The Treasurer's Report

The following is likely the worst treasurer’s report you will ever read. I am a terrible accountant. My theory: why balance the check book when I can just call the 1-800 number on my debit card and find out my balance in a matter of minutes? As for record keeping, I have a chaotic stack of adoption receipts that I occasionally shuffle through in a panic. Ususally the ones I need are lost, only to show up later in an unsorted stack of mail. I have certain areas of at least “maintained” organization, but personal record keeping is not one of them. I am not proud of this. Especially when it comes to adoption records. I regret my lack of order especially the first year of the adoption process. Next time I will be much more diligent. (And yes, I did just say next time, before this time is even finished. What can I say, the children’s searching, hopeful eyes haunt me.)

So, now that we are clear about my rather haphazard records, I will continue on with sharing what figures I do have. These posts are hard. Our culture’s privacy when it comes to finances makes it awkward to have this discussion. But openness is good. For various reasons. 1) I know when I was researching adoption, I was anxious to hear exactly what kind of “crazy expensive” figures we were looking at. Also I found it helpful to see many other families who did not have amazing jobs or a huge inheritance or substantial grants or a rich daddy, but were still stepping out trusting God to fund each step of the way. So to all of you out there praying about adoption :) here is an honest look at the $$. And if you would like to see our agency’s breakdown of the entire process and it’s costs, click HERE.  2) Openness is good for us because in a way it helps keep us accountable. 3) It provides opportunity for all of the generous givers to see more clearly where their money is going, and gives us opportunity to thank them for their open hands. 4) It gives a stellar opportunity for all of us together to lift our voices and our hands in praise to God, who is CLEARLY paying the way for His girls to come to their new home. Ultimately, this post is all about Him. We have small roles. Dave and I are accountable for seeking His wisdom in how to properly use the funding He has supplied, and you all are to be thanked for being willing to allow the finances to move from your hands to ours. But the bottom line is, it’s all His. And we are all just grateful observers of the transference of His resources on behalf of His children who He is placing in a family. If ever I doubted; doubted that it was His will for us to adopt, doubted that He really would fund the process, doubted that He really was passionate about lonely children being united with a loving family…the financial provision alone, especially in last 2 months, has been enough to convince me fully. Please remind me of this if I am every harried and at wits end with two little crazy cuties. I must not forget how specifically God worked to bring them home

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So here are some details on our current financial status. We currently have around $7,500 in adoption debt. We have $9,600 in adoption savings. Before you lose all confidence in our accounting abilities, I offer two explanations. First, the savings figure has drastically increased in the last few weeks. We are humbled and amazed. (Side note to all who asked about the garage sale’s results: Total profit was around $840. We were wowed.) Secondly, our debt is on an interest free credit card. Because it is interest free for a year, we are not in a big hurry to pay it off since we are at least earning a few pennies in interest with the money in savings.

As for remaining costs. We basically just have our plane tickets and in-country costs. On our court trip we paid $2,300 for each ticket. We really hope with having more than 2 day’s notice, we will be able to get better prices on our next trip, but I don’t know how much difference it will make. The cheapest I expect they could be is $1,600-2,000. We will also have Cypress’s ticket home, which I expect will be around $1,000 but again is a guess. (Let me just say all of our remaining costs are guesses. I am sharing conservative estimates, but want to at least give you an idea.) The in-country costs look roughly like this: lodging-$500/week. We will potentially be there for 2-4 weeks (could be more, could be less). Food-$50/week. Driver-$50-$100/week depending on what rates we can get, where all we need to go, who else might be there to travel with us, etc. That gives you an idea of the basics. Please understand how hard this is to estimate. We are still comparing rates/amenities with several different guest houses so we do not have specific lodging plans yet.

 One final factor in this trip. One final IMPORTANT factor. My sister Janna will be accompanying me back. We will hopefully be leaving to go back in the next 2-3 weeks, and will stay with the girls until we have a confirmed embassy appointment, at which time Dave will join us and then we will all come home together. I am so excited to share this experience with Janna. I am jump-up-and-down delighted about it. I have prayed for an opportunity to have my family travel with me for almost as long as I’ve prayed for this adoption. I only wish I could take them all! So Janna will also be funding a ticket, and splitting the in-country costs with me. She’s stepping out on faith in regards to funding also, knowing that God has brought this opportunity to her life, and believing He will make a way regardless of her limited income. 

Now you basically know as much as we do in terms of what costs to expect in the coming month. To summarize:

Tickets: $2,000/adult $1,000/Cypress

Weekly in-country: $650 for the week(s) Jan and I are there with the girls. $1,200 the week Dave joins us for Embassy. (And no that is not because Dave will eat $600 worth of food, but rather because we will likely pay our agency an all-inclusive rate for the final week.)

Thank you all for journeying thus far with us. Words don’t seem to be enough, but hear it from the depths of my heart how grateful I am. We are. I cannot explain how humbling it is to…open the mail to find a check or an anonymous visa card, find cash in my purse or in our house, have meals stuck in my freezer, have my house cleaned from top to bottom, have my laundry folded,  read notes of encouragement on facebook, be thrown a superb baby shower filled with gifts and love from so many friends, be prayed for/with/over, and the list goes on.

 As always, this post is entirely too long. I hope that if you read this far, you came to the conclusion feeling blessed by God for being such a supportive part of our journey to bring our girls home. May your faith be encouraged by our story of God’s provision. He delights in giving good gifts to His children. I hope your eyes can see His goodness, and you can feel the warmth of His smile on your life. Run after Him with reckless abandon and trust Him to fill your life with His faithful provision.