Hope..and how you can play a part!

So I posted on Facebook yesterday that we had some fun adoption news to share..and we DO. It might not be as big as you might have hoped, but we have some updates for you.  We're submitting to USCIS (immigration) tomorrow! This is huge since the approval from them is the last piece of paperwork we'll need before we send our paperwork over to West Africa.  The country that we're adopting from is what's called a Hague Convention country (this is a good thing), so we had some new and different things to add to our paperwork this time around.

So, with that said we're so excited to share with you that we've partnered with Chrome Buffalo to begin raising funds for travel! We don't have an exact date, but we need to be ready so that we're we're told to GO we can.

We are starting a 10 day t-shirt drive to begin raising travel funds! Head over to our Chrome Buffalo site and read more on our story. $11 of each shirt sold goes directly back to our adoption fund. There are toddler-adult sizes so your whole family can rock them! We choose the design featuring HOPE because HOPE changes everything. 

"Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see" Hebrews 11:1

Want to play a part in our story? Click here to get your shirt

One year later...

May 18th marks our 1 year mark on the waiting list for Ethiopia. One year. It seemed to fly by and inch forward at the same time. How does time do that?!

This last year has been crazy. Crazy is probably an understatement. The amount of rawness that we've experienced is insane, but good.

In one year...

We sent off our dossier to Ethiopia, happy and content with our decision to with requesting a healthy boy, 0-12 months. 

Quickly, our eyes were opened to a much wider need. So, in the last year we widened our parameters. 

We wanted to be ready to fill a need.

Our Ethiopian adoption was fully funded. Glory Glory! But...we knew something was up because God never gave us money before we needed it..so we wondered...why were we funded so soon...

Well, let me tell you what happened next...

We were introduced to our son, who in fact, doesn't live in Ethiopia at all, he lives in a country on the coast of West Africa. We love him

We jumped into doing two adoptions at the exact same time. For two children on the opposite sides of Africa. Crazy. 

Our little man in West Africa, he's almost 3...yep..didn't fit in that 0-12 month original "plan" for our life.

But then again...not much in the last year has.  But it is perfect. 

When we were getting ready to send off our dossier last year, in my gut, I knew God was going to do something huge during our wait. 

I selfishly hoped I'd get to travel to Africa (which I did)

But He did way more. 

He showed us His plan for our adoptions, which looked totally different that what we ever imagined.

We prayed for God to make Himself BIG to us, and He did. 

He blew mountains out of our path, and continues to do so...

A year ago June, we'd been waiting 1 month for our Ethiopian little guy!

February of this year..we're adopting..AGAIN!

Hmm..I wonder what we'll look this time next year...