Blessings of an Ornament

We received an early Christmas present from a sweet friend the other night...  

I LOVE it!  

If you can't see the picture clearly... it's the cut out of Africa 

with a heart floating around in the ornament and it says 

"I will not leave you as orphans:  I will come to you." John 14:18

It's by far my favorite ornament on our tree.  I look at it multiple times throughout the day and pray for our little guy, the DRC and the other families I've "met" who are also on the adoption road to the DRC.  

You know how you have that super special ornament that you're just waiting to find when you're digging through the ornament box every year getting ready to decorate the tree...  well, I can tell you that this ornament will be the one I'm digging for each year for years to come.  It marks such a special time in our lives of getting to walk through the blessings of the adoption journey.  Sure, there are ups and down and looooooots of waiting but we wouldn't trade this journey for anything and we feel beyond blessed that God has allowed us to walk this path.

Thank you, Beth, for giving us such a sweet gift and for already loving our little boy so much! 

Thankfulness

I am thrilled the holidays are upon us.  

I love the time between Halloween and Christmas - 

so much to celebrate, time with friends and family and 

traditions from years ago and new ones to be made.

Most Thanksgivings I'm overwhelmed with thankfulness and I can't stop thinking about my family, relationships and things that God has blessed me with.  This year was a bit different for me...  I had a hard time focusing on that thankfulness.  It wasn't that I wasn't thankful and overwhelmed by how blessed we are - but my heart was being pulled somewhere else and it was breaking.  Things in the DRC news were stirring.  M23 rebels took over Goma, a city in the Eastern DRC and have threatened to move forward into other cities, including Kinshasa, the capitol city where we are adopting from.  Thousands are dying, women are being raped and children are becoming orphans.  Local people are being forced to flee their homes on foot in hopes of protecting their families.  My heart has been heavy for the DRC this past week.  I can't get it off my mind.  I like to fix things but even I know this is WAY out of my hands but I'm so thankful to know it's not out of God's hands.  My thankfulness was more focused on His faithfulness and that He knows what tomorrow holds for the DRC.  My devotions today read "When your mind is occupied with thanking Me, you have no time for worrying or complaining." This adoption has already taught me so much about hitting my knees in prayer.  It was just a different kind of thankfulness that I had this year...

Here are some pictures of some Thanksgiving festivities and traditions that took place...

Addison's Thanksgiving Feast at school.  Doesn't Xavier look thrilled to be there?

Xavier was glad to join the boys this year to watch football.

Decorating cookies at the Christmas tree farm.

Visiting Santa at the farm...  (Xavier greatly dislikes facial hair so Santa isn't going to be his favorite this year).

Our family and my brother - the coolest Uncle ever!

Looking for the perfect tree.

Xavier has already yanked over the playroom Christmas tree 3 times - it's going to be a loooong season of Christmas trees,

We have a tradition of going out to eat with my parents and then driving through a local light display and seeing Santa...  Here's my girl and I getting ready to see Santa.

Todd and Xavier getting ready to see Xavier's favorite guy... 

Again...  not his favorite!  Poor kid - we just stood and laughed at him and his expressions.

We're waiting for you little man and we can't wait to have you be part of our fun and traditions next year!

 

Looking for Christmas gifts?

A sweet friend of mine decided to do a fundraiser for our family to help us add to our adoption fund.

She sells Thirty One - this is a product I love and use each day.  I mean, I LOVE these bags and totes!

She is giving us 100% of her commission on all the sale made online for us.  How awesome is she?!?

If you have Christmas shopping to do, think about ordering some Thirty One products as great gifts.  The products will be delivered in time for Christmas.

You can visit the website here.  Click on "My Parties." Find Adoption Fundraiser  -  Kristen Kocher and then shop away!  The great customer special for this month is:  For every $31 you spend, you can get one of 5 items for ONLY $5!  Great deal!!!  I personally plan on buying a few teacher gifts and then getting myself something for $5.  :-)  Let me know if you have any questions!  Thanks friends!

Kristen

Adopt Together

We've had several people ask where they can donate to our adoption fund by giving a tax deductible gift...  

We were blessed to find a fantastic adoption resource called

Adopt Together.  Adopt Together is a non-profit organization that allows families to set up a profile and adoption fund where people can donate money that is tax deductible. This organization was started by a friend that Todd and I went to college with - his family has some incredible adoption stories and has a heart for adoption.  He saw the need for an adoption platform to step up and help with adoption costs after his parents had adopted several children.

You can view a little clip about Adopt Together here.

You can view our profile and donate here.

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Small update... 

Todd and I went to Cincinnati today for our biometric fingerprint appointment. Quick, simple and another step crossed off the list!  

Here's a picture of Todd and I in the lovely parking garage taken by our professional photographer, Addison. 

Orphan Sunday

Today was Orphan Sunday and November is National Adoption Month. 

 

What I love about Orphan Sunday is the huge difference

 it's made for children around the world.

Lives have been changed because church services set aside a 

day to celebrate, raise awareness and pray for orphans.

In doing a little reading on how "Orphan Sunday" began, I was shocked to find out that it started in a small church in Zambia.  A church who had nothing when it comes to money/material goods was challenged to reach out to the orphans in their community.  

They began giving and helping (when they truly didn't have anything to give).

How humbling to realize that it took a small church in Zambia to ignite the fire to raise orphan awareness via Orphan Sunday.  This grew and grew to more churches and has now spread far and wide across the world.  It's been challenging for me to think that if the people in Zambia can give shoes off their own feet and the only food they have in their house to orphans down the street... what more can I be doing?  

We're adopting one and yes, that's one less but what a huge number - 147,000,000.

I've struggled with questions like "What do we do after the adoption? Do we keep adopting kids? How can we help make that number even less?"  I don't have those answers yet but my heart hurts just thinking about the fact that there are so many children desiring a family.  

We understand that not everyone is called to adopt but we are all called to help. 

 I ask that you pray about what you can be doing to help. 

 Is it supporting an orphan monthly? Supporting an adoptive family? 

Providing shoes to children who don't have any? 

Please pray with me about what God might have you and I do to make this number less.

Here's the Orphan Sunday video - a short video that puts things in perspective...

Watch Video Here

Waiting for the next step

Our mailman is relieved because he's got a few weeks off 

before I start stalking his arrival again...

We received our fingerprint appointment from USCIS today 

and were thrilled that our appointment is only 1 week away.  

Next Friday Todd and I will go to Cincinnati and get our biometric fingerprints done. 

Then we wait some more (and watch for the mailman each day) until we receive our I-600A approval which allows us to move to the next (and VERY exciting step) of getting a referral.  You can be praying our I-600A is processed very quickly after we have our fingerprints done - generally it takes about 3-4 weeks to receive the approval post fingerprints but we're praying for a quick turn-around.

I'll leave you with a picture of Merida (from Brave) and a little lion who are anxious for another brother to join them for trick-or-treat next year...

 

  Doesn't that lion look thrilled to be a lion?  HA HA!