"Bring Catrina Home" Benefit

WOW!  I don't even know where to begin in attempting to describe what a blessed weekend we had!  So sorry for the delayed post, as I've been pretty crazy the past few weeks, but it is absolutely no bearing upon the outcome of the Benefit!

Despite the fact that the timing was rather close to the fourth of July, we had a pretty great turn out of about 65+ friends and family members.  There was plenty of yummy food to go around, including pulled pork, hamburgers, hot dogs, baked beans, broccoli salad, cole slaw, etc...  It was all incredible, but I have to admit that the desserts took the cake!  HA!  (That was for Eddie...  :-)

We all had a great time dining and socializing to the sweet piano sounds of John Flanagan on piano (Thanks John!), a beautiful duo of duets by John and Rudge, and wrapped up with some fun tunes by the Rowdy Mountain Boys (thanks ya'll!).

John Flanagan on piano

John and Rudge playing Ave Maria

Rowdy Mountain Boys livening up the place!

One other cool thing about this weekend was that we got to attend the closing ceremony of the Pickens View  Overboard Vacation Bible School on Sunday morning.  As always, it was a great time!  Much to our surprise, we were called to the front and told that the children's offerings for the week were going to our "Bring Catrina Home" fund!  Words can't even begin to describe how special this was to us!  Eddie and I have a heart for children's and youth ministry, so to know that the entire VBS had been praying for Catrina all week and taking money from their piggy banks to help bring our sweet girl home was overwhelmingly humbling!  It is SO beautiful to see how God will provide and often in the least expected of ways!

Between the t-shirt sales (more to come on that), puzzle piece sponsorships, silent auction purchaes, general donations, and the VBS children's offering, we raised just over $2100!  WAHOO!  This is definitely a great help!  Thanks so much to Mama, Tiff, Rudge, and Pickens View Wesleyan Church for hosting this great event and thanks to everyone who took the time to come out and celebrate with us!

Thanks for all your prayers and please do keep em coming!

Puzzle Piece Sponsorhip Table

Haitian Adoption News & Father's Day

Since we took our dossier to Haiti, I haven't been nearly as good about keeping up with Haitian news as I should be!  Last week Haiti announced that the Haitian Parliament approved the Decree for ratification of the Hague Convention.  This Decree still needs to be deposited in the Netherlands for it to take effect, and even after it's deposited, it is another 3 months before that happens.  This decree affects ALL International adoptions.  However, we just don't really know how just yet.  Hopefully it's all good changes, but one never knows.  Please be in prayer that this IS a positive change, that we get through IBESR quickly and with all the proper dispensations, and that Catrina's birth father will make the trek to PAP.

So I should have mentioned Father's Day in my last post, but I think it was pretty hard for Eddie.  Don't get me wrong, he had a great day (as great a day as I could give him), but he seemed about as happy as I would have been "celebrating" Mother's Day here.  It was just extra clear that day that someone was missing.  He's strong and he will be fine, but please do say an extra little prayer for him for peace if you think about it.

"Bring Catrina Home" Benefit - JUNE 30

Just before I left for Haiti in May, my Mom and my sister informed us that they were in the process of planning a benefit to help us raise money for our adoption!  How incredibly thoughtful! When going through the many steps of this adoption, it is such a blessing to know we have the support and prayers of loved ones!

For all of you in the upstate, please do come out!  It's a fundraiser, but also a celebration!  There will be plenty of food and live entertainment.  Last I heard there are two music sets:  an amazing concert pianist (I'm not at all partial...thank you John!!!) and a bluegrass band (I don't know any of these guys yet, but many thanks to them as well!).

It's scheduled for Saturday, June 30 at 6:00 pm at Pickens View Wesleyan Church in Pickens, SC.  Tickets are by donation and will be available at the door.  We'll also be having a silent auction to sell some pieces of original Haitian artwork and we'll be selling t-shirts that Eddie and I designed.  We'll also have the puzzle there (we still have many pieces available for sponsorship) so you can see the progress we've made on that and sponsor pieces if you wish.  There are lots of ways to contribute (and all donations made at the benefit will be tax deductible...thank you Pickens View Wesleyan Church!), but most important we are going to have so much fun celebrating this exciting time in our lives and the sweet girl God is bringing to our family! 

Flyer for Adoption Benefit

No news on the actual process.  We've officially be in IBESR 6 weeks now, but no news yet.  This isn't really uncommon...the IBESR is like a giant black box...you put your dossier in and just wait and pray until it comes back out.  We are also still praying that God will change Catrina's birth father's heart and that he will willfully go to PAP to sign off on our adoption.  Please continue to pray with us and if you can make it out to the benefit, we certainly look forward to seeing you there!

Many thanks & much love!

Update on Catrina's Room

So sorry I haven't had the chance to post lately!  We've both been working like crazy people! 

No news from Haiti concerning the IBESR or Catrina's birth father, so please continue praying!  No doubt God already has this worked out and will bring it to fruition in his time.

While we wait...Eddie and I got a good bit of progress made in Catrina's room over the past few weeks, so thought you all might enjoy seeing some photos:

Chalkboard Butterfly on the door :-)



Bed in the corner by the window



Stacked hatboxes for storage

Those paintings are from Haiti

I love those monkeys!!!  :-)

Does the whiteboard/photo holder look familiar?

Still a work in progress no doubt, but it's definitely coming along!  We're ready for our girl whenever God's ready to bring her!  :-)

Piecing our lives together!

I love puzzles!  Catrina loves puzzles!  Eddie...tolerates puzzles.  :-)  One night while working on a puzzle at the kitchen table (coincidentally just after shopping for a new puzzle to send Catrina), Eddie made the comment that our adoption process is not unlike doing a puzzle.  With each crazy doctor's visit or odd test, with the display of one more private aspect of our lives, we find that it's all slowly piecing our family together.  In this light, we decided to do a somewhat unique fundraiser so each of you can take a part in helping us piece together our future.

We have a 500 piece puzzle (the one displayed below) and we are asking that you consider funding a piece, or a small section of the puzzle with a donation of any amount. When you sponsor a piece or pieces, we will write  your name on the back and add it to the puzzle. Once its done, we will frame it with glass on both sides and hang it in Catrina's room. With this, she will have a visual reminder of how many different people love her and helped get her home.  She will have a better understanding of what is means to be a family.

I also plan to post photos of our progress with the puzzle so you can see how it's coming along.

We chose the butterfly theme because butterflies are the symbol for hope and new life! As a beautiful reminder of His hope and the new life He offers, God sends a ton of butterflies to La Gonave, Haiti each spring.

Recommended donation is $10 per peice, but any and all contributions will be accepted and appreciated!

You may sponsor a piece or pieces using PayPal (the Donate Button on the right), or to pay with cash or a check, simply post a comment below (I will moderate it before it gets posted and remove it if necessary so as NOT to display your personal information) so I can get you our address to you. 

Don't forget to let me know the name(s) you would like to appear on the back of your piece(s).

Thanks in advance and thank you for your continued prayers! We are so blessed to have such a wonderful network of loving friends and family! May God bless you all as much as you have blessed us!!!

My first official Mother's Day!



Please ignore the goofy Lisa in the back ground...she's a chronic photo-bomber.  :-)



Final Update from my May Visit to Haiti

All appologies for the delay in posting an update!  I've been quite busy trying to get back into the swing of things back in the states.  Yes, I'm back home and of course I miss both Haiti and our sweet girl!

My last post was Thursday of the week I was in Haiti, so I'll go from there.  On Friday, I did actually get to meet with Mme. Soliette, but Francesca was sick and couldn't make it.  Since we didn't really have any "business" to discuss, I checked in to make sure Catrina's attitude and school work have been much better these days (both affirmative), then just spent some more time getting to know the woman currently raising my daughter.  I must admit, she couldn't be in better hands!  Mme. Soliette has an amazing testimony and her love for the Lord is the most evident aspect of her personality.  Her birthday was this past Thursday and her celebratory plans were to take a meal to the homless shelter (more similar to our Hospice) and spend some time with them!  What a blessing!  As always, the orphanage has financial concerns and issues with some of the kids, but she simply trusts that God will provide...as He always has!  Please continue to keep Mme. Soliette, the kids, and the staff in your prayers! 

After our meeting, I headed back to the Wesleyan Compound, where Catrina and many of the other children were playing with the team I had followed over to the island this week.  After some good playtime and a snack, the other children headed back up to the orphanage while Catrina and I got to spend a few more hours together before dinner time.  We swang (Nou renmen balanse!), Catrina rode bikes with the other kids on the compound, we climbed trees, etc. 

The girls taking a much-needed break :-)

It was very low-key, but also lots of fun!  Mme. Soliette didn't want Catrina to stay the night on Friday night, as she had homework to do and chores to do on Saturday morning, so just after dinner, we got Greg to take us back up to the orphanage to drop her off for the night.

In my visit with Mme. Soliette, I also had the opportunity to ask how I could be a blessing to the orphanage and her work there.  She apparently had some sort of inspection coming up and needed help getting the building painted, so a few members of the ALIVE team and I headed up Saturday morning and spent a few hours putting a fresh coat on the downstairs of the orphanage.  This level was likely the worst, as it is bedrooms at night and classrooms during the day.  I must admit this was the first time I have ever painted in which I have been assisted by little boys with no pants!  :-)  In fact, we had to ask some of them NOT to help because they were getting too far ahead of us.  All in all, we managed to get the bottom floor about 70% complete, which I'm sure was a huge blessing to Mme. Soliette!

After lunch on Saturday, we had the younger kids (and Catrina) down from the orphanage to play and had tons of fun again.  Once again, Catrina got to hang out afterwards, but this time she got to stay the night!  We had so much fun!  We watched movies (both in English and oddly she was more interested than I was...lol!), made birthday cards for Eddie, jumped rope, etc.  Catrina fell asleep on the couch not too long after dark, which means we were definitely up well in time for Haitian church, then English church on Mother's Day Sunday.  Later in the day, Heidi explained to Catrina what Mother's Day was, at which point, Catrina decided to give me a magnet she had painted for Mother's Day and send one to Eddie for his birthday.  Gotta love the generosity!  :-)

All in all, I had a wonderful Mother's Day and I was SO sad to see it rush by, as this was my last day with Catrina before we had to head back to the states.  I spent pretty much all of Monday and Tuesday traveling to get back home, just in time for Eddie's birthday on Wednesday.  :-)  What a whirlwind it was, but worth every bit of it!

As far as our adoption goes, now we wait...  Please pray for peace, please be in prayer with us that God will move mountains and move our application through the IBESR quickly and with few (or NO!) hiccups.  Please also be in prayer that God will work in the heart of Catrina's birth father and all other individuals necessary to make this adoption happen.