CHRISTMAS TREES FOR Our Baby Girl

We are doing a fundraiser
to help bring our adopted baby girl home from Ethiopia

we are selling Christmas trees for $15 any tree


Special thank-you to Brad & Mary Jo Young of Scotts Mills for the trees

these are noble trees from 5-7 feet ~ freshly cut

please consider purchasing a tree from us to help in our adoption

we will cut the trees weekly and deliver them to our house
So pick them up in Silverton

(Across from Silverton city park bathrooms~up against hillside)

E-MAIL US OR CALL FOR OUR ADDRESS OR DIRECITONS!

Monday through Fridays 4pm-10pm
Saturdays anytime 7am-10pm
Sundays (after church 1pm-10pm)

November 28 through December 23

Questions: Call 503-873-6934 or cell: 503-881-4633
E-mail: awitha@verizon.net

Special Considerations:
If you need a tree taller than 7’ or a tree smaller than 5’, just call ahead of time and we can get one.
If you prefer to cut one down yourself, we will arrange one or two Saturdays in Scotts Mills to do just that.
If you need it delivered, we can possibly work this out as well.
If we are not at our house, call and we can arrange a place for you to leave the money 


Thank you for helping with our adoption!!
Adamandamberstutzman.blogspot.com

BABY BOTTLE COIN DRIVE BEGINS~

so, new fundraiser starting for our adoption-we are doing a "Baby Bottle Coin Drive". Basically, we are giving out these baby bottles and asking people to just fill them with their spare change-so if you don't have one already and you would like one-we would be thrilled to be able to give you one! Let us know and we will get one to ya. We are asking that you just collect change until Jan 1st and then get them back to us-Thank you again and again for helping us raise the money to go pick up baby Abigail! A friend gave me the picture on the bottles-if you didn't notice it is an ultrasound picture with africa in it-I thought it was pretty creative!

Lately I have just been doing a lot of soul searching about orphans and how blessed we are here and how we just can't have any concept of what their lives are like in other countries-we take SO much for granted and yet, THEY are some of the happiest people you can know! There joy is not found in things and I think this is a main difference. I know deep down that somehow I need to get more involved-to save the lives of these children-even saving one life is worth it-one at a time.

I am in awe of the fact that somewhere out there someone is pregnant with OUR daughter-I know I have said this before, but it is just such an amazing thing! I think of her birth mom often and pray for her hoping that she is OK, getting enough food and clean water and enough support. Who knows what her situation is-sometimes I just lay in bed at night and am overwhelmed by emotion as to what she must be going through. While we are waiting excitedly, she is mourning the loss that she must face and the indescribable thought of giving up her own baby. It breaks my heart. I can't at all imagine giving up one of my children and yet I am so thankful that she will and that others do. My thoughts will be with her each day probably forever-she will always be a part of me. Adoption is truly a God-ordained, miraculous thing!

Such a Challenging Video

This was so challenging to me and it should be watched by all! Francis Chan the author of the amazing book Crazy Love that we are doing in our women's Bible study

What will YOU do?

This was on focus on the family this morning-it is Kay Warren, wife of author Rick Warren (Purpose driven life), and it so touched me! It really challenged me though more than anything-WHAT WILL THE CHURCH DO??? Please listen to this 25 minutes broadcast!
http://listen.family.org/daily/A000002304.cfm

Cassidy's Count Down

Here is Cassidy with her chain link of how many people get a baby before we do-it is her countdown. There are 30 links and we will remove some after we get our December numbers and each following month. No real news here, other than still waiting to get our fingerprint appointment in Portland so that we can be able to get our favorable determination letter to bring an orphan into the country-this whole process is so much about waiting that we are really learning our patience! It is so nice to have all the other paperwork done and we are just concentrating getting some fundraisers going in the near future-

OUR DOSSIER IS ON ITS WAY TO ETHIOPIA

We got an e-mail today from Kiersten our caseworker saying that she had just mail off our Dossier to the Ethiopian Government. It has already been sealed, notarized and signed by Hilary Clinton who is our Secretary of State for the USA-see the picture. You can't tell from the pictures, but it was ONE THICK package-all tied together with a ribbon-SO MANY documents! It is amazing all the work that went into that!!
Now it will wait in Ethiopia our daughter's birth country, being approved, until we get our referral of our baby girl. We are so glad that it is complete and done and on its way-now we just pray it will arrive safely and not get lost-which has happened before. We are on our way!

NOVEMBER NUMBERS ARE IN!

Well, our new number for November is.......
31 !!!!!!!!!!!!! We are excited! That means we moved 11 spots in ONE month! Wow! We are hoping and praying that we have a referral of a baby girl by April! We will see. Here is a picture of the 31 that the kids did and if you can't tell that that is a 3 and a 1, then here is another one made from beads that will go in Abby's hair! This month, we are waiting to get our fingerprints, AGAIN, up in Portland at the CIS office. We should be doing that within the next 2 weeks after we get our appt. This allows us to get the form to bring an orphan into this country, a favorable determination letter is what it is called.
So glad our numbers jumped so much! We are excited-it is getting more real every month!

THE CANS ARE IN!!!

Well Zachary is pleased to announce that the can drive has earned him a GRAND TOTAL of $235! towards our adoption....He did good! Thank you to everyone who gave your cans and water bottles. We will continue to take them for those of you who just don't want to deal with taking them back! You can always leave them on our front porch, or bring them to work and Zach will continue to put them toward bringing Abby home! Thank you thank you!
We should get our November official number on the wait list sometime within the next week, but unofficially, due to all of the referrals this month, we are around number 34. It is moving! I anticipate that it will be around 6 months until we get a referral of a baby girl. Amazingly, the last several referrals have been babies that are 3, 4, 5, and 6 weeks old!!! Wow, could have never imagined that we would get a young baby!
We are trying to come up with some ideas for a fundraiser or two. We still need to cover the costs of part of our referral money and ALL of our travel expenses-total these are about $8,000! We know God will provide, but we are thinking of doing either a bowling fundraiser or a spaghetti dinner. We will let you know-