GUESS WHAT!? This afternoon I was pleasantly surprised to find our finalized home study reports in the mail! Happy day!

This means we can send off our I-600A form to USCIS on Monday and then anxiously await to receive back a letter with the date for our fingerprint appointments. Fingerprint appointments mean we can send our dossier to All God’s Children International with our 2nd BIG check and be placed on the wait list. That will be a joyous day for sure!!! I’ve heard it typically takes 3 to 4 weeks to receive fingerprint appointments, so I’m praying we are on the wait list by June! Please pray with us!

Also, we’ve been told by a few people that they’ve experienced trouble with PayPal. We are going to look into it this weekend, and I will post when all is good again. In the meantime, just let us know if you’d like a shirt and I’ll mark you down and we can figure out payment at a later date. We aren’t placing the order for a few more weeks, BUT we have received the minimum requirement. We are blessed! Thank you to all who have placed orders already!

I think we are planning on trying Ethiopian food for the first time this weekend. Excited!

Have a good weekend!

If you’re familiar with the adoption world, then you know t-shirts are a pretty popular fundraiser. I just so happen to be a t-shirt junkie. Seriously, I’m that girl. The girl that needs a t-shirt from every concert or function she goes to. Also the girl that thinks the t-shirt is the best part of running a 5k. You get the picture. So I was overly excited about Jonathan designing one for our adoption. Little did we know it wouldn’t be that easy of a task. It’s hard to be original when everything has already been done, but we put a lot of heart into the design and we really hope it shows!

We’ve all heard it said in different variations how important it is to do for one even when you can’t do for all. 147 million is a HUGE number. I can in no way fully grasp what that looks like. It seems much easier to turn a cheek and go about our daily lives than to actually DO something about it. How many times have we told ourselves that since we don’t have the capacity to do for all, we shouldn’t do anything at all? What difference is 147 million minus one?  I know I’ve been guilty of thinking that way in the past, but now I know it’s simply not true. 147 million minus one is a big deal! If everyone chose to do for one, what a difference it would make! I could list statistic after statistic to help you visualize the severity of the global orphan crises, but the truth is these forgotten children aren’t statistics. There are stories behind those faces, and it’s important for us to move beyond the pictures posted on the internet or the videos on YouTube, as useful as they are in advocating and educating us.

“Doing for One” looks different for everyone whether it be sponsoring a child, missions, adoption, etc. Obviously for us it has evolved into adopting a beautiful brown-skinned baby from Ethiopia. So this is where we pulled the inspiration for the t-shirt design in hopes that it would inspire you to “Do for One” by supporting our adoption through the purchase of one of our t-shirts.  A little over $13 per shirt goes towards the adoption and helps to bring our little one home!

We are doing a pre-sale to avoid any upfront costs and will place the order once we reach the minimum requirement. The shirts will be very similar to the quality of American Apparel shirts. They will be Heather Grey, soft and form fitted. The girl shirts are V-neck and the guys are crew neck. The cost is $25 each. We realize that’s a lot to ask for a shirt, but please remember that you are actually buying much more than just a shirt and we are incredibly thankful! If you see us frequently, you can write a check or give us cash. Otherwise you can pay via PayPal. Don’t forget to let us know what shirt you want and the size.

Not really a t-shirt junkie? There are still ways you can help!

-Share with others through word of mouth or by sharing on Facebook and Twitter.

-PRAY! Specifically we could use prayers that our home study report would be wrapped up very soon so we can get our I-600A form filed and have our fingerprint appointments scheduled in order to submit our dossier. Please pray that we would have enough money saved up to mail along with our dossier. It’s a large amount! Adoption is tough. There are a lot of ups and down and unknowns during the entire process. Just this morning we received an email from our agency that placement time is currently about 20 months. It was previously 16 or 17 months, so the slight increase is somewhat discouraging. Please pray that during these times we would keep our eyes fixed on the One who is all-knowing and His perfect plan and timing for the completion of our adoption.

-You can also make a donation via the PayPal button on our blog if you feel led to do so.

-We are still collecting donations of  items for our garage sale coming up in the next few weeks. If you have anything, please let us know!

Thank you so so much for taking interest in our adoption process and for supporting us on our journey to Ethiopia. We are so thankful for you!

 And the King will say, “I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!” Matthew 25:40

Not much to update on as far as our adoption process is concerned. We’ve basically done all we can for now, so we’re just waiting on the home study report to be finalized. I thought I’d update the blog anyway to let you guys know we’re still here and things are moving along.

Totally off topic, but…

I’m totally addicted to Pinterest and have been for a while. It goes together well with the crazy amount of day dreaming I’ve been doing lately about our future brown-skinned baby. So many goals set, hopes placed on our hearts, and dreams envisioned already for this tiny person that we don’t even know yet.

One of the first things Jonathan and I talked about concerning our future child was that we hoped he/she would love books and reading as much as we do. For those of you who might not know, Jonathan is a huge fan of children’s books. He’d probably sit in this section of the bookstore for hours at a time if I let him. His biggest dream is to write and illustrate one himself. So with that being said, it really is no surprise that this was one of our first conversations.

When I first saw the pallet bookshelves or the nurseries with bookshelves lining an entire wall on Pinterest, I immediately thought it was PERFECT for what I’d envisioned for our little one.

diefrauimhaus.com

dandee-designs.com

projectnursery.com

We still have LOTS of time before we’ll actually start preparing the nursery. We probably won’t even start until next summer, but a little pre-planning never hurt right!? A few more favorites from my board…

poshtotsblog.com

houzz.com

gallery.projectnursery.com

We’ve already received two baby gifts and ironically enough…they were both baby books specifically for adoption. Love!

We decided we’d buy a children’s book at every big step in our adoption process to start building the library for the nursery. Each time we buy a book, we’re going to write the date and a little note inside as another way to document our journey. We’ve already purchased two! We also purchased a journal from Noonday Collection that I’ve been writing in as another way to share our child’s adoption story with him/her someday. By the way, if you’ve never checked Noonday out, you really should. It’s a lovely website and every item is made by skilled artisans from around the world who are using their wages to feed their families or provide an education for their children. I seriously think I NEED one of each item, and I also think I may be able to justify it given the good cause! When Jonathan bought my journal and necklace back at Christmas, the money spent also supported a couple adopting from Ethiopia. Double bonus!

Anyways, thanks for checking up on us. I hope this random post was somewhat entertaining!

Love,

Brittney