Red Letters

"The true state of emergency lies within the church-it lies within us. It's our problem. We can't leave Africa's children lying by the side of the road as we pass on by." This was taken from a book that I am currently reading called Red Letter; Living a faith that bleeds written by Tom Davis. This passage has struck me for more than one reason. I was told to read this book by a friend who had also adopted from Ethiopia and it had been sitting on my shelf for almost a year now, finally something inside me (I am thinking God had a little to do with that voice) told me I should start reading it. I can not tell you how greatly this book has impacted me. When we decided to adopt, I will admit it was maybe more for selfish reasons, we wanted a little girl. We knew adoption was a great thing and that there were lots of kids out there who needed homes, but that was the extent of WHY. After reading this book I can honestly say that I believe that God put adoption on our hearts without us really knowing it and he led us to Ethiopia quietly and in an unassuming way. But now that we are about to bring Ruby home, I am humbled by the fact that we are doing one small thing, yet after reading this book my eyes have been opened about the crisis going on in Africa. I cant get the statics out of my mind and the numbers and the stories talked about in this book. He says it many times in his book, Africa is literally going up in flames and soon there many not be an Africa any more if nothing is done. It is just too hard to imagine, too big of a crisis, and we (America) dont seem to be doing a whole lot about it. I am overwhelmed yet realize that there is hope, We have an amazing God and in him all things are possible! But we need to be his hands and feet, we have to do something!

Small little goof!

Okay so I just got work today that we are not going to be able to raffle off the quilt. So..there will be a silent auction for it at the fundraiser party. The other silent auction pieces are so far; a 3 day 2 night stay in a cottage at Lincoln City, photo shoot, and a very cool water feature, this along with other pieces for sale. Sorry for the mix-up.

On another note this has been the most beautiful last few days and we have been taking full advantage of it. The boys have practically lived outside for the last few days and no Owen has taken up a new sport in addition to his love of basketball, we broke out the tee and have been hitting like carzy, this boys does not stop once he finds something he likes, it is very fun to see. Wyatt on the other hand sees it more as a recreational sport.

Finally she is ours!

Today we finally got the news that our court date has been approved and now Ruby is officially our child. We have been waiting for this news for almost two weeks now, and now that we have it it is very surreal. After the news this morning as I was reading on the couch as the boys were "resting" I tried to picture myself actually having her placed in my arms for the first time, and I was finally able to picture this moment and the knot in my stomach was there and my arms were weak as I finally got to hold my daughter. I just am overjoyed with excitment of how our lives are going to be forever changed very soon. We are now in the process of looking for the best tickets, it is really weird sometimes you can find a flight that is 24 hours not counting layovers, and then the next one is 37 hours! So we are definanlty hunting around for this. But as excited as I am to go and get her, I am a little nervous about flying for that long with a baby that literally has just meet me days before, I guess that is all part of her story that we will get to tell her when she gets older.

As many of you know the fundraiser Party for Ruby is on the May 30th, we know there are a lot of people who live out of town or who have other plans that evening and so we wanted to give a chance to everyone to purchase tickets for a quilt raffle. We have a BEAUTIFUL handmade quilt that was made by Judy Groth, a friend of the family. It is a queen size quilt that will be coming with 3 different throw pillows. Tickets are: 1 ticket for $5 or 5 tickets for $20. We will hold the drawing at the party on the 30th. There is also another way to support thr fundraiser, a friend of mine Cory Harrington is a Scentsy consultant. If you haven't heard of Scentsy, it is a great line of products that will make your house smell wonderful. A warmer and a scentsy bar make a perfect gift! Cory is donating the profit of all of the sales generated from people supporting our fundraiser. Just go to her website www.scentsy.com/coryharrington and click on "events" this is written kind of small and is near her photo. Click on May 30th and Ruby's fundraiser and then you can start shopping from there. Cory will also be at the party and you can make purchases then and she will have samples of the warmers to see and bars to smell.

on pins and needles

Okay so not sure if anyone really noticed but our court date was May 4th, yeah.....it is what....May 8th and we stil DO NOT know ANYTHING! I am going to burst. Our social worker Megan said that she has not had contact with the guy in Ethiopia that handles the paperwork and because it never takes this long (our luck) she is wondering if they are having internet problems or phone issue ahhh. We can't make our travel arrangments until we know for sure that we passed and so we are just waiting. Anyways just thought I would send out this update. Otherwise are family is doing great, I am seeing the light coming a little bit closer on my goal to have both of my children fully potty trained by the time Ruby comes. This morning while I was being a lazy mom and catching a few more minutes of sleep on the couch and letting the boys watch their cartoons, I heard Wyatt say "pause-potty time" (a phrase we say to get him to stop what he is doing and take a potty break) He, on his own (me with one eye open to see what he would do) pulled down his pants ran into the bathroom and went potty all by himself, he even flushed without putting anything else foreign in the potty! This is so huge if you know my Wyatt. He will get there!!!!