Adoption, support and understanding

Not too many years ago my eyes were opened up to a world I was aware, but yet unaware of.  That world is the world that exists around us with millions of children living without parents, a home, or the love that God so greatly shares and desires for each person to experience.

I am ashamed that as a Christian I did not understand the need that existed when the Bible so openly talks about it - care for the orphans.  Although we have always sponsored children in need and helped those around us, I don't think I really understood it to the fullest.

After studying the Bible and what God has to say about orphan care, we knew in our hearts that adoption was something He wanted us to do - being part of His plan to care for His precious children.  I remember reading somewhere that you might not be able to save or feed or love everyone, but you can make a difference in one life at a time.

Any adoptive parent can tell you, including me, that the love and joy that our adoptive children bring into our lives is worth more than anything else on this earth.  It is priceless, no different than biological children.  People think how blessed our adopted children are to have a family, that may be true, but I have to say that we feel just as blessed to have them as our children.  Children are a blessing from the Lord!

We have been blessed to adopt 4 children in the last 4 years and we are head over heels in love with them all.  They fit so perfectly in our family there is no doubt it was part of God's plan for our family.

As you might be able to tell from recent posts, we received an unexpected referral for a little girl.  I cannot post any additional information until we are told we can, so for now this little info will have to suffice.  We knew going into our most recent adoption that we would adopt one last time and that it would be a girl.  When we began this journey almost 5 years ago, it was for a little girl.  But Gods plan was that we adopt 4 boys instead:)    Long story short, we decided to reuse our dossier thinking it would be at least a year before we got a referral, when only 2 days after resubmitting our desire to do so, resulted in a referral.  We are totally in love with this child and cannot wait to get her home to our family forever.

The bad part is that only a few days after receiving our referral we were told we CANNOT re use our dossier (misunderstanding on our agencies part) and we have to potentially find another social worker (who is Hague accredited) AND have a homestudy, dossier and Supplement 3 done and turned in before the end of January.  This puts a major kink in everything.  We thought we would have a year to save for the adoption, but now with a 90 day deadline we have to have all our agency fees upfront.  We know that God will provide through our hard work, tightening of our budget, doing yard sales, and praying for donations from family, friends and sometimes complete strangers:)

We ask you to join us by praying, encouraging and if possible financially supporting us.  We are excited to see what God is going to do to help us bring this beautiful little girl home.

PS - only 7 of the kids in the photo are ours...the other two are sweet friends