Thank you for stopping by to learn more about our adoption! God has been preparing both of our hearts for this for a long time and after endless research and prayer, we have begun the process to find and bring home our third sweet Burton Baby.
The driving force behind our hearts in this is simply that Jesus has adopted both Karl & I into His family and as a reflection of His love and what He has done for us, we want to follow His command to "care for the orphans." God loves every life. "Sar Ang Hae," means, "I love you," in Korean. And it is the deepest desire of our hearts to honor Him by loving all life well. Right now for us, that means loving a little life that is currently growing in a brave mom's belly somewhere in South Korea.
We will be adopting through Holt International's South Korea program! We have already applied and been accepted as adoptive parents by Holt. There are so many steps to this process and we are anxious to hit the ground running.We cannot do this alone, and fortunately, we know we aren't! We know that God has gone before us to pave a way to bring our next baby home. “For the God who calls you is faithful, and He can _ be trusted to _ make it so.” – 1 Thessalonians 5:24. We love that truth about The Lord and are clinging to it as we press on in this long process!
So how can you help us?
1) Pray! We are humbly asking for lots of prayer. Right now we are specifically asking for 3 things:
-That God would provide the money needed to keep taking steps forward in this process
-That God would provide our birth family with Godly support, health for our birth mom and baby and that our birth family would personally know The Lord or come to know The Lord through this pregnancy and adoption placement.
-That God would prepare our hearts for this sweet baby
2) Give! We are also VERY humbly asking for money. I can hardly even type that without cringing. I have always said I would make a HORRIBLE sales person because I hate asking people for money. Anyways, this process is expensive. And we literally will not be able to do it without generosity from our friends and family. We promise to be very transparent about the financial aspects of this. Every dime given will go directly towards agency and government fees to bring this baby home. We will also apply for grants, however we can't do that until we are home study approved. There is a breakdown of fees at the bottom of this page. Our first financial goal is to raise $25,500. Achieving this would mean that when a child becomes available for us, we can accept the referral and officially be "matched," as you have to have the Adoption Program fee to accept a referral. Overall, we expect this process to cost between $39,000-$54,000. There are a lot of variables to the cost.
3) Get involved! Love life with us! Jump in at your local pregnancy resource center to get the chance to sit knee-to-knee with a mom experiencing an unplanned pregnancy. What a hands-on way to get to minister to a woman in crisis! Her pregnancy may be unplanned to her, but not to God. Remind her of her value and worth to our Heavenly Father! Look to see if you have a local chapter of Embrace Grace- a church-based ministry that meets needs of first-time single moms in a real, tangible way. Invite a single mom over for a good meal or volunteer your time to babysit a friend that may have a special needs child and doesn't get much time away.
4) Share! Would you subscribe to updates at the bottom of this page and then share this page with a friend or family member? Every prayer, every dime, every act of kindness towards a typically unseen person will bring glory and honor to God and that just delights our souls. Or Seouls. ;)
We are already looking forward to updating this page with praises and provisions that God has blessed us with. Thank you in advance for partnering with us to bring our 3rd baby home to Texas.
Love,
Karl & Hannah Burton
And if you're still reading, you must be my mom. Just kidding. But here is some very important financial information and a breakdown of all the costs that I copy and pasted directly from Holt's Website. More details about each fee can be found at http://www.holtinternational.org/adoption/fees.php simply select "Korea," from the menu on the left.
Application Fee – $350- done
U.S. Processing Fee #1 – $1,950- done
Adoption Homestudy Fee– $2,500-$2,900 - done
Adoption Home Study Update Fee – $500 plus mileage
U.S. Processing Fee #2 – $3,000
Adoption Program Fee – $22,500
Korea Travel Fee – $800
Post-Placement Reports – $1,600 plus mileage- done
USCIS application – $860-$1,330
Adoption Education Classes – $150-$500 - done
Psychological Evaluation or Other Third-Party Evaluations – $250-$2,500 - done
Preadoption Medical Review of Child Referral Material - $250-$1,000
Dossier Preparation – $100-$1000
Adoption Re-Finalization – $25-$1,500
Airfare, Lodging, Meals, Transportation – $4,900 - $13,000
