What I Saw

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Welcome Home Amberlynn and Amon!

We went to welcome the Craig Family home yesterday from Ethiopia! The Craigs are great friends of ours and they just brought home two precious orphans, Amberlynn who is five and Amon who is three. They are sooo precious and it was so special to be a part of their family's journey towards bringing them home and getting to finally meet them! There were probably around ten adopted children there along with their families waiting to welcome them home! It was so neat to see all the precious kids who had already made their journeys home welcoming more and being excited for Amon and Amberlynn to be home forever. It was an awesome time of seeing God at work again. He sets the lonely in Families.

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Yes, we are alive.

Josiah. He's a cute one. And pretty much he's crazy. And pretty much we love him. He is in love with Kung Fu Panda and has recently transformed into a ninja. Kung Fu Panda has also inspired him to learn to eat with chopsticks. He is now the chopstick master. (And we happen to love our neighbor who was from Japan that taught us how to make Delicious food...its the best.) Making Jello with the brothers. He is quite the creative child as well..."Look mom!! I'm a tunnel!" And he happens to think I stink at craft making...We were making a Christmas wreath with beads and pipe cleaners and apparently my bead pattern was not as good as his... "Ellie, you no do it right...do like mine. Yours gonna give me bad dream." Yes, thank you Siah. I love you too. :) We are super excited for Christmas! We have been crazy busy. The babies are getting huge and talking a ton. Keziah has turned into the most ridiculously frilly little girl and she loves jewelry and all things pink. Keren is almost as equally frilly and loves babies and music and she is constantly dancing. And can she dance...haha. I'll be posting pictures of Christmas sometime next week too. It should be a lot of fun with the littles this year. :)

I Am Thankful.

A year ago this Thanksgiving we were in Ethiopia getting Josiah, Keren and Keziah. I am so thankful for them and what God has done to our hearts through them! They are precious gifts and we love them soooooo much! I am so Thankful for God's saving grace. I am so thankful for each an everyone in my crazy, huge, loud family. I am so thankful for my 5 sibling's birthparents and the sacrifices they made for their children and for chosing to give them all the gift of life. I am especially thankful for one very special woman. Her name is Tigist and we spent last Thanksgiving with her. She is the most unselfish person I have ever met, she has gone through more than is even imaginable and has sacrificed so much because of the love she has for her children. Last Thanksgiving was one of the hardest, most emotional days of my life and I am forever grateful for her and her loving sacrifice. She will always be in my and my family's hearts. I am thankful for Tigist.

Shaohannah's Hope Fundraiser

The Shaohannah's Hope weekend was an awesome time of fellowship and it was so awesome to see how God is working in peoples' hearts all over the country and awakening us to care for the orphan. Shaohannah's Hope is such a blessing to so many people around the world and with out them, we would not have our precious Ethiopian babies! I went to China in June with Shaohannah's Hope as well and a lot of the girls from our China team were there! It was so great to see them again! We got to help out with all the set up and 'behind the scenes' stuff and it was so much fun. A little more than half of our team made it to TN for the weekend and we had a blast! We missed our other China girls though!! My parents doing an awesome job sharing our testimony...:)

Emily Chapman sharing her heart for orphans and her testimony since the accident with Maria...

SEE...

Jeremiah..:) This is Sarah, she has worked for Laura Bush and she is the one who wrote the Special needs adoption tax credit law that enabled us to pay for most of our Ethiopian adoption!! We had never met her and when my parents spoke, it was her first time hearing first hand how the tax credit had helped someone in such a way! How awesome is that?!

Lovely Friends...

My parents with Chuck Colson...

Haha...the Show Hope team were bucket people

for a while. "Every child in Africa is Yours..."

'Uncle Dave' Trask and Vaden...

Mr. and Mrs. Chapman sharing their testimony...

This little girl is Melody, she is seven years old. After going to an SCC concert about a year ago, God spoke to her precious heart and she felt called to help orphans in some way. She started baking pies and doing odd jobs and has raised around $1700 so far and donated it to Shaohannah's Hope! Click here to read more about her story.

The fundraising dinner was decorated beautifully.

Scott Hasenbalg, Director of SH..

And last but not least... How cute is he? My sister and brother-in-law surprised us with this last weekend!! We are very excited! :)

Michael...

I met this amazing little boy in China when I was there in July and the Lord just spoke to my heart so much through him while I was there. My heart just broke for this child and I truly began to see and feel more closely the pain of orphans and it broke me. I have cried over the bleak hope the world prescribes for his future and then I remembered that God says in Jeremiah 29:11 that He has a plan full of hope for each of our futures, a plan to prosper us and not to harm us. It makes my heart glad to serve such an awesome God! Please join me in praying for this sweet little boy's life and all of the other children around the world with similar stories. I truly can not wait for that day! I pray that I will be able to go back someday soon and see his sweet little self again. Its so very different just hearing about orphans and meeting these amazing kids and begin to bond with them. I will never forget Michael's sweet face. It is truly humbling and heartbreaking. It makes me cling to the promise in John 14:18 When Jesus says "I will not leave you as orphans but I will come to you..." He meant that for all of us and I truly believe that one day Jesus will return and the word orphan will be erased from our vocabulary forever and all will made right. My heart is broken for the plight of these kids and I truly want to be Jesus to them in showing them His love throughout my life. Well last week I mailed a package to him and it already made it to China!! My friend sent me pictures of him opening it too!! Isn't he just too precious?!

Something Changed

Adoption has changed our lives forever and we will never be the same! Thank you God for your precious gifts!

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Nashville Here We Come!

We are heading to Nashville this Thursday for the Shaohannah's Hope fundraiser weekend! My parents will be speaking about our adoption story on Saturday. Not only that but most of the girls that I went to China with will be there as well!! Im sooo excited to see them! One of the girls, Julee is actually flying in on Thursday, driving to TN with my family and coming back to stay with me for another whole week! Haha..she will certainly know my family by the time the ten hour ride to Nashville is over... God has actually called Julee to move to China as a result of going on the Show Hope trip and so she will be moving there to work with the orphans that we visited! Im a little jealous..haha. Here is a picture of La Familia and also the Ethiopian babes taken a few days ago by the lovely Melissa Pearce. The Twinettes weren't feelin' it...haha.

Don't Pee Jimmy!

Jeremiah saw a no parking sign this week and understood it to mean don't pee. "Don't P...Don't Pee? Don't Pee Jimmy!! Hahahaha..Don't Pee...Mom thats sign says 'Don't Pee'!! Hahaha.." He thought it was the funniest thing ever and it pretty much almost was.

Cuteness!!!

These kids love each other so much and we love them so much! I can't even remember what we did before we had them. They are so much fun!

The girls pretty much think that they are the boys' other moms.

Josiah was crying about something and Kezzie went and kissed him like 12 times and brought him tissues and books. How cute are they?