Rain, Rain, Go Away…or maybe just on over to Ethiopia

I have a seven year old piano student who has been working on the song, “Rain, Rain, Go Away”.  It’s actually quite cute when he plays it and sings along in his very high and out of tune voice, and I can’t get it out of my head….we’ve been getting rain ALL the time lately.  I certainly love to listen to and especially sleep to the sound of rain, but it makes for some dreary days, not to mention incredibly long grass with no opportunity to mow.

But what can I complain about?  This month in Ethiopia, even in the capitol city of Addis Ababa, they’ve been “rationing” electricity because of a lack of water.  I can’t really explain, so I’ll let this article do it for me.

Power Outages Slated For Ethiopia Capital On Low Water Levels
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AFP)–The Ethiopian capital faces a lengthy power outage until next month because of reduced water levels in the country’s hydro- electric plants, a state-owned generator said Monday.
Addis Ababa, a city of 5 million, will have no power for up to three days a week, the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation said in a statement.
“Power rationing will continue until June. Climate change, which is inflicting a great damage worldwide, is the main cause of the poor performance of seasonal rains in Ethiopia,” state media quoted Water Minister Asfaw Dingamo as saying.

Can you imagine?  I find it very interesting how climate affects this country in so many ways.  We’ve been hearing of the three months of court closures that take place August through October….these are primarily due to the “rainy season”.  They get so much rain that everything just sort of shuts down. But this week, we’re hearing of not enough rain to be able to have power at all times!  I realize I’m fairly simple minded and there might be more to it that I don’t understand.  But it’s sad to think about when we are getting more than enough rain to water our ground.

Something to pray about:  Because of the power outages, communication is very difficult over there.  As far as adoption goes, this will most likely slow down referrals because of all the details and paperwork that go into them.  Even more difficult is the fact that it’s affected court appointments for those who already have their referrals and so desperately want to go pick them up.

So far in our adoption process, there has always been something happening, whether it’s waiting on a document, finishing our dossier, etc.  But now all we can do is wait, which is actually a little harder than I thought it would be.  So when anyone asks about how the adoption process is going, the main question is “when do you think you’ll get your child?”  We’ve always been answering with a certain timeline, but I’m now learning that it’s just not that simple.  We still hope to get our child hopefully by late November/early December, or at least by Christmas…..but I’m preparing my head and heart for the possibility of longer.  It’s a very real possibility, and yet it’s all in God’s hands.

Four Years Ago Today

We’re so grateful for the past four years of marriage God has given us together. Ben and I met at Cedarville University in 2000, and started dating in 2002. We were married at my home church in Allen Park, MI on May 15, 2004.

We look back on that day as one of the best days of our lives. We were surrounded by so many friends and family in support. One of our favorite moments was when these guys gathered around the piano just minutes before guests started arriving. It started as a fun jam session, but turned into an awesome, spontaneous time of worship and prayer.

Ben and I each wrote our own vows. Neither one of us got through them without many tears….quite embarrassing if I do say so….but so special.

Sadly enough, I don’t remember much of our wedding kiss….except for the fact that we almost walked backed down the aisle without even having it! We stopped in confusion, waiting for his dad to finally give the okay

As you can see, we were shielding ourselves because we were getting PELTED with birdseed. Fun, fun.

Our reception was a blast!  My family put on quite a hilarious skit about all the things Ben will have to deal with in having me as a wife…you know, the kind where you get ripped on for all your funny quirks :)  But the skit ended on quite a sentimental note with my dad passing on his “umbrella of protection” over to Ben.  This resulted in one loud and sappy “Aaawwww” from the audience.

Happy Anniversary Day to us

Adoption Benefit Concert

Our adoption benefit concert is well under way! We’re excited to have so many great musicians partnering with us to put on a fun evening of music….and we’re also thrilled to have a few adoptive families tell their stories. We’re praying for people’s eyes and hearts to be opened to the needs of the fatherless. For those who might be interested in learning more about adoption and getting started, we’ll have information for you to take home.

There will be donation boxes in the back of the auditorium for those interested in helping bring our little boy home….but whether you can donate or not (no obligation whatsoever!!), please come and bring your friends! We’ve got five different groups or individuals performing in their own unique styles and it should be a good time of music.

One Month Down

Today officially marks one month since our dossier went to Ethiopia. (for future reference, DTE = Dossier to Ethiopia). Woo-Hoo!!! Only 4-6 left to go. I guess I can say the month flew by, but we definitely had our days.

On Saturday, we had some adoption training with our homestudy agency in Leo, IN. It was a bit of a drive, but we stopped and stayed over at the Mummert’s the night before. The training was from 8:45-4:30 and was really helpful overall. The topics discussed were: Birth Parent Perspective, Grief Loss and Trauma, Attachment/Bonding issues, Adjusting from and Institution, Transracial adoptions/Cultural and Racial Heritage, Disclosing Adoption, Search for Biological Parents, and Medical Issues. Yes, a lot to take in all in one day. Our heads and hearts were very full…..but it was good It was also tons of fun meeting the other adoptive families, including one here in Lafayette. God is so good in providing these connections. Including us, there are now 4 families right in our area who are adopting from Ethiopia!

On the way home, we stopped off in Huntington because someone was giving us their crib. This was so exciting to me!! It’s beautiful and will just be perfect for our little boy. When we finally did get home we had an “early shower gift” waiting on the porch - a brand new crib mattress! So now I can actually put it all together So exciting…..I’ll share pictures when I’m finished.

On Sunday, we headed to Ben’s parents for lunch. Before we left, they gave us a little surprise hehe….they had their own little change drive going on right in their home.

It cracked me up that someone can seriously have this much change lying around their house. I’m going to take it to our bank so they can run it through their machine, but I’m almost positive it’s enough to cover our visas for when we travel…one more expense knocked off the list

Happy Spring everyone! After a long, cold winter, it’s finally here!! I love seeing these popped up all around the house.

John Piper on Adoption

Here’s a neat video I found on John Piper’s website, Desiring God.

His closing encouragement:

“I would suggest that you seriously consider not only supporting, but also doing adoption, both spiritually … and also in terms of finding children who have no mom and dad who could be folded into a family—just like God planned from eternity to fold sinners like us, through Christ, into his everlasting family of joy.

May God bless you in all your dreaming, all your planning, all your praying, all your working in the cause of adoption.”

Conference, Nursery, Birthday, and …..earthquake?!

Just stopping in for a quick post on this busy week! Ben was away at the “Together For the Gospel” conference in Louisville, KY from Tuesday-Thursday. He absolutely loved the conference and came back excited and refreshed, so I’m really glad he was able to go. He also came back with 13 or 14 brand new books! At each session, they come to their seats loaded with free books….good ones too. I guess he’ll start reading them in about 2 1/2 years when he’s finished with seminary The dogs and American Idol kept me company while he was gone. This picture absolutely cracks me up.

A few weeks ago, my mom was here helping me paint and hang curtains in our nursery! It’s been fun getting ready to have a little guy in the house, though I’m definitely trying to take my time in the preparation during this long wait. We’re going with a jungle theme (lions, monkeys, and giraffes!!!) and did the walls yellow, with a green and brown stripe. I was able to finish the second coat yesterday, so here’s a quick pic of the progress….by the way, we got these awesome natural wood roman shades at Lafayette Venetian Blind and Awning Company. They have sort of a “clearance” warehouse down on 9th street open on Fridays and Saturdays, and these custom made blinds were only $10!!! I’d highly recommend checking this place out if you’re in need of curtains, material ($1 a yard!), blinds, shades, etc. So yeah, back to the started nursery:

I’ve been so caught up in adoption, life, Ben being gone, etc. that I totally forgot my dad’s birthday this week! He turned 52 on Thursday….I was only a day late in calling We were able to make a trip to Indy and have dinner with him and my mom to celebrate. If you know my dad, you know a good man….he’s a blast. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!

And finally, the earthquake. For all you non-Indiana friends out there, you’re reading this correctly! Around 5:40 on Friday morning Ben and I woke to our room rattling….I pretty much freaked out I thought there was an animal or something in the room scurrying around causing everything to shake…but that was when I was still half asleep and practically unconscious. Considering that the dogs just sat there staring, we quickly realized that wasn’t the case. I saw on the news later that morning that it was actually an earthquake, measuring a magnitude of 5.2!!! Pretty cool….never thought I’d experience that before

Mountains of Blessings this week!

Before I tell you about them, I have to note one thing:  I often have reservations and wonder if posting this kind of information is appropriate or not.   But then I’m drawn to the fact that everything below is a complete testimony of God and would bring glory to HIM ALONE.  At the beginning of our journey the thought was definitely on my mind that we are the least likely candidates to ever be able to afford an international adoption.  Haha, it’s still true.  God is providing the way.  If you’ve considered adoption and money is the only thing holding you back, don’t let it.  Let God surprise you.

This week has been full of answers to prayer regarding the finances of our adoption. God really poured blessings on us this week, one right after another! We were given $100 on Sunday with a very kind note that started out by saying, “Here’s my widow’s mite towards bringing your son home.” What a cool reminder and example of giving whatever you have….truly humbling. Plus, it might have been the first time I saw someone refer to this future child as our son. Oh, it brought chills. We will have a son someday soon!

On Monday we heard back from an organization called Operation Starfish, whom we applied for a grant with back in January. A very sweet woman explained that they had $2000 set aside for our adoption expenses and that we can request for it once we get our referral. Here’s the coolest part about it, quoting from the letter we received today:

“I wanted to let you know that $1000 of this grant was earned by our youth group at the Charleston Community Church. They participated in a 30 hour fast, canvassing their neighborhoods to get sponsors. They chose your family from our list of “waiting families” to receive a third of what they had earned.”

WOW!! What an awesome opportunity for this youth group to make a difference across the globe. Once again, chills….lots of chills. God’s power is at work through the lives of teenagers. We passed on our blog information to them and hope they’ll follow along in our process so they can see and experience the outcome of investing in God’s kingdom. If you’re one of those teenagers reading, welcome to our blog and THANK YOU!! I can’t wait to get and share the picture of the little boy you were able to help bring home!!

And just when we’re overwhelmed with thanksgiving, another surprise We got a check for $100 today in the mail….from a missionary. Yet another incredible example of sacrifice and compassion.

The Lord is good.

Cousins

Look what our little guy got in the mail from his cousin Soma?! This was such a sweet surprise Apparently, my 14 month old niece was running through Target and picked out these two outfits. My sister just couldn’t resist buying them for ______ (No, we’re still not revealing his name) Our son will have two cousins, one on each side of the family. His oldest cousin Kaelee lives out in PA and Soma lives in MI. We’re sad they’ll be so far apart, but hope they’ll form a special bond when they get together at holidays and such.

Thanks Soma for the cute outfits! We can’t wait for you to meet your cousin!!

Speaking of family, we are so blessed to have both of our families on board and excited for this adoption.  They have been nothing but supportive since the day we applied and the future grandmothers are both giddy with excitement :)  We don’t take our family’s support lightly.  International adoption can be a difficult, risky, scary process….and not all parents of adoptive families are quite so eager from the beginning. They understandably fear for the financial burden, hurt and disappointment, unknown, etc for their children.  Our family has been the exact opposite.  They pray for us and support us every step of the way with just as much faith that God is in control as we have.  We are absolutely thrilled to bring this little boy home and have him welcomed into an extended family that will love on him so dearly.

Conference Call

Our agency has started to do a monthly conference call with all the waiting families to keep everyone in the loop with developments in the program, as well to answer general questions all at once rather than individually a million times. Our first conference call was yesterday and we had some good questions answered.

Referrals - the wait time for us is expected to be 5-7 months long. There are currently about 60 waiting families and AWAA’s goal is to get 10 referrals out each month. I know we’re not at the bottom of the 60 families, but probably pretty close. If the 10 referrals per month does indeed happen, we’ll expect a referral right on target with our wait time. Most referrals have been infants younger than 5 months old! woo-hoo!!!

Court - Once we accept a referral, there are a few paperwork things that need to be taken care of and then a court date will be requested. We’ve signed over our rights to a “Power of Attorney”, an AWAA staff person who lives in Ethiopia. He’ll go to court to adopt this child on our behalf. If all goes well, then some more paperwork needs to happen and we’ll make plans to travel about 3 weeks later. The goal is to travel 6-8 weeks after the referral has been accepted.

Court Closures - this is where the bump is in the road…or maybe a pothole so big that your tires fly off and stop the car altogether. Ethiopia’s courts close every summer from 3-12 weeks. (Someone told me it was because of their rainy season.) The actual dates are a surprise every year and AWAA won’t even know until just before it happens. They’re guessing that court will likely be closed this year from August 7 - October 7. Yup, that’s right smack on the dot with our 5-7 month wait time. We will still be able to get a referral, however the court date cannot be requested until they reopen. This means rather than waiting 6-8 weeks to travel, it could be 3-4 months. Sadness. We’re very hopeful that we’ll still get our child before Christmas, but there are a couple logistical aspects of the timing that can easily cause us to worry. Pray with us as we give ALL aspects of the timing over to God. He’s got it all planned out already.

Finances - Based on the conference call, I’ve estimated that we’ll need about $15,000 to cover the rest of the adoption. This includes the 3rd program fee, international program fee, flights, travel package, medical review from US doctor before accepting referral, shots before we travel, 3 post adoption visits, and re-adoption in the United States to make him a citizen. With much gratitude, we have $4000 waiting for us over at Shaohannah’s Hope, and to accept our referral we’ll need to send in exactly $4000! That brings us down to $11,000. We are still waiting to hear from 2 different agencies in which we applied for a grant. Please pray for those opportunities as well as the details of putting on the benefit concert!

There was MUCH more information in the 1 1/2 hour long call, but those are the main points. We continue to pray for our little guy every day. Please join us in that!!! Although we’re super anxious to bring him home and want to be prepared, we’re doing our best to enjoy and live each day in the PRESENT to the fullest. Looking too far ahead only produces worry inside me and I’ll miss out on the joys of TODAY. I could seriously write a book on the many things we learn through all of this because it’s amazing….stretching, but amazing.

Benefit Concert set for May 30th

Our adoption funding page says that we’ve had ideas to do a benefit concert to help raise money for the adoption of our little boy in Africa. The idea of fundraising, to be quite honest, has just been SCARY. We’ve been praying since day one for God to give us wisdom on how to be involved in raising the money. He has shown us over and over that He’s going to provide…and has done that so far without us doing a single thing!! But God’s also laid it on our hearts to get the message of adoption out to everyone we know (and what better way than through one of our biggest passions: music!!!), and has brought us to a place of humility that says it’s okay to ask for help.

On May 30th, we’ll be holding an adoption awareness/benefit concert at Kossuth Street Baptist Church in Lafayette, IN. All are invited, near or far…we can find you a place to stay! We’ll have a good time of music and worship followed by a chance to fellowship over dessert. The PRIMARY goal in this event is to allow the Holy Spirit to work in people’s hearts in however He chooses. Our desire is that people would walk away with a greater understanding of God as well as a beginning or increased burden for the oppressed people around the world - particularly the 143+ million orphans. We desire that the Spirit would cause people to respond in SOME way to the need - whether that’s through added prayer, support of our adoption expenses to change the life of one of those millions, or better yet, wanting to adopt a child themselves!!

We’re excited to have some good friends and GREAT musicians lined up for this event! Joel Brovont, Jason and Jodi Bradshaw, Tyler and Whitney Daugherty, Micah Chibana……ooh, we’re pumped. Plus, our Builders ABF (Sunday School Class) has taken on the huge task of putting together a dessert fellowship for after the concert.

We’re excited and anxious to see how God will work through this event. Please pray for us as we try to keep our eyes on Him and His purposes while trying to bring the details together. We hope you’ll put the date on your calendars and be able to make it! Stay tuned for more updates