The Davis Family

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’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”

I’m too tired to write more.

Learning how to communicate during OT:

Playing in the pool during our retreat!

There was lots of snow coming down on the coastal range as we drove home, so Anna documented it:

Throwing rocks into the river at Grandpa Davis’ is a timeless adventure:

Jordan coping with the stress of new places very well here:

You probably don’t want to watch these videos… they’re just simple recordings of Jordan crying. We went on a trip to see family for two nights. It was, for Jordan, grueling. He cried each night and was very close to unresponsive to our ministrations. Or rather, he was unresponsive off and on, but never stopped crying, just looked at us or took a deep breath before beginning again. Phew. It was hard. Is hard? People ask why he has a hard time and I don’t even know how to answer that. It’s simply that we’re asking more from him than he can do. He tries and then he become weary and he melts down. For a long time. Sorry to end on a sad note!
Driving – lasted 1-2 hours.

Home – lasted half an hour.

Pictures from January. Hurya was with us until late January and that meant that I was remarkably tired and busy, trying to keep up with my little family and help her also. We made some progress in our fledgling adoption process, working on homestudy paperwork and by the end of the month we knew we were adopting Daniel! School started up again and Jordan participated in occupational therapy. It was a good month…. but I’m glad it’s behind me. I was overtaxed before January started and didn’t find recovery until more recently.

Carolyn reading:

Carolyn reading 2:

Jordan just hanging out in his new play room:

OT time with Joanna!

Here are pictures and videos of what’s been happening! They’re a bit out of order. There’s Christmas morning at our house and then Christmas afternoon once the family came. Then the day after Christmas with the other side of the family. Then there’s my Mom’s big birthday bash and some random photos followed by some cute videos.

December and Christmas:

Video from Mom’s birthday party – the kid got ahold of my phone and its video camera…
This one the little girls are pretending to be angry at each other:

Maggie takes another video:

Felicity and Carolyn being silly:

So silly:

Back at home, Jordan is hanging out in the kitchen with me and checking out the hair clippers. It shows a lot about how Jordan is growing (tall!) and developing.

Pappy reading to the girls over….. Thanksgiving:

Very short clip of Jordan playing in the play room with Hirfan:

We need a middle name for our son Daniel. Daniel _____ Davis. We have some great family names we’re trying out in the middle, but haven’t quickly settled into something that feels right. We have the option to change his first name, but we want it to be close to the name Daniel, which is close to the name he goes by now. Hmmmm. Fun parenting decisions. 🙂

We had some credit card reward points, and with it, we purchased a special 1000 piece wooden puzzle titled, “Victory.” We got it for Daniel, to assemble and hang on the wall in his room. We want to write notes or names on the backs of the pieces of people who have prayed for him and donated to help him make it home. It will be concrete evidence of the people who loved him before he was ours and for the people who are cheering him on to Victory in the many challenges of life. It appropriately features a picture of some lions… Daniel was victorious in a lion’s den some millennia ago.

Let me know if you want your name on the back of the puzzle! Just let me know you prayed for him or donate some stuff for our garage sale fundraiser or you could send $5 and I’ll put your name on there. There are 1000 pieces… plenty of room for everyone!

Any act of support or financial donation will put your name on the back of the puzzle. Suggested donation $5 per piece.

(I’m making a list now of people who have already encouraged and supported this adoption. FYI: Grandparents, aunts and uncles of our kids… you automatically get put on there, because unless you avoid us forever henceforth, you are supporting us and him.)