Thanksgiving 2010

Myles is getting some back molars, see?!!

Reading with Daddy!





Just thought I would share some pics from our Thanksgiving week. We had a 'feast' at school, and spent some time eating with Michael's family! My new nephew, Reese, was my favorite 'Turkey' of the week for sure!

1st Homestudy Meeting

We had our first Homestudy meeting this past friday afternoon and I've been a little slow to post about it partly due to my sinus infection that hit and partly because I was a little disappointed that we couldn't 'officially' start our Homestudy due to lack of funds at the time. I didn't realize that we had to pay half the homestudy fee right up front and the other half just before we completed the homestudy. So we had a great informal interview with no real headway.

Many of you know that I've been stressin about the financial side of this adoption journey. I haven't been totally resting in God's providential hands, I guess you could say. WELL, He showed me a thing or two! The very next day we had over what we needed to start our homestudy! what?! yea, God wasn't content to just provide, He wanted to go above and beyond and show me how able He is.

So I called our social worker monday morning and she's out all week due to Thanksgiving, but I got to leave her the good news on voicemail so we get to start paperwork next monday!! Thank you to all of you wonderful friends and sweet family and just followers of God who have given! Marlee will hear of your love :)

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!! we'll be here celebrating with the Manuels, and it's nice that it's low key and no traveling since I've been in bed for days, and just got Myles back from the doctor today with a sinus infection. I'm so ready for us all to be well longer than 2 weeks at a time! Did you hear it's suppossed to go from being 80 to 49 on friday?!? just another Mississippi Thanksgiving!

Bless you all!

Adding another "M"

So when we started talking about having kids, we also started throwing out names like most couples do. One afternoon after work Michael came straight in the door, got the phone book, and plopped down on the couch to scour it for names for our baby! Along the way HE decided to name every child we have an "M" name so we will all be the same :) awww...yes-we are THAT family!! We didn't find out what we were having with our first biological child so when He came, Myles Nathan He became! We were at a loss for boy names and finally went to Margaritas (our fav. local mexican restaurant) and Michael just said out of the blue, what about Myles...I said I like it-sure! Nathan is after the prophet Nathan in scripture. We pray He will have a heart for God and speak His truth boldly to the world.

The girl name was easy :) I had the most wonderful aunt who passed away from breast cancer 6 years ago. She was a model for me of so many qualities I wanted to emulate...gracious, giving, fun-loving, hospitable, serving, loving, encouraging, and such a wonderful mom and aunt!! oh, and her name started with an "M" :) I wanted to honor her memory by naming our daughter after her. Her name was...Marlene, but we decided to drop the 'n' and make it a little more modern. MARLEE!!

Her middle name is after the matriarch of Michael's family :) The grandkids lovingly called her 'JG'. She lived a long and full life, and finally got to go home with Jesus this past May after battling cancer. She was an excellent wife and mother who taught me a lot about southern cooking, and raising a family! She was smart, witty, sweet, stubborn, and so full of love for others! She was known and loved by everyone in the community, and we miss her lots. What an easy choice of middle name. JOY!!




I know Marlee is spelled with a 'y' in this pic, but myles had hid some blocks and I couldn't find another 'E'. At the time of the picture he was crawling up me and pulling at my arm for the camera so i was kinda in a hurry to snap it!! Forgive me ;)

Coffee Fundraiser!

Everyone knows a coffee drinker, right?! Good! Then you can click over to our new coffee fundraising store and order some for home, and some for gifts!

Our first fundraising effort is a coffee store from Just Love Coffee Roasters! They are a wonderful company who provides families and organizations fundraising opportunities for adoptions and benevolent causes!! They provide fair-trade coffees from all around the world (including Ethiopia!) as well as apparel and accessories.

We LOVE coffee over at the Manuel house, and I've worked several coffee jobs during and after college, so this was a fitting fundraiser for us! The Just Love Coffee company does all the leg work so you can just buy online and they send it right to you, and they send the check right to our adoption fund! hooray :) One step closer to our baby girl!
Thanks, and enjoy some good coffee with a good read!

I just finished 'The Hole in the Gospel' by Richard Stearns (President of World Vision)


It rocked my socks!

Orientation

I sure did feel like a new freshman on campus tonight.

Tonight, Michael and I had our 'orientation phone call' with our adoption agency, All God's Children International. We were sent a big ole packet in the mail that arrived yesterday late, and we had a big day today so we didn't get a chance to look through it before we started-ugh oh! It really was fine, we learned a lot about the process we'll be going through, service agreements, fees (yikes!), time frames (about 18 months), etc.

We are so excited to start this process, but the main thing we need now-our 'next step' is $ MONEY $. I am really bad at this y'all...really have always hated fundraising, but there's no way around it here ;) We need a big chunk of change right up front to the tune of $7,000+, and then there will be increments we will need to pay as we go. Please pray for my faith. (Michael rocks in this area!) I told him, I know God can provide, but will he? I've heard that 'God funds what He favors' so I'm excited to be on this faith journey!

We will be sending out support letters and brainstorming fundraising ideas in the next few days, but in the meantime you can donate to our adoption account by clicking on the pay pal button on the top right of the blog.

Besides this excited (and slightly overwhelming) first step in our adoption journey, we have a new nephew today!! Steven 'Reese' Farris was born this morning at 7:54. Weighing in at 6lbs 11oz., and 19inches long. Pretty great for being just over 3 weeks early! He's so beautiful and healthy-what an answer to prayer! We are all thrilled he is finally here :) I'll post pics tomorrow since I was so enthralled today I completely forgot to take pics! (bad aunt, shame!)

We have to thank the Curtis fam for watching Myles tonight during the call and then for the evening while we took a much needed date night out to eat and a little Christmas shopping!