October Adoption Updat

A lot has occurred within the last few months! We had some hiccups with a big miscommunication in late August/early September, but thankfully our adoption agent and social worker helped us figure things out with the South American adoption committee. So the GOOD NEWS is our dossier was APPROVED and FILED in September!! YAY! We are SO excited and  so thankful!! 

As I was reading through our specific prayer requests from my last blog post, I was just  AMAZED at how the Lord has abundantly blessed our (and your) requests!!  

Not gonna lie—this has not been an easy process! We’ve had MULTIPLE hiccups and  roadblocks since we began. Almost like Satan the enemy was out to stop these plans, just like he’s tried to destroy other things in ours and others’ lives in the past few years. Spiritual warfare  for sure!  

But here’s the good part—literally for EVERY hiccup or roadblock that satan created, the Lord  was right behind him with deliverance and a blessing and assurance reminding us that He  wants these kids in our home to grow up with love and learning about Him, to grow His Kingdom, and reach Heaven one day! ❤️ We are deeply humbled that the Lord has called us to  this and more surrendering to His purpose and faith to trust His plan! 

We have received $10 to $2,000 donations from donors and we are deeply grateful for every.  single. dollar. Every dollar matters to give these kids a new life and love! So many have given  from sacrificial hearts and we are so, so humbled!  

We have been awarded several grants within the last 3 months! I’ll share those below…

1) In August, we received a $2,000 grant from our adoption agency! 

2) In August, we were awarded a $7,000 matching grant from LifeSong for Orphans! This  means that when we raise $7,000 in funds then LifeSong will match the $7,000 for a total of  $14,000!! This would cover the remainder of our immediate expenses (remainder of referral fee,  extra child fee, and Tyler and Jess’ visas, etc)!!😁🙌HUGE answer to prayers!!! This grant was  from direct, tax-deductible donation to LifeSong and also through Gobena Coffee fundraiser.  50% of everything purchased went towards our adoption! On top of that, LifeSong will match  the other 50% towards the matching grant!! Now, that 50% becomes 100%, meaning ALL that  you spend on this site will go towards our adoption (up to our grant amount of $7,000)! We love  sharing about Fair-Trade businesses, plus supporting many countries around the world! Since  we are adopting from South America, we love that several coffee varieties come from there! We  loved the story of how Gobena Coffee began, and their mission to help orphans! You can check  out their mission story here: https://my.gobena.org/about/gobena/ 

LifeSong for Orphans also had post-adoption grants for any special needs, therapies, etc. that  the adopted children may need, so that is really good and we plan to apply for these grants if  needed.  

3) In September, a $10,000 grant from ShowHope!! This was the last grant we were waiting to  hear from! This means we received grants from all the ones we applied for! We are so deeply  grateful!

4) In October, a surprise memorial grant of $7,000—we were nominated by our adoption  agency’s president to receive the Oliver Even memorial grant. 

When we received word of this, I was bawling crying with disbelief, gratitude, and grief. I could  barely read the words of Oliver’s story. Wow. What a deep gift of love to offer someone else  during their family’s time of grief! I feel like a small part of the emotion of gratitude as when a  parent feels like when their child received a donated organ and has a new chance to live  because another child didn’t live. 😭❤️ “Tyler” and “Jess” will have a chance of a better life  because of Oliver’s story and his family and friends’ financial sacrifices. It’s taken us a few days  to process this selfless gift plus the subtle connections we have with this family. Please pray for this family especially as the holidays are coming up and the grief will be there in a new way for  their family. 🙏❤️ 

God has abundantly blessed us in the financial portion of this adoption journey! It is just a  reminder when God calls any of us to any ministry or a purpose or mission He wants us to do,  then He will always provide for it!! 🙌❤️ 

We still have to verify with our adoption agent but it is looking like all our expenses will be  covered provided all of the grants are awarded as promised! ❤️🙌🙏 Thank you, Lord!  

We received an email from the president of our adoption agency: 

Dear William and Ansley, 

I wanted to let you know that we nominated you to receive a grant from another family. 

From Gregory and Cheryl Even Family 

We're making this donation in honor of our adopted son Oliver, who passed away this May  following complications from heart surgery. Many friends and family donated to Oliver's Go Fund  Me page so that another family could achieve their goal of adding to their family through  adoption. Oliver was adopted in a sibling group with his sister Brianna, so we’re excited to hear  you are adopting a brother/sister sibling group also. We would love to get a picture of your  newly enlarged family so that we can share it with all the people who donated. Praying for God's  support and wisdom as you adapt to having two more children in the home!  

Donation $7,000  

Read Oliver's story here: 

OLIVER'S STORY: When Oliver was born, he survived open heart surgery to repair a hole in his heart and a constricted aorta. During the first four years of his life, he lived in four foster homes before he and his older sister came to live with our family in June of 2014. At that time he had multiple mental and  physical health issues, which were slowly resolved over the following three years. We were blessed to adopt both Oliver and his sister, with the adoption being finalized in June of  2017. 

Oliver was full of life and joy. His favorite movie was Free Willy and all its sequels, which he  watched over and over again. At one point, he even wanted to become a marine biologist and  work with orcas. His favorite music group was BTS and his favorite song was "Dynamite." He  loved to dance to hip-hop music and played Just Dance with his sister on the X-Box. He earned  a blue belt in Karate at Chozen Martial Arts Academy, and always kept the classes very lively.  He was delighted to have nerf wars with his older brother and his brother's friends. He also  enjoyed splashing with his friends in the creek near our house. 

Oliver was extremely curious and very bright. He did internet research and found arcane unless  facts. For example, when we visited Hawaii, he let us know that more people died of falling  coconuts than from shark attacks. He was a star pupil in Sunday School and always knew all  the answers. He loved STEM and attended a STEM summer camp several years in a row. He  had a phenomenal memory for actors and movies and could even tell us about movies he  hadn't yet seen.  

Oliver loved food and during COVID, he always wanted to know the meal plan for the day. Even  if he had just eaten, he wanted to know what was for the next meal. He was an early riser on  weekends and would wake up his sister long before she wanted to get up. He didn't like  thunderstorms and would sneak into his sister's room to sleep next to her. His socks never  matched because he would lose one of his socks somewhere in the house. Oliver always said  hello when someone came into a room or came to check on how you were doing. Recently, Oliver shared that he wanted to become a teacher. Since school was very difficult for  him because of his ADHD, he felt he could help other children who struggle in school. Oliver went to Children's Hospital on May 5th to put in a stent to enlarge the aorta, where it was  constricted. Unfortunately, there were complications and Oliver went to be with Jesus on May 6,  2021. Although his life was short, he impacted so many people with his sense of humor and joy  for life. 

To say we are beyond grateful and overwhelmed with gratitude at how the Lord and many  others, including a grieving family across the country, have shown up for our kiddos is an  understatement!  

The latest quick update on our case from our adoption agent is that the South American  adoption committee is waiting on one more updated document to be able to issue the official  referral, but it’s coming!! So we wait, and pray, and wait some more. :) We are trusting God’s  perfect timing for all of us in this journey! 

William and Ansley Tingle

July Adoption Update

July 29–One year ago today, we saw “Tyler” and “Jess’” sweet faces and started on a journey of courage and surrender to the Lord’s plan for our family. We prayed long and hard, as even though we’d talked about international adoption off and on for years, it wasn’t something that was on our immediate radar—more like on the back burner for whenever and if ever God lead us to do it. Within 3 weeks, the Lord CLEARLY showed us MULTIPLE times that we were to adopt THESE 2 specific kids.

Haha—I kinda laugh because around 15 years ago I was at peace with being single and was literally not looking for a guy or relationship and that’s when God had mine and William’s paths cross in the Spring of 2007. Some might think oh those two instances are “funny” or “happenstance.” But, I just believe God’s timing is perfect even if we try to avoid it or run from it or doubt it. God’s plans ALWAYS are best and they ALWAYS prevail! 🙌🏻❤️So here we are, one year into this journey. We have learned A LOT about surrender. Surrender is definitely a key word! Even though at first inwardly we felt like Sarah or Jonah, but the Lord kept gently pushing us to be an Abraham. And so we did. We kinda understand now how Abraham felt when God told him to pack up and leave his homeland. Going through international adoption is literally one step at a time with the Lord laying down the stepping stones in front for us and Him stepping on them first to show it’s safe and it’s a beautiful messy journey. ❤️

Here’s a quick update from this month...

1) We received USCIS immigration approval to adopt at the end of June and traveled to Nashville again to get it apostilled, sent off to our agency, and it arrived in South America. 👍

2) Forms updated—Our medical forms had to be approved again from our doctor and William’s letter of employment also needed updating. The South American country’s requirement is that medical papers and employment have to be current within 6 months of adoption court date and our medical forms and employment letter were done in February. Those were going to “expire” before we were in country for adoption court. We didn’t realize this until our adoption agent brought this to our attention—just too much to keep up with so we had forgotten about the 6 month expiration. This happened the week after we thought we had finished apostilling all documents. 😜 William could not take another day off work because he’s saving his days off for our trip to South America, and I couldn’t take it myself because we’re temporarily down to one car while we wait to get one fixed. So we’re VERY thankful to my college friend Christy Marrs who lives near downtown Nashville who offered to get these last few papers apostilled and mailed to our agent last week!! 🙌🏻👏👏 The have arrived in South America also!

3) So with ALL of our dossier totally completed now we’re celebrating!! 🙌🏻🎉🎉 YAY!!! What a journey that was!!! What happens next is the South American country’s adoption committee will meet and review our completed dossier. They meet every Monday so we’re not sure if they’ll review our case this past Monday (July 26) or next Monday (August 2). After they review our dossier, we will wait 2-4 weeks to get a referral from them. 🙏🙏 So prayers that we receive a blessing of favor with them! After they write a referral, it takes about a week for it to be translated. Then we will have up to 30 days to accept the referral including paying for remainder of fees (please pray we will get these from more grants!! 🙏). After we have accepted the referral we can then mail the kids each a special gift, a photo book, and video introducing ourselves, our lives, and community to them. Their social worker will do this introduction with them. Then we can begin Skype calling! 😍 Also after receiving the referral we have to send the referral to the USCIS (immigration) for an Article 5. This can take 4-5 weeks to receive. After that there’s a lot more steps like visas, then invitation to travel, etc. We’re just taking a few steps at a time because it’s a lot. 😜😂

4) GOOD NEWS!! We received a grant from Gift of Adoption for up to $5,500. This type of grant will specifically cover travel costs so this grant will be awarded right before travel! Also, William was told this week that with his new job transition, he will be able to transfer all of his PTO days for FMLA (which should cover the time we are all in South America), plus 2 weeks paternity paid vacation for when we get home with the kids, AND his new company will give at least $2,500 towards our adoption fees!! SO THANKFUL!!!

5) Our sweet friend and neighbor down our street, Melissa Jennings, hosted a Noonday jewelry show for us this month! Noonday is a company that was started by a lady who was adopting a child from Africa, so a big part of their company is giving towards adoption families! In July, the company gave 15% of sales of a show directly to the adoption families! This week will will receive a check from Noonday for $113!! So thankful to have this go towards our referral fee! Every dollar helps! 🥰 Thank you Melissa and thank you to those of you who purchased items from the show! I hope you’re enjoying them!

6) We are very busy cleaning out, selling lots of items, and reorganizing the house to get the kids’ rooms ready and new playroom/schoolroom ready!! 😍 Items sold will go towards the referral fee and the kids’ ESL tutoring fees.

7) Learning Spanish is still going well!! We’ve kept up with lessons over the summer months. Right now we’re focusing more on everyday conversation, needs, wants, and emotional words.

🙏🙏Specific Prayer requests:

—For this referral process—that the committee will have favor with us and allow us to adopt “Tyler” and “Jess” for an official match! Since they have been “waiting children” for over a year, we’ve had a soft referral since the committee accepted our Letter of Intent to Adopt back last September 2020.

—Pray for more grants awarded! We heard back from Lifesong and they want us to let them know when we have an official referral! Lifesong has 4 financial opportunities so this would be HUGE!

Still waiting on hearing back from another grant. Please pray specifically for $11,000 in grant monies within the next 30 days! We know all things are possible with God and we believe when He calls someone to do something then He will provide financially for it to happen! 🙏🙌🏻

—Prayers for us as we prepare our house and more so prepare physically, mentally, and emotionally for international travel with 3 kids!

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and support! 🥰

William and Ansley Tingle