Leigh & Bobby Sidell's Adoption Fundraiser
Goal:
USD $60,000
Raised:
USD $22,282
Campaign funds will be received by Robert Sidell
Leigh & Bobby Sidell's Adoption Fundraiser
“God’s unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by sending Jesus Christ to die for us. And He did this because He wanted to!” - Ephesians 1:4-5
Hello everyone, we are Leigh and Bobby, and we appreciate you taking the time to read our story! We are excited, thrilled, and overjoyed to have officially started the adoption process! God has been quietly preparing our hearts for years: not only do we want children of our own, but we want to help orphans, whom the Lord deeply loves. We were once orphans, without a heavenly Father. We praise the Lord that He has adopted us into His family and we want to follow His example!
As we sought the Lord on His will for our family, we undoubtedly felt His calling this summer to finally take a giant leap of faith: to start our family through the beautiful, life-giving gift of adoption (James 1:27). Specifically, domestic infant adoption (and possibly twins or an infant with an older sibling). And while that sounds overwhelming and scary sometimes, it is also exciting and would be such an incredible blessing!
We have spent countless hours praying, researching, consulting others, and praying some more. God is so faithful, and we know that He has already hand-picked the child(ren) He has for us. And we are so excited to find out who they are! The outpouring of love, excitement, support, and encouragement we have received so far from family and friends has been amazing. We are so incredibly grateful!
For those not familiar with our story, we didn't find each other until our mid to late 30’s. We’ve been married for over a decade and have dealt with infertility the whole time (Thus, we don’t have any children. Just adorable fur babies!). We know that God gave us the desire to be parents, even though Stage IV Endometriosis and other fertility issues caused some roadblocks along the way. We have always believed that at least one infant would be a part of our story, whether biological or not.
Embarking on this adoption journey is a long, difficult, and expensive one. But so worth it! We are financing our adoption through our savings and the support of our family and friends. We are cutting costs, planning a garage sale, and looking for other ways to raise funds. So, we are here to humbly ask you – our family, friends, and even strangers – to partner with us and help us bring our child(ren) home, through any amount you feel led to gift to us. And it is SUCH a gift! We would be incredibly grateful for any contribution you make.
Our adoption consultant agency advised us to begin fundraising as soon as possible and provide a breakdown of the costs. She also advised us – as they do all their clients - not to drain our savings to pay for the entire adoption because “You will still need money to pay for the cost of having/raising children and living expenses.” That made sense and we want to be fully transparent with you in this process.
Our adoption consulting agency estimates that $60,000 is needed to complete our adoption. This estimate is solely for adoption costs and does not include things like furnishings, baby gear, clothes, toys, etc., that we will need to buy. Although our adoption consultant strongly advised us to fundraise the entire $60,000, we feel led to only fundraise $45,000: We are committed to investing money ourselves, to bring our child home, so we have contributed $15,000 towards our adoption fund.
The $60,000 covers:
• The biggest expenses are for the birth parents - things like:
- Labor & Delivery, Prenatal Care, and all pre and post delivery medical bills
- Expecting/Birth Parent Care (counseling, possible living expenses, housing, maternity clothes, food, utilities, transportation, etc.)
• Attorney, court, and legal costs
• Our Home Study, Post placement visits and adoption finalization by the court
• Adoption Agency Costs
• Our travel expenses (approx. on average 12-16 days of travel, hotel/rental, flights, car rental, gas, food, incidentals).
• Numerous Adoption Consulting Agency fees
• Professional pictures and our profile book
The adoption costs could be more than $60,000 if we end up having more than 1 child or we have to stay out of state for an extended time once the baby is born, due to the ICPC*. (This can sometimes take up to a month or more.).
Once we have completed the (mountains of) paperwork, get our profile book complete, and are eligible to start looking at potential matches, the average wait time for receiving our baby is only 4 to 8 months! This is going to be a big adventure! But we’re so ready! God is so good and so faithful. We know that He has chosen our child specifically for our family. How exciting! We continue to pray for His guidance and clarity for every step of this journey, and we can’t wait to meet our child (or possibly “children”!).
Our hope in inviting you to join us in this process is that you will feel like a valued member of the community we wish to build around our child/children. We are thrilled and so grateful to have you all along for the ride! Whether you choose to contribute towards our adoption goals or pray diligently for our journey - or both - please know that we appreciate you more than words can say!
We will be sure to keep you updated on our progress and our journey, both here and on Leigh’s Facebook page! Which reminds us: Would you please help us spread the word on your personal social media platforms, by sharing the link to this page? The more exposure we get, the better we can meet our adoption goals!
Thank you so very much for helping us bring our children home and grow our family!
With Deep Love and Gratitude,
Leigh and Bobby
PS Would you please join us in prayer for the following?
1. The health of our child(ren).
2. The birth parents. Their sacrifice is an immeasurable loss for them, yet an immeasurable gift to us. Our best day will undoubtedly be the worst day for the birth mother.
3. Whether to do an open versus semi-open adoption and how we can serve and minister to our birth parents.
4. The Lord prepares us to be the parents He wants us to be.
5. That we would know EXACTLY which child/children God wants us to adopt!
#adoptionrocks #domesticadoption #babysidell #ittakesavillage
#lovemakesafamily #adoptionfundraiser
*https://www.adopthelp.com/a-guide-to-the-interstate-compact-for-the-placement-of-children-icpc/
Recent Donations
TITUS 2:7 Jeremy leathers Wishing you both all the blessings in the world !
❤️
Merry Christmas and may God bless you both with the most perfect gift. Love you guys and couldn’t be more excited for you!!
Love ya Bobby- may God bless you and Leigh
So excited for you and Bobby in this amazing journey!
We are happy for you!
You will be great parents.
Praying!
Absolutely positively cannot wait to be part of this journey with your family ❤️❤️❤️. You all will be amazing parents! All the love!
Many blessings to your family. I’m rejoicing & praying with you!
God Bless you both ❤️
Updates
12/7/23 Christmas Reflections
December 26th, 2023
The other night, Bobby and I were enjoying our Christmas decorations, sitting by the glow of the Christmas tree at night. (And a certain cat in his “hiding” spot.). Much like on Thanksgiving, we realized that this will probably – hopefully – be our last Christmas where it’s just the two of us. It’s so surreal! And so exciting.
For 13 years, it’s been just the two of us. I told him we need to enjoy the peace and quiet while we can, as it will be a loooong time before we have that again lol!😂
But, seriously, we are ready for the chaos, the noise, and the joy of seeing the world through our child’s eyes!
We can’t wait for next Christmas with our little one! Teaching them about Jesus‘s birth, showing them the Christmas lights, the tree, having Santa Claus visit, reading children’s books about Christmas, etc.
And best of all…enjoying being with our families with the NEWEST member of our family! 🎄🎅🏼🎄❤️🎄🎅🏼🎄
UPDATE #3: Where are we in the adoption process?
November 27th, 2023
UPDATE #3: Where are we in the adoption process?
Hi everyone! We hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving weekend!
Bobby and I just wanted to hop on here and let everyone know where we are in the adoption process, what we have done so far and what our next steps are.
In a nutshell, we are on average 5 to 8 months away from getting our baby. (It could be sooner or later than that!).
Here’s what we have completed so far. (Everything has MANY more steps to it than we’ve listed, but we’re trying to keep this “brief”😅).:
1. We signed up with our wonderful
adoption consulting company, Christian
Adoption Consultants, CAC. We don’t
know how we would do this without CAC
and our awesome adoption consultant! https:www.christianadoptionconsultants.com
2. We completed LOTS of paperwork,
read, watched and listened to lots of
educational information about adoption.
(Required as well as not required.)
3. Completed & passed our home study!🎉
We are OFFICIALLY approved to adopt
2 kiddos!
WHAT WE HAVE LEFT TO DO before we can “go live” and start looking at cases/be matched with a baby:
1. Complete our Profile book (It’s
essentially an extensive bio
about us with photographs, that the
birth moms will use to decide who they
choose for their baby.).

2. Fill out our “preferences“ paperwork.
This is hugely important and something
we are entering into with much prayer, 
education and thought.
We will have to choose how open we are to everything from gender and ethnicity, to how much prenatal drug and alcohol exposure we’re comfortable with, to whether we want a closed, semi-open or open adoption. (We know we want semi open or open, depending on the situation.).
Please keep us in prayer for all of this! We are super open to whatever and whoever the Lord wants as our child(ren) and plan on casting a wide net! His plans are bigger and better than anything we could dream up ourselves, or that our minds can even imagine! (And we certainly believe that God is bigger than prenatal exposure, and that our child(ren) is going to be perfectly healthy, no matter what they’ve been through!).
Please pray that we have wisdom and discernment, and to know which “preferences” align with God’s heart for our family. We know that the Lord knows EXACTLY the child(ren) He has for us, and we truly just want His will!). Thank you so very much for your prayers! We cannot tell you how much we need them, and how much it means to us! 
3. Fill out multiple Adoption Agency
applications (Our profile book will then
go to these agencies around the country,
in adoption friendly states.
4. GO LIVE! This is when all the paperwork
has been completed, and we are eligible
to start looking at cases and being
matched!🎉
5. Continue fundraising throughout every
step.
Our adoption consultant estimates our adoption will cost approximately $60,000, and recommends that we fund raise the entire amount. (For a breakdown of fees and why we’re fundraising, click on our fundraising link below).
However, we feel led to fund raise $45,000 instead. Fundraising is a critical piece to making this adoption successful and bringing our baby home. We are so humbled and eternally grateful to all of you who have contributed financially to our fundraiser!
6. GET MATCHED!
We are hoping to go live by the end of January, so that we can start looking at cases, and hopefully be matched asap!
According to our wonderful adoption consultant, we are “right on time“ as far as where we should be in the adoption process. (Even though we, personally, wish we were further ahead!).
But!…We know that God‘s timing is PERFECT and that He knows EXACTLY who our baby (or babies) is going to be and when! We praise Him for His faithfulness, and all He is doing in us and through us during this process. He is teaching us patience, surrender, reliance on Him, contentment during the journey, trust and much more. We know He is preparing us to be the parents we were created to be, and we can’t wait!
On a sidenote, if any of you have questions about our adoption or adoption in general, we would be glad to talk to you about everything we’ve learned so far. Please don’t hesitate to reach out! 💖
#DomesticAdoption
#hopingtoadopt
#BabySidell
#Godstimingisperfect
#wantedchosenlovedadopted
https://www.givesendgo
UPDATE #3: Where are we in the adoption process?
November 27th, 2023
Hi everyone! We hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving weekend!
Bobby and I just wanted to hop on here and let everyone know where we are in the adoption process, what we have done so far and what our next steps are. We have “officially” been working on our adoption since August. But we had been researching and looking into things for a lot longer than that. 
Here’s just a little bit of what we have done/completed so far. Everything has MANY more steps to it than we listed, but we’re “TRYING” to keep this brief😅: 
1. We signed up with our wonderful
adoption consulting company, Christian
Adoption Consultants, CAC. (They are
not an adoption agency, but a liaison
between adoptive parents and vetted
adoption agencies that represent birth
mothers.). The whole adoption process is
so time consuming, overwhelming and
long, that we don’t know how we would
do this without CAC and our awesome
adoption consultant! https:www.christianadoptionconsultants.com
2. We completed LOTS of paperwork
and read lots of educational information
about adoption. (Required as well as not
required.)
3. Completed our home study
requirements. Here’s some to name a
few: 
- Our state and federal background
checks, criminal checks, fingerprinting,
etc. 
- Obtained letters of reference for our
home study from wonderful friends.
- Completed 3 extensive home study
interviews, including a home check. (Our
social worker rocks!). 
- We watched several required adoption
educational videos on various topics.
- Mountains of more paperwork!
8. We passed our home study and are
OFFICIALLY approved to adopt up to 2
kiddos!🎉
What we have left to do before we can start looking at cases/be matched with a baby:
1. Revise our homestudy report. There were
several minor factual items that need
to be corrected. Once we get the
updated report, we will turn it in to CAC. 
2. Complete our Profile book (It’s
essentially a professionally done bio
about us – with a gazillion questions we
have to answer about ourselves and each
other, and some photographs – that the
birth moms will see. It tells all about us,
what we’re like, etc. and is what birth
mothers use to choose the parents they
want to place their children with!).

3. Fill out our “preferences“ paperwork. We
will have to choose how open we are to
everything from gender and race, to how
much prenatal drug and alcohol exposure
we’re comfortable with, to whether we
want a closed, semi-open or open
adoption. (We want semi open or open,
depending on the situation.).
Please keep us in prayer for all of this! We are super open to whatever and whoever the Lord wants as our child(ren)! And we certainly believe that God is bigger than prenatal exposure, and that our child(ren) is going to be perfectly healthy, no matter what they’ve been through!
Please pray that we have wisdom and discernment, and to know which “preferences” align with God’s heart for our family. We know that the Lord knows EXACTLY the child(ren) He has for us, and we truly just want His will! 
4. Fill out multiple Adoption Agency
applications (Our profile book will then
go to these 6 to 10 adoption agencies
around the country, in adoption friendly
states.
5. GO LIVE! This is when all the paperwork
has been completed, and we are eligible
to start looking at cases and being
matched!
GOALS:
We are hoping to have all of these next steps completed by the end of January, so that we can go live, start looking at cases, and hopefully be matched asap!
According to our wonderful adoption consultant, we are “right on time“ as far as where we should be in the adoption process. Bobby and I had personal goals and were hoping to have everything done and be eligible for matches by December 1st, but all of this has taken much longer than we originally thought it would…in addition to just regular life and some other life events we’ve had going on.
But!…We know that God‘s timing is PERFECT and that He knows EXACTLY who our baby (or babies) are going to be and when! We praise Him for His faithfulness, and all He is doing in us and through us during this process. He is teaching us patience, surrender, reliance on Him, contentment during the journey, trust and much more. We know He is preparing us to be the parents we were created to be, and we can’t wait!
On a sidenote, if any of you have questions about our adoption or adoption in general, we would be glad to talk to you about everything we’ve learned so far. Please don’t hesitate to reach out! 💖
#DomesticAdoption
#hopingtoadopt
#BabySidell
#Godstimingisperfect
#wantedchosenlovedadopted
https://www.givesendgo.com/sidell
What is an adoption consulting company, and why are we using one?
November 15th, 2023
We have been working very hard since late July on our adoption. The the adoption process is a long, difficult and tedious one, and friends of ours who have adopted all advised us wholeheartedly to sign up with an “adoption consulting company”.
An adoption consulting company is not an adoption agency. They are essentially a liaison between adoptive parents and adoption agencies (which represent birth mothers.). An adoption consulting company walks you through the entire process of private adoption, which – to be honest – is completely overwhelming! There are so many legal ins and outs, so many things that have to be done – even before we are approved to start looking at cases to be matched. They essentially hold our hand through the process, lay out all the things that need to be done legally, connect us with all the social workers, home study agencies, adoption agencies, etc. and just make the process so much easier and smoother.
The adoption consulting company we chose is Christian Adoption Consultants (CAC). https://www.christianadoptionconsultants.com They are a wonderful organization that helps orphans all over the world and whose values and spiritual principles align with ours. Our adoption consultant is so sweet, genuine and has been absolutely wonderful! She’s a Godsend, an adoptive parent herself, and truly cares about each and every client she works with. She also shares our Christian beliefs, which automatically brings an amazing level of connection understanding to the situation.
Another benefit to using an adoption consulting company is that it drastically reduces the wait time for a baby and the “risks” involved in adoption.
“Back in the day” one would sign up with one local adoption agency. Getting a baby or a child could take years. But because CAC works with strictly vetted adoption agencies across the country, we will be exposed to a larger group of birth moms looking to place their children for adoption. CAC will send our profile book (for birth mothers to read) to 6 to 10 adoption agencies. More exposure means more – and quicker – opportunities to be matched with our baby!
The average wait time for a baby right now with CAC is 4 to 8 months, once we “go live“. Going live just means that all our paperwork, homestudy, profile book and pre-placement legalities etc. are completed and we are approved to adopt. We have already completed everything except our profile book, which will hopefully be done by mid December. Then we go live!
Another thing we like about CAC is that they only work with adoption agencies located in “adoption friendly“ states. These are states that allow the least amount of time for a birth mother to change her mind… Usually 3 to 10 days at the most. There are some states that allow up to 30, 60 and even 90 days for a birth parent to change their mind. This can often lead to a failed/disrupted adoption, when the adoption process is stopped after the child is placed in the adoptive home, but before being finalized legally.
This, of course, would be utterly heartbreaking. Adopting a baby from an adoption friendly state gives us the peace of mind that we won’t have to return our child(ren) after bringing them home and/or bonding.
Again, thank you so much for all your love, support, prayers, and financial contributions! You all play such a pivotal role in bringing our child(ren) home, and we are eternally grateful!
If you have any questions at all about our adoption process, please don’t hesitate to reach out!
Love & Blessings,
Leigh and Bobby
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