Church and Home Study

Well, we had quite the busy weekend. Busy but great! On Sunday we led worship and spoke at church. We talked about adoption. Our story and God's heart in it. We showed this video and I think everyone should watch it. Andy is a thinker, so this video reached him. I am more emotional, so the slide shows with songs and the video blogs reach me more. This however is such a powerful teaching. Anyhow, we were so blessed by people after church and so encouraged! Just what we needed before a drive down to Indy.
Why Indy? We had our first home study. Our agency requires us to come to them for the first one. We won't argue....it actually made it significantly cheaper!! My family lives in the Westfield area so we were able to take advantage of the time and visit my grandpa, aunt, uncle and cousins. Nahum was especially happy to have time to play with his cousins. He LOVES them!!
My aunt watched the boys for us while we went to our appointment. We were so nervous! We had no idea what to expect. I mean people typically hope to never have a run in with a social worker let alone chose to meet with one!! Ours however was amazing! She was so nice and encouraging. We sat and cried together talking about past adoption stories and the cool ways God has pulled through for people at the last second. It was really so much better and so much more encouraging than I had expected. We were blessed!
Now we have a pile of paper work to do and physicals etc etc etc.....Then, we have two more in home, home studies and then an additional one later. All in all it was a great weekend and we were given a boost to keep on trucking....

Remembering to pray

When you have a biological baby, you have daily reminders to pray for that child. Your tummy grows, you feel sick, you get tired....and the list goes on. There isn't a second that goes by that you forget about that child. You remember to pray with each kick or hiccup. But when you adopt you don't have those minute by minute reminders. Sometimes it's easy to forget to pray for the child in the midst of crazy days. I don't like that! Andy and I wanted to have those minute by minute reminders to pray for our little one so we decided we would look into getting rings that would serve as that reminder. Every time we see the ring we would pray. We looked online and found some we liked, but the cost.....it was hard to justify. Until....This weekend we were on a date night and we went to Meijer. They had all of their diamond, stainless, silver and gold jewelry 75% off! Andy and I both found rings we liked and together they totaled $20.00! That, is doable! I was so excited and felt really blessed that we were able to find decent rings for such a great price! They are bling finger quality at a green finger price! (Get it? Cause cheap rings turn your finger green?) :)
When Nahum saw our rings he asked us why we got them. We explained it to him and he wanted one too! I thought it was so sweet. So, we are making him wear this cheesy, cheap, dentist treasure chest, ring for a week. If he can keep it on without loosing it we told him we would buy him a nice one. I found one online that is stainless steel with a cross cut out and it's even a boys ring! ( Way more masculine than this one lol! He thinks it looks like his papa's class ring, so he thinks it's cool anyway.)
Now that we have a daily reminder, a minute by minute reminder to pray I feel even more attached to this child who most likely isn't even born yet! How amazing that we can cover this kid and his/her biological mother in prayer before he/she is even born and orphaned!

Fundraising time with Joanna Beasley!

It's time for fundraiser number two! This time it's not a raffle, it's CD's for sale! Our good friend Joanna is a recording artist who has really blessed us with her music and as a friend. She has done everything from being a finalist on American Idol, leading worship at churches, touring on her own to the Beyond Idols tour and pretty much everything in between. We were so blessed by her offer to donate CD's. We are going to be selling both her "My World" and "Patiently Waiting" albums. They are both amazing, but I will say her song "You Call Me Beautiful"  is my fav! :) Ok, Maybe "Just Want You To" is tied for first!  Either way, I think this is a great way for you to be blessed as well. We are getting close to having enough money to complete our home studies and we are hoping the sale of these CD's will be the ticket to raising enough money to finish those. Once we finish the home study portion, we will be able to apply for grants and adoption loans! YAY!


So, here is the deal if you would like to purchase/donate......

A beautiful collage of the past few years of growing, changing and 

learning more about the Love of  Christ through her recent marriage.

Released in August of 2005 at the age of 19, just 3 years after advancing

 to the final 80 contestants in Fox's hit show "American Idol.

Pricing

1 CD of your choice~ $7.00
Both CD's~ $12.00

Shipping

If you live close enough for me to drop them to you or for you to stop in and pick them up, donation is as seen above. If you live farther away but would still like to purchase one or both, we will add a small shipping fee. for one it would be $2.00 and for both it would be $4.00 shipping.

Just email me at erinrtoth@gmail.com and let me know if you want one or both and if we need to ship it to you. To pay, all you need to do is click the donate button on the right side of the blog and follow the simple instructions, or we can arrange for you to pay with cash or check if you live near by.

Check out some previews of Joanna's songs from both albums at http://joannabeasley.com/store.php. You will be glad you did!

Thankful

I know, I know....It has been far too long since I have blogged. I apologize. Life has been busier than normal. (Not sure how that's possible, but I guess it is!) I titled this thankful because that is how my heart feels. Overflowing. There have been many updates financially since my last post. First off, just a heads up that we haven't been able to get our fundraising thermometer to work, so there is more money in our adoption account than we are showing at this point. We haven't even been able to put in the $880.00 donated through the Darcy Holsopple Photography raffle. So yeah, even though you can't see it, it is there and for that money we are THANKFUL! Secondly, random people here and there have mailed us checks or dropped us some cash. For that we are THANKFUL! Third, My Parents had a stocking for our new family member and in it was some unexpected money towards the adoption. So sweet, so cute and for it we are THANKFUL! Fourth, We had our final family Christmas last weekend in Ohio. We usually donate to something such as the Heifer project rather than exchanging gifts. This year, unknown to us, they planned behind our backs. :) We had no idea what they had been up to, but rather than donate to an organization they donated it to us. Totally surprised us and blessed us! For this we are THANKFUL! And lastly I got some great news from our  home study social worker. Our original home study cost (we have to do 4 and an orientation in Indy) was an estimated $6,700.00! Holy ridiculousness! However, through the way this agency handles their home studies, our cost has been dropped to and estimated $3,500! HOLY COW! That is a pretty big drop! Praise God! For this we are THANKFUL! To say the least each and every one of these things has blown us away and blessed our hearts! Just another reminder of God's faithfulness and provision! Thank you! All of you! To every person who has said a prayer, donated or encouraged us. For you all, we are THANKFUL!