We have BIG news!

We are adopting a child!

I’m not sure where to begin. Why Adoption? Adoption is a beautiful picture of God’s love towards us. As a perspective adoptive family, we have opened our home, hearts and lives to a child who awaits their forever family, and we feel honored to do so.  As biological parents choose adoption for their child, I believe they do so as an act of great love and sacrifice. There is no greater love than to lay down your life for another. I think adoption is a precious picture of God turning ashes to beauty. There is loss and pain associated with this process, but God redeems it all and something beautiful is born.

Our family has grown over the years through biological and adoptive means. My husband and I have 13 children; seven are biological and 6 are adopted. Several years after our youngest daughter was born, we realized that we still had so much love to give. We knew God was calling us to open our home to foster children. Why not? Fostering was a natural extension of what we were already doing. . . raising and loving on kids. We jumped in, and 8 years and 15 foster children later, 6 of our kiddos became available for adoption. They had already wiggled their way into our hearts so finalizing the adoptions was just a technicality. With 13 children, we were content and thought our family was complete. . . BUT GOD. He had another child out there who we believe was meant just for us.

Over the years, we have seen so many profiles of waiting children, but honestly, we were not drawn to international adoption. It never occurred to us that we would one day adopt form a foreign country. Until we saw HIM.  He will be 15 in May and will age out soon. When I viewed his video, something I had not experienced before (with international adoption anyway) happened. I can’t explain it, but I instantly felt connected to this child. I felt overwhelming love for him and a fierce motherly instinct towards him. Everything in my soul knew that this child was my son. I shared the video with my husband thinking this may take some convincing, but NO, he too felt something powerful towards this boy. We started the adoption process in a matter of hours after viewing his video, and I must admit, although adoption is not new to us, the cost of international adoption has blown us away.

Because all of this happened so quickly, we really did not have time to prepare financially. Our previous adoptions through DFCS were free, and we just had no idea of what we were getting into as far as cost. We jumped in though, trusting that God will make a way.  We are praying that maybe you will be part of God’s plan of provision. We are only 3 weeks into this process, and our concern is time. Because he is aging out, this adoption process is moving quickly leaving little time to fund raise. We are anticipating this adoption costing approximately $37,000, and to be honest, we do not know where the money is going to come from.

When we were foster parents, we incurred a significant amount of debt in order to add onto our home and accommodate more children.  We gladly did whatever it took to provide a safe and loving home to children in need, and we have never regretted a penny spent. We have always been willing to do what it takes to provide for another child, but this time we desperately need a little assistance.

There is a child in Bulgaria who wants a family, a large family, but without you, we may not be able to bring this teen age boy home to his forever family. He faces the real possibility of aging out and facing life alone.  I can’t put into words how appreciative and grateful we would be if you would prayerfully consider being a part of bringing HIM home.  We hope that by inviting you into this process, you will see yourself as part of the community we hope to build around our child once he is home.  Thank you and God Bless!