T minus 7 days...

In seven day's I'm taking off to Rwanda with some dear friends.  There are so many emotions going on in my head right now excitement, anxiousness, nervousness, anticipation the list goes on. I wish I could put into words how I'm feeling, I'll give it a shot.

Excitement...I have been desperately wanting to go to Africa for so so long..and it's happening. It honestly doesn't feel real at all. I don't even know when it will feel real..maybe when it's over? Who knows, but I am so excited. I get to meet the women who work with Noonday Collection in Rwanda..the women whose stories I've been sharing for almost a year..I am MEETING them. I know I'll cry when I do, probably bawl like a baby. They're so strong and their stories are so powerful..and I get to meet them. Ahh! Not only that, I'm getting the chance to visit the orphanage where my dear friends little guy once lived. Such an honor. I can't wait to see their reactions when they see pictures of the amazing little boy he's become.

We're going with Africa New Life, check out their website and poke around to see what they're doing, they have so many areas where they assist the people of their country. It really is an amazing ministry.

I'm anxious, I hate-no wait-loathe flying, and we're flying for a day and a half. Time to face my fears.

Nervousness- My hubby is traveling to Ecuador at the same time I'll be in Rwanda, we'll be all spread out over the globe, I think that's really cool, but I'm nervous to travel without him.  We've had the opportunity to travel many times on missions trips and this will be the first time (well since we've been married) that we'll travel separately. I'm used to traveling with him..it's comfortable, but I need to be uncomfortable.  I know we're both going to have some amazing stories to share with each other.  If you're a praying person, can you pray for that for me? I'll love ya for it :)

Anticipation- This is will be closest I'll ever be to our children (besides when we go travel to meet them and bring them home).  They are not from Rwanda, but other countries in Africa but it's way closer than Fairfield, California and for that I am so thankful. We'll kind of (kind of) even be in the same time zone. Gives me chills (sidenote: no, I'm not returning with either of our boys, I've had a few people ask if I'm going to get them and no, not yet :) but thanks for being excited for us anyway, I'm just excited to be closer in distance. I think it will bring a peace to my heart)


So that's it folks, 7 days and counting...

A little bit of Noonday love

You've heard me talk about Noonday on here before, you've heard my heart about social justice and being a voice for the oppressed, now YOU have the opportunity to be a voice too! My good friend Rachel of Rachel Wurzbach Photography is hosting a giveaway on her Facebook page-it's super easy to enter and literally anyone could enter. Here's how you can be involved:

1. go like Rachel Wurzbach Photography on Facebook.

2. Share or tag yourself in the photo

3. Wait until March 10th to see if you win! 

See? Super easy

Curious about how you can get involved in Noonday Collection and open your homes to be a voice?

Check out Noonday here and see if hosting a trunk show is something you'd be interested in.

Adopting? Noonday can help you there too :)

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,
    for the rights of all who are destitute.
 Speak up and judge fairly;
    defend the rights of the poor and needy.

Proverbs 31:8-9

She Does Justice, a Fundraiser

I'm so excited to share this awesome opportunity we have to fundraise towards our second adoption.  God provided every penny we needed for our Ethiopian adoption, and it sits safely in our agencies eternal family fund so that we can access it when needed.  It was amazing to watch God show up in huge ways over the last year, and I always wondered why He funded us as early as He did, it seemed like we never had the money until we needed it, and we were cool with that, then the money just kept coming and opportunities for extra work would come up and we were cool with that too, then-we were funded! Boom! Just like that. Now I know why God funded us when He did, He knew we'd be bringing home another little one! So, we're totally ready to watch God show up and make Himself famous yet again.  We're anticipating roughly $15,000 for this adoption, thankfully we should be able to use some of the same documents for this adoption that we used for our Ethiopian adoption, and our home study is current (which is so great) so we can update that to our new country requirements, but we will still have agency fees, orphanage fees and travel fees. $15,000 seems like nothing compared to what we watched God do this last year, and we're not worried. We continued to save even though we reached our goal and that has helped us with some of our beginning expenses.

We are now in full paperwork mode with #2, and we have been given the amazing opportunity to partner with SheDoesJustice as a fundraising family for her affiliate program.  With the affiliate program, any purchases you make through our link to her shop, we will get 25% of every purchase towards our adoption expenses. An added plus? SheDoesJustice is also an adoptive mom who is raising money to bring their child home as well..so by shopping thorough our link you can support not 1 but 2 adoptions! 

Here are a few things from the shop:

Canvases

Prints

Scarves

Headbands

Super cute right?! I'm so excited for this opportunity and for the community that we've found that stands with you on this crazy ride!

Over in the left corner of the blog, we've added our button that goes straight to our link in the SheDoesJustice shop, you can also click on the button below to check things out! And make sure you check out her blog too, she features awesome causes each month and this month's cause is SoleHope!