Beads and Shirts and Sales, Oh My!

So I mentioned in our last post how we may have found a home study contact at a reduced rate, and how that next step sparked the next set of fees due to our agency.  We are trying to focus on the excited part, and not the 'what if we can't move forward because we don't have enough money' part.  I'm not going to lie and say that when we originally looked at the fees involved with this that we didn't have a little sticker shock.  However, God has given us a great sense of peace, and persistence, and we have been looking at some GREAT, fun fundraisers to do in the mean time.  

I wanted to give you all a heads up as to what is in the pipeline so maybe you can begin praying about how you might be able to support our adoption.  Really, anytime we've asked for help or mentioned something here, we come away with even more fantastic ideas or advice, so we'd love to hear what you think!  We've added a short-term goal thermometer on the right side of the blog.  Instead of posting the large, looming number that is awaiting us (we're being very transparent, if you want to know total fees, check out the page for our agency or just email me), we thought we'd break it into smaller, achievable goals.  And we'd love for you to cheer along side us as we reach each goal.  We will be adding in our money that I mentioned we are saving in a previous post, and updating as to all the fundraising efforts we have.  I don't want this whole blog to be about money, though it is all a story of God's provision and perfect timing, so I will try to limit the specific updates on that.  You can always email me if you would like to know where we stand.  

So, once I mentioned fundraising, Eric started researching a hundred different ways you can go about it.  He's found some amazing ideas, so we are in the beginning phases of LOTS of things!  Our lives are about to get even busier, and we love it!  Some have fallen in our lap and we are extremely grateful.  Some are pretty consistent with what we see that other adoption bloggers are doing (if you want to look at a pretty good list of Ugandan adoption blogs, check out this one).  And all are being prayerfully considered, we hope each one brings glory to God the Father first and foremost!  

T-Shirts

This is pretty standard.  We stayed up last night working on a design.  It's in the beginning phases, but we like where it's going so far.  We checked out one website that does shirts for fundraisers and the shirts were pretty steep.  So Eric is going to email the guy he uses for all his band shirts and get a quote from him.  We hope to have some pre-orders if at all possible.  This is what we came up with in just a couple hours.  I'm sure it will be tweaked a ton, but again, it's a start.  I could go on forever about what each part means to us, but I will do a separate post once we get the design finalized and have a plan.  So, in the meantime, tell us what color shirt YOU'D like for us to do.  Most of them we've seen have been black or white (I'm assuming that's less expensive!), but we're considering all options.  This looks pretty cool on a charcoal/gray color.  Vote in the comments! :)

Beads

One of my new friends, and a mentor on this journey so far, has been Tonya LaTorre.  I've been at her house a bit recently helping them with Quickbooks for their new non-profit.  It is such a joy for me to be able to offer help in things that come so easily to me.  And I'm not going to lie, the little girl they've adopted has a piece of my heart.  Their dog is pretty nice too :).  Anyways, when she came home from adopting Kira in January, she brought home boxes of awesome paper bead necklaces and bracelets that the women in Uganda make.   She's been selling them as a fundraiser for the orphanage they've adopted in Kyengera.  You can see pictures of them, and support their ministry, Kirabo Seeds, here.  We sold them at our spring Tot 2 Tot sale, and they were a hit!  

Yesterday she gave me a few bracelets to start selling and promised she'd purchase some necklaces and bracelets to bring back to help us raise more funds!  What a blessing she is.  So, I'm going to set up a page featuring those.  Here is a picture of what I have as of now.  

Garage Sale

You know how I said my last garage sale was my last?  I was wrong.  I used to love doing them, but when you have 3 kids under the age of 5, they get to be more work than it's worth :).  However, in unpacking our stuff that we packed up for when the house was on the market, we've found even more stuff we can part with.    And some friends have offered their things.  And someone that is moving offered to us what they didn't want to move.  So, our official plea is here: We'll take your done with items!  

I know it's crazy hot here, but we hope to hold a garage sale, probably in July, FULL of donated items, that will benefit our adoption fund.  I'm still talking with Cara about having a cupcake/lemonade stand as well, so we can send her proceeds to the orphanage Kirabo Seeds supports.  On the one hand she wants to make cupcakes and lemonade.  On the other hand, she doesn't necessarily want to do it for anyone besides herself :).  We're still working on that servant heart!  Will you please prayerfully consider donating some items you were done with anyway?  And we'd love for our local friends to come out and help us the day of.  We'll let you know that date asap!

A few other ideas we're throwing around are: 

Poker Tourney--Eric found an idea online that someone did where they held a poker tourney and all the proceeds benefited the adoption.  What a fun way to fund-raise!  We're looking into how we could host that, or where we could host it, and if anyone would be interested.  And also prizes for the winners, gift cards, etc.

Raffles--My friend Tonya said she'd bring back a beautiful painting from Uganda (they leave tomorrow for their 3 week mission trip!!) that we could raffle off to raise funds.  We are so blessed!  I can't wait to see the beauty!

I told you about my friend Mindy and her quilting/sewing fundraising for their own adoption.  If I could ever get the current quilt I promised my sister-in-law for Christmas last year finished, I'm going to make one to raffle as well.  Or maybe something else, I'm still considering all of it.   

If you have some great ideas, please let us know.  We set up a new email, newsomes4adoption [at] gmail dot com that we are using for all of our adoption correspondence with our agency, etc.  We both have it sent to our phones, so we get a little excited each time we get an alert.  If you have any questions or suggestions, we'd love to hear from you!!