Shine Like Stars

Shine like stars in the universe as we hold out the Word of life (Phil. 2:15)
We're not trying to be rock stars but just shed some light on a sad and lonely world. Stay tuned for how God works through weak and tired, sometimes really cranky vessels.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

We've got a number!!



We got a call from Christy tonight. She said that our dossier looks good and we are now offically on the wait list. We are #25 on the girls list. Yay!
Tomorrow we're going to get our fingerprints for USCIS. Now just lots of waiting!

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Agggg....More paperwork

So we aren't officially on the waiting list yet. Late last week our case worker called to let us know that some of our papers would have to be notarized again because there was some discrepancies on the notaries dates....So we have to do those and then send them in. Hopefully, by the end of this week. I'm glad that those things were caught before it was sent to a judge in Ethiopia and they denied our paperwork.
We have also been working on filling out grants to help us cover the cost of this adoption. We've finished 2 and have 2 more to go. Most of the work is done, there's just a few more things to add....again hopefully by the end of this week.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Dossier Sent


We did it! We sent out our dossier today. I'm a little nervious about it getting there just because I put so much work into all that paperwork:) I'm sure it'll get there though. So, once it's reviewed and approved we will officially be on the waiting list for our little babe! Yeah, it seems like it's taken forever to get here but I think the timing is going to work out well.

We are excited too because we had the money we needed to send with our dossier. A couple weeks ago we were wondering if we'd have enough and thanks to so many people who have bought shirts we do:) Just another cool way the Lord's provided for our adoption. Only $10,000 more to go!


Saturday, February 28, 2009

Micah is home!

Today we meet Micah Awate at the airport!
The kiddos had a ton of fun running around waiting for Aimee, Dan and Micah. Then we caught sight and the rest is a blur of screaming and picture taking (and maybe some ugly crying from me, which my mom unfortunately has documented). Micah is such a sweet, amazingly beautiful boy.


It's so great to finally have the family complete. This adoption has taken almost 2 years. Michael and I were talking tonight about how great it feels to have the whole Neal family together. I just feels right!





Tuesday, February 24, 2009

"Can I call him Daddy?"

Caleb, Nathan, and I had an awesome conversation today about adoption. We bounced around from lots of different topics...My sister is in Ethiopia right now picking up her new son, Micah, and we're all so excited. I was teaching the boys some of the important adoption lingo that every 5 and 3 year old should know, like: birth mother, birth father, biological children, etc.


Caleb started thinking and asked "why can't Micah's birth father take care of him?" This is one of those conversations when I think 'should I really be saying these things to my 5 year old?', but I quickly decide yes and keep talking. This time about malaria and how sad it is that Micah's birth father passed away before he was born.


Winding down the heavy conversation I say 'do you have any other questions?' He asks what is adoption- I decide I can brighten this conversation up with telling him that God created adoption and that He adopted us into His family and how awesome that is, that God is now our Father. He said "Can I call him Daddy?" and I melted.


Nathan quickly got bored of our conversation, he just wants our baby to be here now. He loves babies!


Here's their new list of names: Elliana (a friend of ours little baby), Ameena (an Ethiopian name I found online, and Drumroll....Caleb's own ---Contenie. Yup he made that one up all by himself.

He just made me read this to him and noticed that Dora wasn't on the list. Dang, I thought he forgot. He also added another original, Elonie.

Friday, February 20, 2009

T-Shirts

Our shirts are in! My brother in law, Dan, did an awesome job designing these shirts for us (he and my sister are travelling right now to get my nephew in Ethiopia). As you can see, the shirt has Africa is filled in with all sorts of words relating to our adoption. Love, family, adoption, patience, hope, 7,346 (miles from Dearborn to Ethiopia), AGCI (our agency), Hannah's Hope (our agency's orphanage), a couple key Bible verses for us, Home (the e in home is pink and is where Ethiopia is in Africa), fir-kir (means love in Amheric).......

Also, we have 50 Jerry Schroeder (another artsy b-i-l) cd's to give away. He's giving the proceeds to Father's House International in Ghana. So we'd like to pass a cd on to you with your shirt:)

We are doing this because it's super expensive to adopt, yet we totally feel called to do it. The Lord has showed us how close adoption is to His heart, we have all been adopted into His family. We feel blessed to have our faith stretched in this process. Last year when we started, we had a little bit of money saved up for it, but as the process continued we were surprised at how quickly we needed to come up with lots of money. I was super stressed about it for a couple weeks, but as the months went on we were amazed at the Lord's provision. He provided extra jobs for both Michael and I. Seriously, it's amazing, we've already paid $11,000. We usually, like most people, have just enough money to pay our bills so this is really incredible for us. He has used this process to build our faith.

Generally, I hate having fundraisers, I hate asking people for money and I feel ackward receiving money from people, so this is a real stretch for me. I'm amazed at people's generosity though and I hate to have my pride stiffle that. So I'm swallowing it here and letting you know that if you'd like to contribute you can by buying a shirt. But if you can't or don't, we still love you and we'd love your prayers more than your moolah:) I've also added a donate button on the sidebar because some super generous peeps asked me to--thanks guys!
If you're interested in buying one you can buy through paypal or if you live close, let us know and we'll deliver:)