Potato Pandemonium!

We are continuing to make progress - both in fundraising and in paperwork.  This week was our take-home soup supper.  Oh BOY what work!  Thursday was CRAZY windy here in Nebraska.  I mean, NUTS!!  When I finally got both girls through the wind from the car into Walmart I was worn out.  As I maneuvered 2 full carts through the store (push one, pull one, push one, pull one), I kept praying "Lord I need HELP! How am I going to get all this out to the car at the end in this WIND?!?!"  After checkout, I heard every Mom's dreaded phrase when completely busy and right in the middle of something... "Mommy, I need to go potty."  So, push, pull, push, pull over to the bathroom so she could go.  Back across the store to the door and the wretched wind...  I ran into a friend walking out the door who stayed with the girls and carts while I pulled the car to the door and unloaded.  THANK you LORD for YOUR perfect timing in that!  He had a plan, He had help for me.  "All things work together..."   That night, my awesome friends J and A came over to help with soup bonanza part 1.  Between the 2 of them, they peeled 30 beets and 60 lbs of potatoes!!!!  I did all the other parts of making borscht - chopping onion, carrots, shredding the potatoes and beets, etc.  By the end, we were done with the borscht.  J chopped all the peppers and I froze the rest of the potatoes.  10 gallon-sized bags of peeled, shredded potatoes ready for Saturday!

Friday, we woke up to the pilot light out on the furnace and it was quite chilly!  A was out of school for the day. I finally got kids ready to leave the house. We ran by the thrift store, the bank, the library, dropped food at the pantry, then back home for lunch.  I was about to head into Sam's to get a space heater, when the heating guy called and was on his way! Yaa!  My friend L was in town and she had ordered potato soup. So, I figured I would go ahead and make her soup so she could take it home!  Unfortunately, I learned a valuable lesson on frozen potatoes.  They were all brown and once cooked, smelled TERRIBLE (and tasted worse)!  I guess you're supposed to "blanche" them before freezing. oops!  I told Lisa, "The bad news is that you don't get potato soup tonight. The GREAT news is that I know now instead of at 1pm tomorrow when it would be too late!"  After everyone was asleep that night, I headed back to Walmart to get 50 more lbs of potatoes!  Now, at this point I could be grumbly about having to get more potatoes and all the lost work.  I'm not.  J, A, and I had a good time together on Thursday and the borscht was completely made.  The potatoes were on a MAJOR sale this week (as was the country gravy mix I needed for the soup).  Coincidence?  No. I don't believe in that :)  I truly am thankful that I realized this on Friday afternoon instead of Saturday when I would not have had an option!
Saturday, N and her kiddos came over to help peel more potatoes and get the potato soup ready.  I am truly blessed with amazing friends who continue to step out and help!  Brian took A to his last soccer game while I went over with N to church for people to pick up their soup!  We delivered 3, then more were picked up today at church.  Overall, we sold 24 containers of soup!  I do still have 2 potato and 1 borscht if anyone wants them :)  They should freeze fine for another day!  Overall, it was successful and now I know how to make gallons of soup- lol!

Updates on kids I talked about last week...
Andr** seems to be doing okay. He is still scared about leaving his country and starting over. Continue to pray for him. His family is hoping to be there in just 4-6 weeks.
O has his appointment at the US Embassy on Thursday. Please pray for him that he can answer the questions satisfactorily and that the US consulate will allow him entry into the US with his family who loves him and wants him to be here with them.
J didn't get very good news this week. He is apparently not in the database. There is one tiny, total longshot chance that the date may be corrected. Most likely he will be waiting one year. At this point, he still needs to at least get in the database so his year can start. His Mom B called him Friday to explain what he must do in order to get that fixed. His reply was "I understand. I am very sad. I will cry later, but now I will work." Please pray for him that his heart will not be hardened through the process of waiting. She explained that some kids as they get older decide that they don't need or want a family. He said "Not me. Not V*ktor. I with V*ktor together every night pray for family. Even before summer, we pray every night for family." Please pray for our precious boys that they will be here with us soon. God will heair their prayers. He will hear ours. He has a plan for these boys, and He says "I will not leave you as orphans." It is our most heartfelt prayer that J does not have to wait this year, but if he does we know He has a plan and will work in it.

We still have some T-shirts if you want one! Let me know!
To donate for our adoption:

http://www.youcaring.com/fundraiser_details?fundraiser_id=7124&url=bringviktorhome

BIG prayers needed this week!

Before I worry anyone, I just want to start by saying things are moving along just fine and as expected for V*ktor.  Unfortunately, my heart is so heavy right now for some of the other kids.
One boy (A) is scared and having second thoughts about leaving everything he has ever known.  His family is trying to get there as quickly as possible so they can see him to remind him what it's like to have a family.  Their papers are moving at unheard of record speeds, so God is in control and has the perfect timing for them.
Please continue to pray for O. He is applying for a student visa and needs someone at the US Embassy to approve him. His family has all the financial backing to bring him here and pay for school, they just need approval from our government! He has been denied once, but they're still trying.

Remember V*ktor's roommate J? The one who was on the phone at the same time both boys learned they were being adopted?  The sweet boy whose "really?" said so much....  All along, we "thought" that he would only have to wait a little while to come - like early spring.  At this point, that's now in question. The database is not showing a date.  They are checking again in 2 days, and I BELIEVE in the power of prayer! PLEASE pray that he is available now and we can travel with his parents to get our boys in January. If no date shows, pray for whoever in the Ukrainian government has to make the decision of what to do. Pray they have an open heart and see that this boy deserves to come home. Right now, it does not look good, but God has a plan.  HE CAN do anything. We believe that and trust Him.  Pray he gets to come and be with his parents very very soon.

Finally, our fundraising has been going really good.  We are in awe of all the support and amazing people who have stepped out to contribute to getting our boy a home and a family.  Silly me - I thought that most of our funds would come from our events. A lot of it has, but even more has come from the generosity of many, many people all wanting to make a difference. As of right now, we are about $10,000 away from having everything we need :)  Praise the Lord!  That brings me to our last prayer request at this point.  Today, I submitted the last piece of documentation needed for a grant. Please pray that we will qualify and be accepted as a recipient of their grant funds. God is in control of this and listens to His people!  Pray pray pray!
V*ktor is good :)  His school celebrated an anniversary yesterday. Apparently the kids spent all day Friday cleaning and getting ready for the celebration!  He FINALLY got his care package we sent at the end of August. We normally talk on Wednesday and Saturday, but he called yesterday to say "thank you so much!"  It was really sweet, he kept telling me he liked the pictures of A and B.  I couldn't figure out why he kept talking about a picture of them.  Later, it dawned on me that they had drawn pictures for him. I can just picture them hanging up in his room - or perhaps tucked away to protect them. So sweet!  He used to hand the phone to J when he was trying to tell me something he didn't know how to say.  I take it as a good sign that now he's asking J what to say so he can say it himself!  I can tell they've been practicing their English!

 

TAKE HOME SOUP SUPPER

SATURDAY, OCT 20th (or Sunday the 21st)

Saturday - Pickup from 5-6 at Syr*cuse Baptist Church
5 servings (total of about 10 cups) for a minimum donation $20

Saturday - 6-6:30 delivery available in Syr*cuse

Sunday - cold soup pickup available in the afternoon

Choose between Potato, Russian Borscht, and Chili

Order by Wednesday the 17th! THREE ways to order:

"Vote" on the "Bring V*ktor Home" facebook page

email me or call me

 

We have decided that we just are NOT meant to camp in L-ville. Remember the last time with the storms in May?  Friday, we got there, got set-up, and plugged in the space heater. Sparks, bad smell, and no more space heater!  Uhhhh, it was getting COLD!  Our friends who were camping with us were late (as usual - haha), so they brought one to us.  The heater took care of the cold part, but OH MY GOODNESS!!!!  That was about the loudest thunder I have ever heard. It was accompanied by lighting that made it bright as midday sun!  Crazy! Saturday wasn't bad during the day. It dried pretty quickly. The boys had a soccer game in S-field, so we went up to that and checked out the new fire-hall. They had an open house at the fire hall complete with obstacle course, trailer with a smoke simulator, seatbelt simulator, cake walk, fire safety quiz, and of course climbing on the fire trucks! As we were leaving, a helicopter landed!  I think our friend L was even more excited than the kids about that :)  Back at the campsite, Brian took the boys fishing. Then, we had yummy steak and taters.  It wasn't long before people were calling telling us to watch the radar!  Our friends have smartphones (as opposed to our dumb ones), so we kept up on it to see that the hail and high wind was going to miss us.  The rain, LOUD thunder, and lightning started around 9:30, though!!!  It lasted all night! When we left Sunday morning to go home and get ready for church there was tons of standing water all over the campground. We came back from church to pack up, and a lot of it had dried.  Glad our canvas on the popup was dry then, too!  We got it home and "winterized" it. So, we are thinking that we are not supposed to camp there - at least unless the forecast is a 0% chance of rain and storms!

We still have some T-shirts if you want one! Let me know!

To donate for our adoption:

http://www.youcaring.com/fundraiser_details?fundraiser_id=7124&url=bringviktorhome



5K fun

It's been a few weeks, so jumping right in to tell you about our 5K.  We made signs to put up all along the 5K route.  The night before, I was out putting them up around midnight. I didn't want to put up the "Caution: Runners Ahead" signs until morning.  At 6AM, I drove out to put those signs up at all entrances to town...  What do I find?  A big. dead. raccoon... in the 5K route.  Ewwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!  After laughing about it while being simultaneously completely grossed out, I decided that a "hurdle" along the path probably wasn't a good idea, so I asked the sheriff to remove it :)  My awesome Mommy friends came to help us with the 5K, and other great friends came to run and walk in it. We ended up with 30 registered and 27 participants!!!  We feel very blessed by all the people who came out to show their support and get movin' for V*ktor!

V*ktor experienced a Husker Baseball game, fireworks, picking corn, a 3D movie, bowling, camping, mini-golf, the zoo...........He got to go to museums, walk through a cave, play aunt Meg's Wii, play on a slipnslide, swim at the pool, take violin lessons........ V*ktor did many other things while he was here in America. The most important things he got out of his trip were free........ He was loved, hugged, and told he was special. He got to be a kid. THIS is what a kid can get from hosting..............Even if we were not moving to adopt him, the summer with our family has already changed his life...........

It has changed ours as well.  We cannot imagine our life without him. He is the missing brother in our house, and we ALL can't wait to have him home!

We talk to him every few days. The conversations are very short, but hopefully enough to let him know that we love him and are coming for him as soon as we can.  He has started taking music lessons for the violin.  He was REALLY excited about a recital on Sunday.  I can't wait to get more details on how that went :)  V*ktor is always interested to hear about what we're doing and where we're going. It can sometimes get challenging with the language barrier - which is so much easier when you can use hand gestures.

The mountains of paperwork seem endless.  We're just pressing on :)  Our fundraising has been going great! We still need a little over $10,000. I am applying for grants right now (more endless paperwork), and those look promising.  At this point, our timeline looks to be around January or February.  Thank you for your continued prayers that everything will come together at the right time:)

 

The listings are up for New Horizons Winter Hosting!!!!  Please take a look at the kids. If you are interested in hosting, I would love to answer your questions. If you are NOT interested in hosting, please look anyway and pick a kid or 2 that you will PRAY for!

http://www.newhorizonsforchildren.org/orphan-hosting/view-available-kids-here/

 

To donate for our adoption:

http://www.youcaring.com/fundraiser_details?fundraiser_id=7124&url=bringviktorhome