Our First BIG Step

If you are one of my ten followers ;), you may have noticed that I haven't posted anything in quite a while. This is mostly because we have been super busy and partially because I wanted to wait until we had some actual news. SO, the fact that I'm posting means...we have some news!! We have officially selected our country and our agency!!! Though I think it's ironic that we actually made a decision on our official last day of summer, I'm sure it is all in God's timing and that it will be very evident as to why it took us so long in the near future. :)

So, here's how it went down. As many of you know, we have been thinking and praying about international adoption since the beginning of last November (that's right, 9 months!!) and thought we were pretty sold on the mission in Taiwan. However, since the beginning of the summer, there has been a stirring and some occurances that have caused us to look elsewhere (see my "Adoption is a Journey" post) and have drawn us to Africa. We initally thought maybe Ghana was the place for us, but, as of last Monday, realize that our baby/babies are in Ethiopia.

We met with two adoptive mothers here in town who have adopted from Ethiopia this Monday. From there, we began to really feel a stirring in our hearts and all day on Monday, we researched and prayed and researched and prayed. We both had a hard time sleeping on Monday night and when we woke up, we were both confident that Ethiopia was the country!! So, we have spent the week researching, E-mailing, calling, and messaging members of groups to find the best adoption agency for us and made the decision tonight (Friday, July 30th) that we are applying to adopt through Children's Hope International: http://www.childrenshope.net/. We have the application filled out and Trev just went and printed our pictures to send with it. Tomorrow we will make copies and get it in the mail so that CHI will (hopefully) receive it Monday!

One thing is that we will be requesting siblings. Since C is so young and we want to keep the kids in birth order, it will be a miracle if we will be able to adopt siblings. If you are praying for us, please pray that this will work out as is God's will and that we will be wise to His direction in this!

Since we are working with an agency, our costs are significantly greater, so we will be doing some major fund raising. Currently, the federal government gives significant tax credits for adoptions, but even this will not cover our costs. Our hope is that we will raise enough money and then receive enough in tax credits that we will be able to bless another adoptive family when our adoption is complete.

There will be so much more to come...thank you all for your prayers and support thus far and in the long process to come! :)

Trevor and Jen

Trevor's Project

As promised...here is a picture of my amazing husband's handywork:

He has worked on this wall unit for the last several days and his hard work definitely shows in the final product! (Don't be jealous, ladies!;))

I LOVE it!

Now I just need to fill it up...any creative suggestions?!

~Jen

Summer Projects

Whoa! I can't believe it has been almost a month since my last blog post!! We have definitely kept busy this summer. We went to Myrtle Beach with Trevor's family for an 11 day trip (hopefully I will have time to post about that soon!) and when we've been home, we have been doing LOTS of projects! This post is for anyone interested in our projects (of course), but also for me to remind myself what all I did this summer. :)

Projects for home:

I bought this picture at Kirklands and immediately knew I wanted to put this verse up on the wall to go with it. Thanks to my sweet friend, Dana Wilkins, I got to use a CRICUT :) to cut the vinyl!! So fun!

I got out my sewing machine for the first two curtains (my first curtains to sew EVER!). I love how they turned out and they were SO easy! The third picture is of our dining room, which has had naked windows for the 3 and a half years we've lived here. Trev has bugged me to cover them, so I finally made a decision and we got dark bamboo shades and super cute curtains from my new favorite store, World Market. (Too bad we don't have one around here.) :(

Another cricut project (thanks again, Dana!) for our new-found love affair with library books!

I got this super cute idea from Disney's Family Fun magazine. Melia and I had a great "Girl Day" shopping for her mirror, clock, and hooks for her big girl closet door. We also got a Michael Graves cleaning caddy from Target (where we bought most everything else) for her shoes. Hopefully this will help keep us organized and get us going on those crazy mornings before Kindergarten!!

Projects for gifts:
We threw a shower for my sister (Lindsey) and her husband (Walter) a couple of weeks after they got their foster kiddos. I made these rag quilt letters (a set plus a few extras)...

used them for a bunting...

and boxed them up for the kids in this cute little cube that I bought at Michael's and embellished with ribbon.

The tutorial for the rag quilt letters is here: http://ohsohappytogether.blogspot.com/2009/07/rag-quilt-letters-tutorial.html.

Caution: these look way quicker and easier than they actually are, but they are oh, so cute!!

I also made them these crayon roll-ups, which I gave them with some coloring books...

The tutorial: http://www.skiptomylou.org/2007/04/25/on-a-roll/

and these personalized hooded towels that I gave them with a basket of bath stuff.

(I had to blur the names, but, trust me, they are cute! Lindsey said the kids LOVE the towels!)

We've also gone to a couple of birthday parties this summer.

I made this draw-string backpack for one of Camden's best buddies, Kenna. She's a little John Deere girl (whether her daddy likes it or not!).

Our nephew, Gavin, is having his birthday party on Saturday. I hope he likes his monogrammed backpack, MU crayon roll-up, two shirts (painted MVP and all-star with fabric paint), basketball notepad, and coloring book! Hopefully his mom won't let him sneak a peek at this picture...Lesley!!

Here's a helpful hint...if you make these for little kids who don't know how to tie a ribbon yet and you don't want to drive their parents crazy, use a piece of elastic instead of the ribbon!:) Brilliant!

And, seriously, don't I have the most precious assistant in the ENTIRE universe!?

Projects just for fun:

My awesome friend, Tiffany Jett, was here visiting and we traded craft tips: she taught me how to make these amazing necklaces that she is selling to help fund her second adoption from Taiwan, and I showed her how to make freezer-paper shirts. The black and silver one is for her cutie-pie of a son and the bright one is for my wild man. When they got together for the first time this trip, they were running through our house yelling "SUPERPOWERS!" hence the idea for the shirt. :) Check out her merchandise...you will be amazed! http://tiffjett.blogspot.com/

These next two are projects that I did just for me. I used a tutorial for both of them, but majorly altered each. I am pretty impressed at how they turned out!

The iPhone cover:

Dimensions and rough idea came from this website: http://www.dognamedbanjo.com/2010/01/13/tutorial-ipod-touch-cover/. I added a flap to the top, a pocket on the back, and a handle. :)

The laptop bag:

This idea came from this website: http://madebypetchy.blogspot.com/2009/08/tutorial-sew-your-own-laptop-bag.html

And that's all (for this post)! My husband is working on something WONDERFUL that will knock your socks off and it should be done tomorrow morning! Eeee! I'm am shreaking with excitement! Can't wait to show it off....

Oh, one more thing...I am sad to say this, but I'm afraid that I am going to need a new sewing machine in the near future. The old one just doesn't want to keep up! *Sigh*

Jen