January 24, 2011

fingerprints back

Just a quick update to let y'all know that we received our fbi fingerprints back in the mail today-no imprisonments :) haha that was quick guys-thanks!! We were told this can be the longest piece of paperwork to come back...even up to 12 weeks. We got it back in 5 short weeks. That's even over Christmas! Thank you Lord! I have my third meeting with our social worker on thursday and hope to be turning in a lot of papers to her :)

January 19, 2011

We have paperwork

This whole time I've been most reluctant about the paperwork process of the adoption, but I never thought I would be so excited to get this!


ok, I know it's a horrible picture, but I was SO excited to get our adoption planner in the mail yesterday and get to work :) I was in a hurry to snap this pic because Michael was pulling out of the driveway and wanting me to jump in to head to our adoption fellowship group! We met at Aladdin restaurant in fondren and the kids were crazy! here's a pic to show off the quality of the dads in the group-go Lee!


A big thanks to Alison at www.lovinmuch.blogspot.com for organizing these gatherings. I just love having a support group of similar families, and I believe will be crucial for Marlee to see and know these families that are similar to hers. And thanks to sweet Callie Grace for taking care of and playing so well with Myles! He was talking about her all night, and when we got in the car, Michael said, I hope Marlee is just like Callie Grace! (She is holding Myles in the pic above!)

January 17, 2011

Mercy Monday

So every monday I wear my 'mercy t-shirt' and I pray for the Busby family who are adopting a little girl, Mercy, from Uganda. They are not using an agency and have had various trials. Right now, Melissa (mama) is in Uganda with Mercy trying to get her home and jumping through hoops and manuvering through sticky red tape. Cody (daddy) is at home in Kansas taking care of their other two girls. Would you say a prayer for them too? If you click on the title of this blog post you can see Melissa's blog.

January 9, 2011

God's been showing off

Get ready to have your mind blown! (I actually prayed that God would give me a testimony like this to share with you so we could only praise HIM)

So after my last post, I've heard of many of you praying for us, encouraging us, giving to us, and helping us brainstorm fundraising ideas-THANK YOU!! Like I said in my last post, God has really given me a peace and a 'refocus' on Him and His promises. I got to spend friday and part of saturday with some sweet friends at a staff wives retreat. We spent a lot of time in the Word together and praying for one another. I left SO encouraged! Then, this morning at church...Michael and I got an anonymous gift of $4000!!!! If you remember my last post, this is exactly how much we needed to meet our deadline on thursday!!!

We are SO grateful!! What a blessing. I've gone through a lot of emotions today :) But what I most want to do is praise the Lord for being our provider! And I really wanted to post this awesome news so that you all could help me praise and thank Him too!!

If our generous donor reads this blog, thank you is so inadequate, but I know you did it this way so the outcome would be Thanks going to the Lord instead of you, and that is SO beautiful. Your obedience to Him is my blessing for sure, but I pray it would be yours in abundance too.

You know, the body of Christ is a beautiful thing. At the outset of this journey, I've been so excited to see God use His body, and each and every one of you buying a bag of coffee, writing a check, sending us encouraging notes, PRAYING, and loving us is a HUGE blessing to us, and I pray it would be to you too.

God is so good, and so faithful. Hope you had some fun seeing His provision in our lives today :) Thanks be to God!!

January 6, 2011

Where we are...

ok, I've been unsure whether to put this out there or not, but I decided to go for it. I Know that God is our provider, that He's called us to adopt and that He will walk us on the specific, unique journey He has for us to go on. With that said I want to tell you all 'where we are'.

Three months ago we applied with our adoption agency, All God's Children. We were accepted into their Ethiopia program and are looking forward to a 0-12 month old baby girl at the end of this process!! We were given a 90 period to raise 7 grand to 'contract' with them and start our paper work process. Well, we had a small portion of that money in savings, but started fundraising right away with our Just love coffee (you can click the button to the right to order), and sent out christmas/support letters to our friends and family! We have been SO blessed by so many of you as you've sacrificed and prayed to help bring Marlee home :) however, our deadline-January 13th-is quickly approaching and we are still $4000 short. we may have a small "extension" from our agency, but we need more mulah. :)

I spent yesterday fasting and praying to seek God's face. He gave me SO much hope, encouragement, and a 'refocus' on Him-what truly matters. It can be easy to get distracted by things that seem to matter so much on this adoption journey like money, timeframes, and paperwork, but God has us on this Special journey to teach us and His timing is perfect every time!!

two things: please pray for our faith on this journey-there is so much power in your prayers!! and please pray about financially supporting us. the reality is that it costs upward of $28,000 to adopt.

love yall! Thanks.

January 3, 2011

2011

Happy New Year!! We have just gotten home from Pennsylvania and a great time with family celebrating the holidays, and now it's time to get back to 'life'. we have a big deadline coming up for money to be due (jan. 13th) and I'll update y'all on that soon. In the meantime be praying for the opportunities God is bringing your way today...your next breath that is...and make it count for the Kingdom of God!