Waiting...

I could probably title every post with this...
Isaiah chapter 40 is so encouraging and puts any anxiousness away that starts to stir my heart...Which also reminds me of another verse I have hidden in my heart. Phillipians 4:6-7.
I checked the adoption account last week and we are still $4250 short. God knows this. He knows I have all the paperwork ready but He is not concerned with that detail because He has the big picture laid out before Him. When He is ready for us to move forward, we will. He knows where our son  is, whether he is born yet or not, He knows the perfect time for our dossier to get to Ethiopia. I have to keep reminding myself of this...This always has been about Him and I won't let my excitement interfere with that.
 For me this waiting period has been about learning more about His promises and it's very exciting. I am going to be starting another study with some gals soon. I haven't done one since last spring so I am looking forward to that. It's always a great time of fellowship and growing. Our church does have a Women's Bible Study but because my husband works at least 12 hr. days that means that he is not home in time to stay with the kids while I go. So I figured I would start doing something that worked for me and some of the other Moms I know who have young children and can't always make it to the Study at church.
I am also looking to get some ladies together to head to MA to go to a conference called Faithlift in April. I have gone in the past and have always come home with my cup overflowing!! I love those conferences!!
J will also be starting to fill in playing worship at a church about 45 min away from here. This is also a huge blessing as he has not been able to play at our church and really wants to be able to use his gift.
Tomorrow I get to go help make quilts for an orphanage in Nepal where our friends have adopted their son from. However they have not been able to bring him home yet as the US won't issue his visa. Please keep this in prayer as they are trying to raise money to hire an investigator so the little guy will be able to come home to his family. http://ifwehavefaithofamustardseed.blogspot.com/ Check out their blog!!
So that's about all she wrote for now...We still have our coffee site which you can connect to at the right, as well as the soap site, which is also on the right. ANNNNNDDDD....www.EllieAnnaPurses.com is still donating a portion of her sales to our adoption. She has some great purses and jewelry which are handmade right here in the ol' US of A...So feel free to help us out as God leads you!! God bless...

I-171H RECEIVED!!!

We got the document today that says we can adopt internationally now!!! Big step!! We have about half the amount needed before we can send our dossier though, so we're just praying and waiting on the Lord. We've received $700 from 2 friends within the last week!!! We know it's going to continue in this way with gifts because God has told me to be still in regards to fundraising right now. A friend and I plan to do a cookbook fundraiser and I am thinking of doing a chocolate sale around Valentine's Day but for right now we are waiting to see Him work. Please continue to pray that God would be glorified as we raise this next chunk of change as it will be all His doing. Happy New Year!!! 2011 is going to be a great year!!

SOAP!! and stuff...

J's cousin and his wife sell soap and other fun things on their website. http://www.soapandcotton.com/
They donate $1 to our adoption for every $5 you spend, AND will give us $5 for each sale for the first 20 sales!! You just have to click Stewart adoption under the tab Support a Mission under the Merchandise tab.
We're so blessed to see all the different ways people want to help us bring this little guy home. Thank you all so much!!
J and I had our biometrics appt. on Dec. 17th so we're hoping to get our I171-H pretty soon...we don't have all the money we need to send our dossier yet, but we will in His timing.
We had a wonderful Christmas with our family and are looking forward to next Christmas when we'll have another fun little one around. We are so excited to see what this new year will bring as well. God bless!!

Christmas Cookie Sale

WOW!! That was fun, crazy, exciting, tiring and a HUGE blessing. I had about half a dozen people help bake, a couple people help with set up and the perfect amount of people to buy!! The cookies are ALLLL GONE!! Thank you Lord!! We used a classroom at church to sell the cookies. We put out about 3 long tables covered with tablecloths and put all the cookie platters on them with tags in front of each stating what type of cookie it was. We had a few simple decorations on the tables. We had another table set up with all the homemade flavored popcorn my friend made and another table with all the fudge, pumpkin bread, bark, cookbooks and the scale on it. My brother donated boxes from his bakery that we placed next to some "gloves" (sandwich bags) on a table right by the door. People grabbed a box and strolled through while listening to Christmas music play and picked what they wanted. We weighed the box when they were done and they paid by the pound. We rounded up or down to the nearest pound as I didn't want to deal with 1/2 and 3/4 :) People were just fine with that and the boxes held about 2 lbs of cookies when full. Everyone commented on how wonderful everything looked and how smooth the sale was. Overall it was a great success!! I highly recommend doing this as a fundraiser!! Already trying to figure out what I can do for Valentine's Day ;)
Lastly, we have some family who is selling soap to help us raise money. It smells wonderful!!! Check them out at http://www.soapandcotton.com/!! They will donate $1 for every $5 sold.

Fingerprinting Appt.

Dec. 17th is the day!!! And if we receive our I171-H a week after that then we could possibly be DTE by the end of the year.......HOWEVER, we are praying for a Christmas miracle. We need almost 3/4 of the money to send our dossier...God knows how we'll get it. And I can't wait to see Him work...
I will be happy to be done with this cookie sale after Sunday, it has been quite time and thought consuming. Not to mention there isn't a flat surface left in my house that doesn't have cookies on it!! I am going to decorate the "cookie sale" room today with some friends. It's going to look great!!

Received!

Well the USCIS received our application and now we are waiting for our fingerprinting appt. We'll have to travel down to Portland for that and there is an Ethiopian restaurant down there we can't wait to try.
Getting ready for our cookie sale, my freezer is full o' cookies!! Praying that it will be a successful fundraiser.
We've also applied for one grant already but there suprisingly isn't much else out there. It's hard to believe that in this big, rich country there isn't more help out there to pay a child's ransom. But again, God's economy is not ours-He can and will do this. So excited to watch how He pulls it all together...

Sent!!

Well we've had an exciting few weeks...We got our home study rough draft last week, I reviewed it and got the final draft approved the next day!! Then got the notarized copy of it a few days later!!! This is a huge piece of the process and I am thankful we're done with it. On Friday I picked up the home study report and sent our I600-A that day!! It is a form that once approved means we're allowed to adopt internationally. We will get fingerprinted too. When we get the approval back (called the I171-H) then we can mail our dossier to Ethiopia. Again my goal is to get it across the pond before the end of the year-Lord willing :)
Our home study states that we can adopt a child from 0-3 yr. old and we are approved for more than one child. We did that because we have heard of instances where people get over there to get their child and find out there is a sibling that may have been in another orphanage and even a case where they found out their child was a twin!! How could you leave that other sibling behind?! Whenever I've prayed for our son I would hear sons (plural). Don't know why...we are not looking to adopt 2 but we'll leave that up to the Lord. I know my hubby hasn't felt that leading but again, not OUR will but His will be done. Frankly I want another excuse to go Ethiopia, so I'd rather only get one child this time ;)  I've never been to Ethiopia but there is a piece of my heart there. A son whom I've never met but who God ordained from before the earth began to be a part of our family. How could my heart not ache to be there??
Another big key to getting the home study report back is that now we can apply for grants. We desperately need a big chunk of change to send our dossier to Ethiopia. We're only a quarter of the way to our goal. We have plenty of fundraisers going on right now. I have three friends who are donating a portion of their business sales to our cause. Our cookie sale is coming up quickly. I have many dear friends/family who are going to bake on our behalf :) We'll sell cookies by the pound right before Christmas, how can we go wrong? Pray for this event and God's continued guidance in this process.