Israel Houghton | Love God. Love People.

Yesterday I mentioned that Brian and I went to see Israel Houghton on Wednesday night at a church in Charlotte. The event was free and it was sooo good. It was one of the most worshipful nights I have had in a long time. If you have never listened to Israel and New Breed (his band) you still probably would recognize some of the songs that he has written. Israel is super talented and I love to hear him play the piano. His newest album is called "Love God, Love People" and it's sooo good! Good thing the mp3 player doesn't wear out from all the listening in the car. Since we got to go to the concert for free I got a t-shirt and they said that since we got a t-shirt we received 2 CD's for free! Well, I would LOVE to give one away! I'm already giving the other one away to a friend but one is up for grabs!! So, if you want a copy of Israel's newest CD "Love God, Love People" then read below....after checking out the video of course. :) Oh, be sure to mute the playlist at the very bottom of the page before you click play on the video...otherwise it will probably not sound very good. hehe





Here's what you do:
Leave me a comment telling me either:
1. Your favorite Israel song
OR
2. The most worshipful concert you have attended
OR
3. A way that you can love God by loving people. :)

I'm just doing the "everybody gets 1 comment" giveaway. I'll randomly pick 1 person on Wednesday! Thanks!!

What have we been up to??

I haven't posted anything in a little while so I thought I'd just do a post with a few things that we've been up to.

Do you know what I have been finding all over my house? In couch crevices, under pillows, on pillows, under the piano bench, scattered all over the floor...
THESE! SEQUINS!

I don't know what caused me to say yes to Isabel when she asked for a big bag of sequins. Maybe because they're so pretty and sparkly and she was soo excited about them. AND they're pretty inexpensive.

Isabel mixes them and pretends they are food. She designs papers with them and sticks them on things with a glue stick. She also throws them in the air like confetti when I'm not looking. :)

Last week sometime Brian and Isabel went off to pick a pumpkin to carve.
I stayed home and made Cinnamon Bun Caramel Corn! It was the best stuff ever and super easy to make. Here is where I got the recipe...and incidentally where I get lots of recipes!http://www.ourbestbites.com/2009/09/cinnamon-caramel-corn-with-pecans-white.html

Here she is digging out all the yucky stuff from the inside. (and yes, that is our ancient tv sticking out behind her! haha. It makes me laugh!)

You can't tell but the pumpkin has eyelashes. And there's our silly cat standing at the door posing too.

On Wednesday night Brian and I went to see this guy in concert! For free!

Our family just loves listening to Israel Houghton. His music is so fun and worshipful. One of my favorite songs of his from this album is actually playing now at the bottom of the page. We had such a good time worshipping that night together with all kinds of people. If you don't have this album, you really need to get it and listen to it. It's incredible. Or check in again on Monday and I might just have a surprise!

Alright, we're off to go trick-or-treating in our friends' neighborhood tonight! Stay posted for photos of a really cute blue fairie. :)

So how does the waitlist work anyway?

Since a bunch of people that are not adopting have asked me about how this whole waitlist thing works, I figured that I would just blog about it and share some about that.

Most of you know that we officially were placed on the waitlist last week. We received the number 93. Now, with our agency there are three lists: a girl list, a boy list, and a siblings list. Since we live in a 2 bedroom house and our daughter will be sharing a room we were approved for a girl so that means we are only on the girl list. Some people are on just one list, two lists, or even all three lists. It really just depends on your family and your parameters. As families toward the top of the list receive referrals (when they are matched with a child in Ethiopia) everyone else moves up on the list. If a family that is on all three lists receives their referral then they are removed from the waitlist and everyone on all three lists move up a spot. If the family receives a referral for a girl and they were only on the girl list then everyone on the girl list moves up 1 spot. Ya get it? Pretty easy.

Thankfully we have 2 ways of finding out about what number we are on the list. The main way is through our actual agency's calls/emails. Each month at no particular time we will receive a call or e-mail to tell us of our updated official number. We only receive this contact once a month. Here's the cool thing. Our agency also has a listserv where most of the adoptive families share their referrals and all kinds of wonderful, encouraging, and helpful information. From the listserv, there is an "unofficial" list that is kept. Everyone shares their official number but then during the month when someone reports a referral, we know that we all move up. We don't have to wait until the next month to hear our official number. We actually know an unofficial number. Now, this number isn't EXACT EXACT but it seems to be pretty close! We knew that we started out at #93 but actually now we are unofficially #87. Pretty cool huh?? That is cool for us because we have moved up but REALLY COOL for those families at the top that received referrals because that means they have actually seen a picture of their sweet baby girl or boy and are so so close to bringing them home!

Do you have any more questions? Let me know. Sometimes I take this stuff for granted because we're living it but I do wanna explain things as much as I can!

So what do we do now? We wait! :)

Waiting with Hope,

Guess who's 30??

I'm officially 30 years old today. It's been a good day. I love that my birthday is in October because it's always beautiful out and nice and cool. Pumpkins and leaves and apple cider. Who doesn't like that? Then, when you add my birthday in to the mix, it's even better!

And this year, our family got on the waitlist and even closer to our daughter in Ethiopia just a few days before my birthday! That was wonderful and we are already moving up the list as more and more families are seeing the faces of their sweet babies as they receive their referrals.

I woke up this morning with Isabel poking me in the arm asking me if I was ready to open her card for me. So sweet! Brian had to work today but when he came home he brought me the most beautiful fall looking bouquet of flowers and of course a sweet card! AND he noticed when I said I needed a coat for the winter (seeing as how I have bus duty at my school and my other fleece's zipper is all busted) and bought me the most beautiful brown coat! I love it!

Check it out!

He also arranged for us to go on a date tonight. Brian and I have always loved road trips because we can just ride in the car and listen to music together and talk. So if we can we like to plan our dates in cities at least 30 minutes away. We went to a little restaurant with pretty lights in downtown Concord. Afterward, we wandered around Trader Joe's (because I'm still baffled at how inexpensive it is) and it's fun to just walk around with our free sample of apple cider. :)

All in all, it was a great birthday! I think the 30's are gonna be fun!

Love,

It's official!!! We're on the waitlist!!

We are officially number 93 on the waitlist for a 0-2 year old little girl!!!

Yay!! We got the news today!

My sweet friend sent me this Psalm when she heard the news!

Psalm 93
The LORD reigns, he is robed in majesty; the LORD is robed in majesty
and is armed with strength. The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.Your throne was established long ago; you are from all eternity.The seas have lifted up, O LORD, the seas have lifted up their voice; the seas have lifted up their pounding waves.Mightier than the thunder of the great waters, mightier than the breakers of the sea—the LORD on high is mighty.Your statutes stand firm; holiness adorns your house for endless days, O LORD.

I'm thankful that the Lord has control of this WHOLE process! He is mighty and neither He nor His plans can be moved!

esperando

Nope, we didn't get our waitlist number today. :( I'm guessing they received our fixed document this afternoon and didn't get to it yet. I'm hoping and praying that we'll hear in the morning!

We've been waiting since January for this. We were "conditionally" approved with AGCI then and that was when we had to raise $10,000 in 90 days. Then, God raised the money and we were officially approved in mid March. So, we were able to start on our homestudy documents which involved searching for Mexican child abuse registry documentation and took awhile as you can imagine. Then in May we thought we might be moving to Texas so we put everything with our homestudy on hold because we didn't want to have to redo everything. We began again at the beginning of June when we found out that we weren't moving to Texas. :) We started our homestudy visits then and had our last visit by mid July. Somewhere early along in all that we sent off for our FBI fingerprints and we received Brian's check but mine was rejected. We waited for mine to come back while we did TONs of fundraising. We received my check and so our completed homestudy was sent to us on September 22nd. We had to wait until our t-shirt fundraiser ended at the end of September and then God provided yet another amazing provision so that we could send our dossier in just in time at the beginning of this month.

10 months....see why I'm ready for a number already??? :)

I sure hope I can tell you all what it will be tomorrow!



esperando,

Quick Update

So our agency reviewed our dossier today and said that it is perfect except for one paper that someone notarized a little off. Thankfully it's a super easy fix! We are getting it fixed tomorrow and they said that as soon as they get it next week they will call us with a number because they'll review it the day they receive it. They also said we did a great job on our dossier because we only had 1 thing to fix! Apparently the notarization mistake was a very very common one where the notaries accidentally sign the wrong spot and 95% of families have some type of thing that needs fixing.

So, I was a little sad not to get a number today but I'm thankful to know that we will definitely have a number as soon as they get our fixed document. We are mailing it first thing Monday morning so it will arrive on Tuesday. So, check back in with me on Tuesday and THEN we will definitely have a number!! :)

only 2 days till Friday!

Today is Wednesday....only 2 more days and it will be Friday! Fridays are great for lots of reasons but THIS FRIDAY our agency is gonna review our dossier and HOPEFULLY give us a number on the waitlist! I know a lot of times you have to fix mess-ups on the dossier but I'm hoping and praying that we get a number! :) That would make this Friday amazing!

This is one crazy contest!

This is so crazy that I had to share it! Have you always wanted to go on a missions trip but feel like you can't afford it? Have you wanted to go show Jesus' love to orphans? Well, then I have to tell you about this!

Kari at http://mycrazyadoption.org/ is giving away 1 and maybe a 2nd missions trip to Ethiopia with Visiting Orphans for Feb. 17-26, 2011. It includes your missions application payment, airfare, food and accomodations.

In order to enter this giveaway, you just have to purchase one Simply Love T-shirt at

My Crazy Adoption Store from now through 10/28/10. You automatically register for the contest when you purchase a shirt online. Also, if you win and you can't go on the trip, you can give it away as a gift to someone else that would like to go. The winner will be randomly selected on 11/2/10.

Isn't that amazing? What a cool giveaway. Wow, I think you all should enter to go!!

p.s. Brian ordered the shirt at the top for me for my birthday this month!! I love it and I think if you are an ESL teacher you are required to have one! If I win, I'm already thinking of who I'm gonna give this trip away to!! ;) I would go but I'm saving up all my extra days at school to go meet our very own little girl next year sometime!

Wow!

I'm headed to bed but I had to post this! Brian and I just finished our daughter's puzzle...thanks to all of your help! It's so beautiful and I'm so excited to get some puzzle glue and then frame it! We wanted you all to know that it was such a blessing writing each of your names on the back of the pieces. We also included some special messages that we want our daughter to know! I'll post a picture of the back and everything after it's framed.

Also, remember yesterday I told you that God provided all of our dossier fee AND all but $100 of our USCIS fee? Well, guess what?? After today, it's ALL covered! I'm not kidding! Brian and I are so overwhelmed by your generosity and love for our daughter and our family.

Thank you SO SO much!

His Love is Extravagant!

I know you are all anxiously waiting to hear about whether we were able to reach the $200 that we needed! I want to tell you that YES because of your generous hearts we are there! We spoke with our agency today and they said we can overnight our dossier tomorrow so that our package will arrive early Monday morning! They will review it to make sure everything is in order with our paperwork and then they will assign us a NUMBER ON THE WAITLIST! I am so excited about that! I can't believe it!

Now, for the EVEN MORE AMAZING NEWS! Two nights ago, Brian and I prayed and cried, unsure of how to pay for the last amount of the dossier fee and wondered how we were going to pay for the USCIS (Immigration fee) that is to come RIGHT after turning in the dossier. We just decided to take ONE thing at a time and pray for the $200 to get that dossier fee taken care of. We decided we would worry about the $800 fee for USCIS afterwards.

Can I share with you that because of your LOVE for our daughter and adoption and your generous hearts that GOD has covered the $200 that we lacked AND ALL BUT $100 of the USCIS FEE! I'm serious! THAT IS INCREDIBLE TO ME! When we ask God for one thing, He has something much bigger in mind!

So, THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF OUR HEARTS! Also, a special THANK YOU to the mysterious doorbell ringer! A few hours ago, I was putting pieces in our puzzle (which I am trying to quicky finish up so I can show you all a picture!) and the doorbell rang. Brian went to the door and there was an envelope taped to the door that said "God Bless" on it. Inside was a donation to our adoption! We have no idea who this is from but we are so grateful to all of you that have prayed and supported our adoption so far!

God's love and plans for us are SO extravagant and better than we can see!



Love,
Brian, Angela, and Isabel

10 People!!

Okay everybody, we have to send in our dossier by FRIDAY (that's right, THIS FRIDAY). That is the end of our 6 month deadline. This is way exciting; however, we are still short on the money that we need to send in. We have fundraised and fundraised and searched and saved and we are still short $200. So, I realized today that if only 10 people bought a puzzle piece for $20 then that would be enough! We would be able to send it in.

Would you consider helping get us on the waitlist by buying a puzzle piece for $20 so that we will be closer to meeting our daughter and she will be even closer to having a mommy and a daddy, to not going to bed at night wondering if a family will come for her???

We would love to fill up that beautiful puzzle with more names of people that helped to give her a forever home and were part of our family's adoption journey.

If you want to participate, please click on the puzzle picture link or click below right here in this blog post.

We know that God has provided for every need so far in our adoption process....so far he has provided right at $15,000! We know that He can provide this last $200!

"In the morning, O LORD, you hear my voice; in the morning I

lay my requests before you and wait in expectation."

Psalm 5:3

Rainy Day

I just wanted to post these photos for fun. :)

As many of you know, we've had a lot of rain here in NC and Isabel has been begging to go jump in the huge puddles that formed down the street. So, the other day I told her to get on some jeans, a tshirt, and her rain boots. She was sooo excited! She jumped and jumped and ran and jumped. You can imagine how dirty she was by the end of it. She didn't care and neither did I. I had fun watching her and taking these pictures.

See the puddles??

Modeling her wet Go Seek Love shirt! :)

Something Else

You know that feeling when you know something has to change? You know something is gonna suddenly happen? It's like you've been holding on to some hope that you can't quite describe but it's there. Something good....something good has to happen. There's been too much and too long of "this too shall pass." It's to a place where you just anticipate good but you think if you anticipate it too much and it doesn't happen, then you don't wanna be heartbroken again. You don't wanna get your hopes up and you don't wanna invest too much because what if... But if you don't have hope at all then it's just too much to bear. These are the times that I don't know what I would do if I didn't have a heavenly Father. He is my only hope. He reminds me that there is something more. Even while I wait, He's there. Even while I pout, He's there.

Some of you know that I am a huge Sara Groves fan. My old blog was named after one of her songs. Anyway, the chorus of her song "From this One Place" is playing over and over in my head....and I'm glad. :)

From this one place I can't see very far
In this one moment I'm square in the dark
These are the things I will trust in my heart
You can see something else
something else

I don't always read The Message translation of the Bible but I love the translation of Romans 8:28.
"Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good."