ALMOST DONE!

I am pretty excited at where we are at with our adoption! I just spoke to our agency, they have reviewed our dossier, which is our final set of paperwork. It is the portfolio about us that goes to Ethiopia. It has to be absolutely perfect by Ethiopia standards and USA standards. So we had a few minor adjustments to make and THEN, THEN we are on the wait list!
Every time I speak to our agency and ask how long the wait is, it gets longer and longer.
We started at a 12 month wait for a referral, then 18 months and today she said expect to wait 18-24 months.
Ethiopia adoptions are really slowing down.
I am not at all frustrated or worried. I know from experience that God's timing is ALWAYS perfect. He already has the perfect little one picked out for our family, and he is working in our lives and in their life getting ready for us to be together!

God has done so much in our little family this past year, I am just amazed. I cant wait to see what these next two years bring! I know it's going to be bigger than I could ever imagine!
Living life knowing that HE is in full control, leaves me with such a peace, an overwhelming peace.

Plus God gave me these two munchkins to keep me plenty busy, while I wait for His perfect plan to unfold!

Adoption Testimony

Jarrod and I are applying for a grant through lifesong to help pay for some of the costs with our adoption. We had to write our adoption testimony and I thought I would share it with you guys.

Adoption Testimony

I am still amazed at our adoption testimony. Because it is so clear that this is all God. About 6 months ago, Jarrod and I both felt a stirring in our hearts that something big was coming. We were and still are so eager to serve God with our lives. We were reading books about what the Bible says about how Christians should be loving and caring for the poor, the needy, the widowed and the orphans. We kept reading about God asking us to care for Orphans and if we cared for them and loved people that needed it, it showed our love for Him! We wanted so much for our lives to show how much we loved Jesus. We began to pray and ask God, what can we do as a family? How can we better serve you? One afternoon I was deep in prayer, crying out to God, God what is it I know there is something? The word ADOPTION flashed through my mind. I was shocked at how clear it was. I kept praying, and asking God if this was it? The more I prayed the more sure I became that this was what God was calling us to do.

I talked to Jarrod about it and he wasn’t so sure, so we committed to praying about it for one month. In that month God worked on both of our hearts. We met new friends who were adopting or had already adopted, we were encouraged, we did lots of research, and most importantly we prayed like we have never prayed before because we knew this was a huge decision and we needed a lot of peace. When one month was up we both knew without a doubt in our minds that God was asking us to adopt. Our fears were gone, we were completely comfortable and had a total peace about this decision. All the things that I was “scared” about before were gone.

Now fast forward 6 months and we are so excited to meet our baby. Our son/daughter is in Ethiopia and we ache for them and long to meet them. We pray for our child daily. God’s hand is in this, He is guiding us and providing for us every step of the way. Our God is an awesome God.

God's World

This past week as we prepared for Orphan Sunday coming up on November 6th, Jarrod and I and two other couples, talked about how God has changed our hearts to be passionate about adoption and orphans in general. We watched this video,TRUE RELIGION, and it explained EXACTLY what has weighed so heavy on my heart in the past year or so.

I have grown up in church, surrounded by Christian friends and family. I have been blessed with everything I could ever NEED. I have not had a heart for the poor or orphans really, of course it made me sad to think about people living on the streets, but honestly I very rarely thought about it. I don't remember it ever being talked about growing up. But God has slowly been planting seeds in my life. Showing me what the WORLD looks like to HIM,not just to me. I constantly struggle with wanting things that I don't need at all, looking at what other people have and wishing I had that.
With my job I spend most days looking at amazing, huge expensive homes and sometimes you cant help but walk through homes like this, and imagine what it would be like if I lived here! How nice it would be to have all this space and the gorgeous backyard and views. I start to get this twinge of jealousy.

Then God gives me the reality check that I so desperately need, He reminds me that I have everything I could ever need, I have Him.

Tonight I read about a women who has commited her life to serving in Africa at a children's prison. YES a prison for babies, toddlers and children. These children are picked up off the streets and thrown into a prison and put behind bars simply because they have no family.
I spent the day buying expensive fabrics and looking at beautiful homes and ended my day with this story:
A little boy living in a Uganda children's prison, told this women his story as they were sitting on the concrete coloring pictures.

While living with his father and stepmother he was physically abused. His birth mother picked him up and then brought him to and abandoned him at M1(the prison). He is only 13 years old and has lived there for quite some time now. He tells her

“I am thankful to be here,” he said. “Because before I came, I was a muslim. Now I know Jesus.” He went on to say that his favorite story in the Bible comes from Luke 23. As he told to her the story of the crucifixion and how Jesus took his place when His hands were nailed to the cross.
He wrote this in her notebook:

“I [know] that Jesus is my Savior. And died for my sins and is going to come back to see me. thank you Jesus for loving me and my friend Kelsey. And I want you bless all NGO come here to share with us the word of God and only son Jesus Christ our Savior. When I come here I didn’t [know] that Jesus my Savior. But when I come to [M1] I have a chance to [know] that Jesus Savior – and he loves me.”

To have a joy and peace like this little boy who in our eyes has nothing.

God is teaching me and reminding me to view the world not how I see it, but how He sees it.

Watch this video it says it all...
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2809712/Videos/True%20Religion%20-%20Orphan%20Sunday.mp4

Adoption Update

Thanks to all our family, friends and community we were able to reach our last financial goal and turn in our agency contract with the payment. A few days ago we received a box from our agency. It is a binder full of everything else we need to do to get on the wait list.
Right now we are finishing up our home study, Jarrod has his interview this evening and then we will be done! But our agency also requires us to do about 20 hours of education before our home study can be turned in. We have a book called "Eyes Open Wide" and another binder of information for us to read. I am thankful for the education because there is obviously so much about adopting a child from Africa that Jarrod and I do NOT know! From what I have read there is alot of things that we have done with our own children that we need to do differently with this child. It is good for us to read it now so we can start making the adjustments with our own children now, instead of when the new baby gets here!

So we have a new goal! The fees that we pay for throughout this adoption are for the MANY people it takes to make this happen.Translating fees, FBI check, fingerprinting, international service fees....
Our new goal is $7200! I need to double check but I believe we have about 3-4 months to raise this money.
We are going to continue to sell T-Shirts throughout the adoption process, and we have some other very EXCITING fundraisers coming up!
Thank you for reading, praying and supporting us we could NOT do this without you!