Control

Control.  This is a huge word.  I know it's not like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious; but for me it's huge. Huge in the sense that it's a huge thing to let go of.  I cling to it; like a crazy person.  I love to know what is going on and "help" in any way I can.  In other words, I like to control. 
Fortunately God has the grace to kindly remind me, I am not in control and He is.  He has every moment of my life figured out.  Even the moments I truly do not understand.  He's got me covered (literally)! So no matter how crazy things get around here, I can rest in the fact that God knows what is going on, so I do not have to.  He really is amazing like that.
Now I must tell you how He has reminded me of this. 

1) Black Thurday (yes, this does exist) I found a great deal on a Kitchen Aid mixer from Kohls.  Josh and I decided this would make a fun fundraiser.  So we ordered one and set up a local raffle.  We sold tickets and put up signs.  And then.......Kohls emailed and said they cancelled our order.  (They have never, ever done this to me before.)  I panicked!  WE HAD SOLD TICKETS!  So for one day, I pulled out my hair wondering what I was going to do.  And then my sister told me to quit fretting and try to contact Kohls.  I tried several customer service numbers...nothing(don't you hate computerized customer service).  But my sister wouldn't give up.  And after 3 days, I found a wonderful customer service lady who helped me re-order.  I was relieved.  And then.....the very next day Kohls called and asked me if I wanted to re-order. (See God was in control--panic over nothing).  He also saw fit to get us even more of a rebate than we originally would have had.  Amazing right!  You would think I would have learned from number 1 but alas I needed a number 2 (yes, I have said this before).

2) For about two weeks our agencies have been saying that our homestudy was finished.  But this mysterious homestudy was nowhere to be found.  No one knew what was going on.  And the social worker was not answering any of my emails or calls.  (And since I am a control freak, I did call and email ALOT.) So this morning she calls me and tells me that although she finished our homestudy and it is ready, she is quitting our case.  We are going to be transferred to another agency.  Which might not be a terrible thing, except they have to redo some things before we can get our "finished" homestudy and they are going to charge us another application fee.  So there goes my wish to have our USCIS in before Christmas. 

Control.  No, I am not in control.  I am letting go.  God knows our time frame and I am going to trust that He worked out the "Mixer Mess", and He can work ALL things for His good and ours.  Because no matter how hard I fight it.....He's got my back.  There is a little girl out there who is waiting for us and God is the one in control of getting us to her.  So if you see me, remind me "Let go, Karen. He's got this."

Progress?

I figured even though there is not much progress to report, I would try to catch you up on what is going on around here anyway. 

1) I was told my Homestudy was done, but I guess it is not.  Our social worker believes in taking her sweet time with everything. This is very frustrating, but I am sure it is meant to teach me more about patience. Please pray that this gets done soon.  We really need to have this done.

2)We recieved three donations this week by check. Thank you - you know who you are!  So I tried to update our "chip - in" widget to reflect these but for some reason it refuses to do so. So I think I will cancel the existing widget and create new ones that are more specific. I feel bad doing this because I will loose the progress we have made, but we no longer need the amount shown.

3)Josh's passport has still not arrived. I am not impressed with Texas' paperwork system. What a mess! Hopefully our six page list of every place he has ever lived, gone to school, and worked will be sufficient for the US to assume that "yes, he was born" and "yes, we would really like his passport".

Side note: Alabama is much easier to get correct birth certificates from; so if you want to travel some day, give birth in Alabama. ;)

Homestudy!

After much annoying pestering (by me), our homestudy is done! I am sure our social worker is glad to be done with us for now.  I had to read 19 pages of how a complete stanger viewed our family. I was really nervous to read what she thought of our house and family.  I must admit she described my house way better than it actually is.  I was thinking "No way, that's not my place!" 

So it is onward and forward for us. 

Next up is a USCIS "aka Immigration" application.

Wooohooo! 

Why?

I can't begin to count the times I have been asked "why". 

"Why are you adopting?"

"Why are you adopting a girl with Down Syndrome?"

"Why do you want more kids when you already have 5." 

 

Sadly most of these questions come from fellow Christians.  And I just want to say, "Because Christ told all of us to take care of orphans. Because there are childen who may never know what love is this side of Heaven." But that is a little too blunt and so I generally tell a round about story.  Tonight I was on Reece's Rainbow and I just  was blown away by the new arrivals on the sight.  If not for this organization so many people would have no idea what was happening to these rejected children.  Orphans who are not "true" orphans....they have parents out there, who for some reason or another decided they were not worth keeping and gave them away.  How can we not have compassion on the least of these?

 

This is Zoey

She is six years old!  Yes, you read that right!  And she weighs 10lbs.  Her file is only available through Reece's Rainbow for around 2 months.  My six year old weighs over 40lbs. In fact, I think my daughter weigh over 10 lbs by the time she was 2 wks old. Zoey needs a family. 

 

This is Bowen

This little fellow needs a Mom to hug.  Isn't he just so adorable.  But he is still sitting in an orphanage somewhere because his parents didn't want a child who had missing limbs.

 

So I dare you...ask me "why?"!

 

 

 

Passports!!!

    Ok, they are not here, but we have FINALLY applied for our passports.   I know this isn't a huge step, but I take what I get these days.  Lately, all I here is "you have to wait", "no, you can't do that yet", "it's not ready yet", and my favorite "this is a long process".  (As if I haven't already figured out that it's a LONG process.)  I get so frustrated.  I am one of those people that likes to do everything I can; I like to feel the progress. But progress is a bit invisible these days.
    Maybe it is time for me to dig deep and figure out what lesson I am supposed to be learning now.  Or maybe this is just Patience 102.  And I was just silly enough to think that Patience 101 was enough.

    Apparently I am supposed to be satisfied with posting yet again about our fundraisers.  So here is our list:

1.  Use Amazon to Christmas shop!!! Just make sure to use our link box at the right!

2. Livi's Gift Shoppe on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/#!/LivisGiftShoppe
Check it out....I am continually adding new things!

3. Blocks....yes, I will still make blocks.  I may never want to see a block again as long as I live, but for Olivia I will persevere. The info about blocks can be found here: BLOCKS

Orphan Sunday

A year ago I couldn't have told you that the first sunday in November was called Orphan Sunday -- a Sunday dedicated to sharing the needs of orphans with the church body.  A year ago I couldn't have told you even in a ballpark figure just how many orphans there are in this world.  I had no idea.  How sad is that? 

  James 1:27
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

I am amazed at how many times I read that verse and didn't realize that it meant ME.  I was to visit the fatherless....I was to help orphans...ME!  The word "fatherless" appears 43 times in the KJV.  43 times!!! These lost children are important to God and they should be to us. 

 

 

And since I learned about the needs of Orphans from Reece's Rainbow (a sight dedicated to raising awareness and funds for special needs orphans), I thought I would share just a few of the children waiting for someone to read James 1:27 or Matthew 25 and say "Hey, that's ME....God wants ME to do this...He really does care about the "least of these". 

Dawn

 

Angelina

Kolya

Boden

Veronica

 

I just wonder how many Christians celebrated Halloween.....do you think the same number of Christians are celebrating Orphan Sunday? Think about it!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Christmas shopping?

Who knew you could help us out just by Christmas shopping?!?  You can!  All you have to do is:  every time you use our Amazon link on the right side of the page ( you can use the Amazon 4 Adoption at the top right or the Amazon search box at the bottom right) to do your Amazon shopping, we earn a percentage toward Olivia's adoption.  Easy, right? So easy you should try it today!

Anyone Interrested?

So right now we are in the midst of way more adoption paperwork than I want to think about. ( I really should have become a notary--or at least befriended one.)  And instead of dwelling on how long all of this is taking and getting frustrated, I decided I would ask y'all if you could help me out with something.

  I am going to be setting up a craft sale sight on Facebook here in the next few days.  All the proceeds will go towards our adoption and it will contain various craft items that I have made and some of my Wildwood items.  What I would really love though is variety. So is there something that you make (crafts, foods, anything really) that you would like to donate to my sale?  Anything handmade would be great, but even something that isn't a craft (books, dvds, cds, etc.) that would just make a great Christmas gift for someone else to buy (so preferrably an unused item).  I will photo list(so you would have to send me a picture) each item and then the buyer of that item will contact me and we can arrange either Paypal payment or check or whatever.  If you donated an item I would just need you to ship the item to the person who buys it (you would have to be willing to pay for the shipping--so I suggest light items).  Anyone interrested????  This would really help us out! 

Here is the link to our craft fundraiser page:  Livi's Gift Shoppe

my new motto :)

Blocks for Livi

So I know it is early (seeing as how I just introduced our blog a few days ago); but you can never have enough time to fund raise.  Josh and I realized going into this how much it would cost our family to bring Olivia home, and we are fully prepared to work our hineys off to do it.  BUT just in case you want to help.... ;)

This will be our first fundraiser, and I am fully prepared to make these for as long as this adoption takes, so all you have to do is come find this post if you would like to donate for them.

  These are Olliblocks (No, I did not create them; the printouts are from Ollibird [which I found on Pinterest]. You can go there and print them yourself if you would like.) But if you are like me and you have other things to do besides take on a new craft where you spend hours gluing, cutting, spraying...etc, then you can just get mine! :)

(The Chevrons are not from Ollibird; I added them--just love that pattern with these cute faces.)

 

So here's the deal:  for a $10 "chip-in" (found up in the upper right-hand corner)  you will receive a gift of one set of 3 blocks (you can get just boys, just girls, or a mix of both...also there is a funny animal set but I don't have a pic yet.)  Now if you would like more than one set the you can donate...

$18 for 2 sets

$24 for 3 sets

$32 for 4 sets 

$40 for 5 sets

These would make great gifts for all the little ones in your family for Christmas, birthdays, baby showers or just because! 

(But please remember these are for personal use and should not be resold --thanks!)

 

If you do not have a Paypal account and can not use the "chip- in", please contact me at: waysthatyouchangeme@gmail.com for a alternate form of donating to Olivia's adoption.

 

Our Journey

So here we go....honestly I have retyped this so many times I can't even count.  I have no idea how to begin this post; so I guess I will dive right in.

For the past few months we have been learning what it is like to "be still" and listen.  "Wait patiently for Him."   And although patience is not one of my strong points, I have learned that it is in these quiet times when you actually have an open heart to all the "ways that He changes us". 

For a few months now, our family has been learning about what it is like to be a child with "special needs" in another country (not that their plight is often much better her in our own country, no thanks to abortion).  And when I say "special needs" this can vary greatly from Cerebral Palsy or Hydrocephalus to Down Syndrome or Blindness.  In many countries if a child is born with needs they are immediately abandoned...left at the hospital and sent to an orphanage.  I am not going to speculate why this is done, because each child has been left for a different reason (some people are afraid to parent a child with needs, some are too poor, some are just following society...etc.)  These children become an orphan even though their parents are very much alive.  And if no one comes for them, they are later sent to a mental institution to live out the remainder of their life.  I don't know about you, but I really had no idea children were treated this way just because they were viewed as "imperfect".  But a really great organization called Reece's Rainbow enlightened me.  They advocate and fund raise for children who can't do so for themselves.  They have helped over 700 children find homes; homes where they are loved in spite of their needs. Now when you think in terms of 147,000,000 orphans, maybe that doesn't seem like a whole lot; but I am pretty sure it made a difference to each and every one of these kids. And it is this organization that God used to show us the way He wanted us to go next....

So our family has decided to make a difference in the life of one of these children.  And although we would love to show everyone HER picture and give you all the details, we have been asked to keep her information private for now.  We can tell you the little girl we hope to adopt is about 20 months old, she has Down Syndrome, and we are planning on naming her Olivia. This is a very long, exhausting process filled with paperwork, appointments, and of course, $$$.  We are very excited to be about a quarter of the way through the process and we would like you to join us for the rest of our journey.  We hope you will root for us along the way and pray for us.