Nia's Family Portrait

I have a bright little girl who is 4 named Nia...she is almost 5 and will remind you when you ask her age.  She has a big heart and is always thinking of our baby Lili and asking questions about adoption. Lately, she has become quite the little artist and drew our family portrait a few months ago.  It's my favorite picture so far! She made wings on baby Lillian, since she is so far away, so that she may fly to us when we are to become her family.  It just made my day to share it with you!  :)

we put the FUN in fundraising!

A lot on the brain over the past week or so.  The road trip was great and it was awesome going home and visiting with family and the Indian food in particular that Ella (mom 2) made was fantastic. So excited about the connection that our daughters will all feel for Nebraska as they get older and also to India.

As far as fundraising for our adoption, it started out as a good idea to use everything I made going towards the adoption..but then we realized that after overhead costs and babysitting fees and bills, that I may help out with our budget at home more than I realized.  We definately put back as much as possible including any extras people would give as tips/donations, but we are still not making money as efficiently as I had thought I would have at this point.  Naturally, I'm happy to have any...but I'm left wondering what I can do to get the community to think donating even $5 is beneficial to achieving our goal.  (possibly people are assuming we are only looking for substantial donation amounts so they are not contributing, thinking their donation may be too small? or perhaps they don't know us and wonder where the money really will go? all understandable). 

So, it was time to put our heads together and think! We did a little brainstorming over the week I was out of town, and the family came up with some good fundraising ideas to reach our goal. Todd and I broke it down and decided we need $18 from 300 people to reach what we need to finish the agency part of the adoption. This should be the last sum we pay to the agency directly. Next year before we travel, our plane tickets and travel costs will cost another $5000 or so, but we have tax money we expect to pay for this, so it's not so immediate. 

300 people...giving $18 each..doesn't sound so bad..in fact that sounds obtainable even!!!

Now the wheels are turning.  My other mom, Ella, suggested to make that goal even easier, why not break it into 30 people in charge of getting $18 from 10 people.  Wow! Wonder why I hadn't thought of that before.... So now you have delegated it out to those closest to you that will approach the people closest to them with a suggestion that will probably be heard. No longer is a silent glass jar sitting there nagging people's conscience to donate to random strangers...instead you have "jane" asking "sally" to give her $18 to support "my childhood friend so and so who is in an adoption".  If someone I knew well asked me to donate under these pretenses..I would definately do it!  And it gives the one in charge of the 10 people they know, the option of breaking it into 20 people giving $6 instead. If that is easier to do and you have that many friends who aren't in a financial situation that is able to give the whole $18 then I say however you want to help reach the goal is great.  And if you wanted you could split the 10 people with your friend and each try to get 5 people to donate the $18 and meet back in a couple weeks and combine it. Looking to rasie the money we need all by myself, well it gets overwhelming. However, looking at it as a project that I can do alongside my friends makes it manageable. 

Finally, I have a plan that I see working. In addition to cards (business cards with our blogsite on them to hand out to interested people who want to know more about our cause) that my sweet girl Jen put together for me out of the goodness of her heart, I have a plan!! WHOO HOO!  :) It feels good to be rejuvenated from my trip and ready to try, try, again. Most importantly I have faith that God is behind us with the addition of our family and with Him we can do all things..even those that seem a bit of a stretch at times. So if any of you feel like you want to be one of the 30 people that can conjure up 10 of your closest friends/family to each help us donate $18..please contact me and we will get started.  We will continue to add whatever extra I make to the pot as well as me calling local businesses to try and do chair massage and possibly even have a few ideas from Todd's side of things! ( Oooo the plot thickens!)

The best part is that this "plan" gives me something to focus on when most of the actual adoption process feels out of my hands at the moment.  And that alone, makes the time feel productive and beneficial..and I'm secure that eventually we will get there..baby in tow! ;)

ROAD TRIP!!!

Knee deep in adoption thoughts and fundraising, me and the girls (Nia, Elise, Emory and my mom) decided to switch gears for the week and take a trip back to my old hometown in Nebraska, to visit with my best friend's parents.  My best friend, Janet, is flying in tomorrow from D.C. and I'm so excited to get to spend a few days doing nothing but having a few great conversations, eating caramel rolls (hand-made by her mom, Ella), and laughing until we can't breathe.

So what makes this trip out of the ordinary?  Well, it's one of the first times my girls will remember going to Nebraska...they were so young when I went a few years ago and it's where I grew up, so I want to share it with them now that my parents no longer live there.  But also because my best friend's parents come from India and it's a great time to celebrate their culture and eat amazing indian food and create childhood memories that will become as important to my kids as those memories are for me.

Just yesterday, I was in Dillards picking up something and the saleswoman made a comment about my 3 girls and I mentioned that we are anxiously awaiting the arrival our 4th daughter from India as well and she asked, "oh! are these all yours then?" pointing to the three blondies quickly spreading out across the store..I, slightly irritated but understanding it probably is coming from mere curiosity, say yes, these are my biological children. She had a confused look on her face and continued with her questions, attempting to find out why we would "choose adoption when we can have our own?" and I told her about our trip to Nebraska today and explained the "family" we are going to see there is the main reason we chose adoption.

For those of you that know us well, you know my best friend or at least know OF her if you have never met her. Janet and I met in 8th grade when her family moved to my town and we were inseparable until the day we graduated h.s.  By college, our parents had become close friends and they no longer needed us as a reason to get together, and our families moved past just being friends into being more like family.  Janet and I attended two different colleges but always picked up where we left off when we'd get together. In 2000, Janet and I went to Gujarat, India together for her to study her parent's language and for us to explore India a bit and it was here that I discovered that adoption would be something that I would want to do someday. 

So when it came to naming our daughter, we decided on Lillian for our newest daughter's name...this being Janet's middle name, we thought it to be a perfect way to honor our friendship as well as being classic and elegant. It was only after sharing our chosen name with Janet's mom (my second mother) that she asked me if I knew why they named their daughter Janet Lillian. I thought at this point, I knew everything about their family, but this was one story that escaped me.  I knew that Sam (janet's dad) was a methodist minister, and his father was found in a village in India by missionaries and eventually he came to the U.S. and got a theology degree and therefore Sam was given the chance to follow in his father's footsteps.  When Sam and Ella moved to the states, they got married and decided to raise their family "americanized". They said they wanted to name their children with American names and I assumed "Lillian" was just a name they liked when Janet was born, picked at random. Bear with me...this is the interesting part of the story ;) :  Apparently my assumptions were wrong as Janet was named after her father Sam's grandmother who grew up in an orphanage in India, run by a progressive lady who converted to Christianity before starting the orphanage. This was in the late 1800's and Christianity in a predominately Hindu society was rare, so I was more than shocked to discover Janet's great-grandma was given an English/Christian name when she arrived at this orphanage, hence the name "Lillian".  Unbeknownst to us, we have named our daughter simultaneously after my best friend and also after a woman who got the same start as our Lillian did. We have no doubt this is the right name for her and are so excited to be able to have this story to share that will connect her to her family in India as well as her family in the U.S.  :)

And I realize this post was probably long enough for two separate entries... so thanks for being patient!  We are so looking forward to a little "girl time" in Nebraska!  See you in a few days after too little sleep and too much food and just the right amount of fun!