only God could write this story

Most Recent Famiy Picture

2012-02-14T14:06:00.000-05:00

This is the picture that will go on the last page of Daniel's lifebook (the scrapbook that tells the story of his journey to us):

And this is the letter that will go with that picture:

Dear Daniel,

It did not take a judge or a lawyer or an agency to tell us you were a Soutter. From the moment we first heard about you, we loved you and wanted you for our son. Even though children become part of a family in different ways, the end result is the same: they are a family and that child is loved bunches and bunches! Always remember, families are about how you feel on the inside, not how you look on the outside. Mommy made this book for you so that you would know your adoption story and know that we value every second of your life. Whenever you have questions or just want to talk, please come to us.

We love you so much-
Mom and Dad

Sidenote: Since Daniel has been home 7 months now, I am not updating this blog as often as I once was. I blog almost daily at The Intentional Home. Sure would love for you to visit me there.

Family Pics. . .

2011-10-04T13:41:00.011-04:00

Anna made this for me after our recent day trip to the beach.

And just think we have a session scheduled for an extended family portrait of 13 of us. . .7 kids, 6 adults.

I'll remind everyone of Anna's quote :)

Got Plans for Dinner this Thursday, 9/15??

2011-09-13T15:28:00.002-04:00

Got plans for dinner this Thursday night??

Our friends the Corbetts have just started the process of adopting a little girl from Ethiopia (using the same agency we did).

And this Thursady, Sept. 15 from 5-8pm, there is a fundraiser at the Falls Village Chick-Fil-A (located at 6701 Falls of Neuse Rd).

If you bring in the below flier, a portion of your dinner purchase will go towards their adoption.

You MUST have the above flier in order for the Corbetts to receive the proceeds from your sale. They are not allowed to hand them out that night. The easiest way to print would be to copy and paste into a word document and then print.

You can even use the flier at the drive-thru. But I think you might want to come in because the Corbetts are holding a raffle and silent auction. See the Corbett's blog to see the items they will be raffling and the items that are included in the silent auction (photo sessions, beach rentals, mt. rentals, jewelry, and more!)

What an easy way to encourage a family. . what an easy way to make a difference. . .what an easy way to care for the orphan. . .

I hope to see you there. Rob has open house that night at his school so it will just be me and the kids. My hope is to be inside hanging out. . letting my younger kids play on the playground. . .us eating some chicken nuggets and fries. . .but depending on how the kids are doing, I may have to swing thru drive-thru.

You Gotta Watch This: Kisses from Katie video

2011-08-06T11:33:00.000-04:00

Here's another reminder of what happens when we say yes to God.

Below is another reminder that God does not put an age limit on when He starts using you. . or when you can hear His voice. . .or when He gives you a "call on your life".

Below is another reminder that God can use ordinary people to do extraordinary Kingdom work.

And below is another reminder that my kids belong to God and not me.

You gotta watch this video about Katie Davis:

What a great video to show my kids. . .to show our youth group.

And below is Amazon's description of the book:

What would cause an eighteen-year-old old senior class president and homecoming queen from Nashville, Tennessee, to disobey and disappoint her parents by forgoing college, break her little brother’s heart, lose all but a handful of her friends (because the rest of them think she has gone off the deep end), and break up with the love of her life, all so she could move to Uganda, where she knew only one person but didn’t know any of the language?"

A passion to make a difference.

Katie Davis left over Christmas break her senior year for a short mission trip to Uganda and her life was turned completely inside out. She found herself so moved by the people and children of Uganda that she knew her calling was to return and care for them. She has given up a relatively comfortable life—at a young age—to care for the less fortunate of this world. She was so moved by the need she witnessed, she's centered her life around meeting that need. Katie, a charismatic and articulate young woman, is in the process of adopting 13 children in Uganda, and she completely trusts God for daily provision for her and her family.

Despite the rough conditions in which Katie lives, she has found a life of service to God to be one of great joy. Katie's children bring constant delight and help her help others by welcoming whoever comes to their door. As the challenges grow, so does Katie's faith and her certainty that what she's doing in Uganda, one person at a time, will have far-reaching rewards. It isn't the life she planned, but it is the life she loves.

To further her reach into the needs of Ugandans, Katie established Amazima Ministries. The ministry matches orphaned children with sponors worldwide. Each sponsor's $300/year provides schooling, school supplies, three hot meals a day, minor medical care, and spiritual encouragement. Katie expected to have forty children in the program; she had signed up 150 by January 2008; today it sponsors over 400. Another aspect of the ministry is a feeding program created for the displaced Karamojong people—Uganda's poorest citizens. The program feeds lunch to over 1200 children Monday-Friday and sends them home with a plate of food; it also offers basic medical care, Bible study, and general health training.

Katie Davis, now 22, is more than fascinating, she's inspiring, as she has wholeheartedly answered the call to serve.

Here is a link to Katie's blog.

Here is a link to Katie's ministry.

And here is a link to the book, Kisses from Katie on Amazon. I look forward to reading this book aloud to my kiddos.

What is going well. . .

2011-06-28T18:53:00.011-04:00

Sometimes you just need to go around the table and speak out what it going well.

Galeta has been home for 3 weeks now and all 7 of us are in the midst of major change, transition, adjusting, sacrificing. . .it has not been easy for any of us. Here's 6 of the 7 of us. . I was taking the picture. I love how everyone is connected. . touching. . holding hands.

So this evening we went around that table and each said what we were liking about the summer. We reminded each other that there were some good points to our summer days.

Here are our answers:

David: the pool, especially the fact that we now let him ride his bike up there by himself

Anna: she said David stole her answer. . she too likes the freedom of riding her bike up to the pool

Jonathan: He liked the thunder and rain. . which Rob pointed out was a good thing since he used to be so scared of the thunder. He also said he likes the painting we have been doing.

Brooke: playing with her friends at the pool and the fact that she and Anna get to homeschool Galeta and Jonathan

Galeta had a list of 4 things. We were amazed he understood the question. This is what he said:

"bike, pool, outside, hungry, oranges, bananas, raisins, all done"

It made me cry. He was saying he likes his new bike that is his very own (he no longer had to ride Jonathan's), the pool, going outside, and when he is hungry he got his choice of oranges, bananas, or raisins. All done meant he had nothing more to say and it was my turn.

Su: I hate to admit that it took me longer to come up with an answer than the kids. I was glad I was #6 and had a few minutes to think. I had 3 things on my list:

1. the older kids have really rallied and helped out tons with Galeta and Jonathan. . they take them outside to ride bikes, jump on trampoline, walk the neighbor's dog. Anna and Brooke homeschool Galeta and Jonathan teaching them their letters and sounds. . .even come up with lesson plans the night before. . like they had the boys flip thru magazines and cut out all the "G"s they found.

2. I was thankful for friends dropping off groceries and meals. . .giving me one less thing to think about. . .and a little adult interaction in the day.

3. I was thankful for the summer months where Rob is able to come home 30 min-hour earlier than usual. Making it until 5pm is a lot easier than making it til 6pm.

Rob: I think we never got to him. . . by then I think Galeta was on his 2nd helping of dinner, J had spilled his water, and Anna and David were in need of a ride to youth group. . .and that is exactly why it is good to remember what is going well.

a sweet conversation I had in the airport. . .

2011-06-17T15:19:00.001-04:00

On our flight home, we had a layover in Washington, home of many Ethiopian immigrants. There is even a section of DC called Little Ethiopia.

As Rob and Galeta were entering the airport bathroom, the worker asked, "Is he Ethiopian?" pointing to Galeta.

I smiled and said, "Yes, are you?"

She said "Yes." And then thanked me for adopting an older boy. She told me he was handsome and that he was lucky.

I stumbled over my words and told her, I thought I was the lucky one. That I could not believe I got to be his mom. And honestly, I was embarrassed by my response. Did she understand what I meant? Did she get my heart?

She continued by telling me that many of her friends killed themselves in Ethiopia because there was no food and killing themselves was better than dying a slow death of starvation. She said that is why so many Ethiopian have come here to DC.

She asked me if my boy's mom and dad were dead.

I said yes. She nodded as if to say, of course they are.

I told her adoption was not the ideal. That I wanted Galeta to be in Ethiopia with his mom and dad. And that sometimes the world was not fair. Again, I wondered did she get me? Not because she did not speak or understand English. . she did and spoke it very well. . .but did she really get that I loved this boy like my own flesh and blood.

She nodded. She said she knew well that life was not fair. She then asked why I would adopt a child that was not related to me. I was a little taken aback by the personal questions and began to think, "Where is Rob? He always knows just what to say, has the right words." I am so not a fast thinker.

But Rob was still in the bathroom with Galeta and so with tears in my eyes, I just told her the truth.

I told her because deep deep inside me. . .how could I say no to a kid who needed a mom and dad when I could give him that. I told her that Rob and I had a good marriage and promised to be together forever.

I told her because deep deep inside me. . .how could I say no to a kid who wanted to belong to brothers and sisters. . .who wanted to belong to a family. . . when I could give him that. I told her that I had 4 other children that were so excited for Galeta to come home.

I told her because deep deep inside me. . .how could I say no to a kid who needed a home when I have been blessed with a house that could easily hold one more.

I promised her that I would always love Galeta and always take care of him.

She asked me if I was a Christian.

I said yes, that is the real reason I can adopt this child. I told her that God gave me this love for this boy. Again. .wondering if I was speaking the right words. . oh, I was so nervous.

She asked what kind of Christian?

I hesitated knowing that this is where our different backgrounds might confuse us. So I simply said, "One that loves Jesus and wants to show His love to others."

She smiled. And at that point I think she got me. We were on the same page. We both knew that injustice is wrong. We both knew that all kids are made in the image of Our Creator. We both knew that we were put on this earth for more than our own pleasure.

I am sharing this story at:

where women are talking about The Practice of Faith.

Truly Blessed

2011-06-09T09:19:00.002-04:00

How It is Going. . .How He is Reacting. ..It's Been 3 Days

2011-06-07T11:16:00.005-04:00

We've been home 3 days now. A family of 7 for 3 days.

All things considered, we are doing really well.

Galeta is a sweet boy. The first thing he did when we entered our home was unzip our suitcase and give each of his siblings a wrapped gift. These gifts of traditional Ethiopian clothes were from our adoption agency. Galeta also got his Ethiopian clothes out of the suitcase and put them on.

Galeta instructed Brooke on how to wear the scarf with her dress.

And then Galeta went outside to investigate the skateboards, bikes, and go carts he eyed when he walked up the porch stairs into the house. Yes, within an hour of being home, Galeta was whizzing down the hill. So much for not overstimulating him.

He will fit in just pefectly with the crazy Soutter kids (and Dad!)

Every morning after breakfast. . and Galeta is getting up sooo early (this morning it was 4am, guess he is still on Ethiopian time). . .he is outside riding fearlessly down the hill.

Our goal really was for a slow pace life. . a non stimulating environment. We had purged or boxed up so many items. But even without all the toys and decor. . .life with 4 siblings is very, very stimulating.

The kids adore Galeta and are constantly wanting to show him something or asking him a question or just simply trying to get his attention by repeating his name over and over again.

Last night we talked to the kids about not calling his name, but simply watching what he was doing and then joining him in that activity. If he is coloring, they are to color with him. . .not ask him if he wants to go outside or if he wants to play trains. If he is sitting on the couch, they are to sit with him.

I dropped David off at the pool last night. . just so he could have some time away from the chaos. And David told me, "I think we got the best kid, Mom. I really do. Galeta is so much fun to be around. And just think, in 6 months or so, when he knows English, he will be that much more fun!!" That made me smile.

Wrestling seems to be a universal boy thing. Yes, there are my 3 sons. Again, so much for not overstimulating Galeta.

And then Dad had to get in on the fun.

What else?

Galeta cries before naptime and bedtime. . from pure exhaustion? from being jetlagged? from being told to go to bed and he does not want to? from missing all that is familiar to him?? I am not quite sure. Probably a mix of it all.

And although my heart breaks to see tears run down his face, I am thankful. Thankful that he is showing emotion. Thankful that he is not numb. I know from all our adoption reading that this is a good sign.

And he also laughs easily.

He cannot be left alone. . .it is like having a 6 month old (who knows nothing), but a 6 month old with the physical capabilities of a 6 year old. I am thankful that David has stayed home from school the past 2 days. Gives me a little break.

But yesterday, David was mowing the neighbor's lawn. And Galeta watched him blow the grass off the driveway and the next thing I know, Galeta has the blower in his hand and is blowing the grass off our driveway. He is observant and smart. But cannot be left alone. He has already pushed the buttons of the dishwasher, stove, and stereo. He has already picked up the phone when it rings and said "hello".

Galeta is already learning English and can say all our names as well as:
come. toilet. shoes. I am thirsty. I am hungry.What it is? water. thank you. wash hands. Just today, he asked David, "Where is dog?". . cause David had left to walk the neighbor's dog. And when I served lunch, Galeta said, "Thank you Mom."

Rob has gotten pretty good at cooking Ethiopian food. We are thankful that we discovered that the Jerusalem Bakery next door to the Ethiopian restaurant here in Raleigh sells injera. And we discovered that injera freezes. Although, we discovered yesterday that Galeta likes fresh salsa with tortilla chips and hummus with crackers. He devours mangoes, bananas, and oranges. . .he has us all eating a little bit healthier.

He eats a lot. Because he does not know when his next meal is coming? Because food is so accessible? Because he really is hungry? He always clears his plate and often asks for more. He comes to me about every hour and half and says he is hungry. I right now am feeding him each time to communicate that I will take care of him. I am there to meet his needs.

This is definitely the hardest thing we have ever done and we are quite overwhelmed. There was no catching up from jetlag. There was hardly time to unpack and wash clothes with 5 kids longing for our attention. I have yet to get a shower. . only because I crave sleep more than clean hair and body. We are physically exhausted. And emotionally all over the place (me, not Rob, of course). I cry out hourly for strength and energy and wisdom and the control to not yell when J frustrates me or when Galeta makes a huge mess. And I keep reminding myself, to think big picture. .I envision what this boy is going to be like at 16. . .and I get tears of thankfulness and happiness in my eyes.

Our J is having the hardest time. All our kids are having to sacrifice for which we prepared them for. But J, being just 4 does not understand. He is used to being doted on by his 3 older siblings and now G is getting that attention. J screams and throws tantrums and cries often. He and G have already gotten into a fight while playing playdough and cars. But they also are the ones that play together the most often.

But you know, yesterday morning, Galeta grabbed my neck and kissed me. He initiated it, not me. Last night he crawled up in Rob's lap and put his head on his shoulder and stayed there for about 10 min while Rob rubbed his back. And it has only been 3 days. I think it is all going to work out just fine.

We Are Home!!

2011-06-06T07:21:00.009-04:00

We landed in Raleigh at 1:34 on Saturday. . .after 27 hours of travel.

Travel went smoothly and we stayed safe and healthy. Most importantly we returned with Galeta. Galeta was so excited to get on that airplane. . .there are many stories to share. But 2 are:

1. On Friday, the day we were to leave, Galeta ran up to the guard of the guest house and told him that today was the day he was going to America.

2. In the airport, he saw another little girl that was obviously adopted and he went up to her and said in Amharic, "Do you know English yet? I already know a few words!!" (that is what the Ethiopian man behind us told us. . Galeta made the man giggle).

We spent most of the week hanging out at the Ethiopian guest house. It was very relaxing (no email or to-do list, no cooking or cleaning) and gave us many, many hours to bond with our new son.

Click here to see pictures of our reunion and read what our agency director wrote about our reunion (she just happened to be in Ethiopia when we were).

Thanks for all your emails. We will try to write a post tonight about how it is going and how Galeta is reacting so come back tomorrow.

We leave tomorrow!!

2011-05-28T21:23:00.003-04:00

We leave tomorrow. 4am. To travel 1/2 way around the world and drastically change the life of our family and little Galeta.

Here is a pic of Galeta taken yesterday. . it was after lunch and all the kids were suppose to be taking a nap.

I cannot believe I get to be this boy's mom. . .that I get to love him, and teach him, and disciple him, and be part of his healing. . .it makes me cry. I cannot believe God asked me?? I so wish more could experience this. . .it is crazy!!

We will land in Ethiopia on Monday morning and go get Galeta. We will spend Monday and Tuesday playing with Galeta at the guest house and possibly go shop at the market. On Wednesday all 3 of us go to our Embassy appointment. On Thursday we are supposed to go back to the orphanage where they will have a good-bye celebration. On Friday we pick up Galeta's visa and board the plane that night. After almost 24 hours of travel we will arrive in Raleigh on Saturday afternoon.

Our biggest prayer request is for Galeta. We know he is excited, but this will be a monumental transition. Can you imagine all the thoughts in his head as he enters this strange new land and brand new family? There will be nothing familiar. He has never been on a plane, eaten Cheerios, ridden a bike, seen so many white people... the list could go on for pages. And he won't speak English! So please pray for lots of peace as he makes this jump.

Thanks for sharing the journey with us. . now is when the real adventure begins!!

Galeta is Coming Home!!

2011-05-20T13:56:00.000-04:00

On Sunday, May 29th we will board a plane and head to Ethiopia.

From Monday, May 30th on, Mommy, Daddy, and Galeta will finally be together!! Forever!

Here's a picture of Galeta that was taken just last week.

We have an Embassy date of Wed, June 1 where we apply for a visa. Our visa will be ready Friday, June 3 and we will leave for home. . all 3 of us that night.

Our plane lands on Sat, June 4 at 1:45pm. . .and that is when the real adventure begins!!

We are busy preparing for travel. . .I will be posting info on the blog. . prayer requests for when we travel. . need of items to take down to Ethiopia. . .info about meeting us at the airport, if you desire.

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An email will be sent to your email address to confirm that you do indeed want our posts sent to your email, so you will want to open that email and click the button.

More soon. Thanks for coming alongside us.

Galeta Gets a Letter from Us!!

2011-05-16T17:09:00.000-04:00

We sent Galeta a few pictures and a letter. . . via a couple who is traveling this week to bring their son home. Here is Abdissa, our attorney showing Galeta the pictures and the letter, see it on the desk?

The letter read:

Dear Galeta-

We miss you. We pray for you everyday. We want to be with you.

There is still some paperwork that needs to be done and then we can come be with you. We are praying we get to be with you soon.

When we come to Ethiopia, we will spend a few days there and then Mommy, Daddy, and you will get on an airplane and fly to America.

We love you very much. We will always love you. We will take good care of you.

And then we put a picture of the 3 of us together when we were in Ethiopia,

and a picture of his 4 siblings telling him they were excited to play with him, and a picture of our van since last time we were there he was fascinated with vans and when we told him we had a van, he wanted to see it.

Please pray that we will be together forever soon.

Deja Vu: Our Case Was Submitted

2011-05-13T13:43:00.001-04:00

So we got an email this Wed (May 11) that said our case was submitted to the Embassy Tuesday, May 10.

NOT last Tuesday as originally communicated.

I am emotionally frazzled.

I have been checking my email every 5 minutes.

I have been getting up in the middle of the night to check my email (because Ethiopia is 7 hours ahead of us).

And then thoughts like "what if my email is not communicating with the Embassy's email and I missed the email" keep running thru my mind.

I have not been able to concentrate on anything. . .and have been glued to my computer.

And I have been like that all last week, now I know. . . needlessly

And then here I am again this week.

So AGAIN, I sure would appreciate prayers that our case passes thru with no red flags. . that nothing needs to be investigated further. . and that we are simply assigned travel dates. We should hear the end of this week or early next week. . .maybe.

And I would appreciate prayers for the grace to "Be still, and know He is God". I would appreciate prayers that I realize who I am really waiting on. . that I am able to look back at God's long track record of perfect timing and faithfulness. Because as my girlfriend reminded me (cause I am barely thinking straight)::

You are not waiting on the Embassy.

You are not waiting for an email.

You are actually waiting on Him.

Our Case Was Submitted!

2011-05-03T17:44:00.007-04:00

We JUST heard that our case was submitted to the US Embassy today.

Sure would appreciate prayers that our case passes thru with no red flags. . that nothing needs to be investigated further. . and that we are simply assigned travel dates.

We should hear in a few days. Thursday is a holdiay in Ethiopia. . .Patriot's Victory Day and commemorates the liberation from Italian occupation by the Allied Forces during the East African Campaign of 1941. . . so perhaps we will hear something Friday or early next week.

For about a month now, we have been praying that God would give us a visa by May 15th, a date we feel like was placed in our hearts. From an earthly perspective, this is not very likely. From the other perspective, our God is the King of the Universe who can do anything.

Either way, we rejoice that we are one step closer to bringing our son home.

Why Are Things Taking So Long? Where's God?

2011-05-01T17:17:00.000-04:00

It has been 3 months since we passed Ethiopian court. It has been 3 months since we met Galeta. We were emailed a recent picture. We almost did not recognize him with his shaved head:

We still are not in the Embassy.

The US Embassy is now requesting that all documents from Ethiopia include a lot of information that was not previously required. The US Embassy is also expecting that all names and dates match perfectly, which is not a strength of the Ethiopian culture. Galeta's name has been spelled Galeta, Geleta, Galata.

Prior to these new requirements from the Embassy, it took 6 weeks from court approval to Embassy submission. Seems like our case is caught between the new rules and the old rules. Seems like we would have been grandfathered in under old rules since we had passed court so long ago, but no, more paperwork is being collected and since Galeta is from Gimbie, a village 12 hours from the capital, each new piece of paperwork, each piece that needs to be corrected is taking a while.

We are weary. We pray that Galeta knows we are true to our word and we will come back. We pray that the fact Galeta is getting lab work done and going to doctor appts. .all required by the Embassy. . .signals to him that our reunion is coming soon.

Sometimes when people hear of all the delays and obstacles, they ask questions like:
"Do these delays make you wonder if you missed God?" "Do they make you wonder if God doesn't want you to adopt?"

The answer is "No. No, the delays, bumps in the road, and obstacles do not make us wonder if we missed God." For starters we are very sure of the call God first gave us. We know the desire he place in the heart of all 6 of us. We vividly remember how the kids jumped up and down shouting for joy when we announced the decision to move forward and adopt again.

We also look at the way God has provided over the last year. How He brought Galeta into the orphanage the day before our dossier was accepted, how He provided $40,000, and how He connected us with a Raleigh family adopting Galeta's friends.

Lastly, we know that obstacles and delays are a part of following God. Many times when we step out in faith, we expect God to open the heavens and pave a clear path. But that is not the way it works. Typically when we step out, trials come. We see this pattern throughout the Bible:

Noah starts building an ark and his neighbors start making fun of him.
Moses asks Pharaoh to let his people go and Pharaoh says "no" (ten times!)
When Peter stepped out on the water, the wind and waves didn't stop. It almost appears as though the wind and waves got bigger once Peter got out of the boat.

No, obstacles and delays don't make us question the call of God, quite the opposite. We know adoption is on God's heart. We also know that satan hates adoption and would love nothing more than to keep us from our boy. We understand that obstacles and delays are a part of following God. We pray that we meet those obstacles with a faith and an attitude that honors Jesus.

1 Peter 1: 6-7 says:

In this (salvation) you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief and all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith- of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire- may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

You Know You're an Adoptive Parent If:

2011-04-29T16:24:00.006-04:00

The below made me smile when I originally stumbled upon it here. Posting it below so I have it "saved":

You know you're an adoptive parent (or should be) if:

1. The fact that there are 143 million children without a parent to kiss them goodnight has made you lose sleep.

2. You realize DNA has nothing to do with love and family.

3. You can't watch Adoption Stories on TLC without sobbing.

4. The fact that, if 7% of Christians adopted 1 child there would be no orphans in the world, is convicting to you.

5. You spend free time surfing blogs about families who have experienced the blessing of adoption.

6. It drives you crazy when people ask you about adopted child's "real" parents.

7. You have ever been "pregnant" with your adoptive child longer than it takes an elephant to give birth.(2 years!)

8. You had no idea how you would afford to adopt but stepped out in faith anyway, knowing where God calls you He will provide.

9. You have ever taken an airplane ride half-way around the world with a child you just met.

10. You believe God's heart is for adoption.

11. You realize that welcoming a child into your heart and family is one of the most important legacies you could ever leave on this earth.

12. You know what the word "Dossier" means, and you can actually pronounce it!

13. You have welcomed a social worker into the most private parts of your life.

14. You shudder when people say your child is so lucky that you adopted them, knowing full well you are the blessed one to have him or her in your life.

Wanna Join Me Friday Night for This. . .

2011-04-04T08:41:00.008-04:00

Jeff and Kathy Boyum are the leaders of King's Kids Minnesota. King's Kids is a ministry of Youth With a Mission and is committed to discipling children, teenagers, and families. King's Kids believes in linking the generations. They also believe that God does not put an age limit on when He can use a person and thus believe in the capacity of kids, preteens, and teens to know God, hear God, and be used by God. Rob and I used to work with the King's Kids team here in Raleigh for many years.

Jeff and Kathy and their 7 children are coming to Raleigh while on a tour of Canada and the USA. They will be speaking this Friday night, April 8 at 7:30PM at Gateway Christian Fellowship which is located at 4900 Water's Edge Drive. I so want to go and would love for you to join me. We could all meet at my house at 7 and then ride together.

Here's a pic of the Boyum family:

And below is a little bit of the email the Boyums sent out explaining what they will be speaking on Friday night:

"God has a call and purpose for families. The promise made to Abraham is that he and his family would be blessed and they would then BE a blessing to the nations (Gen. 12:2, 18:18-19). As families "keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice," then nations will be blessed.

This is why we are going on the road: to encourage and challenge families to seriously seek God together about the plans He has for them. Families have great potential to impact the world for God's kingdom!

We believe very much that this is a time in our nation for Christian families to be encouraged and challenged to live the call of God out in exciting and radical ways.”

If you want to go. . .you certainly can just show up at the above time and location, but if you want to go with me. . .shoot me an email and let's see if we can ride together.

Check Out My Interview

2011-02-22T10:05:00.006-05:00

I did an interview with Blanca over at the blog, Reintroducing Hope. Blanca desires to share stories that inspire hope and the boldness to dream anew. I am honored that "my story" would be categorized as such.

Blanca lives here in Raleigh and we have similar heartbeats. She is a risk taker. She longs to live on purpose. She frequently finds herself telling people, "Just because you haven’t seen someone else do it, doesn’t mean it can’t be done – YOU could be the first."

Click here to read the interview and if you have a moment, leave some comment love on Blanca's post.

Learning to Let God Drive

2011-02-17T13:34:00.013-05:00

I heard it again yesterday at the bus stop. The "Are ya'll done after Galeta comes home? Are ya'll gonna stop at 5?" I need to come up with a pat answer because I get asked that question at least once a day. Let me tell you what I really want to say when I get asked that question:

Rob and I weren't planning on having kids. It's not that we didn't like kids. We were both teachers, taught Sunday School, led youth group, went on mission trips with the youth. We were constantly investing in kids, but did not care to have any of our own. We were having too much fun just the 2 of us. We enjoyed the freedom and flexibility and knew kids would bring some serious limitations.

Then I got pregnant. I cried. Poor Rob did not know how to respond. We had no health insurance. And I was pregnant for 16 weeks and then miscarried. But during that 16 weeks, God grew in me and Rob a mother's and father's heart. Something more than just enjoying kids and investing in them. At this point we did not try to have kids, but we also didn't try to not have them. We were ok with either.

We quickly got pregnant again. .with Anna who is now 13. This time we rejoiced.

This is Anna's favorite picture of us. She says we should write a book one day and put this picture on the front. That makes me smile.

Again we did not try to have kids and year and half later we were pregnant with David. At this point we said we were done. We were trying not to have any more. God had other plans.

God's other plans were 7 months later we were pregnant with Brooke. This is when my grandfather pulled Rob aside and said it was about time we got a tv. He said it would be a lot cheaper. We had 3 kids under the age of 4. All of them were in diapers/pullups at the same time (and this was before I knew of the blessings of couponing and $4.50 packs of diapers). Now we really were done.

Again God had other plans. I remember Rob and I were at Rock Ola. . he was so scared to tell me what he had been sensing in his time with God. He was so scared to tell me that he felt like we were to adopt. I was a stay-at-home mom to 3 little kids, barely keeping my head above water. He told me and I cried. I had been sensing the same thing in my prayer time. I was scared to tell him because he was a 2nd grade teacher who had just quit to go back to grad school. An adoption cost more than he made in one year.

Jonathan came home from Guatemala about 3 years later. He was 10-months old at the time.

We weren't going to have kids, and now we have 4 and will be bringing home our fifth child, Galeta Soutter soon.

We had our plans and God had his. We are so thankful that God did not leave us to our own ways, but broke in. We are thankful for that first pregnancy. During that difficult time, God changed our hearts.

Rob and I can't imagine life without our 5 kids. Oh what a blessing they are. We are thankful that everytime we said, "We're done." God said, "Yeah, that's what you think."

I pray that God will continue to grow this heart in me. The heart that says, "Not my will, but yours be done." The heart that says, "God I've got this really great idea, but is it your idea?"

I am still learning to let God drive.

I am linking this post here, to A Place Called Simplicity (my favorite blog ever). Every Monday, this blogger hosts a Memorial Box Monday Party where bloggers remember the God stories of their lives. Click here for more details on what a Memorial Box is.

Make a Difference with Just a Click!!

2011-02-07T16:30:00.001-05:00

Update: Lisa did win this grant!! Her proposal got the 2nd most votes!! Thank you to all who took the time to vote. I am so excited that a library is going to be built in Guatemala!!

More on Ethiopia and Galeta coming, but I want to remind you of my friend Lisa. Remember me telling you here about my world changing friend and how she has applied for a Kindermuisk Good Beginnings Grant.
If she and her organization, Caroline's Promise are in the top 5 organizations with the most votes on February 9, she will receive $1000 to build a library at Casita Adonai in Guatemala. My Anna is sponsoring a kindergartner at this school.

Right now Lisa is #6. . only behind by 110 votes.

Would you visit here every day between now and Feb 9?
That is today, tomorrow, and Wed!

Visit this link and at the top, click the button that says Search "Ideas by Votes".

Choose "Development of a library for inner city school children in Guatemala" It will probably be #5 or #6 on the page.

You can vote up to 10 x a day. Make sure you click that green vote circle ten time each day you visit.

You have to wait 24 hrs between each set of 10 votes.

Spread the word by posting on facebook or emailing, linking to this post or for even more detail, link to my post here. Invite your friends to make a difference with just a click.

And Feb 9, let's celebrate that we came alongside Lisa and made a difference, that we helped change lives, that we helped kids and parents learn to read. Really!!

I know that sometimes I can become so overwhelmed with the magnitude of all the problems of the world that I feel my little bit can't possibly make a difference. I can easily feel hopeless and often times fail to do something because I can't do everything or I can't do it "big enough". Let's not let that thinking creep in. . .let's believe our 2 minutes of time clicking on this link and then clicking on "vote" will make a difference.

I know for sure that small things done with great love can change the world.

Visiting Galeta at the "New" Orphanage

2011-02-02T17:01:00.002-05:00

In Saturday's post we shared about meeting Galeta for the first time. Yesterday, we shared here about the long drive with Galeta back to the capital. Today we will share about our visits with Galeta that Tues, Wed, and Thurs.

During that time, we went to Galeta's new orphanage each day to play with him and the other children. What a treasure it was to have that focused time with our new son. During that time we kicked a soccer ball, blew bubbles, cuddled, tickled and just spent time together. We were so impressed by how quickly Galeta adjusted to his new surroundings. By day 2 he knew the names of most of the kids and had obviously started bonding with his new nannies.

Galeta really seemed to enjoy kicking the soccer ball and was quite good at it. At one point when the other kids were joining in, Galeta asked one of the nannies if she could keep the other kids engaged in their own game of kick so as to not interrupt the one he was having with his new parents. At least that is what we think he said in Oromifa as the nanny came over and hurried all the other children to the other side of the pavement.

Each day we gave Galeta a pen and paper. He wrote the ABCs. He wrote his name. And then he drew 6 stick figures. When he was done he pointed to each and named them, "Mommy, Daddy, Anna, David, Brooke, Jonathan." Our hearts sang. We told him to draw a 7th figure and told him that was Galeta. He was a Soutter. We were family.

Over the three days, Galeta and Rob drew several pictures and wrote words. All of them centered on our new family... pictures of us in a plane, pictures of us in a van, and lists of everyone's name. Galeta wanted to keep the pad of paper and pen we brought.

We were at the orphanage for about 3 hours each day and at times we would just sit on the porch and watch. Playing kick, playing jump, doing horsey rides, playing Ring Around the Rosies with 15 some children quickly tired us and sometimes we just needed to rest. We were quite pleased that Galeta did not cling to us, nor did he forget us. He would play with the other boys and girls for a while and then run over to show us something or sit in our laps for a few minutes. Then he would run back out and join the games. Sometimes while playing, he would look over his shoulder to confirm that we were there and watching.

One obstacle we faced was sharing our affection with Galeta as well as the other kids. As soon as one of us would give Galeta a horsey ride in our laps, all the other kids would want one as well. "Me, me!" they would call in their native tongue. Galeta was very sweet. He would take a turn and then get out of the way and motion for the next kid to have a turn. We loved on all the kids, but made sure that Galeta got an extra portion of our attention. Some times we would just tell all the kids, "No, we are playing with our son now." They didn't like it, but caught on and left us to be alone with our son.

Oh how these kids wanted attention and touch and love (even more than their wonderful nannies gave them). It was almost like seagulls. . you would give one a little attention and the next thing you knew, you had a dozen little ones wanting some love. Su would pray over each one that climbed in her lap or held her hand that a mom and dad would come forward for them. That their little hearts would be kept soft and filled with hope and that they would not have to wait long.

One day, several children had gathered around to play with Su's hair which was quite different from their own. Galeta came up, swung his arms and shouted, "Get off!" in English. We were shocked. I guess he has some instincts to protect his mother. We'll have to ask him about that when he gets home and learns some English.

Each day was a special time of connecting with our boy and learning who he is. We also used this time to try to reinforce that we were leaving, but would be coming back. Each time we found someone that knew both Oromifa and English, we would have them tell Galeta that we would be leaving in 1 day or tomorrow or whatever and that we would come back to take him to America. Repetition is the best teacher, eh?

Finally Thursday's visit came to an end and we had to tell Galeta good bye for the last time. We got an interpreter and explained the plan one last time. We promised to pray for him each day and reminded him that we loved him. We all embraced and Su and Rob cried. Again Galeta seemed very ok with what was happening.

Galeta's only question was, "Is Raji and Sena's mom and dad coming soon?" See, we had explained to him that his good friends Raji and Sena's mom and dad would be coming to get them and bring them back to America. And then after that we would come to get him and bring him back to America. And then once we were all in America, he would get to play with Raji and Sena. (Click here if you missed that story about Raji and Sena's mom and dad living here in Raleigh).

We shared mixed emotions as we drove away. It was hard to leave and yet we felt a great measure of peace. We knew that Galeta had a good understanding of what was happening. He seemed very ok with all that was going on. We knew that Galeta was in a good place and well cared for. And we knew that this was just another step in bringing our family together.

We would be going back soon to bring him home (10-12 weeks maybe?).

More to come.

Driving Galeta from Gimbie to the Capital

2011-02-01T17:24:00.003-05:00

On Saturday we introduced Galeta and shared our reactions upon meeting him for the first time at the orphanage in Gimbie, Ethiopia. You can read that post here. The story continues....

After we picked up Galeta from the orphanage, we spent 12 hours in the van with Galeta and his 4 year old buddy, A-boy (2 hours on Sunday and 10 hours straight on Monday). We could not believe how well behaved these 2 were.

Under normal circumstance you could not pay us enough to drive all day with young kids. For our 4 children at home we bought one of those portable DVD players to take on any trip of 2 hours or more. The DVD player wasn't for the kids, it was for us... to maintain our sanity. Without it, the kids are too loud and rambunctious and fight too much. But not Galeta and A-boy.

Galeta and A-boy spent 10 hours quietly sitting, talking, looking out the window, and playing with their only toy, magna doodles we brought. We were utterly amazed and very pleased as this trip was hard on our bodies and as adults, we struggled. The roads were unbelievably bumpy and we had to twist and wind around potholes and other obstacles (like oxen!!).

On Monday evening, we arrived at the new orphanage in the capital city of Addis Ababa. We were quite concerned about this part of the trip. How would Galeta feel about being dropped off in this new home after meeting his new parents 30 hours earlier? Would he be confused, feel betrayed by his new parents, be scared of this unknown place, or wonder about the new language he was hearing (Galeta does not speak the national language)?

Suprisingly, Galeta seemed to meet this challenge with a great amount of comfort and understanding. He walked right in and joined the other boys and girls at the table for dinner. He seemed very unconcerned as we said good bye and left him in this unfamiliar place.

As we drove away from the orphanage we were filled with a great sense of peace and both commented to each other that Galeta was going to be ok!

More tomorrow about our visits with Galeta at the new orphanage.

Introducing Galeta

2011-01-30T05:36:00.008-05:00

While he will not be home for a couple of months, G-boy is now legally our son. Hallelujah!!! We have loved him for so long and it makes our hearts burst that we are legally each other's now! And therefore we can now show you a picture.

G-boy's name is Galeta and he is sweet, smart, well-adjusted, and handsome. Aren't all Soutter kids? (wink, wink).

We got to spend time with Galeta each day from Sunday through Thursday. We so enjoyed him.

On Sunday we met him at his orphanage in Gimbie which is 12 hours west of the capital. Our van pulled up outside the gate and honked the horn. Most orphanages, guest houses, homes are behind locked metal gates. Here is a picture of the gate and our van waiting.

Galeta had been waiting excitedly. He couldn't wait for the nannies to open the door of the orphanage so he jumped out the window and ran to meet us. Here is the window he jumped out of:

We were hardly out the van and there he was. We all hugged tightly for several minutes and Su and Rob cried. What an incredible moment in time. The son we had been pursuing and praying for and loving for a year was suddenly in our arms. We can only imagine what he was thinking.

Galeta held our hands and walked us inside and showed us around the orphanage. Several things stood out right away:

Galeta obviously loved his nannies very much and they loved him as well; most of them cried when it was finally time for Galeta to leave for good.

Galeta loves little kids and did an excellent job taking care of all the younger kids around the orphanage. We had such a fun time watching him gently carry the kids around or ensure they had a toy to play with.

Galeta has some well developed gross motor skills. We had a brought a ball and Galeta could catch and throw with no problem. Soon he was ready for a higher challenge and would use his hand to bat the ball back when it was thrown.

We also discovered that Galeta was excited to have new brothers and sisters. In addition to the ball, we brought Galeta a small picture book with photos of the family. Galeta turned from page to page and kissed the pictures of his new siblings. Our hearts sang.

We will post more about the next 2 days traveling back to the capital with Galeta, about our time with Galeta at the new orphanage, and about the other adventures that we were given in Ethiopia.

So come back tomorrow. . .or if you'd like our posts sent to your email, enter your info below and hit the subscribe button. An email will be sent to your email address to confirm that you do indeed want our posts sent to your email so you will want to open that email and click the button.

More soon. Thanks for coming alongside us. We could so tell ya'll were praying for us while we were gone.

Prayer Cheat Sheet For When We Are in Ethiopia!

2011-01-18T21:06:00.006-05:00

A girlfriend created a "prayer cheat sheet" for each day that we will be in Ethiopia. I thought I would attach it here. . it tells you what we are doing each day and some prayer points.

We have been feeling your prayers as we prepare and would sooooo appreciate prayer for us, for G-boy, and for Anna, David, Brooke, and Jonathan and for their caretakers while we are gone.

And if you missed it. . my girlfriend created the below prayer cheat sheet from this blog post here.

Thanks for coming alongside us-
Rob and Su

Please consider joining me in prayer for Rob and Su Soutter, and their 4 children as they prepare to bring the newest member of their family home from Ethiopia. This is the first of 2 trips Rob and Su will take to Ethiopia. G-boy (6 years old) will not come home with them this trip. This trip is where the court legally declares G-boy and the Soutters each others.

Date	Description	Pray For
1/20/11 - Thursday	18 hours of travel (Friday morning arrival) in Addis Ababa	Pray for safe and uneventful travel. Pray for the 4 children here at home. Pray for their caretakers.
1/22/11 - Saturday	10 hour drive to Nekemte YWAM Orphanage. Stay overnight here.	Pray Rob and Su do not get car sick on drive. Pray for restful night & energy for the next part of the journey.
1/23/11 - Sunday	2 hour drive to Gimbie YWAM Orphanage to meet G-boy for the first time. Spend day getting to know G-boy, visiting with his nannies, visiting the market, the 7^th day Adventist Hospital and YWAM’s street ministry. Drive 2 hours back to Nekemte	Pray for their first meeting, for heart clicking between son and parents. Pray for wisdom, to hug or not to hug, to know what to say.
1/24/11 – Monday	Drive 10 hours back to Addis Ababa with G-boy.	Pray that G-boy is at peace, that he understands all that is happening, that he does not get car sick
1/24/11 – Monday Evening	Take G-boy to a new orphanage which will be his home until Rob and Su pick him up 8 – 12 weeks later. Rob and Su anticipate this to be the hardest part of the whole journey. How will they leave their newfound son in this place that he has never seen?	Pray for supernatural peace, for an understanding that Rob and Su will come back to take him home.
1/25/11/ - Tuesday	Visit with G-boy in his new orphanage, rest, and possibly look around Addis a little.	Pray for good fellowship between mom, dad and son.
1/26/11 - Wednesday	Court Day!! This is where G-boy will become officially our son and we will become officially his parents	Pray there will be no hiccups and they pass this day. There have been many cases that do not pass the first time thru and this delays bringing the child home, so pray that they pass this Wed. Pray that no additional paper work in needed. Pray for favor with the judge.
1/26/11 - Wednesday night	At 10:15pm, they leave to return to Raleigh. Rob and Su say, “I can't imagine how we will feel, probably excited to be done with this leg of the adoption journey, relieved to be headed home and excited to see our 4 kiddos, and heavy with the pain of leaving our newest son.”	Pray for uneventful travel. That Rob and Su are not delayed in getting home (for the sake of the caregivers, for the sake of Rob and Su and their 4 kiddos here). Pray for emotions, pray that they are able to process all that has happened, they have seen, etc.
1/27/11 – Thursday	After 24 hours of travel, they will arrive in Raleigh at 2:00 pm on Thursday, Jan 27th.	Pray over jet lag, culture shock, emotions. Pray Rob and Su are able to share with 4 kiddos all about Ethiopia and G-boy. Pray Rob and Su do not get sick upon their arrival home. Pray for 2^nd trip to come soon.

Headed to Ethiopia in 12 days!

2011-01-08T12:08:00.001-05:00

What a crazy journey adoption is. In two weeks, on January 20, we will board a plane for 18 hours of travel to the other side of the world. We will be 8 time zones from Raleigh, NC. I have posted a clock on the right hand sidebar of this blog, down at the bottom, that shows what time it is in Ethiopia right now; check it out.

The trip will be hard, tiring, uncomfortable and unfamiliar. But we can't wait to go. We will get to see Ethiopia, meet our G-boy, and go to court where he will become ours and we will become his. G-boy will legally be our son; we will legally be his parents! Wow! Here is G-boy holding our picture. Once we are legally each others, we can post a full picture of G-boy.

If all goes well at court, we will return 8-12 weeks later to bring G-boy home.

So Thursday morning, Jan 20th, we leave from Raleigh at 6:10am. After 18 hours of travel, we will arrive in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. It will be 8am Friday when we get off the plane. That day we will rest and perhaps shop for trinkets to remind us and G-boy of his home country.

On Saturday, we will wake up bright and early and drive west 10 hours to Nekemte, which is the last "big city" on our journey to G-boy. Our adoption agency, YWAM has an orphanage in Nekemte. We will stay the night in Nekemte. Here are some pictures of Nekemte taken from our adoption agency's blog.

The next day, Sunday, we will drive 2 more hours to Gimbie. The road between Nekemte and Gimbie is bone jarringly bumpy and Rob will most definitely need his Dramamine. However, the drive is beautiful and we will see wildlife and "National Geographic" scenery. Here are some scenes on the road to Gimbie, again taken from YWAM's blog.

YWAM has an orphanage in Gimbie too and here is where we will meet G-boy. Please pray for our first meeting. Do we hug him? Will he want to hug us? Will he understand why I am crying so hard? Will he want to call us Mom and Dad? We will bring a ball and some books to hopefully help us warm up to each other. But prayers for supernatural heart clicking would be appreciated. Here is a pic of the Gimbie Widows & Orphans Home:

We will spend Sunday in Gimbie getting to know G-boy, visiting with his nannies, visiting the market, visiting the 7th Day Adventist Hospital, and seeing YWAM's street kid's ministry.

YWAM has a ministry to the street children in Gimbie, called Abdi Borii, which provides the street children with tuition for school, school supplies, hot lunches, clothes, shoes, a place to sleep and medical care through the Adventist Hospital. These are young children found living without any adult supervision on the dangerous streets of this town. The kids must promise not to beg or gamble to stay in the program.

Sunday evening we will drive back to Nekemte to spend the night and then on Monday, we will drive the 10 hours back to Addis Ababa, only this time we will have G-boy with us!! Please pray that G-boy is at peace, that he understands all that is happening, that he does not get car sick.

When we arrive in Addis Ababa we will take G-boy to a new orphanage (his new home until we return to pick him up). We anticipate this to be the hardest part of the whole journey. How will we leave our newfound son in this place that he has never seen? Pray for supernatural peace, for an understanding that we will come back. As hard as this will be, we will do what has to be done that he can become each others forever.

On Tuesday, we will visit with G-boy in his new orphanage, rest, and possibly look around Addis a little.

On Wednesday, we will go to court. This is where G-boy will become officially our son and we will become officially his parents. Pray that there will be no hiccups and we pass this day. There have been many cases that do not pass the first time thru and this only delays bringing the child home, so pray that we pass this Wed.

That Wed night at 10:15pm we leave to return to Raleigh. I can't imagine how we will feel, probably excited to be done with this leg of the adoption journey, relieved to be headed home and excited to see our 4 kiddos, and heavy with the pain of leaving our newest son.

After 24 hours of travel, we will arrive in Raleigh at 2:00 pm on Thursday, Jan 27th. We would appreciate your prayers for us, for G-boy, for the 4 kiddos here (and their caregivers!!). We have appreciated each one of you who have come alongside us in this journey.

Help My Friend Change the World (It's Easy & Free!)

2011-01-05T14:05:00.012-05:00

My friend Lisa is a world changer. She is a big dreamer, a woman of faith and a woman of social justice. She's the kind of woman I want to hang out with. She and her husband, David have 2 biological boys and 1 adopted girl (named Caroline) from Guatemala.

Lisa is also the Executive Director (as in she dreamed of and started!) of Caroline's Promise, a small non-profit located in North Carolina that seeks to reclaim hope for orphans in the US and worldwide. Here is Lisa with a child she sponsors in Guatemala:
Caroline's Promise gave us a grant for the adoption of our Jonathan. That is how Lisa's heart and my family's hearts initially connected. That was in 2006 and in 2008, Rob and Anna went on a missions trip to Guatemala with Lisa and a Caroline's Promise team. Here is my Anna sharing with a little girl that she is indeed a princess of the King:

Casita Adonai is a small private Christian school in a difficult area of Guatemala City, an area devastated by poverty, gangs, and lack of education. Lisa and Caroline's Promise are working with the local church in Guatemala to provide a safe, loving, quality education for some of the city's most vulnerable children. Many of them are orphans, living with grandparents or other family members. The rest of them live with their single mothers who struggle to earn $1 a day. The school, Casita Adonai provides a safe haven for these families and their children. Here is a picture of the children at Casita Adonai:

Lisa dreams of building a library for these children. She believes that by offering books, children and families will learn to read, and the cycle of poverty will begin to change.

Lisa has applied for a Kidermusik Good Beginnings Grant. If Lisa receives the most votes between now and Feb 9, she will receive $1000 to build a library at Casita Adonai in Guatemala.

Will you help change the world? It's easy!

1. Every day between January 5 and February 9, visit Kindermusik

2. Search for the project by name - Lisa Holbrook

3. Click on the Vote Button. . a window will pop up confirming your vote. If a window does not pop up, try clicking on the "View Details" Page and clicking Vote there. It really is easy!! And you can click that Vote button 10 times. 10 times a day until Feb 9th!!

Caroline's Promise is also looking for sponsors for 59 of the above kids. My Anna is going to sponsor a little girl and be her "big sister". So that means there are 58 left. It is only $35 a month. If you are interested in sponsoring a child, please email Lisa at info{at}carolinespromise4u{dot}org or call her at 336-993-9046 or visit her Caroline's Promise website by clicking here.

For Men: A Call to Action

2010-12-08T14:13:00.001-05:00

If you are a man who loves Jesus, you need to read this post at One Life - One Legacy. If you know a man who loves Jesus, you need to forward this post to him. This guy and his wife are crazy radical for Jesus and are giving His love away in some amazing ways. Su and I are often challenged by their stories of reaching out and seeing God step in.

In this post, DW (the husband) talks about the call for Christian MEN to love and care for the orphan. He really challenges us to step up to the plate and do something. He calls things like he sees them and shares how he typically sees women leading the charge to be Jesus to "the least of these."

I have decide to join DW (actually join God) in the fight for the fatherless. Will you come with us? Will you fight for these who cannot defend themselves, those who have no one else to fight for them?

MEN, do you dare read DW's post?
Do you dare pray for these little ones?
Do you dare make a commitment?
Do you dare go and serve?
Do you dare send them your finances?
Do you dare weep for them?
Do you dare learn about them?
Do you dare fast for them?
Do you dare ask Jesus, "How do you want me to be involved? "

It might be scary and uncomfortable... but we were made for this!

Waiting for Phone Call & Pictures of G-boy

2010-11-19T15:23:00.002-05:00

We excitedly await the phone call letting us know of our official court date in Ethiopia. This court hearing will mark the first of two trips we'll make to Africa. The first trip, we'll attend court and be appointed G-boy's legal parents. And at that time be able to share pictures on our blog of our handsome son. The second trip happens 6-8 weeks later and includes the visa appointment at the US Embassy in order to travel home with G-boy. We are eagerly awaiting the phone call letting us know when we will travel.
This morning, our agency emailed us 4 pictures of G-boy. That was the longest 1 min and 21 seconds ever. . waiting for the pictures to download. Along with the pictures was a note that said G-boy was so sweet to share his gifts from us with the other children. And that he loved the punch ball we sent! Oh what a treasure for this momma! Above is G-boy's sweet hand trying out his new punch ball.

News Friends that Only God Could Give

2010-11-16T11:27:00.016-05:00

I am overwhelmed with God's blessings. . .that is brings me to tears and at times paralyzes me with awe. . .
Last week, we met Deb and Jeremy Baus face to face. Remember this post here, where I told you about Deb and Jeremy Baus and shared the email they sent us when they were in Ethiopia?

Deb and Jeremy are adopting two 20 month old kiddos from the same agency, same orphanage in Ethiopia as we are. And they live here in Raleigh, like 15 minutes away!!
And Deb and Jeremy came over last week to share dessert and coffee and conversation about Ethiopia and to show us video of G-boy. .. oh what an emotional night for me.

We were so deeply touched that this sweet couple took time out of their emotionally intense time in Ethiopia meeting their 2 youngins, going to court, taking in Ethiopia. . . to love up on our son, to give him a letter from us, to read the letter and have a translator translate it, to get it all on video tape, to explain to G that they live in the same town his adoptive mom and dad do. . to give him a hug and kisses. . .

I love watching the video. . G is handsome and is in the midst of all the action. On the video, he is not standing off to the side or against the wall. . he is right there with all the adoptive parents and the nannies and the babies.

Deb and Jeremy told us that G is soo cool and that G and their son, R are good buddies! G is 6 years old and loves R (20 mos.) to the point he picks him up and carries him around. And now they'll grow up together in Raleigh!! What a gift!! A gift to G, a gift to R, and gift to the Bauses, and a gift to us Soutters!! Really only God could orchestrate all this.

As many of you know, God did the same thing with Jonathan. . he and Abigail who shared a room at the orphanage in Guatemala and at one point were even crib mates are now both in Raleigh. We love the Crawfords: Abigail and Abigail's mom and dad and big brother. . Su and Abigail's mom just clicked and not just because they both adopted from Guatemala. . .only God. This relationship with the Crawfords is dear to us now, especially Su and we know that this relationship will be important to J as he grows older. We sense that God is doing something similar with us and the Baus family.

Really. . this is just like "icing on the already yummy cake". . God so did not have to do this. . but a little community of families here in Raleigh who have adopted from the same agency, same orphanage in Ethiopia as us? Only God. There is us, there is Deb and Jeremy, and then have I told you about the Watkins family (pictured above) who Su went to elementary school with the mom and they used to spend the night at each other's houses?? Well she and her husband and 4 kiddos. . live like 3 minutes from us. . .and they just brought home their Corrie from Ethiopia. Brooke and the Watkins' 2 older boys go to the same school. I am telling you only God connects dots like this.

News from Ethiopia about G-boy

2010-10-27T10:01:00.008-04:00

The Baus family who just happen to live in Raleigh are adopting 2 little ones from Ethiopia. . using the same agency we are. . and they are in Ethiopia right now!!!

We have not met face to face (yet!), but sweet Deb (the wife) did email me the night before they were leaving asking if I wanted her to take anything down to our son. She had heard about us thru a mutual friend and heard that our son was living at the same orphanage as her two kiddos were. . .only God could connect dots like this.

We did email her a letter with our picture on it to print out and take to G-boy. And Deb did just that.

And Deb just emailed me!!! From Ethiopia!!! Oh what a treasure!!! Here is Deb's email.

Hi Su-

We just got back to the capital last night from our LONG but incredible trip to *** . Our kids (yours and mine) are so awesome.

G-boy is one amazing kid. I gave him your letter and we have the whole thing on video of a translator explaining it to him. He LOVED it.

I also found out that he and our son are pretty tight! But from what we saw and were told, G-boy is really good with all the kids. I am going to try to attach a pic now but the connection here isn't the greatest.

Rest assured your son is in good hands. He is a happy, happy kid and the nannies there are really great. You can see how much they love the kids and visa versa.

We will get together when we get home and show you the video!!

We get back late on Oct 30-

Deb

I am in tears. Tears of hearing my son is happy. Tears of hearing that he loved our letter. Tears over having 2 pictures. . .treasures. . of our handsome son. He has a huge smile. Tears that Deb and her husband would love up on us like this. . I mean she is half way around the world meeting her two kiddos for the first time. I am sure she has much to process and take in. . and she took time to email me. . took time to video my son. . I am deeply touched by her love for us. . .and we have not even met face to face (yet!). I can't wait to have Deb and her hubby (I do not even know his name) over for dinner. I am going to have to hold myself back and give them a little time to unpack and recover from jetlag.

Oh what a sweet gift today!!

Christmas Shopping For a Cause

2010-10-26T10:36:00.000-04:00

Stacy over at the blog My Cup Overfloweth has this post where all those who are fundraising for their adoptions can share what they are selling.

Her heart is that as Christmas approaches, instead of going to the local Target to pick out a present for those on our list. . we would come to her blog and buy an item from a family that is in the process of bringing their kiddo home. . .and give that fundraising item as a gift.

Sounds like giving 2 gifts in 1 to me. . a gift to someone on your Christmas list and a gift to an orphan and his forever family.

I love that Stacy is doing this just to come alongside other adopting families. She and her hubby just recently came home with their new little one and saw the Lord provide and she wants to be a part of that for other families. Stacy is a momma of 6, 1 biological and 5 adopted!

I linked up my In This Home Paintings. Here is a recent one I just finished:
If you have some Christmas shopping to do, you may just want to click here to see all that is for sale; you just click on the little pictures at the bottom of Stacy's post. Look for the picture of my painting I linked up.

Daily Gifts from God

2010-10-24T14:02:00.001-04:00

On September 22, we decided to move towards the referral of G-boy, our new son from Ethiopia. If you missed that story, you can click here.

At the time, we were asked if we wanted to wait until we had all the money to accept the referral, $7500. We had a couple thousand, but needed much more. We felt God was calling us to move forward, so we stepped out in faith trusting that in 1 month God could and would provide the rest.

We prayed that God would give us financial encouragement every day between Sept 21 and Oct 19th. For 29 days we asked God to give a new sign each day.

And God did. Everyday for the past month, God has given us financial encouragement, daily reminders that He is in charge; like little love notes from God saying, "Don't worry, I have my eye on G-boy, don't worry, I will bring him home soon." When we say everyday, we literally mean every day (except one). We are not sure what happened that day. God probably did something and we missed it or couldn't remember it. But all the other days God did something. We wrote them all down.

Some days it was a check for a painting or a class, other days it was a card from a relative saying "I want to come along side you, let me help." Some days it was a rebate check, other days it was a promise from a friend to send money. One day, Rob went to the Wake Co. Principal-of-the-Year Banquet and won a door prize, a $50 American Express gift check. Each day was filled with anticipation, "How is God going to bless us today?"

We experienced the same thing back in June when we need money for the dossier. For 2 weeks straight, God kept filling our mailbox with all that was needed (click here to read that story). And as soon as we sent in the dossier the money stopped coming, like someone had turned off the spigot. Oh, we got gift checks and surprise money in July, August, and Sept, but they were few and far between (once every week or two).

BUT when we stepped out on Sept 22 it was like God turned on the spigot again and said, "Yeah, go for it, I am right here. You want encouragement each day, I can do that."

And on October 20, there was nothing. The money hasn't stopped completely, it keeps trickling in, but it was key for God to leave the mailbox empty on October 20. It was a reminder or how special the last 29 days had been. A reminder that He is in total control.

Official Referral of G-boy!!

2010-10-07T07:07:00.017-04:00

Last Friday, 10/1, we received the OFFICIAL referral of G-boy, a very handsome 6 year old with a big smile!! Wish we could put photos on the blog for you, but cannot due to Ethiopian govt. rules. We are thrilled to be one step closer to bringing our son home.

And yesterday we sent G-boy a package: new jeans, a long sleeve red and blue striped collared shirt, Spiderman underwear, a Hot Wheels truck, punching balloons, crayons and paper, and a laminated 5x7 picture of us. The director of our adoption agency is traveling to Ethiopia next week and will be able to hand deliver this package to G-boy and tell him he has a family!

We are in the midst of watching God provide the fee that is due upon signing the referral and mailing it back. God has wowed us daily. He has whispered that He loves G-boy more than we do and He will provide a way for G-boy to come home to his mom and dad, brothers, and sisters. God has called people to come alongside us in some abundant ways!

Nehemiah Builds the Wall: Where Our Hearts Are

2010-09-22T08:57:00.004-04:00

In our post here posted back in March, we discussed the reality that trouble often hits right after you step out to risk for God. In that post we said, "We know that when you step out to follow God, you are going to be met with wind and waves." Well, we have stepped out again, and the wind and waves have come again.

For starters, Su has taken the risk of agreeing to speak at a woman's conference this week; see details of that here. The topic of the talk is taking risks for God. She will be talking about Nehemiah and how he took on the impossible task of rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. He did not have enough time or resources, there were obstacles galore, but he felt the call of God and knew that his provider had all that he needed. Su will talk about God's call for each of us to be a Nehemiah and do the impossible for God.

Su had cleared her calendar (as best she could) and set aside the week to mentally and practically prepare for the talk. Day one was a disaster. Everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong. This kids were misbehaving, everything took longer than needed, little disasters happened left and right. It was like something out of a Chevy Chase movie. As the table was being set for dinner and a glass got knocked to the floor, sending glass and water all over the place, we had to laugh (after we yelled); satan was hard at work.
Then, after dinner, we emailed YWAM to let them know we were ready to move forward with G-boy. See yesterday's post here if you missed that. Thru our emails with our adoption agecny, we learned we could move forward with an official referral. As part of our communication, we wanted to make sure we understood correctly that $7500 was needed to accept the referral. We wanted to know how much we needed God to provide in the next few weeks. They confirmed, yes that was the correct amount and also suggested that we may want to wait until we obtained the money before moving forward.

What were we to do? Should we move forward and expect that the money would come, or sit tight and wait until we had it all in the bank?

The wind and waves had come again. This time it was not a broken glass of water, but a direct attack on our faith. Were we going to step out and trust that God would provide, or play it safe and wait?

How ironic that God would allow us to be tested in the area of risking during this week, the week where Su is to speak on risking.

As soon as Nehemiah started his project, he was met with opposition. Several officials ridiculed Nehemiah and challenged what he was doing. But Nehemiah responded, "The God of heaven will give us success." (Nehemiah 2:20). And God did! Nehemiah and his helpers finished in record time; they built that wall in 52 days!!! They had limited time and resources, tons of opposition, and every reason to quit, but God gave them success.
We trust that God will give us success, that he will teach through Su on Saturday morning, that he will take care of our family despite the "broken glasses of water", and that he will provide every penny of the funds needed to bring G-boy home. We are moving forward trusting that "the God of heaven will give us success."

My Son: Update from Rob

2010-09-21T11:00:00.000-04:00

In July we finished our dossier (this huge pile of paperwork). This made us ready to be matched with a child. Up until that point there were no 4-8 year-old boys on the YWAM waiting list. There were only infants. There were times we felt like quitting because there appeared to be no children for us.

But in July, at the same time we were submitting our paperwork, G-boy, a 6 year old came into one of the Ethiopian orphanages. We cannot use his real name on the internet so we call him G-boy (like our J-boy aka Jonathan). We posted the story of the God timing miracle here is you missed it: all about our paperwork arriving in Ethiopia within days that G-boy was admitted to the orphanage.

When we submitted our paperwork, the workers at YWAM told us about G-boy. He was not adoptable yet; paperwork needed to be processed but all looked positive that he would indeed be adoptable. Again see this post here if you missed that story.

Over the last month, YWAM has told us more and more about G-boy. We have 3 precious pictures of G-boy. We are not allowed to share pics or any details on the internet, but wish we could. But if you stop by, we'd love to show you his pictures. G-boy has a huge smile and has lost his two front teeth. . . like most of the 6 year olds we know. We have fallen in love with him.

Since our paperwork was submitted back in July, we have been praying for God's direction, asking that God match us with the child he picked out, the one he chose way back before we ever knew we were going to adopt. We have come to feel that G-boy is the one. The kids talk about G-boy like he is their brother. His picture hangs in the hallway amidst the other family photos. When someone asks me, "Who is that?" I respond, "My son, G-boy."

No More Excuses: Risking for God

2010-09-15T12:56:00.001-04:00

This You Tube video so illustrates what I am going to be sharing at the Women's Ministry Conference at Raleigh International Church on Sat, Sept 25.

I am going to be sharing about radical faith, God experiences and what it takes to be on mission with God. I will be teaching from the Bible book Nehemiah and using Nehemiah's story to challenge us to take crazy risks for God. I will be sharing many personal stories; some adoption ones too!

Are we going to make excuses as to why we can't be used by God or are we gonna make ourselves available for God sized dreams? So often we get our eyes fixed on ourselves, our shortcomings, and the large problems in front of us. Instead our eyes need to be fixed on God. That is what this You Tube video reminds me of.

I'd love for you to join me at the conference: Sat, Sept 25 from 10-1:30. I will be speaking alongside 2 other women. Lunch will be provided. Cost is $20 and needs to be mailed to Raleigh International Church by Sept 19th. Email me if you need more details.

Happy Ethiopian New Year!

2010-09-13T20:12:00.000-04:00

It is a New Year in Ethiopia! It is 2003!! You gotta read this post here about the Ethiopian calendar to understand why Ethiopia is 7 years behind us. The post just made me marvel and reminded me how big the world is, so much bigger than Raleigh, NC and reminded me of how diverse the world is. Heaven will be too.

A God Story and Another Chance To Win a Painting

2010-09-02T10:20:00.000-04:00

For a story that will

encourage you in your faith,

remind you that God can do the impossible

shout that God had not forgotten the orphans and longs to place them in families,

allow you to come alongside a family in bringing home their 2 children from Liberia,

and give you another opportunity to win one of my In This Home paintings. . .click here.

Where We Are At in Our Adoption: August 2010

2010-08-30T22:47:00.000-04:00

Mid July our dossier was sent off to the US Embassy in DC and then went onto Ethiopia. On that day that I Fed Exed that huge stack of paperwork, I breathed deeply. And when I got in the car I literally shouted out loud, "Thank you Lord!"

If you think I am alone, you gotta click here for Missy's blog post about the 13 ways preparing a dossier (a French word for that huge stack of paperwork) is like being in college.

Up to this point (mid July), there were only babies in the YWAM orphanages that were available for adoption and as you know, we feel like we are to adopt an older child between the ages of 4-8 (right in between my Jonathan and Brooke):

I think my understanding is correct; the Ministry of Women's Affairs has been closed and this means that only abandoned kids can be accepted into the orphanages. I am assuming most older kids are brought to the orphanage by a grandparent, aunt, or parent who can no longer provide and care for them. The orphanage cannot take such kids right now because the paperwork cannot be processed because the Ministry of Women's Affairs is closed right now (for how long? no one knows. . it has been closed for several months now). Only paperwork for abandoned kids can be processed right now. . that is my understanding.

Babies are often abandoned and found. An older kid that is abandoned is not necessarily found; he "becomes" a street kid. I am trying to put words to something I have no words for. . .or have even had experience with. . . sometimes you do not even know what questions to ask because you have never heard of such things before.

Anyway, up to mid July there were mostly babies available, no 4-8 year old boys.

But you know what happened mid July???

Do you know what happened over in Ethiopia the same week that our dossier gets sent off?

A 6 year old boy comes to the orphanage! I cannot share details on the internet/blog per Ethiopian gov't requests. And this is not an official referral because the government is closed right now (this is different than the Ministry of Women's Affairs). . the govt is closed right now due to it being the rainy season. The roads become impassable during the rainy season so all shuts down. Again something our American brain cannot understand. Word is the govt will reopen come October.

But a 6 year old boy is at YWAM's orphanage the same month we become paperwork ready for a referral. Coincidence or a God thing?

We are praying for God to speak, to show us whether this 6 year old is indeed our son. We are waiting to see all his paperwork and a picture. Email from the village YWAM has an orphanage in in Ethiopia is very hit and miss and it is next to impossible to email photos. But a missionary did send some pics back to the US with another missionary and there most likely will be some snapshots of this little boy in those photos.

So we are praying we get to see a picture soon; I think my heart will be able to connect and "know" once I see a picture. Or perhaps my heart has already because:

I have been praying for this little boy. . for his heart to be filled with hope despite all he has endured in his short life. I have been praying that God fills him with a supernatural joy and peace. I pray that he does not feel alone. I pray that he is able to sleep thru the night, that he does not have nightmares, that he feels safe. I pray that his heart remains soft and he is able to laugh and play. I pray. . .

Crazy Love Giveaway: Win an In This Home Painting

2010-08-26T12:00:00.004-04:00

Many of you know that I have been creating In This Home paintings for others, similar to the one hanging over my fireplace. It is a joy to create these pieces for other families and each painting is such an encouragement to me because each painting brings us that much closer to bringing our son home from Ethiopia (and I promise my next post will be an update on where we are at in this adoption; it is long overdue!)

I wanted to let you know that Jill over at Forever n Ever n Always is hosting a giveaway of one of my paintings! I am really blown away; this mother of 9 (amazing photographer too!) ordered an In This Home painting for herself. Here it is:

Jill then decided to give away one of my paintings to a lucky winner. The lucky winner gets to pick out the colors, background, and "we do" statements, but Jill pays for it. That is some crazy love! Crazy Love spread to us Soutters, to our soon to be son, and to one lucky winner. Really, I think only God can prompt this kind of crazy love.

Go over to Jill's blog and browse around; click here to read Jill's post about the giveaway and enter!!! You have to enter today (Thurs 8/26) because the giveaway ends Friday, 8/27.

Wanna Join Us?

2010-08-25T15:32:00.000-04:00

This weekend Rob, the kids, and I committed to sponsoring 2 kiddos from a extremely poor, small village about 122 miles from the capital of Ethiopia.

YWAM, our adoption agency is spearheading some amazing projects in this village. Click here to see what God is doing in this village. We are excited to join God in His work! Go ahead and read the rest of this post, but come back here and click that link above to read the blog post about what is happening in this village.

You see, the agency we are using to help us adopt our son, a 4-8 year old boy from Ethiopia is Adoption Ministry of Youth With a Mission: Ethiopia. YWAM began humanitarian work in Ethiopia in 2007 with the mission to improve the lives of widows and children there. God eventually led YWAM to help some of these children thru international adoption. And as parents-to-be of an Ethiopian boy whose birth parents could not provide for him or who are no longer living, we wanted to help 2 kiddos be able to stay with their birth parents.

Midaso (Mi-doss'o) is 8 years old and wants to be a teacher when he grows up. Extreme poverty (his father is a missionary who struggles to provide enough income to support his family) has not yet stolen this little boy's ability to dream. We have not only committed to sending $30 a month so that Midasso has enough to eat and can go to school, but we have committed to praying that this boy is able to fulfill his dreams and that God uses him to pour into kids when he gets older.

And our hearts broke (especially my David's) when we learned that 4 year old Alemitu (Al-a-meet'-oo) and her family are living on the edge of starvation. Alemitu lives with her mother and father and is one of four kids. Both of her parents sell firewood to make a living.

And there are only 4 more kids that need sponsorship. Would you join us? Might you be the one to make a huge difference in one of these kids' lives? For only $30 a month, you will give one of these kids food to eat and access to schooling. . .and hope.

YWAM takes your $30 and purchases are made in Ethiopia by their in-country representatives. No administrative fees are deducted; 100% of your dollars are used for these children and their families.

If you are interested in sponsoring a child, you can click here for more info. Or you can email Becky or Joy at support@ywamethiopia.com and tell them you are a friend of mine/or reader of my blog :)

Here are the 4 kids that need sponsoring. If the pictures are still up, they still need sponsoring. I will keep this post updated.


04 Derartu (Dare-ar'-too) This little eight year old girl is one of seven children. Her mother is very young and beautiful and her father is dead. They rent a hut for a very small amount of money. Derartu is unable to attend school because they cannot pay the small tuition. Derartu's mother sells firewood and also does cooking for others.

16 Durti Geda
(Dur'-tee)

Durti is five years old and lives with her mother and father. She the middle of five children. Her father is a missionary in this village and earns about $35 a month, which is not nearly enough to support a family of seven. This good man needs help!

17 Masho Feysa
(Mash'-oh)

This six year old girl's father died and her father's brother became the husband of her mother. Masho is the oldest of two children and her mother is pregnant. Her step-father sells firewood to bring in a small amount of money.

17 Sebona Kedir
(Seh-bone'-uh)

There are five children in this 5-year-old boy's family and they live with their mother and father. His father tries hard to provide for his family by selling wood he gathers for fires and he sometimes helps others farm their plots of land.

I have this silly rumbling that thru this blog all 4 kids will get sponsored and that we sponsors will know each other either in real life or in blog land and then we could join together to pray in real life or thru email for this village and these families.

Our Mailbox this June

2010-07-18T22:03:00.000-04:00

Hang in there with me. My blog posts have not been as frequent as I would like. Oh there is much to share, and much going on in my head and heart, but the words just aren't there. . . yet.

But let me tell you about our mailbox in June.

For the LAST 2 weeks of June, our mailbox had nothing in it.

Oh, there was the flier for Rapid Fitness, a mailer advertising Capital Dental Care, an Oriental Trading Company Catalog, a letter from ATT wanting us to upgrade to a cable, dsl, phone package.

But really, every single piece of mail we received those last 2 weeks of June went straight into the recycle bin.

This is so funny. . this is so crazy. .this is so a God story. . .

because the FIRST 2 weeks of June our mailbox was constantly filled with blessings, with envelopes full of crazy love.

Those first 2 weeks of June, checks kept arriving in the mail.

Checks for In This Home paintings, some even written for more than the amount of the painting.

Checks for coupon classes that I teach.

Checks from old friends out of the blue saying they wanted to be a part of bringing home our next child.

It was crazy. Every single day for 2 weeks straight there were reminders of God's love in our mailbox. Every single day for the first 2 weeks of June, there was encouragement that God was writing this adoption story.

Little did we know that our fingerprint form would arrive from US Immigration 2 weeks earlier than expected. This US Immigration Form (171-H) is the last form needed to turn in a whole stack of papers (dossier) to Ethiopia.

$2200 is also required to be sent in too. We were not expecting this form to come until the end of June. . thus not needing the money until then.

But God knew and filled our mailbox with checks the 2 weeks prior to getting this form back.

The total of those checks was $2300. $2200 for the fee and $100 for shipping!!! Our God is good.

And then the checks stopped coming. June ended with 2 weeks of junk mail only. To us, the last 2 weeks of June were just as important as the first 2 weeks. It showed us once again that God is in control and He is the one bringing our son home.

I am linking up to Linny's blog party over at A Place Called Simplicity . She calls this party Memorial Box Monday.

As Linny says, "the purpose of each Memorial Box Monday post is to remind yourself and others of God's great faithfulness, His powerful provision and His Unexpected Gifts in each of our lives." For even more detail on what a Memorial Box is click here.

Why Ethiopia?

2010-06-16T22:27:00.007-04:00

Thru many blogs and books, we have become educated on how AIDS, poverty, and war have created a crisis of unfathomable proportions leaving millions of children orphaned and all alone in Africa.

An entire generation of parents are no longer; there are 4.4 million orphans in just Ethiopia.

Our hearts have broken for these orphans. We feel like God has enabled us to weep for these children.

And now we feel like God is asking us to be one of these children’s mom and dad.

We are excited; we are scared, we are in awe. Us? He wants us?! to be the mom and dad of this little boy? What a privilege! He chose us out of all the moms and dads to be this little boy’s family. That brings tears to our eyes.

• One in six children in Ethiopia die before their fifth birthday

• 44% of the population of Ethiopia is under 15 years old

• 1.5 million people are infected with AIDS (6th highest in the world)

• Drought struck the country from 2000-2002 (first year no crops, second year no seeds, third year no animals)

• Half the children in Ethiopia will never attend school. 88% will never attend secondary school.

• Ethiopia’s doctor to children ratio is 1 to 24,000.

• In 1993, after 30 long years of war, Eritrea broke from Ethiopia and became an independent nation leaving Ethiopia landlocked without any major seafaring ports.

Staggering.

Unbelievable.

Incomprehensible to us middle class Americans.

We (Rob and Su) are not oblivious anymore; we are no longer ignorant.

We have been made aware.

We have grown disturbed and broken over this crisis.

And we’ve come to realize that crazy love takes action.

As one blog we stumbled upon posted:

Love is an action word

Love doesn’t sit idle

Love doesn’t stay where is comfortable

Love doesn’t wait until there is enough money

or until all its ducks are in a row

Love doesn’t worry about what other people think

Love is an action word

The action we feel God is calling us to is another adoption.

African Children's Choir coming to Raleigh

2010-06-10T23:43:00.003-04:00

Mark Your Calendars!! Friday evening, June 25th, 7pm the internationally acclaimed African Children's Choir is performing at the Raleigh Vineyard at 6894 Litchford Rd in Raleigh!!

Since 1984, the Choir’s message has reached many millions of people across North America and Europe and as far a field as Australia. Some of their performances include the White House for President George W. Bush, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, American Idol for "Idol Gives Back," the United Nations Assembly, and Westminster Abbey for the Queen of England.

Through the excellence of their performances they have raised substantial sums of money. This supports both the commitment of the organization to the ongoing care and education of the Choir children themselves and funds the education and welfare of many thousands of children in some of Africa’s most troubled and needy areas. There is no charge for this event at the Raleigh Vineyard, but a love offering will be taken during the show if you are so inclined.

The African Children’s Choir is the ambassador for Africa’s neediest, most vulnerable children.

The Choir shows the world that its members, like the millions of abandoned and traumatized children in Africa, have beauty, dignity and unlimited potential.

We Soutters will all be there and are super excited. We see this as a great opportunity to be intentional about supporting those in need, nurturing a broader world vision (and for us, getting a glimpse into our son's birth country). Let me know if you want to come and we'll meet you in the lobby and go sit together.

A Craft Show Miracle (from 2007)

2010-06-08T11:36:00.001-04:00

Linny over at the blog, A Place Called Simplicity (my favorite blog, really) hosts a blog party every Monday where she asks others to share the God stories of their lives. She calls this party Memorial Box Monday.

As Linny says, "the purpose of each Memorial Box Monday post is to remind yourself and others of God's great faithfulness, His powerful provision and His Unexpected Gifts in each of our lives." For even more detail on what a Memorial Box is click here.

I am wanting to participate in sharing our God stories "because when we actively remember God's faithfulness in the past, we see that the future is under His control as well." And I need to remember that God has this current adoption in His hands.

So today's story that "only God could write" took place at the end of 2007. Anna was 10 years old at the time.

Over the Thanksgiving break, we sat Anna down and asked her to pray about how she was going to raise the money she needed to go to Guatemala. She and Rob were planning on spending a week that coming summer (2008) loving up on the children in a number of orphanages in Guatemala, including the one Jonathan (our 4th child) lived in for his first 10 months. Anna needed $1500 for her part of the trip.

Anna prayed and said she felt that we were to participate in Sanderson’s Holly Days craft show. We told her that she probably wouldn’t get in since it was coming up quickly. We asked her to keep praying.

In the meantime, Rob and I prayed privately and both of us felt God telling us to follow Anna’s lead and support her. By the end of the long weekend, Anna was sure that God was asking her to do the show, which we had discovered was less than a week away.

Rob and I had a crisis of faith. Were we going to take some serious risks and support our daughter? Or were we gonna tell Anna that she probably hadn’t heard God because it was too late to get in the show? We went with the former. We bought lots of art supplies, cleared our schedules to find time for creating, began making logistical arrangements, and emailed the folks at Sanderson.

By that first Thursday in December (the show started Friday), the crafts were getting done but we had heard nothing from Sanderson. We called the school and were given the same email we had already tried. We wrote again. This time we heard back, a letter telling us they were full and we would not get a space, they had more vendors this year than any other year. We emailed back, thanking them and letting them know we would be available if anything changed.

That night, we pulled the kids and prayed again. Anna felt like she got a picture of us at the show and people flooding our booth. She also saw a picture of Su at her computer on the AOL screen but did know what it meant. After the prayer time, we continued to craft and Rob and David drove across town to pick up tables for the show.

Part of us felt we were crazy preparing for a show we did not even have a booth at. The other part thought there was nothing else to do: of course we were going to prepare for the show, like Noah preparing for rain.

Later that night we put the kids to bed and each one begged God that we would get in the show. Rob and I went downstairs and continued to create.

We popped open email and found a note from Sanderson that read: “We just now had a cancellation. You will take so and so’s place.”

We jumped up and ran to the kids’ rooms. Everyone was screaming and jumping up and down. Tears were streaming down Su’s face. Anna had the hugest smile on her face and said, “I just knew it!” and hugged Su so tightly. We cheered for Jesus and thanked him for showing up.

Our pastor often says, “How do you spell faith?

The answer is, "R-I-S-K”

We are so glad we took the risk. And so to remember this story. . Anna and I bought the wooden word FAITH to put in our Memorial Box to help my now 13 year old

remember the very first (when she was 10) supernatural, faith filled, risk taking God adventure. May this be a mark of her life.

I'll tell you the turnout of Anna's craft show next Monday.

And if you missed my very first Memorial Box Monday post about God showing up at the mall, click here.

God Shows Up at the Mall

2010-05-24T21:00:00.001-04:00

So here is my first Memorial Box Monday post. This God story just took place yesterday, Sunday, May 24, 2010. Click here if you missed my post about what a Memorial Box is.

I took my girls to Crabtree mall yesterday because Anna needed a specific top for her dance concert and she had a H&M gift card from her birthday to spend.

As we were fighting the crowds of H&M, trying on shirts, and my head was thumping to the loud music, a lady in a hot pink shirt came up to me and gently touched my arm.

I do not remember exactly what she said. . which is exactly why it is so important to write these God stories down soon after they occur. The lady seemed nervous and stumbled over her words, but said something like:

"I was over there with you when you were looking at the t-shirts and something in my gut told me to give something to you. So I am going to give it to you and walk away. Is that ok? Now don't come after me."

I was kinda taken aback and did not know what to say so I just uttered "ok". I cannot remember if I smiled or not. I was thinking she was gonna give me a tract or perhaps the phone #/website to some business proposition. She grabbed my hand and put some paper in it. I stuck it in my pocket and walked towards my girls.

In the corner of H&M, I looked at what she had given me. . it was $100.

And I looked for the bright hot pink shirt because I WAS gonna go after her.

I was gonna tell her about this little boy in Ethiopia that we are adopting and how we were asking God to provide for the adoption expenses and the plane tickets and a 12 passenger van. And I was gonna tell her that I thought her "gut feeling" was God and tell her that God still speaks today (maybe this lady knew that and she just said "gut feeling" as not to scare me off. . I do not know). Oh I wanted to tell her lots; I wanted to invite her to go get a pretzel with me and my girls.

I could not find her, but right there in H&M, with tears in my eyes, I said outloud, "Thank you God!"

Thru a lady in a bright pink top who had a "gut feeling", God whisperd to me. . "See, I have not forgotten that you are on this adoption journey. I am right here with you. I hear your prayers. I am going to provide." He spoke encouragement to my soul.

And so a H&M logo will go in our Memorial Box to remind us that God can show up anywhere. . even at the mall.

For more God stories, click the box below:

What is a Memorial Box?

2010-05-24T07:41:00.001-04:00

Linny over at one of my all time favorite blogs, A Place Called Simplicity has a Memorial Box. This is a box where she purposefully gathers symbols representing the times of God's faithfulness. Every Monday, Linny shares an item in her Memorial Box and tells "the story only God could write". And then she invites her readers to do the same.

Linny explains that "In the Old Testament (Joshua 4) God tells the Hebrew nation to build a Memorial of stones to remember what He had done. He goes on to say that everytime they see the stones they are to remember and tell their children the story of His faithfulness and then to tell their children's children. So why did God tell His people to do that? Just for fun? No!! He did it cause He knew how forgetful they would be and that they would need to constantly tell the story over and over to remember His faithfulness."

So I am joining in. Rob and I are in the process of transforming the firewood box in our stairwell into a memorial box. Rob, the kids and I are making a list of all the God stories in our lives and figuring out what item we want to get to represent them.

And I am gonna start recording these stories here every Monday because as Linny says,

when we actively remember God's faithfulness

in the past,

we see that the future

is under His control as well."

Stay tuned for my first Memorial Box Monday post. . . the story just happened yesterday.

Where We Are At: May 17

2010-05-18T00:15:00.004-04:00

Here's where we are at in the adoption timeline:

We are currently waiting to receive our fingerprint appointment card from US Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS).

We will then go to Durham, NC to to get fingerprinted. I am guessing this will be around June 15 or so.

A month after that (so around July 15), we should receive our I-171H in the mail. As soon as you we have that, we are ready for the referral of our son.

Then we send in our dossier (fancy word for lots and lots of notarized papers and copies) to be authenticated in Ethiopia.

Referral of our son

Receive Ethiopian court date and make travel plans. This is new, the Ethiopian govt now requires the parents to be there for this court date. This is new as of May 2010 so now we have to go to Ethiopia twice.

Travel to Ethiopia to meet our son and appear in court. Once we pass this court appointment, the child is ours and I can post pics for ya'll to see. (I think I am right about this).

Say Good-bye to our son. . I have already cried over this. I bawled hysterically when we had to leave Jonathan and he was a baby and did not comprehend that we were leaving and coming back much later. Jonathan was asleep in his bassinet when we left. I cannot imagine leaving a 4-8 year old. So we go back home and wait for an Embassy Appointment date to be given.

Travel to Ethiopia again and be reunited with our son. Get son's passport at Embassy appointment.

Return home with our son

And here's where I am at emotionally:

There's joy and excitement and anticipation, but there's also a heaviness and broken heartedness that makes me cry often.

To have all these emotions within the same day and try to process and pray thru them. . . at the same time that my 9 year old needs to be homeschooled, laundry needs to be put away, kids need to be picked up from school, and dinner needs to get on the table is . . . a lot. This is the hard part, not all that adoption paperwork, not all that running around town getting this form and that form filled out, not the money. This whirlwind of emotions, this having your heart become aware of things you weren't aware of (more on that later), that is what I am referring to when I say, "adoption isn't for wimps."

I pray daily that my son in Ethiopia. . that his heart would be filled with hope, that somehow supernaturally he would know that a mom and dad and 2 brothers and 2 sisters are waiting for him.

My prayer for me is that I would enjoy this ride and be strengthen and changed to be more like Jesus in the process. God loves my boy in Ethiopia more than I do.
God has already written this story.

God preparing Brooke

2010-05-14T16:12:00.001-04:00

I have been praying that God would prepare each one of us for our time in Africa. Yes, each one of us.

My prayer is that God would provide plane tickets not just for Rob and me, but for the kids as well. I want them to go. For so many reasons (which is another post).

And so I am praying that God not only provides a way for all 6 of us to go to Africa, but that He also starts preparing us for what He is going to do in us and thru us while we are there.

And I think I am seeing a glimpse of this preparation in my Brooke. Remember this story of Brooke praying for our next door teenage neighbor's boyfriend. . even though she was scared?

Well, the story continues. Last Sunday. . .May 16th, 2010. . again documenting for me and Brooke. . .during worship Brooke felt like she heard God tell her that she was to pray for a lady that started with the letter E and had no kids.

Brooke wanted to tell Rob what she had heard, but then it was time to go to Sunday School.

When Brooke got to Sunday School, there was a new teacher assistant, Mrs. Emily. Brooke knew then that she was to pray for Mrs. Emily. . that this was the E lady God was talking about during worship.

After Sunday School was over, Brooke ran and found me and told me that she wanted to go pray for Mrs. Emily. Oh me, I think Mrs. Emily and I had had one conversation before and that is it.

But this was not about me, this was about nurturing this heart of prayer in my 9 year old. So we found Mrs. Emily.

I introduced ourselves and thanked her for teaching Brooke in Sunday School and told her that Brooke wanted to pray for her and could we?

Mrs. Emily said yes. Brooke took over so confidently and said, "Is there anything specific you want prayer for?"

And Emily shared something real and significant. Which so made me smile because by sharing something real. . Mrs. Emily showed me and Brooke that she believed that God does not put an age limit on when God can use a person or when suddenly someone can start hearing His voice. Oh how my heart smiled. Kids can so see thru when we are faking it or just doing it to not hurt their feelings. Mrs. Emily was sincere.

Brooke then asked, "Mom, do you want to go first or do you want me?"

Brooke prayed.

Emily cried.

And afterwards Brooke had to make sure Mrs. Emily did not have any kids so she just out of the blue asked her, "Do you have kids?" No surprise, she didn't. Brooke just looked at me and nodded her head and smiled.

Oh this is what I like about being a mom. . identifying what God is up too. . identifying those unique gifts He has placed in each one of my kids. . and then when I see the chance to water them and nurture them. . to jump at the chance.

I have a feeling Brooke is being prepared for some praying in Africa.

These are selling. . .

2010-05-12T10:24:00.005-04:00

These are selling:

These are selling not because I am super talented or business savvy, but because God longs to bring home a little boy to his forever family.

The following blogs wrote about my paintings. The real reason I am listing these blogs is not for you, but for our boy.

One day, I will show our son this post and tell him, "See, God had it all planned. Look what He did. He totally made a way for you to come home. Look how He got the word out about Mom's paintings. Our God is soo cool. Look how he used paint and paper and crafts and couponing and blogs to bring us together. Our God is so creative!"

And then we can talk about what talents and gifts my son has and how he can let God use then for good purposes and big God things. Oh yes, that makes me smile! I have seen it over and over again. . skateboarding, craft shows, couponing, water bottles and bananas (more on that later), scrapbooking, blogging. . . all used to further His Kingdom.

Check out these shout outs:

Just A Girl

That We Might Be Adopted

A Place Called Simplicity

Throwing Our Arms Open Wide

Musically Pink

We Are That Family, this post too

Cleary Crew

Click here if you'd like to see lots of pictures of paintings I have done for families, to a page with all the details about how these paintings are made, and if interested, details on how to order one for your own home.

It's More than Just Art. . .

2010-05-05T23:14:00.019-04:00

It's More than Just Art. . .

it's a Vision for Your Family

and it helps bring a little boy home from Ethiopia

If you have been in my home, you have seen the large whimsical art above my fireplace. Oh. .this is so much more than just decor; this is what the Soutters are all about; these are our priorities.

The sales of these one-of-a kind pieces of art helped to raise funds for our adoption of a little boy from Ethiopia. And due to the volume of orders I have currently, I am no longer taking orders. I have many orders to keep me creating until March 2011 and then our little boy comes home!! I am keeping this post up because one day I want to make all my posts into a book for our son. . for him to see how God was orchestrating his coming home. So if you came here from another link, thanks for your interest, but I am not taking orders or adding to my wait list. I am slowing down to wrap up current orders, prepare for our son, and then adjust, transition, and bond as a family of 7. Thanks for understanding.

Here is a painting I did for the Marble family:

Just tell me your colors. What colors make you smile?
Pink and brown made this gal smile. You can click on any of these pictures to view it larger.

Or you can send me photos of the room where you will hang this one-of-a-kind art. Here is a painting I did for a special family in Kansas after I saw pictures of their kitchen:

Tell me what color background you are thinking. a neutral like Cream or Tan/Khaki OR a bright cheerful color like this apple green.

Or perhaps a soft blue. I can do any color background you want.

Tell me your colors and I will then pick out the paint and paper and have you approve. This gal shared she wanted blues and khakis and some turquoise too because it was her favorite color.

Once colors are approved, you then get me a list of 20 things your family is about. I can give you a list to help you brainstorm.

Here is a painting I did for the family. I love that one of their "we do statements" is we do snuggles.

Each painting is a custom, unique piece just for your home. No two paintings are identical; this is truly one-of-a- kind art. What a reminder of your family's priorities and purpose!! This piece was made for a special family in California:

The paintings are dimensional. . the words "In This Home" and the house stands out from the canvas. The roof and door of the house are separate pieces and add even more dimension.

I love the button as the doorknob.

Three sizes are available:

A 24" wide by 18" tall painting is $75.

Here is a 24 by 18 painting that will hang in the Roe's homeschool room. I just need to put their 15-20 "we do" statements on it.

The next size I offer is 36" wide by 24" tall for $130. This was a birthday present from a hubby to his wife.

I also offer a huge, 48" wide by 36" tall pieces of art; this is the size of the painting in my living room for $240. Here is one of the large paintings I did for the Dickenson's, to hang in their dining room:

Contact me at susoutter at bellsouth dot net (use @ and .) and we can talk your colors, what your family is all about, and get started on your unique piece of art work right away.

And one more picture. Below is a painting I did for the Cleary family. Look how the door and windows match her dining room walls perfectly!

Click here to see what the Cleary family and others are saying about their paintings.

Please note that if you are not local (Raleigh, NC) and I have to ship your painting, shipping/handling charges will be added to the price of the painting. I will just add the exact amount that I am charged to ship it, plus the charge of the box. The 24 by 18 paintings average $17. The 36 by 24 painting are averaging around $22. And the largest 48 by 36 paintings are averaging $98 to ship.

Even When You're Scared

2010-04-27T23:36:00.005-04:00

Brooke (our 9 year old) was outside when she noticed our 15 year old neighbor's boyfriend drive up. He had a back cast on and his upper body was stiff. He proceeded to knock on our neighbor's door and walk in.

Brooke told Rob that she really wanted to go and pray for that boy, but

she was scared.

She continued to say, "I wish I was brave like you Daddy."

And Rob said,

"Brave is not being scared.
Brave is doing something
even when you are scared."

Where did he pull that from??

And then Rob immediately said, "Let's go do it! Let's go pray for that teenager!"

So they knocked on the door. And Rob shared that Brooke wanted to pray for this boyfriend.

Brooke went first.

She prayed

even though she was scared.

Brooke then came running into our house, heart beating fast, hardly able to get the words out. . . to tell me what she had done. I had no clue what was going on.

She told me that was the most scared she had ever been, but that she did it. She prayed for this teenager's back to heal, for him to be able to take his cast off.

I am sure I will get more details from Brooke in the following days. I am sure I will make her write it all out in her journal. I am sure that later this week, I will quiz Rob on every detail of this interaction. I am sure I may even hear something about it from our next door neighbors.

But right now as my family is asleep, I am thanking God for

a little girl who believes that God heals

for a little girl who has compassion for a high school boy, a boy 6 years older than she, a boy she does not know

for a husband that seizes the teachable moment

for a husband that stops the cleaning of the yard to say, Let's go do it!

for the reminder that sometimes I need to do "it" even when I am scared

So I know this has nothing to do directly with our adoption,
but I have a feeling indirectly it does :)
so I had to post for me to remember.

Want to see what others stopped, took notice of, and were thankful for?
Check out "Tuesdays Unwrapped" at Chatting at the Sky

I am constantly amazed. . .update on prayer request

2010-04-13T18:15:00.005-04:00

I am so excited!! I just wrote this post at 2:45 pm today asking for prayer for our homestudy. I do not know if any of you had the chance to even read it yet.

After I wrote the post, I got on the couch and prayed. Prayed for our social worker. Prayed that our homestudy would get emailed to our agency for review today.

Rob and Anna walked in around 3:40. I stopped praying and painted Anna's nails and heard about Anna and Rob's day. Rob left to skateboard and I checked the computer.

Our social worker emailed the final draft of our homestudy at 3:59pm!!! About 15 minutes after I had asked God to intervene.

I reviewed the homestudy. Our social worker made some corrections and at 5:51 our homestudy was emailed to our adoption agency for review.

3 hours! I am constantly amazed by the power of God. I am constantly amazed that He allows us to be a part of His plan. He could have done all this without us but He allowed you and I to participate through prayer. God is good.

The Stages of Int'l Adoption Paperwork & Prayer Request

2010-04-13T14:45:00.003-04:00

The paperwork stage of our international adoption is divided into 4 parts. I wanted to share so you know where we are at. I will try to explain in non adoption language to make it easy to understand.

The first part is the application process which we have completed. This is where you fill out the agency's application, get 4 letters of reference, and sign all kinds of agreements. We have already done this.

Upon completion of each paperwork stage, a fee is due. Read here if you missed hearing how God provided the fees for this stage.

The 2nd part is the homestudy. Many documents are required to even begin the homestudy process: autobiographies, answers to questionnaires, medical forms filled out by doctors, birth certificates, marriage certificate, employment verification letters, county and state background checks, 10 hours of online adoptive family training.

The social worker takes all these documents and the info she gathers in her meetings with you and creates a homestudy that is submitted to the adoption agency AND to Homeland Security, the US Citizenship & Immigration office. A fee is due at this time too. . and I gotta do a post soon on how God provided that. :)

Once we have the homestudy, we can move to the 3rd stage which is applying for "advance processing of orphan petition". You fill out a form, include the homestudy, and copies of birth certificates and marriage certificates and send it off to Homeland Security. They in turn tell you a date of when you can come in and get your fingerprints done.

We will go to Durham to get these fingerprints taken. We will then wait for them to mail us approval. . the I-171H form. . that is what we want, this goes to Ethiopia with us. It is also what is needed to complete the 4th stage of the paperwork: the dossier (go here to hear how you say that word).

The dossier is this huge stack of documents: the I-171H form, homestudy, medical forms, employment verications, bank letters, copy of tax returns, birth certificates, marriage certificate, copy of passports, family photos, reference letters, police clearances. .all notarized and sent off to the adoption agency who in turns sends it to Ethiopia for authentication by their government.

At this point are you able to receive a referral of your child.

And here is where we are at and what we need prayer for:

So we are waiting for our homestudy. . all documents have been given and all meetings have been conducted. . we just need the hard copy of our homestudy in our hands to move forward.

Will you pray with us that we would get this homestudy this week? We have been waiting quite a while, a lot longer than we were told it would take.

I do not think we are necessary in a hurry. . .as we trust God is orchestrating the coming together of us and our son just perfectly. . but we would just like to continue to move forward. . we would like to check this off our "to-do" list. . we would like to free up a little "brain energy". We sure would appreciate prayers for this homestudy to get done and in our hands.

How We Decided to Adopt. . Again

2010-03-29T14:00:00.015-04:00

Ever since Jonathan came home from Guatemala in July 2007, we have felt that God wasn’t done growing our family.

Two months after Jonathan came home, Su wrote the following in her prayer journal (inspired by a scrapbook layout she had seen in a magazine years ago):

These 4 are enough. . .
These 4 fill my days and nights and sometimes beyond
These 4 are brimming with my hopes and prayers
These 4 fill my homes with an obscene amount of laundry and mess and dirt and noise
These 4 can't hold any more of my love

But there's room in our home for at least one more
There's room in our van for one more
There's room in our hearts for one more
We have all this extra love that's missing a child

Over the past 2 1/2 years, the thoughts of another child have grown not only in us, but our children as well. One night, Rob and Brooke were driving by a huge mansion. Brooke out of the blue said, “We could have lots of kids if we lived there.” And almost immediately Rob had this overwhelming sense that there were more Soutters to come.

One time during worship at church, David saw a picture in his head of our whole family in a plane flying to Africa.

And then one night before bed, while praying, David asked God to speak to him. David told us that he got a picture in his head of a hand holding up 4 fingers. But he said the thumb was missing.

David said the picture was God telling him something was missing, but he could not figure out what. Su and Rob looked at each other, knowing what was missing.

Anna’s heart broke for the orphan when she and Rob took a missions trip to

Guatemala

the summer or 2008. They loved on the children in many orphanages including the one where Jonathan had lived.

And then Anna read an article in American Girl magazine about a family that had 20 kids, 5 biological and 15 adopted. And since then, Anna has asked, and sometimes begged for us to have more children.

This is the same girl who was not excited when we told her we were adopting a little boy from

Guatemala

because it was one more sibling to get into her things.

From September 2007 to February 2010, the desires grew and the confirmations came. We felt we were ready, like we had our bags packed, that we were even in the car with our seat belts buckled, but God had not said go.

On February 2, we talked and prayed and asked God if it was time to move. Neither of us heard anything. The following day, on the way to work, Rob felt like God said “Go. It is time.”

That afternoon we called Adoption Ministry of YWAM: Ethiopia and began the process. As we took the first step, we prayed for the $600 application fee to go with it.

The next day Su’s dad called and left a message on the answering machine saying he had a surprise for her. The surprise was a check; Su’s grandma had recently passed away and Su’s dad wanted to share… the check covered the application fee.

Coincidence? Maybe? But we saw it as God’s perfect timing, God saying, “See, I really did say go. I will provide. I love this little boy in

Ethiopia

more than you.”

Another Crisis of Belief

2010-03-23T16:35:00.001-04:00

The last paragraph of our most recent post titled Water Walkers was this:

"There will be more obstacles, many. There will be times when it seems there is no way. But that's what it is like when you go water walking."

And indeed today we are faced with a crisis of belief.

We got an email today from our agency stating that although the MOWA in Oromio opened, now the Addis (capital of Ethiopia) MOWA has closed.

This MOWA (Ministry of Women's Affairs) approves all letters issued by the various offices in the Oromia region. This closure means that court dates cannot be issued and children are "stuck" until they can get a final stamp of approval from this office.

And so we are faced again with the choice: do we look at the circumstances or do we look at Jesus?

We sure would appreciate your prayers for our little boy and the other 4.4 million!!! orphans in Ethiopia.

Water Walking

2010-03-22T18:35:00.000-04:00

If you are familiar with the story of Jesus walking on water, you know that His friend Peter joined Him, walking on the waves. Peter saw God at work and asked if he could join. Next thing Peter knew, he was climbing out of the boat and onto the sea. But as Peter approached Jesus, he got fixed on the wind and the waves. He got scared, and he started to sink.
God could have removed the wind and the waves. He could have made the sea calm as glass, but He didn't.

As we stepped out to start another adoption adventure, God did not remove the waves. 2 days after we signed up with YWAM, the agency stopped accepting families.

The Ministry of Women's Affairs (MOWA) in the region of Ethiopia where our agency's orphanages are located had been closed for the last 6 months while they restructured and restaffed. Our agency kept hearing that MOWA would reopen any day but any day was not coming. So what that meant was no adoptions could be processed, no referrals could be issued, and no new children could be admitted to the orphanages. It was the first time ever that our agency had more families than children-which is crazy because there are million of orphaned kids in Ethiopia (the reasons why in another post). And for that reason, they decided to stop taking new families-2 days after we were accepted to the program.

Like Peter our first reaction was one of fear. Oh no, they are shutting down. Will we be able to get a child? What if we do all this work for nothing? We tried not to worry but wondered if we missed God. And tried to figure out why He would direct us to this agency and then have it "shut" 2 days afterwards.

But just like Peter, God was there to grab us. He quickly reminded us that He was in control. Sure, everything looked hopeless. But this was God's story and we had been here before. We know that when you step out to follow God, you are going to be met with wind and waves. We know that there are no certainties with international adoption (like when we lost the referral of a child during our first adoption). Like Peter we needed to keep our eyes on Jesus. The timing of our journey was no accident.

Last week we received an email saying that the MOWA opened!! We praised God and thanked him for taking care of us and the son we have yet to meet. God's plans are never thwarted by the things that seem too big or hopeless to us!

There will be more obstacles, many. There will be times when it seems there is no way. But that's what it is like when you go water walking.

Why no posts

2010-03-21T16:29:00.002-04:00

So I have gotten on this new blog about every other day and I try to post. There is much to share. And I start to type and then I delete. It is too big. . much bigger than me. And perhaps that is it. . here I am in the midst of something so much bigger than me that I cannot find the words to describe or explain or do it justice. Thus I feel insecure at the keyboard.

But oh, I so want ya'll to be a part of the journey. I so want to give God the glory for the things He is doing. There is a battle waging, but I am determined to press through. Come back for a new post tomorrow.

Are We Crazy?

2010-03-05T16:40:00.001-05:00

I heard it again today, "Are you out of your mind?" As people have found out that we are adopting again and thus choosing to add another child to our family, choosing to raise 5 kids. . .I daily hear some version of "Are you crazy?"

I smile. I am not offended. We are crazy. Rob and I are crazy in love with each other, more so now that when we first got married 17 years ago. We are crazy in love with our four children who are now 12, 10, 9, and 3. And we are crazy in love with God who has changed our lives. And thus we want to be faithful to what we feel like He is calling us to do.

Crazy is a compliment. I see it as synonymous with "Wow, you take this God thing for real!" Or "You are a risk taker for Jesus, or a sacrificer for Jesus, or a servant of Jesus." And that is who I really want to be; I do not want to be a lukewarm, go to church, sing a few songs Christian. So when I hear, "Are you crazy" I smile!!

Oh, I mess up a lot. I am even a little embarrassed to write the above because God is so good and so perfect and so loving and I don't always represent Him well. At the same time, that is the heart of the Bible message. God takes plain ordinary broken people and invites them into a beautiful, adventurous, often crazy relationship.

Welcome!!

2010-03-03T15:57:00.004-05:00

Perhaps you came to this lil' blog because we sent you a letter letting you know that we are adopting again or perhaps you came here thru my other blog The Intentional Home. . .or perhaps you just stumbled across it. Whatever the way. . welcome!!

There are 3 purposes of this blog:

1. to chronicle the story "only God could write" as we launch out to bring home our 5th child from Ethiopia.

We were witness to a beautiful story when we stepped out and began the journey to bring Jonathan home from Guatemala and I am sure I will share pieces of that story as we go along on this blog.

Jonathan aka J-boy is our 4th child. We have 4 kids right now, 3 biological and 1 adopted. Here we are:

I am Su. My husband is Rob. And the kids are Anna, David, Brooke, and J-boy.

So we know there is another beautiful story this time around. . .a different one this time around, but just as beautiful.

2. to keep friends and family in the loop as to where we are in the process and guesstimate how much longer til our son comes home

3, And one more. . to encourage those of you who stop by or stumble upon this lil' blog that God has a story that only He could write for YOU, too.

Click here for my most recent post.

My goal is to post every week. . we will see how that goes :) If you'd rather have my posts sent to your email instead of having to check in and see if I really did post . . . then I would encourage you to look over at the right hand sidebar up towards the top and enter your email address or those of you who are use to blogs. . you can subscribe in a reader too.

Contact Me

2010-03-01T15:02:00.001-05:00

You can email me at

susoutter at bellsouth dot net

You need to use @ and . I had to write it this way so spammers wouldn't find my email address.