Fun Together as we Prepare to be Parents

Jonathan and I had a blast from the past moment this evening on our way home from WalMart:

First of all, you need to understand that EVERY TIME we are in WalMart, I somehow find my way to the baby department, where I inevitably buy something for our baby-to-be. Since we know virtually nothing about our baby at this moment, our options are rather limited, but we have quite the supply of wipes, baby lotion, and bath toys filling the nursery closet : )

Well, tonight I found the music section of the baby department so we ended up purchasing a lullaby c.d. (for part of that nighttime routine) and also found a c.d. put out by Fisher Price for Sunday School songs. It had many that we remember from our childhood, so we thought it may be a fun purchase.

On our drive home, I started looking at the back cover more closely and Jonathan and I began to reminisce about these songs – trying our hardest to remember the correct tune and the right lyrics. We had a good time laughing and singing our old favorites together; including these timeless ones…

·         Peace Like a River

·         Deep and Wide

·         Father Abraham

·         Arky Arky

·         This Little Light of Mine

Hopefully these titles bring back some good memories for you all as well : )

Enjoyed an Evening of Fellowship

We feel so blessed to be a part of Chosen - our church’s adoption & orphan care ministry!

We attended a bonfire this evening and met more families in our local community who are thinking about, are in the process of, or who have completed the adoption process. It is always such an encouragement to be around other families who understand the process and who can help us prepare for what the coming months may bring. 

Spaghetti Dinner Success!

As many of you know, we had our spaghetti dinner fundraiser last night and we feel like it was a great success! We hosted exactly 100 people and made a significant profit to help offset upcoming adoption expenses. Thank you to everyone who participated. It seemed as though everyone enjoyed the evening – food, fellowship, raffle prizes, and a rousing game of heads and tails : )

We would like to thank many people for the significant help that they provided in putting this evening together –

* Dan & Gloria DeNeal – setup, food prep, running sound, clean up
                * Jane Priest - setup, food prep, clean up, raffle prize donation
                * Rachel Haste – sign language special, food prep, clean up
                * Josh & Caleb Haste – setup, food prep, poem reading, clean up
                * Kathy Garrison – setup, adoption awareness talk, clean up
                * Lee Woods - setup, food prep, several last minute "odds & ends"
                * E.C. & Susie Gupton – setup and sign in table
                * Rachel Morgan – setup
                * Haley Garrison, Amie Bott, and friends – serving the meal, clean up
                * Joyce Jones – raffle prize donations
                * Jessie Swinderman - raffle prize donation

You are all a huge blessing to us and a part of our child’s coming home story. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Coinciding with the fundraiser, which was unexpected, was the official release of our dossier to Ethiopia. It was approved by our agency this week and submitted. Our dossier to Ethiopia (DTE) date, which you may hear us refer to later in the blog, is officially 10/7/11.