ANOTHER UPDATE

Today has been CRAZY!!!!  We are trying to raise our final funds PLUS get ready for our garage sale NEXT WEEKEND.  PLUS, working on Ethan's QUEEN size quilt-our LONG TIME standing fund raiser that ended this week.  PLUS, prepare for Ethan's coming.  Today...has been VERY overwhelming!
I am stopping to let you all know that we are still in need of $2400 yet PLUS we are praying that we raise $1000 for our garage sale so we can cover our final needed funds for this adoption!  These two things together SHOULD cover our last needed funds.
PLEASE...will you PRAY....for our family-INCLUDING ETHAN ;), for our finances, for our trip-both ways, for the transition, for our garage sale!!!!, and for anything else that you know we will need prayer for!!!  THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL THAT YOU HAVE DONE SO FAR!!!!
ALWAYS BLESSED, Connie for the crew!

Confirmed!

We have been confirmed that we will be leaving America on May 4th and coming home on May 12th!!!
We are totally thrilled!!!  This means that we leave in TWENTY-FIVE DAYS!!!  WOW!!!  SO much to do!
We will be landing at 7pm....the day before Mother's Day!  We cannot wait to see you all!

In other news, Jessica and Wes had court today!!!  Danny is no longer an orphan!!! His name was changed today....his name is Colton Daniel!  Praise the Lord with me!!!

Two boys who were orphans are now SONS!!!
ALWAYS BLESSED! Connie for the crew

WE HAVE OUR DATES

We will be going to Ethan's country...leaving the weekend of May 5th and coming back the weekend of MOTHER's DAY!!!!!!
Connie for the crew (Ethan's Mommy)

UPDATE

Right now, we are thinking that we will be given our second trip dates at the end of the week!  We can't wait to see when we will be bringing our Ethan HOME!!!  We are trying to bring in the last of the money that is needed by having a VERY spontaneous garage sale NEXT WEEKEND...the weekend after Easter.  The girls said that if that weekend is when we are supposed to go get Ethan then they will do the garage sale! HA!  I know that there would be people who would help as that would DEFINITELY be a reason for joy! Otherwise, we would scrap it for another time.
This means that we are at the end of Ethan's grant fund raising.  Ethan has $806 in his grant yet (remember that they don't show what has been used for other needs...our first trip, dossier costs were taken out so it is NOT what it says on our grant...that is the TOTAL that has been raised since Ethan was put onto MY FAMILY FOUND ME).  We have found out an ESTIMATE of our costs for the airplane tickets...it is around $3300 for the three of us. We also will be needing to stay in the capitol this time and that is MUCH higher in costs for food and hotel than where we were at in Ethan's city before.

We are trying to raise the money with the garage sale-so a LOCAL way of help being brought in, we also  have another LOCAL fund raiser that we are starting in full force and that is PAPA MURPHY's Coupon Cards that have coupons for a 1 topping pizza for $7.99-Med.Lg or Family size/ a 3 topping pizza for $9.99-Med, Lg. or Family size/ Any stuffed pizza for $10.99-Lg or Family size/ Any TWO family size pizzas coupon for $6 off any regular priced pizza/ A free cheesy bread or cookie dough w/a purchase of any regular priced pizza/ Any pizza, any size $2 off any Regular menu price/ Any gourmet pizza for $9.99 for a med, Lg. or Family size/ AND Any 3 family size pizzas for $10 off regular menu price.  We are selling them for only $5 a piece...please catch me at church, or email or FB message me or let me know how many you would like...they don't expire!
Then we are trying to finish the treasured quilt for Ethan that is going to be using all of our clothing that i have saved of our girls' favorite clothes combined with Scott's/mine and Nate's clothes to have OTHERS names embroidered on the pieces of cloth that have donated and asked to be on the quilt.  $20 for your name to be on the quilt.

We are praying that we can get in the last $3000 QUICKLY so we will be fully funded before we leave.  If you can help us, we would appreciate it greatly!!!  Our money says that we are at....$5091...which is really the $806 SO that would mean that we need to have it say $8091 VERY SOON!  We are praying for a mighty miracle!  Will YOU help us bring Ethan home?
ALWAYS BLESSED, Connie

It is starting to hit!!!

Tonight, it is started to sink in that we are REALLY FINALLY going to be bringing HOME to our country, our state, our city, our neighborhood, our family, our church.....our son!!! He is going to be running through our house, sitting at our table, reading our books, sleeping in his bed, using our bathroom (hee hee....a BOY!!!!), falling asleep in my arms, playing in our yard, sitting in "our row" at church, throwing balls, playing with our cat, meeting his aunts/uncles/ grandparents, SISTERS/BROTHER-in-law/cousins/great aunts & uncles/great grandma, meeting new friends, eating our popcorn, wearing his fleecy pj's, roasting marshmallows for S'mores, sitting on squishy couches, watching his relationship with Sophina grow as they age, watching his sisters with him...watching them all fall in love with each other, seeing him at our church service....singing with all of our hearts, hearing Pastor Matthew Molesky's sermon being preached with such passion, meeting Twila Pulford-whom i KNOW will weep with joy, meeting oh my....so MANY MANY MANY of you come to mind!!!! Seeing our first family picture, my first Mother's Day as a mother of a son for the very first time, his first family reunion-THIS summer, his first Christmas/Thanksgiving/4th of July, his first time seeing Lake Superior up in Grand Marais, his first trip to the different Grandparents houses, his dedication service at our church, his first time realizing that he is my son/our son/a brother, his first time in our home, his first time in a bathtub, his first time playing a game with us, his first EVERYTHING!!!! I just am overwhelmed and so blessed!  Oh and all of those "ours" will be "his" and THAT i can't wait for!!!!
ALWAYS BLESSED, Connie for the crew

DO WHAT YOU CAN

I just thought that i could share some of the writings that i have written on FB and a few more thoughts.
I'm only one. But still, I am one.

I cannot do everything, but still, I can do something.
And because I cannot do everything,I will not refuse to do the something that I CAN do.~ Edward Everett HaleTHIS is EXACTLY what i have been trying to say (not always in the most beautiful ways but THIS way is so perfectly said!)






It is like i was telling a worker at a store that i have continued to small talk with over the years BUT got pretty deep this last visit!!! (so cool) I would rather obey God and have others be upset then to go by other people's (even godly people's) opinions and listen to them and thus disobey God. Does that mean that it feels good when the people are CLEARLY not behind your decisions....NOPE BUT that does not matter when you are obeying the ONE who has asked you to do what HE has asked YOU to do!!! (pass the offering plate)
OK....NOW, for some more meat! Do you think that God only asks of us the measly life? NO! Have you looked through the Bible lately? What about asking Gideon to only have 300 soldiers against a mighty army....does that make logical sense??? What about when God asks His disciples to let out their nets on the other side of the boat after they had been fishing all night? NO!!! ALL throughout Scripture the Lord asks UNlogical things of His people!!! SO why do we NOT support those who DO the HARD things and obey when God asks the illogical!?!?!?!  


Some other stories of illogical things that God asked....David, who was a young boy, slaying a MONSTER of a man named Goliath with only a sling and a stone.  Noah to build a boat that was HUGE and took YEARS to build.  Have you ever taken the time to really stop and think about what Noah went through for all of those years...YEARS of boat building when there had yet to have been rain?  What would we followers of Christ be telling him if we lived back then?  "Noah, there is SO much more that you could be doing instead of wasting your time building a boat" 


Abraham being asked to sacrifice his son...his ONLY son when God had told him that that was the son that there would be so many offspring from that they would be unable to be counted!  What would we have told HIM as 'advisors'!?!?!  "There is no way that you heard God correctly! This is not what God would ask of you NOW....you only have Isaac, you should wait and make sure that you heard right"


Or how about Sara being told that she was going to have a baby!!!!  WOW!  Have you all thought about that one and what we would say to her???  "Do you not know how you make babies? Don't you know that you are too old for this!  What were you two thinking?  How are you ever going to play ball with him or be able to keep up with him!?!?  That was so irresponsible"



I think that we want the outcomes of these stories without the hardship of the stories!  Do you not remember the taunting that Noah went through?  Abraham actually GOING up the mountain and actually putting him ON the altar in COMPLETE FAITH!  He OBEYED without knowing what we get to read happened next!  Sara LOVING having a baby in her old age....she was OLD and had a baby!  Seriously, i swear, i wish we would take time to just chew on these amazing FACTS!!!


SO....why is it that we think that those stories in the Bible are so incredible and wonderful and we wonder why that doesn't happen anymore?  Maybe it is because we are not willing to DO what we CAN?  Maybe it is because we aren't willing to go out in the fight with only 300!There are so many different things that God asks of people...that God asks of me and i am sure that i have had things that i have ignored.One person may be struggling with something that would be simple for someone else to do BUT it has been asked of that person and when they do that thing that is super hard for them...it is more meaningful than if God had asked the person who was fully capable of doing that with ease.  MAYBE God asks something so simple of you that you just take it for granted and think it is so little that you don't do it BUT it would have been a REALLY big deal if only you would have obeyed.


The older i get the more I just want to live a life that is full and rich.  Man, i fail just like the men and women of old and what is amazing is that God forgives and loves me and says to try again!  i want to obey in the little things and the big so that my life won't be all about the "stuff i have" but instead will be about a legacy i leave...of integrity, passion and faithfulness to the God of my fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob!
ALWAYS BLESSED,  Connie for the crew 

An incredible "GOD" story!

God's timing is always amazing but i will not say that it always FEELS best!  The waiting was SO hard...no matter which time it was throughout this adoption.  WAIT on the Lord....yep, it is in the Bible and there are great verses that talk about it BUT....WOW!  Have you ever tried it lately???  REALLY had to try it....where you feel like your waiting is as if you are about to drown from exhaustion, the beating of the waves against you are too much, and the waiting is just not worth the pain?  Waiting is NOT fun!  Yet, it is one of the tools that God seems to use most often for training us to be more like Him!
I don't know why another sermon just came out me but it did.....and yet, i DO know.
You see, today was the day that our family found out that we have a little boy who TODAY received our last name and is living his last few weeks in an orphanage across the ocean.  Today is a day that we will never forget!  Today is a day that a miracle happened....i received news that i have a son!!!  I never thought that it would ever happen in my life when i miscarried our son four years ago!
I also need to tell you something else though....today is a day that is very bittersweet because my heart is so heavy for another family.  A family whom i care about very much.  A CHILD that i careD about so much that we called the agency to say that we wanted him to be our son.  What was amazing was that that little boy had just been accepted for another family the night before we asked to adopt him!  Scott and the girls and i  had spent MANY days bantering back and forth and then we finally decided FOR SURE...YES!!!!
He was gone!  Too late!  (God is so amazing in that his mother later asked me to be her friend without even knowing that our family had thought that we were going to be her little boy's family- she since knows the blessing that her son was in guiding us toward Ethan)
We went back to looking at children again while still getting our home study set up.  That family started paperwork for adopting their son.
The Lord was SO in control but i just couldn't believe that we were ever going to be able to find a child who we were SUPPOSED to have!  How could we choose?!!?!?!?!  First, there were all of the ridiculous rules and different countries had different rules!  Those rules ruled us out for Russia.  THEN, they had different schedules of visits that parents had to do for different countries.  SO that meant that Ukraine was out as there was no way that we could leave Sophina and even the other girls for five weeks again (we had already done that when Sophina had had her open heart surgery and it was NOT good for our family to be apart for that long PLUS now Scott had a job).  Ukraine was out. (i have since been told that a family could break up the visit for Ukraine and we may have been able to have done Ukraine after all....but God)   Bulgaria looked like the best option for our family.  At the beginning though i wanted a girl......but then i saw Robert and the whole family ADORED him and he DID melt my heart.  OK, maybe boys aren't so bad but still....no, i can't imagine.  THEN, i saw this little boy and he broke down ALL of my reasons to not allow us to be looking at the boys.  This boy with his beautiful brown hair, his gorgeous deep brown eyes, and his lips and cheeks were so precious!   He was a little boy who tore down all of my fears in adopting a boy.  Now, we had lost him! How in the world would we ever be able to find OUR son or daughter?
PLUS! We were getting close to our home study coming and we still didn't have a child picked!!!
We did finally find him (in time...the week of our home study) and Ethan is so perfect for our family that it still overwhelms me with his 'fit'!  God has blessed us so!
SO, Connie, you are thinking...."WHY IN THE WORLD ARE YOU TELLING US THIS!?!?!?!"  You see the family who is adopting Danny has still not heard THEIR court dates yet.  Remember how i have asked us all to be praying for this family in the past?  THE WAITING IS OVERWHELMINGLY painful and hard!  God's timing is best is TRUE BUT it is HARD!!!!  Jessica and Wes need our prayers and Danny needs his day in court....BUT the reason why i am writing this on THIS particular day is another reason that this day is amazing.
One year ago today, it is written in our prayer book that we prayed for.......Danny to have a family!  Remember at this point the children that i am writing in our prayer book are the ones that i fell in love with....the ones who grabbed my heart and then later...we actually pursued!  One year ago, Danny did NOT have a family!  One year ago, there were women (maybe even some men) who stopped what they were doing that day or the next day and prayed for little Danny in his orphanage and his parents that we prayed would come!
Today, i am asking that you pray .....yes, right now, would you PLEASE STOP right now what you are doing and pray for Danny again?  Will you pray again for his family....and now you can use his family's name, Wes and Jessica!  Will you pray that they also will be able to skip the stage that we did and that their court date will be here quickly?  Pray for all to go smoothly and whatever else you want to pray for!  Here is their link if you would like to follow their new lives.....at the-white-acres.blogspot.com
Thank you to all who have been prayer warriors over this year....just look at the outcome of the prayers!  AMAZING!  ALWAYS BLESSED, Connie for the crew