Help From Friends

Wow. We're just $969 away from the half-way point. The donations that came in during the last 7 days have left us speechless. The people that God has moved to give towards our adoption are - once again - not people that we ever would have reached out to if it had been up to us because it would have felt like a stretch. But it's not a stretch to God, it's an example of the Body of Christ working together, and that's really exciting to be a part of. Thank you for joining our journey!

UPDATE on ADOPTION
Nothing new to report. I wish there was, but we're still in the holding pattern. We do know that our (revised) paperwork is with USCIS now, so hopefully we'll get our approval for 5 (from the U.S. government) within the next week or two. Still in a holding pattern for approval from Costa Rica, so the update this week is - there is no update. We're just waiting. :) 

If you want to do something (non-financial), please PRAY for our kids. They still don't know we exist (they won't be told until all the paperwork is official and we're stamped for approval by everyone involved), but so many people know about them, and so we ask that you use this time of waiting to pray for them. 

• Pray that God would begin preparing them for this huge life transition - language, culture, country, family.
• Pray that He would put Christians in their lives to show them the love of Jesus.
• Pray that their hearts would be open for learning how to trust us and accept our love.

UPDATE on PRINTING ITEMS
I took an informal poll on Facebook to see what - if anything - people would be interested in buying to support the adoption fund. The outcome of that was two-fold. 

1. The overwhelming majority of the folks who responded indicated that they felt the same way we did - if they're going to donate, they'd rather just donate outright so that most of the money went to us rather than a t-shirt company. (FYI: YouCaring also takes a percentage out of each donation to pay for running the site and handling the payments and donation receipts, but it's a tiny amount compared to paying $20 for a t-shirt and the company keeping $15 while we get $5). Several folks also mentioned that they really didn't need another bag or t-shirt, although they loved the design our friend created.
2. Another friend - someone that Peter grew up with in Peru - reached out to let us know that he runs a print shop and would be happy to work with us to get the amount down so we got more from each shirt or bag printed. We're still considering this option as it would be pre-sales (so we'd handle payment/shipping), and then we'd let him know how many we would need. 

BOTTOM LINE: It looks like we might hold on printing for sales, and instead use the designs our friend created to make thank you cards or a small token of appreciation for the people who have donated - so don't worry, it will still be put to good use! :)

UPDATE on BOOK SALES
One of the reasons we're hesitant to go down another sales path is because we already have anitem for sale that we're excited about. Most of you know that in 2010, we published a children's bookthat Peter originally wrote when he was in high school. Feedback from the parents - and grandparents - of small children is that the kids love it. We resurrected our promotion of "Mashed Potatoes: A Little Brother Story" this year in the hopes of bringing in a bit of income to put towards the adoption. And now an online friend has picked up the theme and run with it on her blog.

Some of you may know about or follow the Life as MOM blog, or you may have purchased one of the cookbooks that Jessica wrote (I've recommended them highly!). This week, Jessica (a mom of 6 - so she knows what we're headed into!) used the platform of her blog to talk about our book, and our adoption, and to offer to donate for each book or Kindle sold through her unique links. It was a total surprise to us, and we are so honored by her gift of support. PLEASE check out her blog post about it (http://lifeasmom.com/mashed-potatoes-book-adoption-fundraiser/), and share it with your friends. Not only will we receive whatever she donates from the sales, but we'll also receive our portion of the book sales. Thank you, Jessica!