One Sought Me

The kids and I made this painting of Ethiopia's map outline during some of those snow days when we are stuck inside and the paint box just screams to be used!  We designed the inside of the map outline to resemble the country's flag and then the kids put their hand prints all around the picture.  I'd like to think of it as raising our hands to praise God for all that He has done for us and for hearing our prayers during this adoption process!   I cried to the Lord with my voice, and He heard me out of His holy hill.  Psalm 3:4 And call upon Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.  Psalm 50:15 I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.  Psalm 34:4 Blessed be God, who has not turned away my prayer, nor His mercy from me.  Psalm 66:20

It's hard to believe that our baby is turning 4 !  When we started this adoption process he was just turning 2 when the Lord placed it on our hearts to expand our family through adoption.  Now, most likely, the birth order will remain in our family and the new little ones to join us will be younger than MJ.  Praying for news but as we wait we enjoy our family size of 6! Today we were working together in preparing for MJ's birthday party.  MJ is a fun-loving, active boy who loves to laugh and make others laugh.  For his age he is very coordinated and plays soccer, dribbles a basketball, and can run all over the Wii U game system!!  Above all, even beyond soccer, this little fellow has a strong sweet tooth!  He loves sugar anything!  So when we were brainstorming party themes we landed on the thought of a candy party.  Little bit of searching on pinterest and bam!  Here we go Candy Land Party!! So far we have been making decoration...

Count, sort, stuff, press, zip, pass....  Our kids all helped as we worked to assemble the crafts into individual packs for the upcoming missions trip Haiti.  It was a fun time having the kids be a part of this trip in a hands-on way.   The missions team will be conducting an activity and learning time for the community youth surrounding Alex's House Orphanage in Kalico Beach, Haiti.  Each afternoon the youth that attend the meeting will learn a Bible lesson, have a snack, participate in games, learn new songs, and make a craft.  We will be ministering in one location for two days of lessons then move to another location ministering to another group for two days of lessons.  All in all we hope to have a little over 150 youth attending the meeting times.   One craft we will be making is a canvas bag with a draw-string closure. The Haitian kids can decorate their bags with beads and fabric markers before putting them to good use.  We gat...

Thanks for stopping in!  My family is on a journey to adopt two little ones from Ethiopia and though we are on the waiting list for them, we don't know their faces or their little personalities yet, but we love them dearly already!! Praising God that our expected budget funds have been raised we are now working on donations to take to the orphanage and gifts for the nannies and staff that are right now caring for our precious children! Read Here and Here to see what the Lord has brought us through! A couple weeks ago my daughters and I worked on gift bags for the near 35 nannies!  Here is what we made: We found a great deal on little perfumes and lotions then we added a cute notebook, nail clippers, nail file, and hair ties too.  I hope they like it!  Functional and cute right?  For the gentlemen on staff we found a gift box with a nice neck-tie.  Looking forward to the day we load these up on the plane!  Join us to pray for those...

If you have been following our adoption journey, thank you!! And thank you for praying for us!! I hope that you have seen that our dossier (all the required papers) has finally been completed, county approved, and state certified too with the fancy golden stickers and all! We mailed our lovely dossier to our agency and I didn't realize the relief that would come along with completing that phase.  Letting that paper work go was so freeing in that all that responsibility was now completed and moving along to someone-else's plate. We called the agency to confirm that everything was in order and looking good to get the news that it was "a beautiful dossier" and one of  the best she's seen!  Presented organized and professional, we packed that baby up right.  Good news!  Then our agent said that now the dossier gets mailed to the agency that does the referrals/child match and gets registered there.  The dossier isn't finished traveling yet as it will travel t...

I was inspired by the many creative Etsy people who make items for their adoptions that I thought I'd try a couple of their projects for myself!  Well, here you have it! Africa up-cycled bottle caps turned into magnets.  I used a Mod-Podge product designed specifically for giving that glass look over a bezel or concave item.  The first attempts failed because the paper got too much of a wet look, buckled, and curled up.  Next round I found the solution to be to first seal the paper layer down with regular decoupage, let that dry, then apply the Mod-Podge product.  They turned out well and it was very easy, but there are some air bubbles that I couldn't avoid.  The necklace bezels turned out too, but again, there is an air bubble near the west coast that I didn't see coming.  If I'd do this again, I would try a different product for the glass look. All in all it was inexpensive and fun to do!