Show LOVE, Give LOVE...

Yesterday I was reminded of just how truly blessed we are...

As some of you know, we recently took our son to his Pediatrician for a routine well check exam. While there, the Doctor discovered something "abnormal" (in order to protect our son, we have chosen not to go into detail about this). He referred us to a Pediatric Surgeon for a second opinion and gave us orders not to "Google" or think about it again until we met with the surgeon. Well as parent's that is near impossible. I immediately called in my prayer warriors asking them to lift up our son in prayer, that this issue would correct itself before our consultation with the surgeon. I cried out to God asking that IF it be HIS will and HIS plan, that this problem correct itself before our consultation with the surgeon.

God gave me an answer. It wasn't what I wanted but He answered.

Our son, our baby boy, our 18 month old will be admitted to the Children's Hospital, he will be administered anesthesia, he will be laying on a table with skilled doctor's and nurses surrounding his precious little body working carefully to correct his issue. Derick and I will feel that we are miles away while we sit in a waiting room. This was overwhelming news for me yesterday. This was not the news I wanted. This was not MY plan for our son.

As I walked out of the consult room, holding my baby boy while he slept, we passed through the waiting room to exit the building. I noticed the other children sitting in the waiting room. Some looked healthy, some were confined to wheel chairs, some had severe disabilities.

I placed my sleeping baby boy into the safety of his car seat and thanked God for my healthy children. I thanked God that this procedure is not more serious. I thanked God that we are living in America with access to medicine, state of the art health care, access to trained surgeons who can correct my son's issue. Derick and I are so thankful for these things and we do not want to take our children's health for granted again.

Even still, I cling to this passage from Jeremiah for our son...
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

In the same way that I cling to that passage in Jeremiah for our son, I also cling to that same passage for our Ethiopian child.

Our child who is waiting in Ethiopia and so many others across the world do not have access to state of the art health care, medicine, trained surgeons, and parents fighting for them.

Our child in Ethiopia deserves these same "luxuries".
Our child in Ethiopia deserves a chance.
Our child in Ethiopia deserves to know the love of our Heavenly Father.
Our child in Ethiopia deserves a forever home.
Our child in Ethiopia deserves to know that they are loved, wanted, prayed for.
Our child in Ethiopia deserves to have unconditional love from a mom and dad.

This Mother's Day, would you join us in purchasing with a purpose? Would you Show LOVE to your mom this Mother's Day with a gift that will help us GIVE LOVE to our child waiting in Ethiopia?

Jump on over to our online store to get a set of custom designed scripture note cards for your mom, wife or friend. Each purchase between now and May 10th will receive a FREE Mother's Day card and FREE shipping with discount code "FREESHIP".

Take Me Into the Beautiful...

One thing that has always been a big influence in my life is music. I guess I should say that I can't remember a time where music was not in my life. For me, it is an essential part in worshiping my Heavenly Father. He is reason that I sing.

When we began processing through countless adoption fundraisers I knew that we had to do a concert, a night of worship. We also knew getting a well known band was out of the question due to lack of finances and lack of connections with anyone. We figured when the time came, we would find a worship team from a nearby church that would be willing to come lead us in a night of worship.

A few weeks ago we received a text message from a friend that read:

Cloverton will be coming through the area at the end of April, do you think the church would want to host a concert?

Jokingly I told Derick, "Hey, maybe we could get them to come do a benefit concert!" Derick sent the text joking/asking and the reply back was "They might, I'll give them your information."

If you aren't familiar with Cloverton, they are an amazing Contemporary Christian band who just so happens to have the #1 most downloaded song in the history of KLOVE with "Take Me Into the Beautiful".

A couple days later, I am standing in the middle of Hobby Lobby when my phone rings. I don't recognize the number but I answer and hear a voice on the other end say "Hey, this is Lance with Cloverton, is this Lacey?" 

WOW! I was in total shock. He went on to ask questions about our adoption and our vision for the concert. They shared in our vision to do two things, worship our Heavenly Father and bring awareness to orphan care in the process.

The only available date they had was in four weeks. If we are being honest, we were all concerned about the time frame and if we could pull it off considering our small town. We all agreed to pray about it and talk the next afternoon to confirm.

The next day we went to lunch at one of our favorite restaurants. While having lunch, a friend who works for the Galilean Home Ministries came by to talk. We begin to tell him about our opportunity to host Cloverton for a benefit concert but we just felt that didn't have enough time, resources and connections to make it successful. After talking further, it became apparent what we needed to do. 

We would partner with The Galilean Home Ministries. 

The Galilean Home began in 1970 with Jerry and the late Sandy Tucker. Having been unable to conceive and after much prayer, the couple decided to adopt. They now have two biological children and 30 adopted children. Through their ministry, they have helped nearly 1,000 children and over 700 newborns. What a testimony of God's love and following his call in Micah 6:8 to "Seek Justice, Love Mercy & Walk Humbly with Your God". This organization who is really just a big family, is very near to our hearts. With their involvement in adoption and orphan care, it is only natural that we would partner with them. 

We are now two weeks away from the concert and tickets have been on sale for one week. We are trying not to focus on how many tickets get sold because we know our God will sort out all the details. What we want to remain focused on are two very important things...

1. Honoring our Heavenly Father through a night of worship with the talented band Cloverton. 

2. Bringing awareness about orphan care and The Galilean Home Ministries. 

God introduced us to Cloverton in 2011 when they performed at the local Apple Festival. In 2012 their former sound technician began attending the church where my husband pastors. In 2013 we began praying about growing our family through adoption. In 2014 we began the adoption process and Cloverton agrees to do a benefit concert to help in our fundraising efforts. 

Coincidence? Absolutely not. 

Only MY God could write a story so beautifully....

We would love to have you come out and join us for a wonderful night of worship.

Let the fundraising begin!

I have a dear friend (who lives in the desert) that is amazing at fundraising ideas and has helped so many through her fundraising efforts. As soon as I knew we would be adopting, I also realized that we would need to do fundraising to help us bridge the gap.

After talking with my desert gal pal, she suggested we put our talents to work to help with our fundraising efforts. My mom and grandma can take nothing and make something beautiful out of it. My husband has a great eye for design. So we pulled together our resources and talents and produced what I believe are some great products.

Here is what the ladies have been working on...

And here is what Derick has been working on...

A special thanks to Kyle Terry with Kyle Terry Photography for photographing our note cards. He has a great eye and is wonderful to work with. 

We are working hard to get all our products uploaded to our website so you can shop! We hope to have everything finished within the next couple days.


God has surrounded me with crazy talented people who are willing to help us out in any way necessary. I love that he knows exactly what we will need and places the right people in our path.

Let the Journey begin...

"I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you"

John 14:18

In 2011 a dear friend Emily Fox challenged us to throw our fancy Easter duds to the side and dress for a purpose for Easter. She called it "Forget the Frock". She asked us to purchase a t-shirt to raise orphan awareness, each t-shirt would feed an orphan for one month. My first thought was "that's great that she can do that, but I could never do that". That Easter my family walked through the doors of our church in clothing that was perfectly coordinated and not at all in our budget. I had dressed for me, for self, for approval of man. OUCH. That morning during worship, God broke my heart, I remember trying to hold back tears thinking that I chose to fill up someone's wallet instead of filling up a child's belly. I was devastated by my selfishness. I promised to stop living for me and start really living for Him. To get out of my comfort zone and serve. The seed of orphan care was planted then and began growing.

God had blessed us with a healthy daughter and son, why were we so lucky?! Our family seemed complete. Life was great but I had a feeling that our family wasn't complete. Even though we had the picture perfect family, something was missing. I began talking with Derick about it and told him I felt led to adopt and that my heart was breaking thinking of the millions of children who had never felt loved. Anytime I talked about it, I ended up nearly sobbing. He was somewhat quiet on the topic but in true "Lacey fashion", I decided to continue talking nagging to him about it until he came to me and said "I am okay with adopting, but I want it to happen in God's timing". Oh how I began to pray.

In January of 2014 Derick traveled to Uganda for a video shoot involving our global mission partner U.C.S.S. During his trip he encountered two families who had adopted and each shared their story with him. He brought back several different souvenirs for us but this one was the best.

It is a small statue of a mother, father and three children. This was his way of telling me that he agreed with my feeling that God wasn't finished with our family.

We researched, attended seminars, researched, met with an agency (where we only qualified for one program), researched some more, (have I mentioned how MUCH information there is on adoption?!) and then we gave it up to God. We began praying that if this was going to happen, then I wanted God to ordain it, to orchestrate it, to control it. You see, when I try to take control of things I have a way of rushing them. I want things to happen quickly but God is patient. He knows the plans and he knows what is ultimately best for us. I too wanted what was best.

Insert GOD story:
Valentine's Day was approaching and Derick told me that he had tried to surprise me with concert tickets to see Casting Crowns but decided it was not in our "budget" (Thanks Dave Ramsey!). Nice gesture babe... We went on with life, unaware of what God was up to. Two days before the concert a friend of ours called Derick and asked if we would take their Casting Crowns tickets (for FREE!). Their exact words were "consider this a Jesus Kiss". We were humbled and looking forward to a night of worship with Callie. That night videos played in regards to orphan care, World Vision was there (with whom we sponsor a child) and then Marc Hall began talking about his family's own adoption and told us that the agency they used was present that night ready to provide information. In all of my research of agency's in Kentucky their name had NEVER came up. Weird. I went to the table and got the information and threw it in my purse. A few days later I got it out and start browsing their website. The word "ETHIOPIA" stuck out. I clicked on it began reading. I felt peace, I felt at ease. It seemed like the perfect fit for our family. I didn't want to rush it or dismiss any other program, so I sat and read through each program they offered. I showed it to Derick and he felt the same way.

We submitted our Pre-Application and were told we would hear back within three business days. 14 hours later we got an email that said "based on the preliminary information your family is a good fit for our Ethiopia program."  We were approved! It was what we had prayed for. It was right. It was in God's perfect timing. Our next step is to submit the full application and begin what is called "the paper chase" where we will compile our entire life history in documents.

So hear we are...Easter 2014 is slowly approaching and we are once again challenged to "Forget the Frock". But this year is different, this year it is more than just putting away the fancy clothes and buying a t-shirt to raise orphan awareness...this year our family is taking a step of faith to provide an orphan with a family - just like our Heavenly Father did for us. We ask that you walk alongside us on this journey but more than anything we ask that you lift us up in prayer that we can remain faithful in the process and continue to allow God's timing in this journey. We also ask you to lift up the nearly 5 million orphans who are in Ethiopia. That number is staggering and hard to wrap my mind around. The gut wrenching reality is that I alone can not change the lives of the 5 million, but I can change the life of one. What can you do?

-Derick, Lacey, Callie & Collin