Raise HOPE!

Quick post today letting you know about a really neat opportunity for you to help us with our fundraising!!

A friend of mine is a Premier Jewelry Consultant and she has approached me with a very thoughtful and generous idea!!!

There is this gorgeous necklace in their catalog called "Hopeful."

From now until we are fully funded, every time someone buys this necklace from her, Brittani will donate 30% of her profits to our adoption fund!!!  

How generous of her!!!

So, if you were looking for a way to help, here's another option!

To order from her, contact her via her Facebook page by clicking this link.

"Like" her page, and then message her or comment on her page to get more info!

Very excited about this one, and will be purchasing one myself!
I'll update this with a picture of me wearing it soon. :)

There were a few necklaces to choose from for this fundraiser and there was a reason we chose "Hopeful."

We chose it because regardless of the cost, the time, the distance between us, and the hard times that WILL come once Tobi's home....Christ has given us our hope.
Not only hope that Tobias will be in our arms soon, but hope that He has conquered ALL for us! 


"I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” 
John 16:33

False Alarm

So, yesterday I blogged about how we are only a whopping $300 shy of being fully funded for our adoption!

(Read it here if you haven't yet).

Well, this morning I receive a text saying that a friend has offered up an additional $500 donation!!!

So, as of 11:00 this morning, we were fully funded!

Then, I talked with A Love Beyond Borders.

I've been wanting to have a conversation with them in regards to finances because as I mentioned in this post, we are the first family from Compassion for Congo to complete our adoption through A Love Beyond Borders in Kinshasa.

So we had a wonderful, very informative conversation that helped us understand much better what our trip will look like.  

And she walked us through the cost!

Aaaannndd we realized how drastically different the circumstances will be in Kinshasa vs. going to the guest house in Lubumbashi (where the orphanage is).  

In Lubumbashi, you pay a few hundred dollars for staying in the guest house, you pay for whatever food you purchase, souvenirs, and a few other things I'm sure.

HOWEVER....

In Kinshasa, you pay for the work that the ALBB (A Love Beyond Borders) representative goes through to pick us and our luggage up at the airport, transport us to our hotel, bring Tobias to us, provide us with other required legal transportation and translators, get our exit letter for us, as well as transportation back to the airport for departure.

THEN, there's the $150/day we pay for our hotel, the money for food, the money for any leisurely transportation, the money for exit taxis, and the money for any souvenirs.  PLUS, we want to have extra on hand for any other unexpected emergency. 

All that to say....that fully funded post was just a false alarm. 

:)

We are looking at another $3,700 or so.

And that was really cool to think we were funded for a couple hours, but it was actually kinda weird!

I was just telling Chris that it felt so wrong to be done fundraising already!  I felt like we couldn't be done yet!  Well...we aren't!  haha!

It's good timing though.  Our adoption yard sale is this weekend and we are hoping for another few hundred from that.

We also have a very expensive Italian inlay curio cabinet from Italy we are selling as well as several Thomas Kinkade paintings! (so let me know if you're interested!)

So even though it was a little disappointing, we are not sorrowful.  We know He'll provide.  I mean we received $2,200 since SATURDAY!!!!  Ya never know what The Lord will do or when He'll do it or WHO He will choose to work through!

We'll let ya know when we find out though!

We're Under $1,000!!

So, I am very excited to type this.

We officially, have LESS than $1,000 to raise to be FULLY funded for our adoption!!!!!!!

Oh. My. Goodness.

How we've seen The Lord provide!

I really need to sit down and tally all that we've raised and spent so far.  I haven't done that yet.

I HAVE been keeping track of what we have NOT paid for yet.

And although I KNOW that things can, and probably WILL change, we are only $300 short of being fully funded.

$300.

In the past 8 months alone, The Lord has provided us with well over $8,000!

We are still amazed.

This past Saturday, we held a car wash at our local KFC parking lot.

That car wash brought in $820!  It was so evident that people were not coming just to get their car clean...I'd say maybe a few were there just for the wash.

But the rest were there to give to Tobias.

And our hearts are overwhelmed yet again.  We had family and friends there helping us and working HARD!

Then I received some REALLY exciting news from a good friend of ours.  This special friend wanted to give us $800!!!!

THEN a family member handed me a check for ANOTHER $100 the next day.

We are so humbled.
The Lord is guiding and leading others to give.  We can't look back at this past year of fundraising and think that we had much of anything to do with raising all this money.

I mean, we have definitely been "fundraising," but we can't force anyone to give.
The Lord has provided!
He has moved others and that's something that we don't have the power to do!

So we look forward to the day when we can explain to our son how much went in to bringing him home.  How many people love him and were moved by their love for The Lord and His people to assist us in rescuing him from such a dark place.

So, as we are in the "home stretch" of fundraising, we are also in the "home stretch" of waiting for Tobias!

Things keep changing on us, but right now we are looking at November or early December. Remember me talking about the "field investigation"? If you didn't read it, you can read it here.

Well, the Embassy WAS scheduled to send people out to Lubumbashi for investigations this month. But they have postponed that to October or November. (probably means November).

However, because Tobias was abandoned, I am told that the investigation is very brief for him. It is more involved for children with living biological parents.

Sooooo, prayerfully, soon after they go to Lumbumbashi they'll give us the "go-ahead" to travel to get him!!!

Tobi will be headed to the Love Beyond Borders transition home pretty soon here. Probably within a couple weeks.
(You can read about that in the same previous post here).

They'll get him started with applying for his passport and then once he has that, they'll apply for the Embassy visits and try to get him his visa.

Then we'll just be waiting on that investigation to be done in Lubumbashi!

(hope the timeline is understandable...I've gone through it about a billion times in my head!)

So, we're moving along!
Very excited!
Thank you again for praying.
Thank you again for giving.
Thank you again for loving our family and our son
even though none of us have met him yet.

We're so close!!  
 

Movie Night!

So, I am NOT one to typically break the rules.
As my best friend can attest to, I never have been!
That has rolled into parenthood for me. When we find what works for us, we stick with it for the most part.
Our kids thrive off routine, so I'm doing my best to keep a daily schedule for us.

Chris will frequently find me "Googling" toddler/baby related questions  to see if it's" OK."

Like...

"Is it OK to give a toddler molasses?"

Or

"Can you give a toddler Benadryl in combo with Zyrtec?"

Or

"What is safe to give a child with a tummy ache?"

Or

"Can you take Sudafed while breastfeeding?"

I like to know what the rules are!
And I rarely break them!

Chris and I greatly cherish our alone time once the kids are in bed and we also really prefer their well rested temperaments over their overtired ones.
So...
We have pretty strict bedtime routines that we don't really stray from often.

BUT we made an exception this week.

If you haven't done this with your kids yet, you need to!

I was tucking the girls in, we had already brushed teeth, read books, sang, prayed and were saying goodnight when Chris came in and we both surprised them with MOVIE NIGHT!

Instead of laying their heads down, they got to jump out of bed and come to the living room with us. Chris had already got a bed of blankets out on the floor for them and Peter Pan cued up.

He got them hot chocolate and a cookie to snack on and Joy was just beside herself! She couldn't stop talking about what a great surprise it was!
After their snack, they cuddled with daddy to finish the movie.

***I am 100% aware that the pictures on this blog, taken with my or my husband's smartphone do NOT meet current blogging photo quality standards :)***

As we've seen our girls start to mature so quickly into tiny little ladies (especially Joy), we've been trying to be more purposeful in having frequent "special" times with them. Something so small can seem so large to them!
Especially with Jackson around who can tend to steal all the attention with his cuteness....and the fact that I have to feed him every 3 1/2-4 hours!

Well this was a very special night for them. After I fed the baby and put him to bed, mom and dad's attention was all on them for their movie night. It was fun for us (I never tire of watching Disney movies) and because we're such sticklers with their schedule, the girls knew this was a big deal!

We did warn them that it was straight to bed when the movie ended, and Noelle was pretty tired anyway....so was Joy....but that child almost NEVER admits she's tired.  Even when she's falling asleep :)  (You can see a video of it on Facebook here.  You have to be my "friend" to watch it though)

So we made a memory this week with our movie night.

We'll do it again in a few months....Joy right away asked if we could do it again the following night! Haha

But we loved it so much, I just had to share and encourage other parents to schedule a surprise movie night with the kids sometime!

They won't forget it and neither will you!

Why we won't be watching Princess Movies Anymore

So, up to this point I have mainly kept the posts on our blog to adoption related posts.
But I titled the blog "It's a mom life" for a reason!  
I'd eventually like to just be able to update family and friends on how our family is growing and changing.
But I would also like to share more about what my life is as a mom and share things that
are close to my heart.

So here it goes.

Our oldest daughter is a princess fanatic!

She absolutely loves all the princess movies, has a Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella dress complete with
her several tiaras, princess shoes, and necklaces.
I do not see anything wrong with allowing our girls to dress up and play pretend.


However, we're seeing a trend that we do not like, and we believe it stems from watching all the Disney princess movies like Cinderella, Beauty and The Beast, Aladdin, Little Mermaid, Tangled, etc.

And we've just made a decision to take those types of movies out of our video library for a long time.  
And I'll share with you the reasons why.


She is looking up to an adult princess.

 "Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior..."

Titus 2:3a

Our girls are little ladies.

How do these movies line up with the example

of Godly women?

 

Joy loves to look pretty.  She loves to dance like a princess.  She loves to look at herself in the mirror, pretend to marry her prince (daddy), and pretend she's falling in love.

But she's 4.

We're noticing that it is difficult for her to understand what is acceptable for adult (or teenage, really) princesses vs. her little preschooler self.  For example, usually the days following watching a princess movie, she talks about the difference between an adult kiss and a little kid kiss.  She is fascinated by it for some reason and tries to push the envelope with the type of kisses she gives to us or her siblings.

And another example.
When dressing up, she is always looking to us to tell her how beautiful she is.  How "princess-like" she is.  How precious she looks.
I'm sure that this stuff is normal for little ones to experiment with.  But look at what she's watching!!!  She's 4 years old and sees movies with teenagers "falling in love" and wanting to marry their prince within the week!  They normally dress pretty immodestly, are always beautiful with long flowy hair, and will always kiss their prince.  How is she supposed to process these adult concepts in her head?  I believe it's so hard because she isn't SUPPOSED to have to process things like this yet!  Her example of love should come from family around her.  
Our kids see my husband and I hug, exchange kisses and goof around all the time.  
But to their understanding, we have always been together.
We are secure.
We are a solid fixture in their lives.
We can explain our love story to them, but all they see is that from the moment they were born, mom and dad have always loved each other and that's how things ARE.




We need to nurture her inner beauty.

 ^"But let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious."

1 Peter 3:4

 I don't believe this "gentle and quiet spirit"

can be found in the princesses

that girls look up to.

 

 

Joy doesn't need to have the same "self worth" that the world tells us to.
She needs to know what is most important to our Lord.  And that is her heart.  

Think about it.
What's the first thing that comes to our mind to say to a little girl when we meet them?
"How pretty you are!"  
"What a beautiful dress!"
"I love your gorgeous eyes!" 
"Wow, such a little cutie pie!"

Anything wrong with these?  Not inherently.

But what are these tiny little hearts learning???
That they need to be pretty for others?
That they need to smile pretty for others?
That they are better because they are pretty today?
That we should strive to earn complements about our OUTER appearance?

We need to address their hearts.
And the "heart" of the matter is that God cares for what is inside.
Our "inner" beauty.
NOT the counsel of the world that says how important and self-loving we should be to ourselves.
But our inner self that loves the Lord.
That puts others first.
That desires to honor and respect our parents and forgive others.
The thing that our Father finds as PRECIOUS!
 
We would like to pull our girls away from the all-important Princess persona of beauty.
We need to teach them what true beauty is in the eye of our Creator.
 

We want to be an example of humble repentance and grace.

 "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

1 John 1:9 

Good vs. evil is not the same as sin vs. righteousness.

  Repentance is obviously not seen in these films because

they are void of Christ. 

 
The best way for our children to understand their own depravity and forgiveness through Christ
is showing it to them practically.
We talk to the girls all the time about repentance and forgiveness of sin, but they NEED to see
that we are in this with them!
We are sinners saved by grace and they need a Savior just as much as we do!
They must see us apologize when necessary and be the example of humility and turning from our sin to Christ.

But look at these movies!!
Young women and men break the law, disobey their parents, disrespect their parents verbally and with their actions.  Couples make it clear that regardless of what their parents approve of or think, their "love" is most important of all and gives them permission to do whatever necessary to be together.
That is directly in contradiction to what we are trying to teach them!
And there is usually no remorse!

We are working in a direction more like this:

We can tell our girls how "not nice" they are sometimes.
Or how "mean" they are when they take something away from the other.

But a better approach would be this:

Did God create you?  
Did God create your sister?
Did He make those hands of yours?
Did He form your heart?
Then how would He like you to use your hands toward the sister He made for you?
And how do you think He feels when your heart is unkind toward someone that He made and loves?
Do you think we should pray for Him to forgive you?
Would you like to try and do better and treat your sister in a way that pleases The Lord now?
Sometimes it's hard, mommy and daddy sin too.  But we always are very sorry for our sin and thank Jesus for forgiving us and allowing us to do better next time!

If they watch a show, make it a purposeful one.

 “All things are lawful,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful,” but not all things build up.

1 Corinthians 10:23

Is it sinful to turn on Cinderella?

No.

But I do not see it as helpful to our little girls'

hearts and minds as they try and process what this world is all

about and who God created them to be.

 

This isn't ALL about the princess stuff.  
It's about both trying to take the ungodly, unnecessary adult-like fairy tales away and replace them with much more appropriate videos for their little eyes to watch.  
I mean, it's not like there aren't 1,001 BETTER things for them to watch!
I was the one who brought out these nostalgic movies to introduce them to anyways.
I remember watching them, wanting to be Ariel transformed into a human, Belle being captivated by magical creatures and falling in love with a beast, Jasmine in her skimpy outfit and pet tiger....
So I am to blame for subjecting her to these concepts. 
How much more productive would it be for her to watch Biblical shows?  Educational shows?  
Things we can talk about later that don't include explaining why Rapunzel was allowed to kiss Eugene with an "adult kiss"? And that don't include explaining why Ariel's top is technically a swimsuit top instead of a "bra"?  And why we don't pull our shirt down to show our bare shoulders like Jasmine? 

Our little girls are future women.  
We were once this young.
We must do our best to form their hearts to see themselves as God has created them.
Precious in His sight...yet with sin.
Which is why the Gospel is SO important in our parenting!!!!
He looks at our hearts...which is sinful!  Even theirs.  And look at the wide open door we have to tell
them of the beautiful gift of Jesus.  
There's no wondering when we'll have an "opportunity" to share the Gospel with our kids.
It's every minute of every day!

So maybe later down the road when our kids understand more about being young ladies, we'll sit and watch Little Mermaid again and sing all the songs together.  Lord knows I look forward to that! 
I don't know when that will be.  But I know that when our little girls lay in bed at night falling asleep, I don't want them day dreaming about a Prince Charming.  Their hearts are much too young for that. 
Instead, they can lay in bed and dream of the date that they get to take with their daddy.
Of a fun day ahead shopping with mom.
Of all the funny things that their baby brother did that day.
Because the time WILL come that a young man will lay heavy on one of their hearts and mind.  And when that day comes, I want her to see herself as the lady that we do.  As a daughter of our Heavenly Father that should be guarded and protected from the world's distorted view of love.  And also saved for the prince that will one day take her away from us.

Approved!

I spoke with our agent at USCIS yesterday

and she said our I600 was

APPROVED

on July 12th!!!

YAY!

For those of you who aren't working on adoption

paperwork in your spare time,

an I600 gives us

permission to bring Tobias into the States!

We already had permission to bring an "orphan"

into America, now we have permission to bring our

son specifically!!

SO, all he needs is a Passport,

his Visa,

and he's ready!

Sounds simple right???

Not quite.

It sounds so so simple in our minds as well.

Here is what the next few months will

hopefully look like.

Things can change very quickly though!

Didier will go back to Congo and

schedule a trip to Kinshasa.

He will bring Tobi to a place called

"Love Beyond Borders"

transition home.

We are now working with them to complete the adoption.

They have a home there to take care of the

children while they work on getting his

passport and visa.

They will get the passport, get an appointment for

The Embassy, then the Embassy will start what is called a 

"field investigation."

 This is where we really need to be in prayer.

They physically travel to Lubumbashi where the orphanage

is and do an investigation.

They make sure that documents and a bunch

of other stuff is correct and legitimate.

They do a group of investigations all at once

and I've HEARD that they

will be traveling to Lubumbashi in

AUGUST!!!

This. Would. Be. AWESOME.

With all the delays that we've had,

we really have stopped counting on a specific

time period.

BUT.

If they did Tobi's interviews and investigations

in August....

that would mean he'd have his visa soon after that!

SO,

please pray with us that it happens that way!

Once they are done with the investigation,

and stamp his passport with his

approved Visa...

we get to go to Africa

and pick up our son!!!!

The bittersweet part of all this is that

it looks like we will NOT be traveling

to Lubumbashi where he has lived

for over a year.

We won't get to see Didier's family and those

that have helped care for Tobi while he

was there.

We won't see the church and participate

in worship with them on Sunday.

But.

This is about Tobias right now.

And we get to meet him,

hold him,

and keep him!

It will probably also be a better situation

for our children back home.

I believe we will be able to communicate with them

more in Kinshasa.

We'll see if that's true!

So we're excited and anxious as ever to meet Tobias.

And let me share something real quick.

I think about our son's beautiful

dark skin all the time.

Ever since I was young, I have just LOVED

African American's skin!

As a young, immature teenager,

my best friend and I would always talk about how

we would one day adopt

a black child because they were so 

darn cute.

Well, we watched "42" last night.

It's the story of Jackie Robinson.

I confessed to my husband that I honestly

try to forget about the past of our country and the

other countries that treated

their people with dark skin like they were animals.

Then, when things started to change,

they would recognize African Americans as

"human",

but FAR from equal.

I was thinking about how we would one day

explain to Tobias how people that looked like

him used to be treated in such a

terrible, inhumane way.

THEN, I thought of how it must have been

for parents back then.

How do you explain to your child that

God created all of us equal,

but the majority of the world doesn't see

it that way???

Ugh.

I'm so thankful to not have lived through those days.

And I weep for those that had to.

Gosh, could Jackie Robinson's grandparents even

COMPREHEND white people

WILLINGLY adopting black children???

I'm so glad that we've made it that far

as a country.

But the CHURCH should have been there

LONG ago!

Anyway.

That's just a little of what has been on my heart.

All children, regardless of their

ethnicity or skin color,

need parents.

There are millions that need rescuing.

But I really look forward to the stares.

I look forward to people glancing twice as they see

our 3 kids with light skin,

walking with our son who stands out with

his chocolate brown face and wide white eyes.

 Every stare and every question is an

opportunity to share WHY we adopt.

Now.

If we could only get him home....

A Little Closer to Congo

So right now we have a lot going on.

We returned last week from

a week away with Chris

while he had an intensive Seminary class.

We are getting ready for VBS.

Oh, we're adopting.

We're potty training Noelle.

And I got a cold on Friday!

But all these things (except the cold)

are so rewarding!

We had a great time staying in a hotel while

Chris was in class.

I was actually surprised at how much the girls

behaved and liked it!

There was even a class on his last day

that was for the seminary wives!

It was SO refreshing to be with like-minded

ladies whose husbands are, or will be in ministry.

AND there was child care!

:)

I had angel Jackson with me, 

but the girls

got to go play.

The last few weeks we've really just been

looking forward to Didier coming though!

I hope no one thinks we put him on a high pedestal.

I don't think we do.

He's a man of God that preaches the Word,

disciples men,

takes in and cares for orphans

and does A LOT of work to get them home.

It was wonderful to allow our church family to get

a glimpse of Congo through him.

He speaks of Tobias and it makes me tear up!

It makes me feel so much closer to him, yet so far away

at the same time.

You can listen to it here.

He sang a song for us in Swahili that was about

always being ready for The Lord's return.

The people received it as we hoped they would.

We really felt such a unity,

not only for wanting Tobias home.

But I pray it is also for adoption in general.

And for Congo.

When we finally DO bring Tobi home,

we don't want to look back on the year and half or so

and think that we're all done now.

That we've all done our part and have risen to the

call to care for the orphan.

This isn't a one-time thing.

We ALWAYS care.

We ALWAYS do what we can to help.

I can't WAIT for the next person we know to adopt!

I may not be able to write a big check,

but we'll do all that we can to assist!

And I really think that this process has

instilled that in most of our church body.

It is precious to see!

SPEAKING of helping!

haha

I'll give you a little update on our financial status.

We have about $3,300 left to raise.

Give or take.

The shirts have done really well!

We only have 6 Lrg shirts left and that's IT!

If you want one let me know soon!

We're looking forward to seeing how the rest

is provided by Him.
We received a check for $500 from a very special
friend recently.
What a generous surprise that was!
We are SO undeserving!

It looks like more changes in the process are ahead for us

as well!

We'll tell you more about it when it's set in stone :)

So that's all for now,
hope to have another update very soon!