Here is our Adoption Journey so far…
We started this process of adopting 2 little girls from Liberia in April of 2022.
After visiting Liberia for 5 months in 2024, we decided to additionally adopt a little boy. This little guy, already bonded to our Liberian daughters, also became very close to our entire family during our time in Liberia, and now, life without him with us is unimaginable.
We chose Liberia because we are impressed by Liberia’s resilience and progress as a war torn country that is healing from so much. Liberia works hard to allow adoptions when necessary and to reunite families whenever possible. We are grateful Liberia is allowing us to adopt our daughters, and hopeful as we watch Liberia grow as a country.
We started this journey in April of 2022.
In May of 2023, with the help of our friends and family, church, community, and organizations like Noonday Collection, Phill the Box, Funds2Orgs, and Adopt Together, we reached our fundraising goals to make our adoption possible. At that time, we anticipated our Liberian daughters would be joining our family in 3-6 months time.
We did not get any solid updates for months, until November of 2023, when adoptions for multiple agencies, including our agency, were suspended in Liberia, which prompted our visit to bond with our kids and explore all avenues in person in February of 2024. We returned home in July of 2024 after exhausting all resources to unite our family permanently.
There are multiple political conflicts that brought adoptions to a halt in November of 2023. Although these political conflicts put Liberian children at risk, the layers of the conflicts are multifaceted and complicated beyond the adoption process itself.
As we continue to wait, we are committed to intentional international parenting. We will continue to visit as much as we can and continue to pursue every avenue to unite our family on one continent. We appreciate any encouragement as we continue to walk this road.
The Adoption Process is like moving the biggest Rock I’ve ever seen. Our adoption process is becoming the Rock that Floats.
Our adoption of these 2 little girls used to be the immovable Big Rock. It grew to a big rolling Rock with tons of momentum. Now it is about to float.
Click here to see our “Adoption Rock” start to float.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
FBI fingerprinting is a big milestone in our timeline to get our feet on Liberian soil. On average, we will wait 30-45 days from today to get a letter (I-600A approval) from the USCIS (immigration for the United States) that gives us permission to adopt internationally from Liberia. After that approval, we send our documentation to Liberia (it’s ready to go except the I600A approval letter.)
Then we wait again. During the next wait, Liberian government officials investigate the history of our Liberian daughters’ lives. They will talk to their mother, their aunt, the staff at Small World Children’s Home and any other adult or professional entity they deem appropriate for verifying that adoption to the United States is the last resort for their survival. Their mother is alive and is reportedly supportive of their adoption and relieved they have a family waiting.
Click here to see our “Adoption Rock” start to float.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
We will get the chance to meet their birth family in Liberia, as their mother will be required to be present in court to sign for their adoption. We hope to establish a relationship with her, so she can check in on the girls and so we can check in on her.
We have decided to become Noonday ambassadors. We are inspired by Noonday and the fair trade marketplace created by Noonday. We plan to use our profits to fund our own adoption, then use it to fund adoptions for other families. Noonday creates a fair trade world market for artisans all over the world to have dignified jobs. Human and child sex trafficking is a problem worldwide. We want a chance to combat slavery of this nature by providing jobs to those being rescued from traffickers all over the world. Noonday does that. Noonday supports adoption with every purchase. We love that, too! Our generation has found a way to make the global market an equal playing field for those wanting an honest day’s work that results in ways families can thrive, no matter where they were born, or what has happened to them.
I am not a jewelry person. I wear my wedding rings and my Keep…. ….going bracelet and my watch.
Now, I wear my bullet necklace.
Click here to see our “Adoption Rock” start to float.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
My bullet necklace was made from used bullets and artillery found in fields of Africa from violent conflicts of the past. They are melted down and made into jewelry like my bullet necklace. It cost me $42. The journey of the bullets I wear around my neck are ones that I wear in memory of the loss of life. That loss of life created an instability in the foundation of the fields they fell in. Those same bullets now build a bridge between my throat and the hands that assembled the necklace. May we learn to stop using our bare hands to attack the throat of our rivals, and learn more about how bullet necklaces forge peace.
https://ivonneliebenberg.noondaycollection.com/shop/moonlight-necklace/
I hope to sell a lot of bullet necklaces. I hope to save a lot of lives with bullets around my neck.
I did 2 separate blogs that I thought of a lot today, and want to reference them again, here.
One is about weather, and after hurricane Ian made his mess, weather forecasts takes on new gravity for me.
https://adopt100morehappykids.wordpress.com/2022/08/24/day-148-adopt-from-liberia-weather/
Statistics are helpful for me to quantify a need for resources. Statistics also help tell stories without violating the privacy of those children, especially before they are ready to tell their story on their terms.
Statistics I know well are those involving child sex trafficking in southwest Florida. I will not revisit those statistics at this moment, but just know that any hurricane increases the number of victims within the child sex trafficking industry. Fosters are trafficked. They are trafficked a lot. Some of us thought we had abolished slavery, but we remain wrong. I know, I’m sad too. Sad or not, if we don’t start talking about it more, exposing it more, punishing it more and allowing it less, we will regret it. Knowledge is power. When you are ready to be a part of the solution for child sex trafficking, just do a quick google search involving human trafficking and the Polaris project. At minimum, consider buying a bullet necklace from me to give jobs to those exiting trafficking on the other side of the earth.
Click the next link to buy a necklace that helps our adoption and gives a job to former sex trafficking slaves.
https://ivonneliebenberg.noondaycollection.com/onlinetrunkshow/?cl=151221D6-CB1E-44CB-A4ED-3B5042599288
The 2nd blog is the one about our passports and can be found here:
https://adopt100morehappykids.wordpress.com/2022/09/09/passports-im-not-a-saint-day-162-adopt-from-liberia/
I have started comparing our adoption process to a big rock that is rolling down a dirt road, pushed by 100 different hands, all helping move us closer to our Liberian daughters. If you would like to help float the big rock across the ocean, a $5 donation makes a huge difference to the relentless heart of mine that could care less about the exhaustion of my soul on days like today.
Click the next link to give $5.
Click here to see our “Adoption Rock” start to float.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
The freedom to adopt a child from Liberia is one I was born with. Because I’m an American, some things are open for me, as granted by my birth on American soil. That freedom is sacred to me. The ability to complete an adoption is one we work for. Daily we work. We work to protect it, work to pay for it, work to maintain our status as “stable” and work to maintain the network of support that is mostly the readers of this blog to keep our big “rock of adoption dreams” rolling down a dirt road to reach our kids. Pretty soon our “rock of adoption dreams” will float across the Atlantic Ocean and back.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
The thing we have power over for this adoption is asking for help, and moving the mountain of money it takes to adopt 2 littles from Africa. We asked everyone. We brought every effort we had and borrowed effort from everyone willing to share and used every skill set we possess and then borrowed or developed more skill sets. We prayed every day, and honestly, after 3 years in the foster care world as a parent, my prayers are often angry. Possibly consistently angry, but consistently persistent as well.
Then the support showed up, and still shows up every day. Every day, you are here in some form. Every day, someone helps. Every day someone does something unexpected. Whether it is clothes and textile donations, or noonday purchases or ink cartridges or cash or just a question to see how we are doing, help shows up every day.
We still need around $16,000 to float across the Atlantic Ocean and back. Seems like such a small number, knowing we needed $71,100.00 just 202 days ago.
Thanks for helping. Thanks for listening. Thanks for supporting the rock of adoption dreams that should sink, but instead floats.
Click here to see our “Adoption Rock” start to float.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
Keep…. …..going.
https://adopt100morehappykids.wordpress.com/2022/10/11/day-196-adopt-our-liberian-daughters-keep-going/
Please click link for full update!!
I’m not sure how to start this one, just know it will end with :
Keep…. ….going.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
as it always does. Because I will keep going.
My Keep…. …..going bracelet has spread a lot of joy this week. For some reason it softens the blow when the worst imaginable things happen. Days when we unexpectedly lost the most. Days like September 28th. And days like September 11th, where we all lost a lot. And more personal days for me like April 1st and August 1st and May 21st and April 26th. Days my heart pauses and I accidentally hold my breath trying to figure out how to close some gaping hole in my soul the fosters left. Their birthdays. The days we said goodbye. The days in between. My runaway train imagination of where they are and what they could need, and if they remember when I sat for hours in a rocking chair just teaching them to breathe and think and learn how valuable and important they are. How their fight for survival was one they could lay down when under my roof, and what to do when they find themselves at risk for danger. Not “if”. When.
Keep…. ….going.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
The bracelet helps me. I’m glad my friends are wearing it too. Something about the solidarity of standing together with that matriarch support of who we are together on the outside and what we know is the truth on our worst days on the inside. We still get up, and keep…. ….going. Because it’s a fight. Life is a battle of all kinds of things. Most days I have a lot of fight left in me at the end of the day. And on the days that cause the colossal collapse of that fight, I always have a little hope left. And the confidence of the bracelet.
Keep…. ….going.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
Because God asked me to. Because it’s the right thing to do. Because the weaponization of our children is real. They will fight for something. Let it not be their life, as my fosters did. Let it be an easier cause. Like cancer or how to build a microwave that doesn’t need power!
Devon Crews, thanks for the bracelet. It still helps.
So as I am searching for what to say or how to start and what to say, on my treadmill, lost a bit today, Jeremy bursts in my sacred dark workout room and I immediately think there is a broken bone in a child somewhere….nope! We got a $7000 grant from Gift of Adoption.
$7000 grant.
Gift of Adoption
Speechless, tearful, happy, and humbled.
Combining Noonday final numbers from Ivonne and all those who helped with our noonday show, total donation came to $1200.
$1200 donation
Noonday Show with Ivonne Liebenberg
https://ivonneliebenberg.noondaycollection.com
So in the last 30 days, our daughters in Liberia have had $9300 cash show up to support their adoption. $1100 in anonymous donations, plus $7000 from gift of adoption, plus $1200 from noonday.
It’s incredible. If you are reading this blog and considering adoption, please know that you can do this and I will help you.
We have a very narrow window to make it to Sadie’s 5th birthday on 12/1. It was always a lofty goal, a possible miracle, and as I continue to ask God to keep moving mountains out of my way to get my arms around our 2 youngest daughters, I know it is because of the goodness of people around us that we are even close to the realm of making it.
Keep…. ….going.
https://adopttogether.herokuapp.com/families/the-smith-s
Your generosity and solidarity and encouragement and hope, even amidst an actual hurricane, put us in position to be there, and you continue to hold us in position to make it to a birthday party of a kid we haven’t met. It seems like our family’s journey to adopt these kids is like one big rock. And your help looks like 100 hands rolling one big rock down one long dirt road.
Our “rock” is now in the hands of government officials. Both here in the US and in Liberia. This part is about to get hard. After we get fingerprinted on Monday for the US immigration office, there is nothing left to do but wait. (And fundraise for travel) and wait.
The wait is hard. Your prayers will still move our rock. But our physical ability to push is about to end. The wait is going to be hard. The unknown will be even harder. “When” is better than “if”. Thanks for deleting the “if”. Now we wait.
Hoping our big rock and willingness to roll is paving a highway to make adoption easier, faster, better and make families stronger. Hoping the wait does not stall our adoption unnecessarily.
Each day our daughters live with us is one less day 2 more orphans don’t starve to death.
It is no longer hard for me to ask for help.
God is still God. Kids still need families. People are good, with good intentions.
One thing I know for sure is that these 2 little sets feet we keep chasing down to bring under the protection of our family are worth the chase. These little girls have done and will do great things. They already know how to keep…. ….going. What else will they do? Click the link below to help if you want to. We appreciate the solidarity.
Day 191. Adopt 2 from Liberia.
October 6, 2022Adopt100more
As we recover from Hurricane Ian, we are grateful we did not have any major damage, and have been in a position to help others.
It is so devastating to see a natural disaster first hand. It’s encouraging to see people come together for good. People are good, with good intentions.
We got the rest of our passports in the mail today! We are waiting on the US embassy to acknowledge our intent to adopt from Liberia, and stamp a piece of paper that gives the blessing of the US government for us to proceed to the next step.
We still have a lot more money to find to afford our travel. We got news from Gift of Adoption Grants that we received approval to some type of grant assistance. We are unsure of the amount, or if there are funds available for our family to receive a grant. We should find out by October 18th.
We received 2 separate anonymous donations totaling $1,100.00 this past week. Very encouraging! Especially in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian.
Our noonday fundraiser went really well! We will announce the final numbers next week. The support there was so encouraging.
We are hoping for an e-mail update this month on how our kids are doing and maybe some new pictures!
It is difficult to sleep and eat and function normally with so much loss all around us. It seems to take such deliberate effort to do simple things, like get out of bed.
We are thankful we kept our lives and our home during hurricane Ian.
Keep…. ….going.
Please keep our family and our town of Cape Coral, FL in your prayers as we brace for Ian.
Arrow is where we are in the picture.
We received a $1000 anonymous donation yesterday, amidst the storm preps. Thanks!
Keep…. …going.
2 more days to shop our noonday show and buy items to help our adoption. Here is the shopping link! Proceeds will be placed here as a donation, so stay tuned on the miraculous amount we will get!
http://bit.ly/noonday4thesmiths
Noonday is a fantastic company started by an adoptive mom who found herself on a similar road we are on several years ago.
Her journey to her son, Jag, in Africa as well, gave motivation for the idea of reselling artisan items in the US from merchants all over the world in developing countries. Click on our shopping link to read more about this company. See the blog for amazing stories of lives being saved through this company’s mission. The bonus for us as an adoptive family is every dollar spent helps an adoption somewhere. You can help by sharing our shopping link with your friends for early Christmas shopping.
I have so many items around my home that I have purchased over the years for different adoptions. Noonday items are a welcome addition to that collection.
http://bit.ly/noonday4thesmiths
The batik art set pictured below is just one example of how one purchase feeds a family in Malaysia and teaches my children about the world as they paint decor for my home.
