What A Night!

 
Amazing!

Wonderful!

Humbled!

Words can not express the thanks,

the thoughtfulness and the generosity of all those in attendance.

Thank you to those who came out on your BIRTHDAY and your ANNIVERSARY to support and celebrate with us!

Blessed by so many friends
Blessed by our community

I can only imagine....

when we can put these two pictures together!

 

CAMP MEADE

Well, this summer sure didn't turn out

at all like we thought it would.  

 

We thought we would be in China...................

But a new computer system was being put in place at the Civil Affairs Office in China.  So we wait.  

 

Delay after delay and glitches in their new system kept pushing our travel to China further and further away. 

 

We did not sign up for any summer camps and we did not plan any vacation this year,

but we have enjoyed our summer!

 

 

 

 

The Beach

 

 

 Bowling

Where else can you win green teeth?

 

 

 

 

 We got to see a NEW family!

 

 

 

 

 We had quiet afternoons reading.

 

 

 

 We had surprise visits from old friends!

 

 

 

 We had "bake offs"

 

and "cupcake wars"

 

with judges

 

it was a tie

 

We told them we would have to have another contest

 

so we could judge AGAIN.

 

 

 

 Roller Skating

 

 

 

 great times with friends!

 

 

 Chick-Fil-A

 

 

 

 no better place than

THE ICE CREAM STOP!

 

 

What a great summer!

Winner

 

 

We were SOOOOOOOO excited to be able to present the iPad2 to our winner!

AND THE WINNER IS.......................................................................

Tomorrow is the DRAWING!

We would like to thank everyone who took part in the raffle that will help us continue our journey to Valerie. 

Here is a video introducing Valerie - here

to those of you who I have not showed her photo to thousands of times already. (hehe)

It means so much to us that you purchased a ticket and some of you took the time to sell additional tickets for us.  We thank you for all of the donations and we are so super amazed at the outpouring of love that you guys have given us.

We thank you for your support and wish you good luck tomorrow!

 

Come back Monday 4/15/2013 at 6:00pm to see the results.

 

iPAD 2 Raffle

We received a call from our agency this week about our child. She is a beautiful 9 year old girl.

 

 We are super excited to be able to share more with you as soon as we are able to!

 

At this point we should be traveling in 4 months!

 

Would you be willing to purchase a raffle ticket to help us with the costs associated with bringing her home?

 

Could you also share this link and blog to others who may be interested in supporting us?

 

We are raffling off an iPad 2 on April 15th

(TAX DAY).

 

one ticket is $10

two tickets are $20

and three tickets are $25

 

If you pay through our ADOPT TOGETHER account it is TAX DEDUCTABLE for you!

 

Thank you!

https://www.adopttogether.org/00217/

 

Thank you for helping us bring our daughter home!

 

THANK YOU!

Words can not express the thanks.

 

Thank you to everyone who donated

 

 

 

Thank you to everyone who helped load up and set up

 

 

 

Thank you to everyone who spread the word

 

 

 

 

Thank you to everyone who shopped

 

 

 

Thank you to everyone who helped in every way

 

Thank you for making this sale a HUGE success. 

Sneak Preview!

Things have been very busy, we are planing our

YARD SALE FUNDRAISER.

 

It will be THIS SATURDAY, March 2nd. 

We will be out there at

4:00am,

 

 

 but if you want to come a little later I will understand. lol

We will start at 6:30am and stop when it is all gone!

 

 

 

 

Here is a photo of my garage last week

 

 

 

I am to tired to post a picture of what it looks like now, but

 

 

Today, you can not even see the floor!

 

Rosemary and Stacie have just as much stuff.

 

Three garages full of items.

 

I am sure that you will be able to find something

in all of these TREASURES!

And in doing so you will help us bring home our TREASURES!

Bring My Sister Home!

 

 

My girls have seen us trying to raise funds for our adoption.  They know that we have to pay for documents to be notarized, court and government fees, airline tickets to fly to China, and a place to stay while in China.  They decided they wanted to help get their sister home.

Here are some items they have made to try to FUNdraise.

 

 

Each knit hat comes with a matching scarf(working on those now).  They just wanted to get these pictures on the blog now, so that they will have time to keep up with their orders!

 

 

Hats are $15 and Scarves are $10

 

 

The Ipod bags are $10

 

 

 

The soaps are $6 each

 

They are handmade from ALL NATURAL products.

 

 

Wild Olive Tees Fundraiser

Get Your Shirt HERE

Go to the above link to order a T-shirt. 
Use code MEADE 1207 so that we get the credit.

This is a great site that has mens, womens and childrens t-shirts.  They have agreed to help up raise money for our adoption!  For each person we refer to them that makes a purchase they will donate a portion of that sale to our adoption fund!

These are just a few of the choices:

 

 

What a Beautiful Day

We had a yard sale this past weekend.  I know, I know we are always having yard sales.  This is our 4th one just this year!  We have held a yard sale for each of the families that we know that are adopting.  We all gather stuff and when we have enough, we have a yard sale.  When I first started doing this, I asked people all the time if they wanted to donate anything.  Now, people approach me and tell me that they have items to put in our next sale.  It is awesome!  I have been doing this for the past four years now.  The proceeds of these sales go to the family who is closest to bringing their child home.  If there is not a family that we know of in the adoption process, we have a Foster Home in China that we support.

Well this sale was a little different because it was for our family.  I feel really comfortable asking for donations and money if it is for someone else, but have a hard time if it is for me.  So when it came to pricing the items, I just couldn't think. 
The morning of the sale, I made a sign that said all procceeds would go towards bringing our daughter home from China and I asked the Lord to bless the day.  The first few people started to arrive, and I still had not priced anything.  The first person came and asked how much her stuff would be.  I told her, "We have wonderful friends who have blessed us by donating all these items.  Please pick out what you would like and think of a fair price and that is the price you will pay."  I had a lot of people give me some very puzzled looks, I had some people who took advantage of that, and I even had some people put their things back and say they couldn't think of a price.  But for the most part, most of the people were fair and some were even generous. 
And I made a few more contacts.  This time with an organization who helps children who have been removed from their homes because they are in a dangerous situation.  They place these children into a safe shelter until they can return home safely or until they can find a place for them to live.  Man, the Lord really knows my heart!

Thank you Lord for blessing us with such a wonderful day!
 

Did we "Survive" the Week?

This week I spent less than $10.00 on our grocery bill.  No, I did not leave out some zeros on that number.  If you remember my post from HERE. Then you will know what I am talking about.  I went to the store and bought a gallon of milk, some shredded lettuce, and two bell peppers.

This was our menu for the week.

For breakfast:
eggs and bacon
my daughters famous pancakes (those are chocolate chips and syrup)
eggs and toast
cereal (three days)
On each of these days we ate whatever fruit we had, grapes, banannas and apples.
We drank milk each morning.

For Lunch:
hamburgers
Ramen noodles (my girls favorite)
chicken salad sandwiches (2 days)
peanut butter sandwiches (2 days)
ham sandwiches
There were also chips, fruit, apple sauce, raisens, bell peppers, nuts and towards the end of the week Halloween candy mixed in there.
We drank water.

For Dinner:
potato soup and potato chips (to kick us off)
Boston Butt (two nights - and some put in the freezer)
spaghetti
tacos (two nights - we love tacos)
stir fry chicken
We drank water or milk.

 

 

Did I mention, we LOVE tacos?

 

 

Yummy, stir fry chicken