What a Week

Wow, it’s been a week.  Here is a recap the last 5 days…

T-Shirt Fundraiser

We started the week with our t-shirt fundraiser and we are blown away by the support! We’ve sold 84 shirts already!  84 shirts adds $991.40 to our adoption fund!  That’s awesome!!  Way more than we ever imagined!  I can’t wait to see everyone in their matching t-shirts! 🙂

We will continue to take orders through Monday and then place the order with Fund the Nations on Tuesday.  I plan to send invoices this weekend to those who are not paying with cash or a check.

New Blog Design / Adopt Together Account Donation

Have you noticed the new design on our blog?  It was done by a new friend of mine, Jenn, from Jenn Jordan Designs.  We were looking for help to get a button on our blog (Under “Support Us” on the sidebar) that would link our friends and family that are looking for a way to help to our Adopt Together account, and she had the answer, along with a few other fun additions to make our blog look and work better.

We were recently approved for an Adopt Together account.  It is an account that allows family and friends to make tax deductible donations to our adoption fund.  The really cool thing is that it is possible that we could receive matching donations in this account from the Adopt Together organization.

Jenn was working on the blog design on Tuesday afternoon and not even an hour after she was done, we received an email saying that our first donation had come in to our Adopt Together account…for $500!!!  We hadn’t even announced the new blog design or the Adopt Together account and here was a donation for $500 from a very good friend. Wow, blown away once again.

Josie Update!

Also on Tuesday, just a few days after being LID, we received an update on Josie.  We were shocked because we were not expecting the update to arrive so quickly!  I was hoping it would come by the end of this week.  The update was SO great…I was already emotional about the Adopt Together gift and the t-shirt sales and seeing her pictures put me over the edge. 🙂

Ahhh!  Isn’t she sweet?!  We can not wait to see that smile in person!!

We also received answers to some of our questions.  We got her height, weight and foot measurements.  It turns out that she and James are twins.  They are basically the same size, which helps to know so we can start getting some clothes for this girl! 🙂

The best part of the update was reading that she looks at and plays with the book of pictures we sent of our family…and that she is familiar with our faces.  That is such a gift to know that she knows our faces!

We asked what makes her sad or mad and they said if a friend grabs her toys – haha – who wouldn’t be mad or sad about that?! 😉

It is normal practice for them to shave the children’s heads.  We asked if they could please not do that anymore so that her hair can start growing out.  I see lots of bows and headbands in her future! 🙂

And then came Thursday…

My Mom had her hip replaced.  She’s been struggling for a long time now with bad arthritis in her hip.  She was misdiagnosed for at least a year before finding the real cause of her pain.  I’m happy to report that the surgery is now behind her and she can recover and hopefully walk much better than she has in a long time.  Would you please pray with us for a quick, smooth recovery?

My Tante Gerda and Ome Adrie flew back to Holland on the same day as the surgery.  As my Dad was waiting for my Mom to come out of surgery, Jay, Jacob, James and I were driving my Aunt and Uncle to O’Hare.  I wrote a very emotional post just a couple of days ago, which you can read here.  I won’t repeat it all again, I’ll just say that it was very hard to say “good-bye”.  I’m so thankful that even though we are not able to spend much time together here on earth, we will one day spend an eternity together in heaven.

Are you exhausted just reading all of this?  Because I feel like I could sleep for a week right now. 🙂  Crying (mostly tears of joy!) really wears a girl out. 🙂

I just want to end by saying again that we have been completely amazed at the outpouring of love and support for Josie and our family.  It’s funny, I was so nervous about starting the fundraiser on Monday.  Why did I even question?  God always over-delivers!

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”
Ephesians 3:20-21