Home Depot gives Support

As we continue to plan for our Both Hands project, we have a small list of jobs to do at Sandie's home - painting, a ceiling fan, renovating a powder room...  As we considered the costs of supplies, we decided to write a brief letter and go to the Home Depot near Sandie's house.  I spoke with one of the managers of the store, while Alicia and Ariana were on a completely different mission - selecting paint for the nursery.  After I explained the project to the store manager and sheepishly asked if Home Depot would be willing to help, she said that they thought it was a great idea and wanted to help us out.  Home Depot provided us with $100 towards supplies and she gave me her card saying that when/if we need more support, give her a call.  This was such an encouragement to us as we continue organizing this project.  Our team is coming together - we have over 20 people committed to helping with the work on Sandie's home.  We have a team "foreman" who met with Sandie and went through her home to figure out a list of projects.  We sent out our personal letter to friends and family.  We have our "Kick-off" meeting scheduled for this Tuesday evening to meet with our team and pray together.  We are really looking forward to working hard to help and encourage Sandie.  Thank you for your prayers and support.

By the way - the color for the nursery will be a light pink!

One Step Closer

It is so awesome to see God's hand at work.  In the past 24 hours we received our loan check for our Dossier to be able to be sent to Honduras & moved one step closer for our approval!  I was more excited to get that than I ever thought I could be.  Again, it is like God is saying "see, all you have to do is trust me...I will provide!"

Our Biometrics(fingerprints) were completed today and now we just wait again!  We are praying that these results come as fast as the other results came and yet I continue to trust in God's timing.

This week, we hosted two team members from Life Action (a conference that we had at our church) and had such a wonderful time with Sarah & Rachel.   A vision of what our life will be like in about 10 years.  Rachel is so much like Alexa & Sarah, much like Ariana.  What a blessing it was for our family.  To be able to share this brief time with two wonderful Godly young women, I truly believe was such a gift for our girls as well as both Andy & I.  We will miss having them around and yet gave us a glimpse of what our life is yet to come.

It amazes me to have this feeling of love for this little girl that we can only imagine in our hearts and minds.  We can't wait to get the news of who she is and what her little personality is like.  I know that God is wrapping His loving arms around her even at this moment and trust that the time will come in His time that we will be able to wrap our loving arms around her.

Lifesong for Orphans

As mentioned in previous posts, we are working under the Both Hands Foundation in cooperation with Lifesong for Orphans.  We will be partnering with Lifesong through the use of our blog to be advocates for orphans.  Now and then, we will post a blog from Lifesong which will be a reminder to us of the need for us to reach out in love to those who need a home and a family.




OCA Mission Moments from Lifesong for Orphans on Vimeo.
They sat in the studio with an expectant glow as they spoke about their children they had yet to meet, but who they claimed as their very own...

Josh: "As unbelievers, we are aliens.  We are strangers.  We are separated from God.  But God has come in and adopted us, through Christ, to be in His family."
Jenn: "And we're just so thrilled that our family can be a picture of that to the world!  And just like we would never question our true son-ship to God the Father, it's been an encouragement to us to think about, we really don't have to question whether these kids are our true children... cause they are!"

When Josh and Jenn Philpot felt God's nudging toward adoption they weren't sure where they would get the money.  They received a matching grant through the Orphan Care Alliance (OCA), turning the $6,000 they had raised into $10,000, and making it possible for them to bring home not just one child but two!

OCA is a multi-church alliance in the Louisville/Southern Indiana area.  Adoption funding is just one part of their ministry.  Their many outreaches include recruiting and training foster parents, mentoring local foster children, assistance for local churches in launching orphan ministries, international orphan care, and more!  They are also a part of Lifesong's Outside the Walls Network, which connects churches to serve orphans more powerfully together than they could on their own.

 

The Orphan and the Widow

There has not been a lot happening in the process of the adoption - we are still waiting for the preliminary approval from USCIS.  At the same time, we have been working on the Both Hands project, which we mentioned in a previous post.  We are building a team to work on a widow's home, and each team member will send out sponsor letters to raise funds that will go toward our adoption.  We have written a letter that explains our project.  You can find our letter on our donation page on the Both Hands site.

Please pray for us, Sandie (the widow we will be serving) and our team as we prepare for our project date on June 25th.

A Great Yard Sale

What a day!  I am exhausted!

I woke up around 5am and tried to will myself back to sleep for another 30 minutes.As I lay there contemplating the fact that our friends and family had been very generous with offering items for the yard sale.  We had a basement, living room and dining room full, there were items in our sitting room and a few in the barn.  Needless to say, this fact moved me to get out of bed.  It wasn't long until Alicia was up and we began the process of setting up for the yard sale.  My brother, Mike, and my nephew, Zachary arrived around 6am to help carry everything out.  It was one trip after another...at one point Zachary commented that there seemed to be no end to all of the stuff.  Our friend, Kim showed up shortly after that and Alexa also joined us.  We ended up with twelve tables filled with items and much more. 

Our first shopper showed up at 6:30, only an hour and a half before the sale actually was scheduled to begin.  It was about this time that the first light mist arrived, so we ran and grabbed towels and sheets and covered what we could.  The good thing was the shoppers were consistent and continued non-stop until 12:30.  The rain was light, it came and went and ended by mid-morning.  There were times that traffic in the driveway looked like the Schuykill Expressway during rush hour. 

Things we expected to sell are back in the basement, and other items went quickly.  One of my favorite moments of the day was allowing the kids to sell some video games.  We were given two televisions, and we had a handful of old atari video games programed into joysticks.  These were sitting on a table and no one was even looking at them.  I ran an extension cord to the table and allowed Alexa and my nephews to play the games.  Within minutes we sold the games and one of the televisions.  At one points it seems the kids would start playing a game and someone would buy it before they could finish the game.  We started breaking down the yard sale around 2pm.  Once everything was packed up and the yard was was empty once again, we sat down to total up the sales of the day...when all was totaled, the yard sale brought in almost $900.  We thank the Lord for such a great provision, and we thank our very generous family and friends for donations of items, money and time.

Here are some more pictures from the day:

Joseph Enjoying Breakfast!

What else do you do with ski poles!

Time to clean up!