God's Blessings...In Hindsight

Truly God has blessed many this week, in many ways. Here are just a few...

Chrissie, the little Serbian Sensation, as her mother Lorraine has penned, is still alive and fighting. We have been praying for her and her family since her open heart surgery began on Tuesday morning. It has been a roller coaster all week, she died twice and right now she is on life support, and she is alive. I have been humbled and brought to tears by the strength her mother and father, Lorraine and Matt, have shown through this ordeal. What amazing faith! Please go see their blog about their precious princess Chrissie.

http://allarepreciousinhissight.blogspot.com/

Finally it's time for Shelley, Kullen and Leah to return home to the US after such a long time away from their families. Praise God!

Others, even if it doesn't feel like a blessing at the moment, have been blessed with an answer of no it's not time to adopt. Another received a date for them to travel to pick up their son! Dossier's have been sent out! There has been a successful adoption, and now we're just waiting for the GOTCHA DAY!

Tony and I have finally been able to meet a family from Reece's Rainbow that live in Massachusetts, and they live just an hour from us! :)

I guess you could say that once again I am being blessed with peace about not hearing from any of the jobs that I applied for last week. I really can only look at it as God hasn't prepared the perfect job for me yet.

This week I have watched satan try to bring christians down, but all he did was succeed in bringing them to their knees...in PRAYER and PRAISE to our heavenly Father, our Great Physician!

An aside, I believe I read on Lorraine's blog that they had over 13,000 hits on their blog...take that satan!!!

What A Week! Praise God...

At least it feels like it has been a week already...and it's just Tuesday.

Once again my troubles have paled in comparison to others problems. Yes, God has a way of doing that to me...not a bad thing really, but it sure is humbling.

I thought my car was a major frustration, then onto the way I felt when people ignored things.

Then I got home...

There was Shelley and her brand new son Kullen and her friend Leah. Blessed to go visit orphanages but when they needed to come home, they couldn't. To top it off, Kullen is sick. :(

Then there was Chrissie and her heart surgery yesterday and her mothers gut wrenching plea for prayer for Chrissie...she had died and now is in a medically induced coma and on life support.

Now there is the little 6 year old special needs boy they found dead in a park in Texas, with no identification.

It kind of placed my troubles on the back burner, so to speak and now I am able to concentrate on praying for others and their difficulties.

Yes, I am praising God for making me Aware of others. I'm glad He re-focuses me and shows me what is really important. Thank you Father for your correction! :)

Hope everyone has a great night...and please pray for Chrissie!

Please Pray For Our Friends!

r HisWe are asking for prayers for Shelley, our friend, her newly adopted son, Kullen, who happens to be sick, and Leah. They are in stuck in Bulgaria after adopting Kullen and they are waiting to fly home, but the volcano erupted while they were in another country visiting an orphanage.

We are all worried about them, Kullen especially because he sounds like he has a sinus infection. So please, pray for their safety, finances and ability to get back home. And pray for her husband and other members of her family while she is away.

We all know that God is still on His throne, but asking for His help is what we are supposed to do...Thank You! Have a blessed day! :)

You Know, God Is Really Amazing!

Okay, while I was steaming and sad this morning, I did leave out a positive detail...we are blessed with my oldest son who is a tow truck driver. He towed the car to Tony's work for free. And Tony works on cars for a living, so for about $30.00 he was able to replace the timing belt and it was done already! :)

God really has blessed us! Oh, and I freaked out too because I lost an envelope of money from our budget, and we found it in the car!

Praise God! He is Awesome the way He takes care of the details :)

Have a wonderful evening and enjoy your family!

Anger ends in GRRR...

You know, if I laughed as much as the time spent aggravated lately they would haul me away in an ambulance! :) Yes, I admit I am finding more to complain about lately, but sometimes I think I am righteously angry. Let me explain...

Today I dropped Tony off at work, on a Sunday AGAIN :( Righteously angry? Yes, in a perfect world, but not so much here. Once again satan wins. On my way home with the car, suddenly the car dies without so much as a sputter or cough. Righteously angry? You bet, I was going home to get ready to go to church to so I couldn't go. satan won. Still righteous? Not so much, it's a car and cars break. The timing belt broke again for the second time in 5 months! Righteously Angry? YES! Better quality components put in the cars would be helpful. But let's face it, it's a car and cars break! So not really righteous...

While I sat for an hour and 15 minutes on the side of the road waiting for assistance with my flashers going, not one person stopped or looked at me to see if I was okay or if I needed to call someone. Righteously angry? YES! I was pulled over at a stop light too...roll down your window and ask me if I need anything? You can't always assume that someone has a cell phone or that they are okay enough in that type of situation. What has happened to everyone? I understand that people are creeped out about stopping in these situations, but you can't stop, roll down your window and ask if I am okay or do I need them to call someone for me? And to top that off, I recognized 2 cars that drove by as members of my own church. Righteous anger? YES indeed.

I posted this on my fb status and one person mentioned that we all have crosses to bear and sometimes that means covering our eyes...not quite sure I knew what that meant, but I reminded her that I felt like the samaratin that was ignored by the priests and pharisees. Anyone remember that story?

Two things struck me this morning as I saw the apathy in God's people:

1. Any one stuck on the side of the road is some one... someone's mother/father, son/daughter, brother/sister, grandmother/grandfather, aunt/uncle. Turn the table and say the person was YOUR (fill in the blank) and no one stopped to help?

B. If I am invisible to God's people, then does that mean that we will ever receive help from my christian brothers and sisters to bring our twins home?

The cost of stopping this morning would have been 5 minutes and they may have been a few minutes late to church. If time, as precious as that is, can't even be spent on making sure someone is okay, then how can I believe that they will spend precious dollars on making sure that two of God's children have a forever family? Righteous Anger...GRRR...YES!

I don't make a habit of stopping for people that are with others or are visibly on the phone, but if there is one bit of doubt, I will turn around and make sure they are okay and have someone coming for them. I don't ever want to have to look Jesus in the face and give an account to Him that I was going to be late to church or dinner and I just didn't have time to stop. Righteous Anger...GRRR... YES!

GRRR...But Hopeful!

We gotta whole lotta GRRRin' goin' on!

With tax day in our rear view mirror, we are grrr'ing because the state we lived in before was just a bit greedy, so any hope of having a tax refund to put toward our adoption is out because we owe! We don't owe a lot, but enough to be a pain in the back side! That made us rather annoyed!!! GRRR...

But, on a happier note, I have just applied for 4 jobs, 3 receptionist positions and 1 retail within 15 miles (round trip) of our house! I left one of the places hopeful today, the office manager was not in today but is in on Monday so I should hear something from her on Monday! YAY!!!

So please, if you are a prayer, please pray for this job! I really liked the place as soon as I walked in. I'm not a psychic but I had a really good feeling about it. We'll see if this is where God wants me! And thank you for the prayers...He is the only way to get through all this!

So now I have to get rid of this sinus headache because I have so much to do, a room to clean, organize for a yard sale, get my daily chores completed...but right now, healing!

I sure hope you're have a fantastic day! Bless you!

I guess I don't understand companies anymore. I was really excited to see that Target was hiring, then when I went on line to apply, the Target in our town isn't hiring, one about 18-20 miles away is. So why did they advertise there then? Aldi did the same thing last fall, when I inquired with them and was told it was for a store about 18 miles away from my house. Aldi may pay alright, but I am not going to travel 20 miles to go work in a retail store that isn't going to pay me more than minimum wage, especially with gas prices on the rise again :( So it looks like we are still waiting...

On a brighter note, I have started digging out the room that will be the girls bedroom! I am moving things and re-arranging to fit everything where it needs to be! :) Just trying to keep busy while I wait for a job! I just can't contain my excitement!!! :)

Soon girls...mama and daddy will be there as soon as we can! :)

The Waiting Game...

Well, I put in applications today, and I will again tomorrow. If we can do it before our homestudy is complete, we are also going to apply in the next week or so to the Both Hands Ministry through LifeSong Ministry. Both Hands is a project to help a widow and at the same time you are earning funds toward your adoption. You can earn up to 10,000.00 in funds. What a huge chunk of money just for spending a day volunteering to help a widow! Wow, what a blessing...

http://www.lifesongfororphans.org/bothHands.html

Please check it out. What a way to help widows and orphans :)

Getting Ready To Go Out...

Looking for a job AGAIN!!! Something has to give soon. And I am noticing other job opportunities as we are out and about, soooo....

I am going to Target. I figure if I get a job there, that money will go toward our immediate adoption expenses, and maybe there will be a discount? I saw a beautiful comforter/sheet set that we want for their room! And some furnishings for their room, too. Not to mention all the pretty clothing for girls there :)

Also, Babies/Toys R Us is hiring. Either place will work for the same thing, adoption expenses and discount for future purchases. Just praying that something comes available soon! God is Great and He will provide what we need! :)

Have a great day!

Happy 28th Birthday Christopher!!

You know, I woke up today with a thought...my oldest son Chris is 28 years old today! WHAT...where did the time go??? Boy did I feel old, but then I remembered that Chris is my oldest! I felt so much better because my youngest son, Cale is just 20! WHEW! :D

28 years ago today was Easter Sunday and Christopher was born! I went into labor with him on Good Friday, was in labor for 36 hours and the dr. finally gave up and did a c-section. I was young and he was my first! God gave me my son and He changed my life. My sister and I are totally the opposite, like night and day! My sister was always the babysitter for all the cousins and neighborhood children, and I wasn't and I loved that! That is until that fateful day, April 11, 1982 when I became a mom! I absolutely fell in love with Chris and have LOVED each of my children and have been in love with children ever since! I have taught preschool Sunday school, high school Sunday school. Children are the future...we really need to invest in their lives in a big way! Investment starts with love...

We came back in town last year right on his birthday, so celebrating happened a few weeks later, but this year we are going to celebrate ON his b'day and are having his favorite...grilled barbecue chicken, potato salad and Coke! We missed doing this while we were in Kentucky.

We loved our boys and really did have a time of it trying to raise each of them, in different ways, and sometimes had to question whether we'd make it through every stage...but we are happy to say that Chris is exactly how we raised him to be. He is loving and caring, would give the shirt off his back to help someone (even in the cold) and he is a great kid!

He is looking forward to the twins getting here, and I think they will really LOVE their big brother Chris!

Happy Birthday Chris...we're glad we're home again to celebrate your day! We love you! :)

Here Is Our BUTTON!!

Grab This Button

Here is the blog button that Lu made for us! Thank you sooo much Lu! If anyone knows me, that button is perfect for what I am about! We are so excited to share our button with anyone who wants to share it with others to help us bring them home sooner! :)

About 3 weeks ago the MOJ of the twins country gave us the okay to file papers for the twins to be ours... That, to us, is HUGE! We are so excited for the day we fly to pick them up!!! They are so special to us.

So now I'm in 'super get busy' mode. We figure if we need to stay here a little longer, then we will bloom where we are planted. God provides, we just need to be patient and wait for Him. I won't lie, being patient isn't easy for me, and this seems to be an underlying thread of learning for me, but at least I can see that now, and with His help, we will be fine.

So, today I am in the pantry and the kitchen. I am clearing things out to sell in our yard (tag sale here in New England...just a little cultural lesson :) sale, organizing for our eventual move and getting ready for our homestudy to begin.

Then to switch wardrobes from winter to summer so we can get rid of all these storage tubs out of the twins bedroom.

I am also going to put in an application for a job. They are not hiring or interviewing until 4/15th, so if I get that job, at least I will have had a jump start on cleaning and getting ready for our homestudy! Yay!

So please pray for this job opportunity...it could easily help us to bring Slavka and Sandra home to us! :D And that will make me one happy mama!

Can You Tell?...

Can you tell how excited we are to have them with us next Easter? This is the pic of a couple of things we bought for them...cute felt Easter baskets, some bunny necklaces and rings, some stickers and grape flavored lip balm and a bible matching game...I can't wait to go get them, we'll be bringing these things with us when we go... :) I just thought I'd share!

Keep us in prayer as we do our fundraising...so we can go pick them up soon! :)

Happy Easter! He has Risen!

We had a very nice Easter Holiday with our family. We enjoyed spending time with my parents and our boys! Even more, we had a glorious day remembering that this is the last time we will be alone on Easter morning...next year we will have two beautiful little girls, Slavka and Sandra, to have an Easter morning Egg hunt, and then dress in frilly dresses for church! And I will once again be able to color Easter eggs and all of the other fun things we did on Easter morning...until the boys grew up!

I have to admit, I did buy Easter hats (pictured above, for some reason I can't get this blog to put pics where I want them) and little Easter baskets with little trinkets...I just couldn't help myself this year :)

I am beginning to count down the holidays we have without the girls... Mother's Day, Father's Day, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, first day of fall and hopefully they will be here before Thanksgiving! What a wonderful Thanksgiving that will be! We are so excited to have a full house again! God is so Great! :)

Have a great night!

Recapping...Again...STILL...

We are still waiting...for a lot of things...still...

I am working on a crib sized baby blanket, still. I am in the process of making 20 more pins, still. I am trying to figure out how to get them out where people can see them and where we might sell the pins so that we can reach our goal, still.

I am trying to get the word out about our puzzle fundraiser, pins, prayer blankets so people will help us bring the girls home, still. I am working on a huge yard sale, still.

I am still waiting for a job, I will be going to fill out an application for a receptionist job that I qualify for, but won't know anything until after April 15th. Praying real hard for a job, still.

We just had someone donate to the girls, she purchased a few pins and donated above that, so we are in the neighborhood of $650.00 to $700.00 away from our commitment fee! Another step closer! That truly did our hearts good...so as of tonight we have a new way to view 'STILL'...

Psalm 46:10-Be still and know that I Am God. He truly is Great and has provided thus far, so we are still and we know that He is in Control. :) We'll be there for you girls, your Father has Promised!

Happy Birthday Cale!!

How's this...two post updates in one day! It's a record for me I think :) I just wanted to say Happy Birthday to my youngest son, but he's no longer the baby. I just spoke to him and he is excited about his new sisters, but I didn't dare call him the big brother yet :)

I miss having him here all the time, making me laugh and saying silly things. I guess we can say that he is the reason we are adopting. I had so much fun with him having him here all the time, homeschooling him and teaching him right from wrong, I just stayed young through it all. He is goofy, like his dad and I was lucky enough to have him home with me!

Well, as much as I am proud of him, I am also melancholy as today my last teenager turns 20...so no more teens at this time. But I take great comfort in the fact that soon we will have little ones again in the house...keeping us young and making me happy! No more silent empty nest! YAHOO!!!

Well, I have to go finish email and being a housewife...HAPPY 20th BIRTHDAY CALE!!!

Well I Thought...

I really thought I would just feel the way I felt when I heard from our facilitator about the country's decision to allow us to adopt the girls...just loaded with nervous energy! Right? Yeah, that's all, and then I'd want to go out and window-shop, looking for things for the twins! Yeah, that's it.

I have seen others who say they were moved to tears when they found out and such, but that didn't happen to me. Then, on Wednesday afternoon when I received a note from Andrea, it didn't say anything in the subject line, so I opened it and there was a link and the message was copied to the woman, Lu from England, who makes the blog buttons. All the note said was 'Up and running'. So I sat there and couldn't figure out what that was all about...that was probably the longest 1 minute of my life, then I clicked on the link...

And then the tears came pouring down my face and I must have cried for at least the first 5 minutes...there on the opened RR page was our beautiful twins faces and our family profile that said 'Slavka and Sandra for the Stancil Family-Manchester, CT'. It was probably the first time it wasn't surreal for me! If you were sitting here watching me type this right now you would see me crying again!

I called Tony at work and told him through my tears, and he said 'There's no crying in adoption!' which did get me laughing...he's a goof-ball like that! I still can't look at that page without tearing up! I didn't think I'd be this sappy, I just figured I would be full of nervous energy, but no, cry baby is more like it. I really have to practice not crying, I'm gonna mess those two babies up when we finally go get them...they will think I was sad or something! And going to see the officials! UGH...I hope they can discern happy tears from sad!

Well, gotta go look at my daughters again and cry some more...have a very blessed day!

They are OURS!!!

I just love saying that :D We are so excited and our love grows stronger everyday! I get up everyday and check the 'my family found me' page just to make sure this isn't really a great dream that I just woke up from...and everyday their pictures are there, and I just want to reach into the screen and squeeze them both and give them hugs and kisses! I have been waiting too long for daughters, they don't have any idea what they are in for!!!

We are about $800.00 away from promise fee...I have a couple of good friends that are helping me plan a large yard sale, complete with baked goods and maybe some lemonade (or just kool-ade, or maybe some sweet tea-we learned something while we were in Louisville)! I am now starting to plan a 6 to 10 mile walk for adoption...just trying to get a hold of people that have organized large walks like I'm thinking...we'll see ;)

I am also looking into 2 job possibilities this week, maybe at Babies R' Us and the other at Walgreen Drugstores. Please pray that I am successful! I am really getting excited at the prospect of working and being able to take care of our homestudy within the next couple of months, and then for the other expenses that we are finding in our guide book for their country. I am getting excited by the hour, I can't believe they are ours, right now it seems surreal...maybe I'll go back to see if they are still on that mffm page! Yup, they are still there! :D Did I say I'm really excited? :)

Thanks for following our blog! We hope you had a very blessed weekend!

Oh HAPPY HAPPY WEEK!!!

Well, if you have been looking at the 'my family found me' page on Reece's Rainbow, you will notice that our 'TWINS' are there! We had sent in our information to our facilitator and to Andrea, but I had not thought things would happen so fast, at least not until Monday of this week. We found out kind of by accident, someone emailed about the new page that was created and she was happy to see new commitments there including our two, Sandra and Slavka!

So my heart sank, :( I worked up the nerve to email Andrea to ask who had come forward, or was it us. She responded so quick that my stomach flipped. I told Tony I couldn't look, so he said he would...and here was her response:

YOU are the family! :)

I COULDN'T BELIEVE IT!!! I think my heart really sang! I have only felt that way a few times in my life, the day I was married, and everytime I found out I was expecting! I totally feel like we are pregnant, minus the sinus headaches for three months and the night sickness! We are SOOO EXCITED!!! I had so much nervous energy we took a drive and ended up looking at things for the girls! Like I didn't already create a tote of things for them, like cute magenta tops I found on clearance, Hello Kitty hot cocoa mugs, a bouquet of 'stuffed flowers' with faces, a bible memory game...and more!

I'm not sure if we can announce it on the elist until our FSP is posted, so until or unless I hear otherwise, this is the only place that we will announce that Sandra and Slavka are OURS!!!!

Now reality of the work ahead has set in...we received the guide for the country we are adopting from...and there is so much to do! I just thank God for those who have walked this path before me, their experiences will certainly be appreciated! One step at a time. And I refuse to panic about the money. There are several people we know who are nay-sayers and are really trying to make things much bleaker than it needs to be. If it is God's will, these girls, God's girls, God will see to it that every penny, dime and dollar will be there! :) AAAAAHHHHH - THEY ARE OURS!!!!!

We did find out that we cannot rename the girls the names that we chose when we adopt them, the only change will be their last names. I'm just excited to bring them into our family, I think I'm okay about not renaming, at least at first.

The information on the hows and whys of their country is really exciting, but intimidating. There is so much we will need to gather, but after following many blogs, especially 'beautifulgiftofGod', Bella and her family, I know we can do this and that it will feel amazing when it's over!

Our biggest prayer is that we can get everything done and have them here with us before Thanksgiving...What a wonderful day of Thanksgiving that will be!!

We are PRAISING our God for the opportunity to be Sandra and Slavka's mama and daddy! AAAAAHHHHHH!!! The TWINS are OURS!!!!

Well...we just keep plugging along!

Our days are filled with bad stuff like cars breaking down to exciting things like friends coming along side us and making donations to our adoption! I truly feel like life right now is a roller-coaster ride! This past week, we had someone who has become very special to us on this journey tell us that she and her husband would like to donate to our adoption. Well, I was speechless, (which doesn't happen very often) then I regained my composure and emailed back. They sent us a wonderful love offering which is allowing us to send in our Voice Of Hope fee and Family Sponsorship Page fee along with our applications. We can now concentrate on our promise fee and then our homestudy fee. Little steps, but steady steps. We also had a couple of people donate to the twins fund page which is even more encouraging to us! We really had a very blessed week from truly special people in our hearts, and God will bless you for your gracious gifts! Thank You!

Tony and I chose names for the girls the other night and we are so excited about our choices! Can't wait to share them...email me if you want to know what they are, we aren't going to share on our blog until after the facilitator and court accept us to adopt them.

I went out looking for a job this morning at temp agencies, because once I get the twins home I intend on devoting my whole being to them as a full time sahm and homeschool them, as I think that teaching them one on one is the best way to overcome their issues.

Well, the trip to the temp agencies were very unfruitful...there is truly nothing out there, so I am just praying something will open up soon, anything, even retail! I will be going out again tomorrow morning, so if you can pray for success in this, that would be great!

But as we go out on this journey, we know this...God does have a plan for us and for the girls, we just need to continue to be patient...He will provide a way for us to bring them home! :)

What I'm Doing Now...Prayer Blankets

Pink, Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow with Pink Border

I am making my Prayer Blankets available for order. I started making Prayer Blankets about 10 years ago in Ashley Nichole's honor. I call them Ashley's Dream. Here are pictures of them in the colour pallet I follow.

Blue, Pink, Purple, Green, Yellow, Blue border

Green, Yellow, Blue, Purple, Pink, Green border

Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple, Pink, Yellow border

Small is Carseat sized $45.00
Medium is Nursery/bassinet/layette sized $55.00
Large is Crib sized $75.00

All prices include shipping unless you are out of the US. And these prices are subject to change if prices of yarn goes up astronomically. I am selling these to raise funds to bring our girls home! Yes another fundraiser :) Anything to get them home! Please email me if you are interested in one and we'll talk price then. And if you are a Reece's Rainbow family, I have special pricing for you so that it isn't so pricey...adoption fees are bad enough without having to spend a lot for something special!

I am keeping my idle hands and minds busy, so that I don't become discouraged in our journey! So, To God Be The Glory!

Have a blessed weekend! :)