Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Monday, October 15, 2012

Pictures, Puzzle and Tag Sale Updates

Wow, wow, wow.  That is my day today.  Woke up at 3am, checked phone for any adoption updates - none.  Fell back asleep.  Alarm went off at 5am, checked phone - UPDATES!!!! 

Ok, I'm going to push the "pause" button here for just a minute.  We had our yard sale, "tag sale", this past Saturday.  It was great.  I learned more about receiving love from others and the true meaning of "community" more than anything.  Let me just say again, I have been blown away by the love and support of friends and church family.  People I don't know personally donated stuff.  It was just so amazing to be apart of all this community.  It was such a blessing to be part of it.  We made a little over $400 at the yard sale.  Technically, we aren't done because we have alot of donated furniture we are going to put on Craig's List, and some other things we are going to put on Ebay.  Not bad, not bad at all!  We get to change our little fundraiser ticker to include that!  YEAH!  It's really nice too see that number go up.  Thank you to everyone who donated.  We sincerely appreciate your kindness and generosity.

Moving on to the updates - I was totally surprised by the new pictures of Imani in my mailbox this morning.  She is much smaller than I realized.  Much!  She is skinny.  Not scary skinny, but pretty skinny.  Our facilitator told us we should have our consent to adopt from the commune this week.  Praise the Lord!  They have this saying - This is Africa - meaning, plans are optional.  It is very relaxed over there.  When some tells you "this week" you need to be prepared for sometime this month, hopefully. UGH!  So annoying.  To me, this week is TODAY.  Trying to relax here.

One of my new facebook friends is in the DRC right now picking up her kids.  We had sent a couple little things to Imani through my friend.  She was finally able to go today.  Although, we thought she wouldn't, then she did.....talk about a roller coaster - she was also supposed to go last week.  Up, down, up, down.....I was glued to my computer ALL afternoon.  At 3pm I was like, ok, it is 8pm there, she HAS to be back by now because she has been getting her kids to bed about 8....then, the pictures started coming.  OH MY GOODNESS!  It was so great, I was crying tears of happiness.  Kinds weird because I am not very "touchy feely" when it comes to others, but to see all these pictures of these kids who are living together, waiting on their families to come and get them....it was amazing that my new friend was able to go and give us all a little glimpse.  I try to describe it as when you are pregnant and "if I could just see his/her face one time, then I will be content" feeling....all the while knowing that you will NEVER be content with just one peek!  I can't wait to get on the plane to Africa and to bring her home - to her family.  Soon.  Very soon.

Puzzle - Ok, we are making some serious progress on this puzzle.  How many pieces do you think we have sold?  Take a guess.  Remember, this is a 1,000 piece puzzle.  HUGE.  Like, out of our mind huge!  It took us 6 weeks to put this thing together.  We would work and work and work, then take a break.  Then work and work and work.  Take a break.  Then, FINALLY, we got close and then we had a fire within to get it done!  Dillan, James and Ben put in the last three pieces.  It was great!  Here is the finished product:



To date, we have sold 394!  Whoo Hoo!  We are making some serious progress in a short amount of time!  So exciting!  Thank you all!  I still have some names to fill in above, so if you don't see yours, then don't worry, i have not forgotten!

It's late and I am really tired.  Today was a GREAT day, but I am drained from the ups and downs!

Christy

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Moving Along!


The last three weeks have been a little hectic with Rob going to Honduras and life in general.  I was SO excited for school to be back in, that I forgot the “cons” of school.  Work has been especially taxing on me lately and I have continually wondered about this.  This issue has been in my prayers constantly.  Not sure how to fix it yet, because like most two income families, it is probably impossible to go back to one.  Still wrestling with what God wants me to do and best to glorify him through this.

We do have some forward motion in our adoption.  While we are still waiting on the “consent to adopt” that comes from the commune (think “mayor’s” office), we have been steadily working on lots of paperwork.  Today, we mailed our Dossier to DRC.  Exciting, yet scary!  That little package has originals of all the papers that Rob and I have – birth certificates, marriage certificate, home study, passport copies….those sorts of things.  So, prayerfully, we have sent it to Congo and it should arrive on Monday.  Isn’t that neat?  I’m sending a package to AFRICA today, Thursday, and it will arrive on Monday! 

This past week we also had our official fingerprints taken at the USCIS office in Norfolk.  This process has really been quite annoying, but now, our finger prints are done!  Crossing another “to-do” off the list!  Feels good.  I spoke to our adoption officer today as well as she said she will have our fingerprint results today or tomorrow and will be able to finish our case then.  LOVE her!  She is super kind and does what she says she is going to do.

I also want to share what is going on in our fundraising world.  We are deathly afraid of being seen as “those people” who constantly asking for “your support”, so we have tried to pick and choose our fundraising choices very wisely.  Rob and I have battled back and forth about when to do a yard sale.  He wanted to do it in the spring and I wanted to do it now (fall).  While he was in Honduras I received a community letter that reminded me about the community yard sale on October 13th.  In my neighborhood, we are not allowed to have a private yard sale at our house.  I don’t know why exactly….so, I’ll just keep moving.  So, anyway, I decided that we would have a yard sale and since that moment, I have truly overwhelmed by the kindness of others.  I was so worried that this was not going to do well, but I can truly say that this yard sale, whether successful financially or not, is being used by God to remind me of the kindness of others and my church family.  People I do not even know are giving me donations.  I have donations that have taken up ¾ of my garage!  It is truly amazing!  I just look at everything and I’m like, “How am I going to even begin to sort through this stuff, much less tag and sell it all!”.  My neighbor Jenn has been a God-send.  I think she knows that I was completely overwhelmed when she came over last night because she just started tagging and organizing!  Whew!  So helpful!  My pastor’s wife is making a poster for us that says all of the proceeds will go to our adoption fund to bring home our little girl.  I am hoping that when they see that, they won’t try to haggle as much – but, to be fair, I am pricing things to sell.  I’m not trying to be unrealistic here – I want to give others a reasonable price for this stuff because it was ALL DONATED! 

I can’t help but to feel blessed by God in the middle of this.  Don’t get me wrong, I am seriously stressed here, but when I think about all these people who have donated items and money and time to us, I realize that this is the love of God shown to me through others. 

I can’t wait to share the results of the Yard Sale with you!  I also can’t wait to share an update on the Puzzle!  I was going to do that earlier this week, but the pictures I took did not come out, so I will wait and post a Puzzle update and Yard Sale update all at one time – probably Sunday after I have had time to recuperate!

Much love,

Christy