National Adoption Month

November is National Adoption Month. As many of you know, my wife and I want to grow our family. As it turns out, I have some issues which hamper that wish. After considering and praying on a gamut of options, Cana and I feel called to adopting.

The adoption process is neither quick nor inexpensive. Your love, support, and prayers help bolster our patience. We thank you all for helping us carry the emotional strain that comes with waiting.

Financially, we need help as well. Please keep in mind, we are not asking anyone to pay for the entire process, but any little bit helps. Below is a link to our GoFundMe, but that is far from the only way to help. We also have a CafePress store (http://www.cafepress.com/thebrownsadopt) and my lovely and talented wife #willcrochetforadoption (https://www.facebook.com/willcrochetforadoption/).


We appreciate the love, support, caring, compassion, well wishes, prayers, and good vibes more than any of you will ever know. And, should you feel called or compelled to help us financially in our adoption as we are growing our family and #findingourcrayons, we thank you so very much.

Mike
#FindingOurCrayons

Pass It Around: Brown Family Yard Sale!

THIS SATURDAY, 10/15/2016, 7AM to 1PM

We are having a YARD SALE**!  

We are selling everything from appliances, wedding decor, clothes, dvds, blu-rays, and sooooo much more!

Below are some pictures that are just samples of what we are selling.

So, come on out, send your friends and family. We greatly appreciate all your help with pulling this off! 

**All Proceeds go towards Mike & Cana's Adoption fund**


Mike & Cana
#FindingOurCrayons

Fundraisers and My Patience Level (or Lack there of)

If you know anything about me (That is, Cana), then you will know patience is not my virtue.  Just ask Mike, I have no patience.  I don't wait well, I never have.  I do a bit better if I have a timeline, but sometimes it just makes things worse.

But that is the thing about adoptions, there is no time frame on which everything will be completed.  No 9 month time line there. But, I guess after YEARS and YEARS of avoiding asking God to grant me patience, He decided to give me a lesson in it anyways.

So we started working on what fundraisers we are going to do to help me focus on something other than the wait,  and raise money for the adoption.  We already had the GoFundMe.com page, but we realized that there are some people who won't use that to help.  So, we then looked at other options and started working on the next 2 fundraisers: Yardsale and T-shirt Sale!

For the t-shirts, we are using Bonfire, a site that allows a campaign for up to 21 days...

We picked the primary to be in Tahiti Blue (Because Tahiti is a magical place! *Geeky Smile*), but we also have Espresso Brown, Light Pink, Heavy Metal Gray, and Cardinal Red.  If you are interested in a t-shirt, click here!

Mike also created a CafePress store to sell a t-shirt design he came up with for our adoption.

This one is my favorite style shirt... 

The great thing about CafePress, there is no time limit on how long you can sell something.  But is more than just shirts too... So you probably need to just check it out in all it's glory.  For the CafePress Store, you can Click Here!

But, we also decided we are going to do a yard sale.  Because we live so far out in the middle of no where, we are trying to figure out if the Jockey Lot will be our best option, or if someone will loan us their yard for the yard sale.  Also, anyone who might have items to donate, we would appreciate it as well.  Our goal is to do the yard sale in October.

And these are just the fundraisers that we could think of that we could easily do. We are hoping between now and January, we will come up with the next set of fundraisers for the new year, if we haven't reached our total goal.

So while I am starting to learn what patience really means, I wanted to let all of y'all know how thankful I am for all your help, support, and thoughts/prayers.  And even if you can't help financially or with a donation of items, I know that you are thinking of us, lifting us up in prayer, and giving us support in the ways that you can.


Cana

The Start of Something New

As many of you know, we are adopting (if you are new to following our blog, then this might be a surprise.  For those of you that have been in any contact with us here on the blog, facebook or in person, you know this already!)

We have been saving up for the adoption now for a couple of months.  And we will continue to save until we reach our goal.  It is slow going, but we are working hard to reach it. 

A lot of y'all have been asking about us having a GoFundMe campaign. 

And here it is!




If you want to go to our GoFundMe campaign, Click Here. 

Please know that we are not asking for your money.  If you want to donate, please feel free to. 

We greatly appreciate all your love and support as we travel this path towards growing our family!

Mike & Cana

A Penny Saved Is a Penny Earned

“God Knew that it doesn't matter how your children get to your family.  It just matters that they get there."  Kira Mortenson

When you think about adoption, about your children that are out there, just waiting for you, you know it doesn't matter what you have to do to get them.  It only matters that in the end they are with you.

What is hard to accept is the cost of adoption.  There is no such thing as a free adoption.  On average, adoptions range between $18,000-60,000 depending on where you adopt from and how quickly the adoption takes place.  That cost doesn't count what you pay for outside of the agency.  Things like home renovation aren't accounted for in those costs.  And still for us, it doesn't matter.

Now, that is not to say that I'm not stressing over where that money will come from.  Because, I totally am stressing at times.  I mean, $18,000 is a LOT of money.  I don't think I've ever seen that much money in one place at one time.  So we did something to help me not stress so much about the money.

We have this jar on our dining room table.  It is a simple, blue mason jar that I bought for our wedding, with one of my scrapbook stickers on it.  Mike chose what the jar would be labeled as, and wrote it on the jar.  He calls it the "Goodbye Geek Room Jar".  I call it our "baby jar".  But in all reality, it is one of our adoption funds. 

Protected by the T.A.R.D.I.S and a Dalek

It is simple and plain.  It isn't very full, but we put in what change and cash we have.  We have jars on our desk at work, and our loving co-workers have helped by putting coinage in the jars too.

It isn't our only funds for our adoption, (No, we have our savings accounts that we are trying to line with the money needed for the adoption) but it is the most visible one.  For me, it is a beautiful, physical reminder that one day, in the place of that simple blue mason jar, we will have a child sitting at our table. 

And that is what helps us keep saving.  We are only 15% towards our first of 2 goals. Once we have reached the first goal, we can start the paperwork, and go through the home study.  And it seems so far away, especially, when you think that 15% is still so far from 100% of just goal #1. 

In the mean time, we are going to keep preparing our hearts and our home for our future child. 

Cana