All she wants for Christmas is a family

Who will love her

and cherish her.

Who accepts her, despite her disability.

Who longs to hold her in their arms

and make her their daughter.

Could you please help make Anna's

Christmas wish come true?

When all of the other gifts you have given

have long been forgotten,

this one special gift of helping Anna come to her forever family

will be remembered for a lifetime.

To make a tax deductible donation

click on Anna's picture below.

Everyone who makes a donation will be

included in our prize give away.  We will draw one name on December 15th

to give away one iPad 16gb w/ wi-fi.

The winner will have their iPad just in time for Christmas!

Thank you and God bless you!

Anna's fund is growing!

I noticed tonight that Anna's fund is growing through the Reece's Rainbow website!  Thanks to all of you who are donating!  If you donate through Reece's Rainbow and you want to be entered into our prize give away please send me a message letting me know that you made a donation.  We will be drawing for the iPad give away on December 15th.  Again, thanks to all of you for helping us get one dollar closer to bringing Anna home!

Orphan Sunday

Today is Orphan Sunday.  It is a way to rediscover the importance that Jesus desires for us to care for orphans.  Today should not be the only day that we seek out ways to help an orphan.  Jesus says that we should be doing this 365 days a year, not just one day a year.  There are millions of children who are fatherless, abandoned and neglected.  Many will die from malnutrition, neglect, lack of medical care and also a broken heart.  The early church was known for its sacrifical care of orphans and widows.  But what role do they play now?  What roles are we ourselves playing now, to take care of the orphans?

There are millions of orphans who have no one to love them, parent them and tell them about the love of Jesus.    Here are a few reminders of God's word that command us to take care of the orphans ~

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress." (James 1:27)

Psa 10:18 You defend the fatherless and oppressed, so that mere mortals may no longer terrorize them"Remember those…who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering." (Hebrews 13:3)

Psa 146:9  The Lord protects those residing outside their native land; he lifts up the fatherless and the widow, but he opposes the wicked. "Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, "Give them up!" and to the south, "Do not hold them back." Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth"  Isaiah 43:5-6
 
Mal 3:5 “I will come to you in judgment. I will be quick to testify against those who practice divination, those who commit adultery, those who break promises, and those who exploit workers, widows, and orphans, who refuse to help the immigrant and in this way show they do not fear me,” says the Lord who rules over all.

Job 29:12 for I rescued the poor who cried out for help, and the orphan who had no one to assist him;

Deu 26:12 When you finish tithing all your income in the third year (the year of tithing), you must give it to the Levites, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows so that they may eat to their satisfaction in your villages.


 
Our family wants to rescue an orphan who desperately needs a family of her own.  Little Anna was born in Eastern Europe 5 years ago.  Her parents refused to take her home from the hospital because she was born with Down syndrome.  She has remained in this orphanage since she was 17 days old.  Orphans in EE are typically transferred around the ages of 4-6 to mental institutions that make the baby house orphanages look like Disney World.  Our family is trying to rescue Anna before her country transfers her to one of those dreadful, awful places that you and I cannot even imagine what a horror this would be.  Can you please help us? If you are able,  you can make a tax deductible donation by clicking on the link below with Annas's picture.  From now until December 15 we will send anyone that makes a donation a pink awareness bracelet that reads "Saving Anna".  Everyone that makes a donation between now and Dec. 15 will also have their name entered into our drawing for a prize give away.  We will be giving away one 16gb iPad with wi-fi.  Wouldn't this make a great gift for someone on your Christmas list?  Could you please help us rescue this little girl before she is transferred to an institution?  Will you please tell your friends and family about our fundraiser by sharing our link?  If by the grace of God we reach $10,000 we will upgrade that prize to give away one Apple Macbook pro!! 
 

OR

 
 
We also ask that you pray for our family as we travel through this journey.  There have been a few stumbling blocks along the way and we were hoping that we would have a travel date soon.  Please pray that our path is more smooth as we close in on this journey to rescue a princess!

One more rescue mission

Oh my gosh, look at that sweet face!!  Here is another sweet baby that is on his way to a forever family!  Over the last several months I have read stories about people being inspired to adopt by following the journey of someone they know that are adopting through Reece's Rainbow.  I felt kind of weird by posting photos of waiting children from RR because to be honest with you, I can't imagine anyone I know following in our foot steps to go and rescue one of these precious children.  Well it happened.  A lady that I met back in August has fallen in love with this little fellow Quinton and she and her husband are now in the process of adopting him.  His mommy to be has a heart for children with special needs and fell in love with this sweet boy after reading our blog and visiting Reece's Rainbow!  This is soooooo exciting!  When she sent me an email last night that they were committing to Quinton, every hair on body stood right on up!  It felt like I had static electricity over my entire body!! Crazy!

I just want to thank the Lord for using us in any way to help make the way for more families to stand up and commit to bringing home one (or more) of the precious angels listed on RR.  Maybe you should go and check them out too!! 

Reece's Rainbow

We apologize

Okay I want to start off by saying that we sincerely apologize if you are offended by us reaching out for help to rescue Anna from a life in an institution. Apparently some people don't feel as passionate about helping other humans to have a better life. It's okay to make a donation to the Humane society to help animals. It's ok to donate to our local schools, and saving the trees and birds, but don't ask for a dollar to help save a childs life.

If you know our story, and some of you don't, then just read and know why we are doing what we are doing. I have followed Reece's Rainbow for over 2 years now. I have prayed many, many, many prayers for the children and the families that are adopting. We have donated money to several families along the way. I was born being a "giver" and so I guess it is hard for me to not relate to those who aren't. For over two years I have secretly wanted to go and rescue one of those beautiful orphans with Down syndrome but I knew my husband would NEVER go for it. So for 2 years I talked about the kids on Reece's Rainbow to him and my children but had never asked him what he thought about us adopting one of the children. Back at the first of the year I just out of the blue asked him if we could please adopt one of the orphans from Reece's Rainbow. His reaction blew me away. He said "absolutely not". With a broken heart I went away by myself and spoke these words out loud to God. God if you change his heart we will go and get her. These were words spoken out loud to God. So I just kept praying for him but never asked him again. A couple of months go by and I am sitting at work and Mike and I are emailing each other back and forth. Out of the blue comes this thought - Send him her picture. Ohhhhh you can believe I said right back - I can't do that, he will be mad at me. It didn't take long for me to realize you better send him that picture so I did. Well, our emailing back and forth stopped after that and I just knew he was mad at me. I went home that night and not a word was mentioned about the picture I had sent him so I just assumed he was unhappy with what I had done. The next day he brings it up to me and I started crying and poured my heart out to him and told him that I just couldn't get her off of my mind or my heart. After a few words were exchanged he said to me "we will talk to the boys about it". OK that almost blew me off of my chair!! Did he really just say those words? I couldn't believe it! Over the next couple of weeks of going back and forth he finally says OK we will do it. Well as soon as he said that I was attacked by all of these thoughts that we could never do this and we couldn't pull this off because this adoption will cost $30,000 + and we simply didn't have the money. So I started asking God for signs and honestly, every time I talked to him about a specific thing he would answer me. Riding down the road I told God, we don't have $30,000 how are we going to do this God? Is this really what you want us to do? A few seconds later there is a sign at a church above our house that read "Jump in with Faith". Okay God I get that message. So many times I would have these thoughts racing through my mind and wondered if we were really doing what God wanted us to do. I thought about how EASY it would be to BACK OUT now because we hadn't made our official committments but then God reminded me very quickly of what I had said out loud to him that day. "But you said if I changed his heart you WOULD go and get her, are you telling me now that it's just too hard to do?" THAT day I committed to God and haven't backed down since then, that despite the hardships we WOULD go and get her.



All along I have had the highest faith that God will provide a way for us to go and get her. I haven't doubted him at any point along the way. God knew when he changed Mike's heart that we DIDN'T have $30,000 to go and get her. He didn't have to do any work in Mike if he wasn't going to provide the finances for us to be able to adopt her. I believe that. I believe that in one way or another, God WILL make sure we are able to carry out his plan. BUT last night I read something that just went straight to the heart. People that don't know our story saying that what we are doing is wrong and that we shouldn't have committed to her if we didn't have $30,000. Really? Did God tell YOU that? Because that is not what he told me. Well are you making sacrifices? Of course we are! Mike and I do NOT go on high dollar vacations and do not blow money on brand new cars and a lot of things that we don't need. Last year we went to visit my family in Maryland and that was it, no other vacations that year. This year we went no where, trying to save money... and we are fine with that. Heck we might never go on vacation again and I could care less really. We are trying to save a life people....not asking for money for a brand new car.



I told Mike last night about what I had read, that we shouldn't be fundraising to adopt her. He told me that I worry too much about what other people think about me. Well that's just me and I can't help that. So this morning, a sweet, sweet person said something to me that put everything back in to perspective. You see, she has fallen in love with a wee one on Reece's Rainbow too. She was having a conversation with her pastor about her desire to adopt this baby with Down syndrome and she told him "we don't have the money to adopt him". The reply from her pastor was something like- you can reach out for help and if it is in God's plan everything will work out. She handed me a check to go towards our funds for Anna and I held myself together until I got to my car. She had no idea what I was struggling with after what I read last night that upset me so much!! I was so discouraged last night and this morning that I wanted to shut my blog down and not reach out to another person for help, UNTIL she said what she did to me!!! God is helping me to understand that there are going to be people who don't like what we are doing or asking for money. In fact, there are some people who think we have lost our minds for adopting another child with Down syndrome!!! One person even said to me - why would you do that to yourself? Do what to myself, save a life? How harsh is that? So I am just going to leave it here and say- if you are among those that are offended by us raising money for a good cause, then we deeply apologize. You can delete the link to our blog and never be bothered by us again. And then I want to say to all of you that don't think we are crazy and want to help us and have helped us - WE THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF OUR HEARTS AND MAY GOD BLESS YOU!!!