Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Raffle Day 2!!

Man am I blown away by the generosity! There is no way to thank you for contributing properly! Just know that I have MANY hugs ready to give!!!

I wanted to share a little bit about why we are doing this raffle for those of you that may be new to the blog.

We are a family that has grown through adoption. We have 2 bio kiddos now ages 21yrs and 17 yrs, we thought we were complete when in 2004 the adoption seed was planted by God through Steven Curtis Chapman. We brought home our first son N, in 2006 from Ethiopia. While we were there we fell in love with the country and the children. We knew we would be back. We began the process for a waiting child in 2007 and in 2008 came home with E. It’s been a long road. More like a roller coaster, lots of amazing ups, pretty cool twists, not so great drops…but God’s been faithful and we feel his call to adopt once again.

I have felt it for about 2 yrs now, but it’s not been the right time, and my dear hubby hasn’t felt it was right so I have just been praying. About a year ago God laid the children of China on my heart. I started to feel as though that was where our next child must be… but I will be honest with the fact that I have struggle with that because I LOVE Ethiopia. I love the country, it’s people, it’s children.

Through some pretty amazing events we thought we were not going to be able to adopt from China, so we began our focus on Ethiopia. I was confused though because I felt like my feeling about China had to have been from God.

A couple of Friday’s ago I was reflecting on why I wasn’t feeling the urgency to move forward, why things weren’t coming together like they had in the past, why we weren’t moving as I thought we should be. Then we got the call from one of the agencies that we had contacted about China adoptions and they said they had been busy and gone during the Christmas holiday but that they had been fleshing our situation and our family and they felt confident that we would be able to adopt through China’s SN program.

Things began to click into place, answers seemed to come.

So… Why the raffle and why now?

If we can get our Home Study done before the end of February we can do a renewal, which is easier and half the cost of doing a whole new one. We feel like we would be good stewards to it at half price…kind of a no brainer right?

Why don’t we have the 850.00? Well because we’ve had a couple of glitches over the past couple of weeks with bills and repairs.

Why a raffle? Why not just sell stuff?
Because raffles are fun. We had some fun stuff. People aren’t just giving us money, they get something fun in return.

Thank you for being a blessing! Thank you for sharing with us. Thank you for helping us reach our goal. If you cannot give, please consider sharing this on your blog. Hey it’s get’s you an entry into the drawing! :) Perhaps someone will see it and be able to help. Every 5.00 donation helps!

4 comments:

Our journey following Christ said...

I cannot tell you how much I am enjoying seeing you chip in button keep moving every time I look!

Wahoooooooo!

Love,
Laura

Runner Mom said...

Hey, Andrea! I love your blog! I will be praying for you all....how exciting! As an adpoted child myself, I am a huge advocate of adoption. I'll be back to check!
Hugs!
Susan

Tarah said...

You are so amazing Andrea!
I love that you are all jumping in with both feet knowing and trusting that God leads this.

mark said...

Andrea,
Can you leave access to the raffle open for a few more days so a few of us "late comers" can contribute to the cause? We're ALL "winners" knowing that we're helping you bring an orphan that much closer to become part of your family. Thanks for letting us participate in the journey with you in such a unique,fun way! Mark & Liane