1 in 50.

I posted last week about needing 20 people to give $20 in order to reach our I-600a fee. The overwhelming response was amazing. We met our goal. One of the people who gave their $20 made a comment that has stuck with me. She said "I'm thrilled to be one of your 20". She didn't know that it hit me like a ton of bricks. (I held back tears honestly) Putting words into action and showing a commitment to our daughter and bringing her home means so much to us. I pray that some day I can articulate clearly just what that means to our family.

When we adopted Silas we didn't fund raise. We didn't have to. (no that does NOT mean we were rich or anything of the sort, far from it actually) The Lord in His miraculous ways asked us to give up everything financially in order to pay the ransom for our son. He not only asked us to sacrifice everything He provided the deficit in ways we couldn't explain other then "only God". This time around He has asked us to again step out in faith, out of our comfort zone and ask others to join with us as we work to bring our daughter home. In another post I'll blog about the differences of those two journeys and the beauty of being a fund raising family.

For now I have a challenge. I've said this before but I'd love to put feet on it not only for us and our commitment to adopt another child from Ethiopia but for other fund raising families to do the same. I mentioned before that there are many ways to be apart of the orphan crisis solution. Not just in Ethiopia but all over the world. Wherever the Lord calls you to be apart. If He's calling you to partner with us to bring our daughter home. AWESOME. If He's calling you to give to another organization. AWESOME. If He's calling you to partner with another family that is adopting. AWESOME. I'm simply asking you to do something. God calls ALL of us to be a part of the solution. For us our part is not only giving to organizations that work in Ethiopia to minister to the children that are not adoptable but He has also called us to bring another child into our home to love, cherish, care for, and to be our daughter. What is he calling you to do?

I'm going to put something out there. We are going to be fund raising for at least the next 9 months. Yes that is NINE MONTHS of coming up with ideas on how to raise the ransom to bring our daughter home. To change the life of a child forever. To change our family forever. Some how God WILL provide the $25,000 ransom needed to change an orphans status to daughter. Essentially that is what we are doing. We are paying the fee necessary to make an orphan our daughter. Ours. The gift of a daughter. I'll be honest, there is not much I wouldn't do for this child God has hand picked for our family. Seriously. I'm pretty sure there are some who avoid my blog because its yet another fund raiser. Yet another post about needing the money for our daughters adoption. I get it. Frankly I wish I didn't have to. Money is the necessary evil in order to bring our daughter home. It's something I don't have alot of and this adoption won't happen without the support from our friends, family, even strangers. You have a HUGE part in making this adoption happen. HUGE. We can't do it without you. That's the facts.

Me personally. I want to be apart of helping bring as many children home to their forever families as possible. If my $5, $10, $20, $50 bucks helps to bring another child home I'll do it. I love being able to help in that way. It may seem small but every little bit adds up. Everything.

How can you help us?

We need 50 people to commit to giving $30 for the next three months. That's it. Really. $30 a month for three months. That will put us at our dossier goal. Now with that we are also working our tails off to cut our budget to add to our own adoption fund because we believe it is important for us to sacrifice of ourselves for our daughter as well. With that as well as other fundraisers we have in the works this could change. The commitment needed could go down based on the donations received. We'll keep that updated as well. We are taking each fund raising goal a step at a time and only as needed.

Why three months?

We found out today our first rough draft for our home study will be back in about a week. As long as all of our clearances come back in a timely manner our home study should be complete by mid June. That is MUCH faster then anticipated and while things could change I want to plan for the quickest. $30 a month is doable yet a sacrifice.

That gives us the rest of May, June, and July to raise the funds for the dossier fee and hit our personal goal of submitting our dossier by the end of July. Submitting our dossier makes us officially a waiting family! Officially waiting to see our sweet girls face!

Will you be 1 in 50?

50 people. $30 a month. May, June, July. $4500 raised.