Tupperware Fundraiser!

Our good friend is a tupperware consultant and she, along with another good friend, are helping throw a fundraiser for our family. It will be held on Sunday August 22nd at our church following the second service. Lunch will be served and it will be a fun time to learn about the great products from tupperware as well as an opportunity for us to share about adoption. If you are unable to attend the event but would still like to check out tupperware products you can click here (Fisher Tuperware Fundraiser) to go to our fundraiser page through tupperware. This link will be active for you to order products (no pressure though :) ) until the 22nd!

3 Year Old's Drawing of a World Map

We have a huge world map on the wall in our house and have been talking to our kids about where their new brother will come from. On Father's day our 3 year old got a hold of the envelop that had Ben's Father's day card in it (hence why it says "Daddy" in the middle of it) and drew her own map- all on her own. She was telling us, "Opi lives way over here, Maddie lives here, and Emma, Samuel and Luca live right here." So, Ben added in the labels and she now has her own world map. Note for our other family members: we are working on teaching her where all of you live and someday she will get all of you on her map! Anyway, we thought it was pretty cool and hope that the wall map in our house will continue to show our children how big this world really is and how it's filled with so many different people.

Some challenging thoughts by Francis Chan

Along the way of our adoption process our goal is to put things on our blog that have inspired us and challenged us along the way. This short video clip was something that helped us fully commit to adopting now and not when things were even more comfortable in our life. Since we released our grip and stood up on this balance beam everything has felt so right even though we feel like we could fall off any minute. Before we started thinking about adoption we really were wrestling with how we were living our lives and what else we could be doing for the kingdom. We saw this video and we saw ourselves heading down this path of the American dream.....comfortable home, comfortable family life, comfortable church, comfortable job, no major disruptions, etc. Since God has called us to adopt the word comfortable has disappeared. After awhile it probably will come back into our lives and we will have to have remember to stop hugging the balance beam and let go of the comforts of this world. For now it's feels pretty good to be walking the balance beam knowing that the only way we are standing up is because of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is nothing profound yet it's easy to forget at least for us.

First Home Study Visit

Our first home study visit went great! Thank you to all who prayed for us. We really felt at peace during the whole visit and were able to be ourselves. Our social worker is a really neat woman who has also adopted herself and is really encouraging and supportive. We basically just sat and talked with her for over 2 hours answering her questions and her in turn answering ours. We ended with an exchange of the paperwork we have gotten through this far as well as instructions on how to complete more paperwork. She also checked out our home- I think we passed that part!

She brought up some thought provoking questions such as how we will feel about the possibility of meeting the birth parents/family (which is likely because now we are both required to appear in court in Ethiopia) and also how we would feel about the birth parents in general- thankful, judgmental, resentful, etc. and how that could in turn affect our child as he grows up. We talked about how we will have a transracial family and how it is important that our son have friends who look like him and that we are proactive in promoting friendships with families of different races. We also talked about ways in which we can celebrate our son's Ethiopian heritage as he grows up.

We also went through a serious conversation about possible issues that our adopted son could have and that we have to realize we are knowingly deciding to parent a child that can have a lot more challenges than our biological children. We talked about different medical issues and mental/emotional issues he could have. On the flip side, we also talked about the awesome privilege we will have of raising him and that how each child (no matter what challenges arise) is a true blessing from the Lord.

We have a few more meetings with our social worker during the home study process which includes individual interviews with her where I assume we get a lot more personal than we did during this first meeting. It is a bit weird to have our lives under scrutiny but we feel that it is so worth it and also understand the importance of making sure adoptive families are fit to parent.

Next steps- fingerprinting, applying to USCIS (our country's immigration department), police background checks, and more paperwork!

One paper at a time!

We are so sorry we haven't been posting here lately. We have been very busy with the "paper chase" and things are coming along slowly but surely. Yesterday, we had our first major paper notarized at our doctor's office so we are encouraged. Melissa called a list of traveling notaries she found online and the one who was available turned out to be an adoptive parent herself! She adopted a daughter from Russia some time ago and was really excited for us. She later called Melissa's cell phone after the appointment to share more of her excitement for us and said that adopting her daughter was the greatest thing she has done in her life (her daughter is now 20). We have already seen God bringing people into our lives at the perfect time to keep us encouraged and solidify that is truly what He wants us to do.

Our next step in the process is to begin our home study with our social worker on Wednesday June 2. She will come to our home and conduct an initial interview with us and answer any questions we have. We have a few more paperwork items to finish up this weekend before she comes to visit (as well has hopefully finishing up some long-in-progress house projects!) Please pray for us on June 2nd!

Everyday it seems like our 3 year old daughter is understanding more about adopting a little brother from Ethiopia. This morning while we were eating breakfast she asked if she could pray for "Opi" which is the name she made up for him. It brings us great joy to think about how God is working in the hearts our children and preparing them for the acceptance of a new sibling. God continues to supply everything we need for this adoption! We hope to be more faithful in posting and sharing things that God has used in our lives to remain faithful to this pursuit of adoption. Thank you for being patient with us.

1ST GARAGE SALE!

We officially completed our first of garage of who knows how many! This was a trial run for us and we were very pleased with the results. We were able to sell roughly 180 dollars worth of things donated from family members and things we had around the house. We posted a sign on our house saying where all the proceeds would go to and we were able to strike up conversation with those who were interested. Our neighbor asked if we were adopting a dog but was pleasantly surprised when we told him we were adopting a child from Ethiopia. We tried a few times to tell people we were saving this money for an adoption but they still wouldn't budge on 25 cents. We ended up giving them the deal and had a good chuckle later. We do hope to have more garage sales in the future so if you have anything at home that you do not want anymore and would like to donate we would be most appreciative. We will keep you posted on our next sale! The 180 dollars we received today will go towards our Hague Adoption Training courses that we need to sign up for asap. The total cost for the training is 175 dollars so WE PRAISE GOD!! We want to give a BIG THANK YOU to M's sisters, who traveled in from out of state to help out with this garage sale! We couldn't have done it with out you girls!

Why?

We recently came across this translation of Proverbs 24:12 that is written, "Once our eyes are opened, we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows that we know, and holds us responsible to act." These words pretty much sum up our motivation to pursue an adoption from Ethiopia. We know adoption has been on our hearts and we cannot continue to close our eyes on what God has allowed us to see.

Why are we adopting?
Adoption is something we had agreed we would be open to before we were married. As we approach our 5th anniversary of marriage and feel the blessings of 2 wonderful children, we stopped to think for a moment about where God wanted us to go next. We knew we wanted another child but what did God want for us? We both knew there was the calling of adoption in our hearts and the calling seemed to get stronger as we both thought and prayed. We both felt that if we didn't step out now, we probably would find an excuse to not do it. We are very excited to join God in this journey! God has adopted us into his family so we look to Him for his example of how he rescued and loved us. God desires all the nations to come together to worship Him and we look forward to seeing how God is going to make this more real in our family. Honestly we are a little nervous, but it's just a reminder to us that we cannot do this alone. We are following God, and we are trusting in his provisions spiritually, emotionally, and financially.

Why Ethiopia?
There is a number of reasons why we feel called to adopt from Ethiopia that range from practicality to something within our hearts. Ben went on a couple trips to Africa during and after college and was really impacted by what he saw and learned. While Melissa has felt a strong purpose to adopt since childhood, Ben has more recently become excited about the idea as it would forever tie our family's heart to the continent of Africa. Currently, there are not many countries in Africa that allow international adoption. Ethiopia is one of the countries that DOES allow adoption and also is one that we as a couple (our age and length of marriage) fit the criteria of eligibility. Ethiopia is a country of great need. Here are some stats:

• 1 in 10 children die before their first birthday • 1 in 6 children die before their fifth birthday
• 60 percent of children in Ethiopia are stunted because of malnutrition
• 1.5 million people in Ethiopia are infected with HIV (sixth highest country in the world)
• 720,000 children have been orphaned by AIDS alone, and there are 4.6 million orphans
• Half the children in Ethiopia will never attend school. 88 percent will never attend secondary school
• Ethiopia’s doctor to children ratio is 1 to 24,000.

These stats are overwhelming yet they encourage us to keep moving forward. We know the one child we choose to adopt is a drop in the bucket compared to 4.6 million orphans in Ethiopia, but it's something we want to be a part of. Who knows, God may use us to encourage others to adopt along the way. If 7% of 2.1 billion Christians helped an orphan there would NO more orphans. With this stat in mind the urgency for us to move forward has never been stronger. We are trusting in God and his provisions.

So, as we write our first adoption blog we ask for your prayers as we embark on this journey. We want each of you to be a part of this journey we are on. We want to be a blessing to you and we want to encourage you to step forward and obey whatever calling God has for you and your family. Thank you for being a blessing and encouragement to us already!!