I have 5 children....

My sweet Alyssa, who is blossoming
into a BEAUTIFUL young lady.

This time in 2008 when my husband asked to get a job, I was reluctant, but God knew exactly what He was doing when He provided me the job that He did.  I got to teach one last time to a beautiful group of preschoolers  who are now in Kindergarten.  In that group of children, I have made some really good friends.  I LOVE each of those children I had in my class and I try to keep up with them as much as possible, but there are 3 that I consider 'mine'.



You see, these 3 'extra' children, well their moms are some of my dearest friends.  These children are some of the most precious children I know, and when I get the honor  of getting to take care of them, I just loop them into my family.  I treat them just like I treat my own children.

My precious Jesse, who is one of the
silliest boys I know! 

You see, I feel like God has placed them in our lives for a very special reason.  When I get a phone call from these special mommy friends asking me if I can help them out, I try to move heaven and earth to be able to get a chance to spend time with these great kiddos.

So, in the last 2 weeks, I've been honored to be able to attend special events at school for 2 of  my 'extra' kids.  When people ask me if they are all mine, I often hesitate and actually CRAVE to say YES, YES!  ALL OF THESE PRECIOUS KIDS ARE MINE!!!

Adorable Bella, who often is mistaken
for Perryn's twin!!

I think God is giving me a glimpse to what He might have up His sleeve when I have all of these kiddos in my van...sometimes I have all 5 together, but most of the time, I only have 3 or 4 total...at one time - when I say 3 or 4 that includes my two! heehee.

So, Lord, I can't wait to see how you bless our little family of four and make us a bit bigger.  I can't wait to see what kind of house you provide for us so that we can keep adding to our family.  I can't wait to see the cute faces, races, and specialties that you are going to put into our family.  But....

since it's not time to add to our family, please help us to love on the single moms that you have brought into our lives, the families that need a little extra help because they have two working parents and they need us to just step in every so often.

Help me to bless those families that are currently adopting with fundraisers and my voice.  Please help us to pray for, love, and encourage each of these families and those others that you bring into our path.

World Aids Day

Please watch this video about Adoption and HIV/AIDS.  I pray that if God blesses us with more children that we will not be hesitant or ignore those children with HIV/AIDS.  I feel that He does have some special plans for us in adopting some really special children.  I pray that we are open to adopting the ones that He places before us.

Giving

So, I'm one of those people who LOVES, just LOVES to do things for others and watch smiles be put on their faces.  That's why when God showed me/told me that I needed to revamp my creative business, I didn't argue with Him at all!!


You see, I also LOVE to be creative.  It's almost more of a stress relief to create things for others than it is to go running or exercise in general.

I love to be creative with my baking (I'm more of a baker than a cook).

 It took me stepping out of my comfort zone to make both this pirate and the crane cake.  I like to be more a 'paint by numbers' decorator not so much a free hand decorator.

I love to be creative with paper as well.  I LOVE to create something that is a representative to a family.  For example: the pink daisy announcement represents a client whose baby, Savannah, was born straight into the arms of Jesus.  The three daisies represent her, her husband, and their son Jaythan.  The butterfly represents, Savannah.

The Ladybug card is for a friend who wanted to announce the adoption of their daughter, Kaiya from China.  The large daisy represents, daddy - Russ.  The medium size daisy represents mom - Angel, and the small daisies represent all three girls together - Zoe, KK, and Kaiya becoming sisters.

I'm not sure where else one could find a place to really put so much TLC in the things that are made for them.

Well, last weekend, Nov 13, Perryn and I went to a Holiday Open House.  We sold bookmarks, Christmas cards, raffle tickets, and cupcakes.  You can find out how Perryn was a special part of the Open House here and how our table did here.   I had agreed to do the Open House to help fundraise, then I felt I was getting too stressed, so I tried to back out.  Well, God knew what he wanted me to do.  Perryn and I went to the Open House and we sold, what God wanted us to sell.  Here's the COOLEST part about the whole thing.  Even though I walked out of there at the end of the day with approximately $250 of profit in my purse, I really only made $9.  How you ask?

Well, I got to write 3 checks.  Two went to Children's HopeChest for part of their "Change their Story" campaign that we are kind of doing, but in a more unique way.  But I also got to write a check to a family who is using me to fundraise for their adoption in Russia.  Here's what she said on facebook:
"Oh, my goodness!!! You are beyond amazing!! I just opened my mail, and have not stopped crying! I had no idea you were selling Christmas Cards at that event to raise money for us and the adoption!! I am overwhelmed with gratitude and love for your servant's heart that is so full of God's love!!! Love you!! So grateful for you!"

This made my day.  Not because I was looking for any glory, but because my HUMAN side wanted to keep more than just $9  from that day.  For about 2 minutes I struggled with the profit I made, because I have NEVER made that much profit at one time with my little business.  But, I quickly was reminded by God that HE wanted me to bless others.  That's why I have been blessed with the talents that He has given me.  It was a really cool feeling to mail those three checks....almost a surreal feeling.

I know, it's taboo to talk about faults and I kind of feel like I'm 'bragging' about what happened last week, but I'm not trying to do that.  I want you to know that their are several causes (adoption/orphans and Child Trafficking/sex slaves) that are close to my heart and I am so glad that God has blessed me with ways to help them out.  To help make a difference to others.  This is our way of beginning to celebrate Advent this year.  Instead of focusing on just us, I want our family to really focus on giving and blessing others.

My voice is really small, because it's only one, but I need YOUR help to make my voice a little bit louder.  Please help me spread the word about a giveaway that I'm hosting.  There are 11 DIFFERENT ways you can enter it to win a handmade Advent calendar PLUS 4 books signed by Tom Davis, CEO of Children's HopeChest.   Will you please help me spread the word,and enter the giveaway?   So, please hop on over here and find out how YOU can enter this giveaway a WHOPPING 11 times. You don't have to purchase anything if you don't want to, but please look around and help spread the word for my giveaway.  Many thanks and blessings.

Raffle Tickets

I would like to help a dear friend of mine get her little girl, Emma Charity, from Russia.  She is currently selling raffle tickets for $5 and I have 20 of them.   Please let me know if you would like to have one, so we can connect and get the info that we need for you to be entered.

The drawing will be on Dec 19th and will be shipped where ever the winner lives!!

I saw God today....

So, today I ran my VERY first Half Marathon The Chosen for Adoption 1/2 marathon.  I was 'awake' at 4AM, because I was nervous I was going to oversleep for the race..LOL.  I also needed to help get 2 children dressed and loaded into our van.

Anyways, we got to the race and I had to go potty REALLY bad, but the line was LONG and they had already started the race.  So, I sucked it up and went ahead and started.  When I looked at the start clock, it said 3 mins, so I started the race 3 minutes late. I got to the first mile marker/water station and waited in a line for 5 min to use the Porta John....after that, my race went pretty well.

I rounded the #2 mile water station and my legs started to already fell extremely heavy; however, I knew I could push through the little hills that were there. I looked up into the rain clouds and saw a very faint rainbow, and a whisper from God, "I AM HERE today."  I started to get very emotional knowing that God was running with me today.

After the water station at the 3.5 mile marker, I saw the sunrise through the storm clouds, and God reminded me again, "I AM HERE".  As I came up to the 5 mile marker I saw the vastness of his creation in the waterfalls, trees, and the river below, and He reminded me AGAIN, "I AM HERE".  I got a chuckle going down a really steep hill knowing that I was going to have to go back UP that hill in a bit, and thought, "God you have a GREAT sense of humor!"  I even saw God in the rain because it started very humid, but it cooled off a bit and the wind picked up, and I could feel Him fanning me.

After mile 5 I began seeing others from my church's running group, and a high came over me that was very encouraging to me.  I turned around at 6.5 miles to go back the way I came, which was pretty cool, because I could kind of gage where I was in the course and how much further I had to go.

Along the way, my feet, ankles, and knees began to hurt.  And I would pray, God, please take the pain away.  This is when I felt the furthest from Him in my race, but as I prayed and asked Him to keep giving me the stamina and the endurance, the pain would disappear.

Towards the end (and even right now) my right ankle and knee really began to hurt.  I remember hearing thunder and laughing because I had 'forgotten' that God was with me and he was giving me a audible reminder that He WAS STILL THERE with me.

finish line

The craziest thing is that it hurt to walk more than to run.  Now, here's the COOLEST part of the WHOLE race.  I RAN THE ENTIRE THING!! Well, at least 90% of it!!  I walked through EVERY water station (which I had planned to do).  I used 3 of my 4 energy gel packs along the way. I stayed very well hydrated.

By the time the last 1/2 to 1/4 mile, the pain in my right ankle and knee were getting to be a bit unbearable, but I was determined to finish the race RUNNING, and with God's great and awesome help, that is exactly what I did.  I even had a cheering section cheering me on.  I know for a fact that the last few picture of me from the professional photographers are me crying while I ran, because I was hurting, I was ALMOST finished, and well because it was my very first 1/2 marathon.

When I crossed the finish line, they said my name and where I was from, I got a bottle of water, and a medal. My total time was 2 hours 54 min 23 sec.  Now if we took the 3 min from the late start and the 5 min bathroom wait off, I ran my very first 1/2 marathon in 2 hours 46 min...LOL.

Now, as I ran the entire thing (walking through the water stations and walking a couple of times in between on the way back due to pain) God was reminding me that I was running for the girls who can NOT run.  They want to, they need to, but they can't.  They are being owned and trafficked for sex and this is NOT OK!!! So, I ran for them.  I'm not sure what my totals for sponsorship are, but the last I heard it was $581.  Now, yes, that is $2000 short of my goal and does not provide the rescue of 2 girls; however, it does supply about 12 rescue packs to help the girls who have been rescued.  And that is GREAT news.  Please check out the Indian Rescue Mission and keep up with what they are doing to help rescue girls in India (this is where my sponsorship money is going.)


Be looking for me to continue to run for these girls.  The next race for sponsorship will probably be in the late winter/early spring and then I'm looking to run a triathalon in June.  I can NOT wait!!!

For your enjoyment, here are some pictures of what Gabe and the kids did while I was running.  He also snagged some pictures of the other Austin Stone runners...I heard we had 50!!!

**Now I just need to figure out where to get one of those cool 13.1 stickers for my running box.  Heehee.

It's time

Right now, as you read this, I am running my VERY first 1/2 marathon.  I love that God chose the Chosen for Adoption Half Marathon to be my very first to run.

One day on the highway coming home, God revealed to me that I needed to run for the girls that The Indian Rescue Mission works very hard to rescue.  For example, these 21 (TWENTY-ONE) girls were rescued on WEDNESDAY, Oct 20, 2010.    How AMAZING is our God that HE ORCHESTRATED the RESCUE of 21 girls at ONE TIME?

These girls have a handful of people to fight for them.  The least I can do is run for them.

So, my goal was $2500 to help fund 2 rescues, but I didn't reach my goal. [There's still time to sponsor me (go here to do that and BE SURE to write "Elizabeth's 1/2")], However, with the $581 that has been raised supplies about 13 rescue kits.  See these girls need some 'supplies' to get them through the next few days/weeks/months as they learn to live a different lifestyle than that of the sex trade.  

So, thank you to all who donated. Please pray for safety and health over the next several hours.  I predict it will take me approximately 3-4 hours to run this race.  

T minus 10 hours

Well, the time has come and in less than 10 hours I will be running my very first (of many, I hope) 1/2 marathons.  God has protected me over the past several months as I trained and he has given me insight to what He wants me to run for.  Just like in my creative business is helping adopting families fund raise, He has asked me to run for those who can not run for themselves.

So, here's a little of what has happened today.  I went and got the van all ready for a small road trip, and a road trip we have taken.  We had lunch in South Austin at Jason's Deli and then we stopped at Aquarena Springs to explore their glass bottom boats.  I got a deal on tickets yesterday at Living Social Austin yesterday and paid 1/2 price for our boat ride.  It was SUPER cool to see all the living things on the bottom of the San Marcos River and learn a little history in the process.  Here are some pictures:

With the frogs. 

Frogs on the side of their aquarium. 

Look at those HUGE fish behind them. 

With the nobby knee tree. 

On the wetlands walk. 

Turtles on the log. 

Looking out the window.

Perryn looking at the bottom of the river.

I'll let you know tomorrow goes after the race. We got a late check out, so maybe I can update you before I go home. Hugs.

BREAKING NEWS!!!!

I just received this email from James over at The Indian Rescue Mission.  This is worthy of praise; however, the reality is that there are MANY more girls that need to be rescued.  Please read the email, and then learn about how to help more girls get rescued below.

Email:

BREAKING NEWS: 21 GIRLS RESCUED

In a joint operation done by my friend, Shyam kamble along with Maharastra State police rescued twenty one girls from various brothels in Pune today ( October 20,2010).

Among the rescued, 11 girls were minors and others were majors. They were all trafficked from Bangladesh to India.

Please pray for these girls.

James Varghese

Founder and Executive Director

Indian Rescue Mission

Email: jamesvarghese@...

          indianrescuemission@...

Website: www.indianrescuemission.org

              www.rescuemissionindia.weebly.com

In case you're not aware of it, I'm running a 1/2 marathon on Saturday (yes, in THREE days) and I am looking for 200 people to help sponsor me for at the LEAST $10 each.  When you donate you MUST put "ELIZABETH'S 1/2" in the notes section in order for your donation to go to rescuing more girls that are being trafficked.   Click the HOPECHEST donation button below to donate via Paypal or click on the "I RUN FOR RESCUE DONATIONS" button to donate via credit/debit card.  Make sure you designate your donation to go towards "Elizabeth's 1/2" whichever method you choose to donate. Thanks. 

You can read more about sex trafficking here.