Elijah Hudson

Finally we can officially tell about our son!! (well we still have to wait for China to give us final  approval us).  On Friday March 22, we were looking at looking at a referral for another little boy and thought we would move forward with him.  Then we got an email for our baby! I couldn't get him off my mind and felt we should decline the boy we had been looking at.  It was difficult but we had already felt some reservations about the first little boy.  So when we saw Elijah's picture we knew we needed to say Yes to him.  We emailed our agency and asked for his full file.  Emailed our friend Kristen Nelson (THANK YOU KRISTEN), to get her expert opinion on his medical info.  Everything looked good and what we were expecting.  On Monday, we sent in our Letter of Intent (LOI) to China.  This is for them to know our intentions to adopt this specific child.  They then look at our dossier and make sure all the information in our LOI matches.  Once this happens they send us a Pre-Approval (PA).  It seemed to take forever to get our PA.  We sent our LOI in on 3/25 and got our confirmation of PA on 4/11.  China had a 5 day holiday right after we send in our LOI so that is one reason it took so long to get it.  However, our PA was actually granted on 3/29.

Elijah just turned 1 on March 12.  He is so adorable.  He is in an orphanage that partners with our agency Small World. His orphanage is in Huizhou Guangdong.  So much research to do on where he is from and what needs he will have.

what does all of this mean?? Well it just means that now we are waiting for our Letter of Approval (LOA).  This can take anywhere from 40-90+ days, great estimation huh?  The average time it takes to get an LOA is 60 days.  Once we get our LOA we can apply for his US visa, get approval to adopt him from US immigration and our Travel approval.  It is looking like most likely we will get to travel the first week of August.

This feels forever away right now.  Waiting is so difficult.  Leaving your child in someone elses care for so long is painful.  Please pray for our baby Elijah Hudson.  Pray that his care givers in the orphanage will love on him and give him special attention.  Pray that the will hold him while he eats, cuddle him when he cries, and play with him.  Pray for our hearts (mine especially) to be restful and at peace knowing that God loves Elijah so much more and is fighting for him.  I can rest trusting His timing and provision.

More on baby Elijah later...

***We are still praying to be matched with our second son.  We have up to the time we get LOA for Elijah to be matched.  Pray that this all works out quickly and we will know who are second son is!

***Keep praying that our funds come in for our adoption. We still need a significant amount to bring home both of our boys.  We have applied for several more grants.  Please pray that they would be generous.

Thank you for walking on this journey with us.  

Praise & rejoice

Thank you all for listening/reading my heart the other day. God is so good & I can't help but praise Him!! We prayed & asked Him to protect & bring our dossier papers to the agency. My sweet husband, who doesn't struggle with worrying as much as I do, kept saying I have "peace, lets wait till Tuesday to do anything" was right. In my good moments I listened to his voice & to the Fathers speaking through him. Well Tuesday at 6 am Us time our package arrived in the town where our agency is. At 1 pm it was in the hands of our agency! Thankful & reminded once again that God is working in this adoption. Fighting for us & for our baby!! Will remind myself again to rest & trust. Thank you for walking on this journey with us!!

Choosing to listen & let go!

Two weeks ago we finished putting all of our paperwork together that we had been working on since September really for our dossier. Needless to say it was a big deal & took a lot of time. Since our application is still in the US immigration office for approval, we decided to send it signed & tracked through regular post to save about $50. As Matt left the house, we prayed over it & the last thing I said was I don't care how we mail it it just can't get lost!! Well 10 days later, after both of the grant application we mailed at same time had arrived & our dossier hasn't as checked on things. The UK post said it was in the states, the US post says they haven't received it from the UK. Then the UK post said it was probably in customs but couldn't verify. So it is somewhere in Limbo & no one knows where. I've had several panic moments. If it is really gone then we will be put back a least a month before mailing off the dossier. I am having to take EVERY thought captive to make it obedient to Christ. From blaming myself, to blaming Matt, to thinking of the ABSoLUTE worse case scenarios (remember this has a TON of k information about us in it). God has been gently at times then more annoyingly ;) through my friends & hubby reminding me that HE IS in CONTROL!! He has orchestrated everything, provided abundantly more than we've asked already & although I've been the one filling out papers & applications & making sure all our ducks were in a row & all boxes ticked, it is in HIS HANDS and I HAVE to trust Him!!! I can rest in HiS sovereign plan. He not only is leading us & loves us but He knows exactly who our baby or babies are in CHina & loves them more than we do. He is the miracle worker. He knows where are documents are & what will happen now. Rest, trust, peace, release, remember. All words or promise God has been speaking over me the last few days. At times I listen well, at times I don't hear over the other screaming in my head, at times I don't want to listen & want to think I can do something to fix it! I am praying I choose to listen & apply these words. I also am praying almost constantly that He would deliver & protect these documents!! Please pray with us!! Lets watch & see Him show His power! Thanking Him in advance.

Christmas Bake Sale

I have been so amazed at how God is blessings us through so many people supporting us in this journey of adoption.  It is so so cool to see Him answer prayers and then just proved through people in unexpected ways.  We asked Him for wisdom about how to raise money and followed what we felt He was leading us to do, then He just starts providing over and abundantly in ways we didn't expect. So often I think pray too general prayers,  I'm seeing that as I've prayed specifically about aspects of our adoption He has answered specifically then gone above what I asked.  Why does this surprise me?  Doesn't scripture say

Ephesians 3:20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

John 14:13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

I knew that through this time God wanted not only to increase my trust and faith in Him but also to show Himself powerful and pour out love not just to us but our sweet blessing in China and to our friends who walk through this process with us.  This is what is happening and we are still in the early stages guys!  I'm so excited and hopeful to see what else He does! To God be the Glory! 

Here is one specific way that we saw Him at work to provide and answer specific prayer:

The church we are a part of had a Christmas coffee morning let us set up a  bake stall.  My amazing friends Amy and Hallie helped me with making all the goodies.  Amy's mom even chipped in to make minced pies.  I had prepared so many things.  Red and green peitit fours, chocolate covered cake balls (couldn't find my sticks last minute for cake pops), chocolate chips cookies, mini pumpkin pies, pecan pies, christmas tree brownies.  Several days worth of baking going on here.  My friends made a victorian sponge cake, christmas tree cupcakes, red velvet cupcakes, cheesecake, and minced pies.  My kitchen smelled like sugar so much that it kind of made me sick honestly!  I really had NO IDEA how much to make as I hadn't done a bake stall before and the weather had been so awful that i just knew it would rain all day and no one would come.  leaving me, matt and the girls to eat all this stuff:(.  But my prayers specifically was that we would make at least £100 profit not including my cost.  Well we made more than that!! After Katherine took some of the items left over we made £120 profit after I took out my cost.  That's almost $200.  I was really pleased and surprised.

My baking has been steadily bringing in funds.  I think total from my baking just over a month now we have raised almost £330/$530.  I have quite a few orders in for the next few weeks too.  

I have been really encouraged to see that something I really enjoy doing is helping to bring our baby home! God is faithfully providing specifically through baking than I thought possible. 

This is just ONE of the MANY ways God is going above our specific prayers to bless and remind us that He is the one leading us down this journey and HE is the one providing.  Glory to Him!

sweet treats "MADE WITH LOVE"

I made a birthday cake for my friend Katherine a few weeks ago and they all convinced me to start selling cakes to raise money for our adoption.  Although I really love baking and enjoy the things I make, I don't consider myself a pro baker or decorator.  After some convincing and 2 orders being put in to me that night, I figured why not give it a go.  My thought was since Matt is so creative and can paint or create about anything, between the two of us we could learn to decorate cakes pretty.  We'll see how it goes.  I wanted to make some cute flyers and put them out so people could order them and know what was going on.  We are also going to try and sell custom kids table tents like the one we made for Abygail.  I wanted the name and logo to be similar for both the cakes and tents and I wanted it to communicate that it was for adoption.  So we came up with treats/tents "Made with Love" supporting child adoption.  What do you think?  I really like it.  Here is the logo/flyer that Matt created.  He is really talented (yes I'm partial)

           

            

We created an email address for people to order stuff from madewithloveadoption@gmail.com

My first order was over the weekend for our good friend's daughter's 4th birthday.  It was really fun to do and I'm so glad they let us create something for her.  

If you live in the London area and want something yummy let me know.  It's my pleasure to make something for you to enjoy! MadewithLoveAdoption@gmail.com

Baby Bottle Fundraiser

Another idea we had to help fundraise was to do a baby bottle fundraiser drive.  Several of you have already said you were happy to take a bottle home for a few weeks and see what you could collect.  THANK YOU! The idea is that you put extra change or whatever you feel led to in the bottle.  You also take it places, school, work, church, playgroups and ask other people if they want to donate as well.  After a few weeks you can either send a check to matt's parents or pay whatever was collected on our blog via major credit card.  Here is the cards we created to attach to the bottles.

Bottles for our Baby

Your support and participation is a

much needed blessing which will

help bring our adopted baby home

from China!!!

How can you help?

1. Take this bottle

2. Keep it for ONE MONTH

3. Put any loose change or bills

you want to in the bottle

4. Carry it with you and ask your

friends to contribute

5. Return it to us.

6. Email what you collected:

cajunsabroad@gmail.com

If you can’t physically return the

bottle you can pay the amount

collected on our Pay Pal section of

our blog:

http://cajunsabroad.blogspot.co.uk

or through Barclay’s pingit app.

If you would like to take a bottle home and help us this way just let me know and I'll get one to you! 

We are excited to see what you guys can help us raise and the blessing you will be to our family.  Thank you in advance.  

Housing for our Stateside?

If you have been trying to keep up with our blog I apologize. It has been really sparse. We asked you to pray in our last newsletter about a home for us when we are on stateside assignment. We have asked for housing all around Arkansas but nothing seems to be available. At our salary we can not afford rent and we are not allowed to have a second job (company rules) so we are looking for housing offered by local churches or WMU organizations. If you know of any place that might be available please let us know. E-mail cajusabroad@gmail.com Our dates for stateside are September 09 through March/April of 2010.