Celebrate

I don't have the energy to write what's on my heart. To keep it simple, yesterday I celebrated a birthday of a little boy who's not yet in my home. And today along with my dear friends Bonnie and Tony, we remember the devastating loss of my friend Scott (their little boy) 14 years ago.

The emotions are many today.

Today I will fill my day with friends for at least two hours as we help some good friends of ours raise support for their upcoming mission trip to Belize.

Adoption Auction

Hi everyone. I'm slowly transitioning from Mexico missions stuff back to adoption details. We're working hard at adoption details, including raising funds. To offset the cost of our adoption, we're hosting an adoption auction fundraiser. This will be an online auction for about 2 weeks followed by a dessert and live auction here in Iowa. We've had several donations of items and greatly appreciate that. Realistically though, there's a need for more donations. If you have an item or service to share, I want you to be able to do so. Please let me know ASAP if you would be willing to donate to our auction. To give you an idea of some of the donations so far, here's a list:
prom dresses worn only once

· tie blankets

· hand knitted scarves

· free baby sitting

· baby quilt

· custom designed cards

· hand crafted jewelry

· antique hand quilted quilt

· framed wolf print

· acrylic painting

· silver bracelet that doesn't fit them

... hmm, i bet I have some stuff like that...especially a bracelet from an old boyfriend. Some other things come to mind as great items too:
gym memberships

· guitar lessons

· educational tutoring

· photography sitting

· photography lessons

· livestock - for a pet or for meat

· something you make - either professionally or as a hobby

· Supplies left over from something you sold (mary kay, creative memories, etc)

· that new pair of shoes or jacket you never returned

· that really cool international item you bought but don't know what to do with
These are things I think of cause they're things I like/want but don't necessarily need. Anyway, let me know. We would be much appreciated to hear back from you either way. Just to give you an update on where we're at in the process, I'll share that too. On Monday night we viewed the profile of a waiting child and will be presented to the selection committtee for him. Chances are it won't amount to anything but I live by faith, not by coincidence. I'm trusting in God's will on this, regardless of the outcome. But before we can move too much further, we have lots to do. We have to pay the remainder of our application fee. We have the contract and invoice at home to sign and return. We have to do our finger printing for our background investigation and gather up our birth and marriage certificates. We will be emailing our tax info today or tomorrow. Those we named as references are working on their surveys. After that, we head to LeGrand Iowa for the first part of our adoption education requirements. The process is moving along now and we're excited for the end result! Thanks so much for being willing to participate in our journey.

Weekend Report

I spent Friday night and Saturday morning at Beulahland Bible Camp hanging out with the Mexico City team. It was great to bond with old and new friends while we did some cultural presentations, shared what God's doing in our lives, prayed with our partners and studied God's Word. It was exciting to hear two of our team mates express a desire to be baptized. Both of them had been baptized at a young age but want to be baptized now as a public statement regarding their faith. What a cool end to our time together.

At noon Ryan, the kids, and our friend Elaine met me at the camp for a picnic and fishing. It was cold and rainy but we were prepared for lunch and Scott was determined to fish. It was a light rain so we managed that but were cold. Scott caught a big fish right away but after that Elaine was the only one who caught fish. As an international student from Malaysia, this was her first fishing experience and she loved it. I also paddled around the big pond with the kids and they loved it but my quads didn't!

Saturday night we did a quick run to Ryan's folks and grabbed some pizza in town before getting to their house. We ate our "diet" pizza [I think thin crust pizza is like being on a diet cause I love bread] had a quick tour of the remodel project, helped them move some things, showed them the waiting child list for adoption and picked a little girl that I want to get some more information about, stopped at WallyWorld on our way home and got in bed late.

Sunday was a full day at the church. I was home at 3pm and had a lazy afternoon with the family. Ryan left to work on the train that he and a few guys are building for vacation bible school, and eventually I got the wild indians in bed. [I seriously wonder how differently they would act if they didn't have sugar in their diet.] I popped two tylen0l pm's and headed to bed!

I can do it

Last night while at the warehouse where Ryan was working on the VBS set, I rattled off the words of one of Scott's children's books. Chris got a kick out of the story and I'm not sure he noticed that I had it memorized. Ryan on the other hand gave me a look and told Chris and me that I should be able to memorize whole books of the bible because I've got a good memory. I thought that was funny since Ryan is the one with an incredible memory. I can do numbers, not stories, unless they rhyme and are children's books.

I went home last night and read through Hebrews 11-12. The 11th chapter talks about the things people did because they had the faith. That got me thinking about our ongoing adoption stuff. Then it got me thinking about Ryan's comment from earlier. I've thought more than once lately about my need to hide God's Word in my heart - to learn and memorize and know scripture. But I rarely do it. So I'm gonna try what Ryan suggested. Only I'm going to tone it down quite a bit to one chapter to begin with. I'm going to work on memorizing Hebrews 11 and wee what comes of that. God will bless my efforts, I know, but I'm excited to see how thinking about the faith of others will impact my own life. Anyone wanna join me???

Adoption

For those who don't know, God has put it on our hearts to care for the orphans. We are currently taking baby steps of faith through this journey of adoption. Please tag along with us via our adoption blog Journey4Hope through comments and prayers.

Dreaming at Night

For the last 4 or 5 nights I've dreamt about adoption. Last night's dream was so detailed and real feeling. In my dream we picked up an Ethiopian baby that needed a family immediately, skipping the paperwork trail, and brought him home. The dream is a little fuzzy now but I do remember bits and pieces. I remember sitting in the airport and for some reason I couldn't remember the baby's name but I already loved him deeply. I wanted to ask Ryan the name but was embarrassed and had this feeling that he'd forgotten too. Finally one of us remembered; his name was Elias. We took little Elias home and surrounded him with other family and friends that also loved him.

Each night the dream is a little different but each night it does revolve around adoption. I'm not sure if that's just how God is choosing to tug at my heart, or if these are thoughts and emotions stored in my subconscience as I pray and read about adoption.

Regardless, I'm well aware that God has called us to adopt. As I typed this, an old friend called me at the office. I congratulated him on his new baby and we got to talking briefly about kids. I told him that I had two little ones and he replied "well, you were the one who always told me that you were going to adopt!" What sweet words to hear, yet difficult at the same time. God, please use me to be Your hands and feet in loving the orphans and the widows.

Closet

Okay, Okay, I admit it... I'm a wanna be graphic designer. Problem is that I can copy anyones ideas but I have a hard time creating my own. With the proper tools I bet I could have a lot of fun... and maybe make enough money to fund our adoption...

Efficient with Time

Typically I work through lunch and I'm okay with that. Yesterday I had a lunch meeting but I also had a few errands to run so I left the office early to accomplish my To Do list. It shouldn't take me long at all to stop at the court house and renew my license, ask about renewing my passport in another office within the court house and then stop at the post office to get cute stamps for my Sweetheart Supper invites. I planned for an hour originally but ended up with only 30 minutes, which still should have been plenty of time. Of course, it didn't go so smoothly:

Stop in for the license renewal. I'm proud that I'm looking good, and even managed to wear mascara for my license picture. Only the mascara doesn't like my contacts and so my eyes were irritated and I had a problem reading the little line at the bottom of the vision screening. Past that and moved on. The lady at the desked filled out all the information in the computer and then said "that will be $20 please". Twenty dollars? Last time I got my license renewed, it was only $11. I didn't even have to look in my wallet, I knew I had $17 and some change (being on a budget will make you aware of the money you have). I asked if she'd take a debit card and she informed me that it was cash or check. Well I didn't have enough cash and I don't carry checks anymore (too easy for me to spend money that way). Embarrassed I asked the lady if I could run to the bank quick (practically next door only there's a river in between) and get some cash. I drove to the bank. Drove to the bank? Isn't it next door? Yes, I too realized that when I made the corner, crossed over the bridge and stopped at the bank. I went in a cashed a check for the cash I needed. Walked back to the bank. Yes I walked back to the bank even though it was in the low teens with a nasty wind. The vain person in me was a little concerned that all my prep work (I don't usually wear make up) would be worthless if my picture turned out to look like Rudolph. I zipped my coat up tight and pushed it over my nose to keep my face warm and I hurriedly walked back to the bank. The lady kindly put me to the front of the line and finished up my licensing.

She mentioned that it would be a a few minutes while it printed it off so I thought I'd make the most of my time and run down to the recorder's office to ask about my passport. The recorder was very friendly and answered all my questions. Unfortunately I have to get a brand new passport and pay the whole fee because I changed my name when I married. Grr. We chatted about not needing the passport right away cause we've just started the adoption process. She informed that it would be $110 to re-do my passport and asked if I'd like to do it then. Considering the time, and the fact that if I didn't have $20, I certainly didn't have $110 in my wallet, I said that I'd come back another time. I left her office and hurried off to my meeting downtown on foot, in the cold and windy weather. It was actually quite pleasant once I crossed the river and the buildings provided a little shelter from the wind.

After my meeting, I need to make a quick stop at the post office and then I'd head back to work. Only I'd walked and the post office was farther through town and I didn't want to walk to the post office and then all the way back to my vehicle so I asked for a ride to my vehicle at the court house. Only my van was parked near the bank, remember, I drove it the half block to the bank. So my dear friend gave me a ride 1 block over to my van. As I was getting out of her truck, it hit me: I never went back in to pick up my license at the courthouse! Who in the world forgets that. My friend graciously drives me to the courthouse and drops me off. I head inside, retrieve my license, which had since been placed in the waste basket because another lady saw it sitting out and thought it was an old one. I then walked back to the bank, got in my van, drove the two blocks to the post office, got my stamps, and headed back to work. When I walked into my office, my boss asked "so, did you get lost out there?I" I politely answered yes and proceeded to tell him about how efficient I was with my time.

My goal was to get things done in a timely manner. I'm not sure I fully met my goal. What do you think?