Home Study Scheduled!

We have our home study scheduled for next Thursday at 12:30 pm.  Please pray for that process, and us gathering all of our paperwork in the mean time.  Thank you again for all of the love and support!!!! :)

We have already saved up the homestudy fee before we started this process. We're so excited though, because once this is complete, we can apply for grants.  AND it makes us that much closer to getting our referral, that's the day we're looking forward to right now!

We have a date and an update!

One of two important dates coming up is tomorrow!  Will you please pray for us?  At 2 pm tomorrow we are having our first conference call with our social worker from Lifeline regarding our adoption.  We are super excited, but know we're going to have a lot to take in, and a lot more paperwork to complete.  

We also heard back from the Houston based agency we'll be using for our home study, and we're going to set it up for NEXT WEEK!  We are very excited about this as well, it makes us one step closer.  Each little part is exciting.  

Thank you SO MUCH for everyone that has purchased puzzle pieces so far and for the straight up donations!  We basically raised almost $1,000 in a week!  That $5 or $10 you gave feels like $1,000s to us!  We really had no clue how we were going to do this.  But God began putting ideas in our heads, and all we have to do is follow through.  We hope you don't tire of seeing the different things we have coming up, we have been blessed by so many already!

Two things we'd like for you all to share if you feel so led are:

1)  Next Tuesday, June 21st from 12 noon - 9:30 pm go have some great frozen yogurt!!  The Orange Leaf Katy is giving us 10% of their sales from all day!  All you have to do is say that it's for the Newsome Family and they'll put your receipt in the box with our name on it.  The address is: 

Villagio Shopping Center, 22756 Westheimer Parkway Suite 120, Katy, TX 77450

2)  We have set the date for our garage sale!  It'll be Saturday July 23rd from 7 am - 1pm.  We'll be taking donated items to sell, as well as baking cupcakes to sell and support Cupcake Kids.  It has it's own page at the of this page.  Check it out here.

Thank you again, I don't think we'll ever tire of saying that!

  

Isaiah 58:6-11   "Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?  Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him,and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?  Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.  Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, 'Here I am.' If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday.  And the LORD will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail."

Micah Man

Our sweet man probably doesn't get equal time on this blog.  He's not in anything yet.  He's not the baby anymore.  But he is still my cuddle bug.  And boy has he started showing his 'boy-ness' more and more!  From wanting to fight/wrestle, to turning everything, including barbie hairbrushes, into guns, he thinks he is fearless!  He loves to play 'racing' with sissy (aka running SUPER FAST around the house), as well as dance along side her.  He REALLY likes to be loud with her tap shoes.  He's also the sweetest thing to Anna.  If she's fussing (which she's been doing lately thanks to a double ear infection), he goes over and whispers to her.  It's the cutest thing!  We are in the midst of potty training.  Some days are great, others are so-so, but he definitely gets it this time.  I think it's the red-headed stubbornness that is our problem some days :).   He hasn't taken swim lessons yet, but he LOVES the water.  We are spoiled, my mom and Eric's mom both have a pool, so the kids get to swim a LOT.  Micah loves being thrown, so when daddy and Uncle Greg get involved, he has an absolute blast!  Here he is over Easter.  

Jumping to Daddy

Daddy holding him up

Sweet big and little brother after his hair cut

His 'long hair hippy' look (per Darrell)

Finding an egg

He's done with pictures.....

Breakfast one morning ;)

My goofy boy

Dyeing some eggs

I just love this picture of him at Cara's easter egg hunt at preschool.

Posing after dance class one day, truck in hand :)

his sweet smile!

At Eric's cousin's wedding....

And our crazy little family on Easter :) 

Cara's Dance Recital

Cara had this year's dance recital this afternoon.  She did her ballet dance to "Hold Me in Your Love," and her tap dance to "Rockin' Robin."  They were both precious.  It's amazing how much she's progressed in a year.  We are SOOOO going to miss Ms. Kathy next year.  She was so loving and kind to the girls, but also got the job done.  Out of all the 'little' girls, her classes were by far the most well prepared, at least in my opinion! :)  And the girls had a great time dancing!  Here are some pictures:

Nana & Cara

Aunt Amanda & Anna

My little ballerina

Coloring before she went on stage

Ready to go!

On stage

Last pose

She was being silly

Ready to go!

On stage

Ms. Kathy and her daughter with Cara

On stage for the finale

Daddy giving his girl flowers!

The last time she WANTED to smile.  She got in a weird mood (she was very hungry) after this :)

With Yaya

Us 3

Puzzle Piece Fundraiser

First of all, I promise a non-adoption post later today or tomorrow.  I scheduled this for Saturday morning.  This afternoon is Cara's dance recital, so we'll have tons of cute pictures of our girl! :)

Pretty?  This is the puzzle we got off Amazon with gift cards from Swagbucks.  This was one of Eric's first ideas he came across on other blogs that he thought, we can do that!  It is so easy to implement and we are blessed to have free gift cards to use to purchase it.

If you are unfamiliar with this concept, the idea is to 'buy' or donate $5 per piece.  We will then write the donor's name on the back of a puzzle piece.  As we continue to sell, we will put the puzzle together until it is complete.  Then we will frame the puzzle and hang it in our little man's room to remind us of all the people that donated to bring him home!  This puzzle has 1,000 pieces.  Seems out of our reach.  Do we even know 1,000 people??  But it is not out of God's!  We are claiming Ephesians 3:20-21 today.   
 "Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think,according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen."

Please consider sharing this link on your blog, facebook, or in an email to friends and family.  We'd love to have people from all over supporting the cause of the orphan, OUR orphan.   I have set up a separate page for this specific fundraiser, where I'll post updated totals.  Love you all, thanks for sharing along in this ride with us!