and July.
We get to bring him home 3-6 months after that trip… so August-January!!! Praying for August, which is, frankly, unlikely. (sigh)
Things that would be helpful to us:
Donations to the fundraiser garage sale we are preparing
Credit card points that can be used to help pay for airfare (this is a big chunk of the adoption expense!)
Straight up money donations (paypal or the tax-deductible fundraiser account at https://purecharity.com/davis-family-adoption-5)
Remember that all type of support will get your name on the back of Daniel’s “cheerleader” puzzle, which will show Daniel tangible proof of the support and love that was being poured out for him even while he was alone in the orphanage.
The puzzle is titled, “Victory”
Daniel’s Victory