A New Season.....

I will admite i have been struggling.... but not JUST struggling... secretly struggling! The Lord has been prompting me to share for a long while now, but i have been afraid.... afraid of judgement... prideful... etc... and im done! We are suppose to support each other and even tho i am much more "comfortable" being the Supporter.... i cant hide any longer!

*A little background info... i grew up in an envoiroment of extremes.... one day i may share more about my childhood with all of you but thats for another day! One of those extremes i will share is of the financial nature! When i was growing up there was a constant...AND WHEN I SAY CONSTANT, I MEAN CONSTANT!! problem with MONEY!!!!!!!!! creditors calling all the time, lots of credit cards and asking so and so or so and so for more money! it was very unsettling as a child to grow up and from as young as i can remember i was always "worried" about money! your not suppose to wake up in the middle of the night worried about money at 10/12 years old! (this happened constantly throughout my life but 10/12 is the first time i remmeber it happening) i would regularly ask my parental figure that was "whipping" out another credit card to but another somthing or other that they couldnt afford, why they were doing that.... and why not just go home and find something to eat, or to wear and pay the bills??? i either got yelled at for asking or ignored! but i do remember the panic and fear of all of that and as a very young child i made a choice to NOT live that way! When i got my first job it all went in the bank! and i went through a reckless phase when i was in my early 20s, when i was first out on my own... spending all i made and living the "high" life, on a low salary lol... but then i got married!!! and everything changed!!! i couldnt just spend, because it wasnt just my money, and someone else would be effected by my spending habits! so i stopped!! simple as that... My Hubby and our family was WAY more important that STUFF!!!!!!! Praise HIM!!!

So the last 4 years i have worked some, and the hubby has worked some... funny enough one of us has always had a job but never at the same time LOL either i found a job and he lost his, or vise versa.... but we have always been able to provide for ourselves, even if on very little! The last few years (financially) we have been very blessed! The hubby had a good steady job and we were able to live comfortably.... He didnt make much tho, i frequently had people utterly shocked when they found out how much he made at how we were able to live on such an amount! lol and my response has always been the same... we have NO DEBT!!!!!!!! other than our mortgage!!!!! and if we want to do somehting special we save up for it.....very simply if we dont have the money for something, we dont buy it!!!! ive had a lot of pride that i have been able to be a stay at home wife for the last 2+ years, and the hubbs just beamed with the pride of being our provider!!!!! Life Was GOOD!!!!!!

On April 16th, our world came crashing down around us!!!!!!!!!!!! It was a friday, and the last day of work at our home (we had water damage and it forever to get the work done, but this was the last day the carpet guys were installing the carpet and then everything would be done) i was heading to baltimore to spend the day with my family (so i would be out of the carpet guys way) LIFE. WAS. GOOOOD.

Then my phone rang.... i was driving down rt 70. about halfway to baltimore and it was andrew... my first thought was, this was a werid time for him to be calling me! and my second thought? that my husband didnt sound good at all!!! i had a sense of dread building inside of me, as he was silent for a moment.... he asked me where i was, and if i wanted to come and get him? (mind you it was like 10am) nervous and not really hearing or understand what he was saying i said "NO... I DO NOT WANT TO COME AND GET YOU!?!?! LOL" he laughed that little nervous laugh he does right before he cries... and i had tears well up and began to cry without even knowing why, i began to look for an exit that would allow me to turn around!!!!!!

I fought the urge to ask him why i needed to come and get him, but eventually gave in and asked... as his voice quivered as he told me, he was standing with a box of his belongings outside of his office! HE. HAD. BEEN. FIRED.....

it was all i could do to keep control of the car! i wanted to scream! we prayed together and i told him i would get there as soon as i could.... *now friends i have to tell you my husband is a VERY hard worker! and that had we been paying attention, we should have been sort of prepared for this... The Enemy (you know who i mean ;) had been attacking him at work for years, and making his work enviroment VERY unpleasant! infact we had been praying for the Lord to deliver him from this bad work enviroment (& his communte of 2 hrs each way on a train) for almost a year. but ofcourse we were praying for a new job! (our plans not HIS!)

My life... my safe, comfy, life... changed forever that day! did we have financial worries before that day? sure... we never had a large income! But we had an income! and we knew how blessed we were to have it.... and no matter how unhappy hubby was at this job he rejoiced at the blessing of the job!

the first few days we spent only thinking about that day! the future was too scary.... and i didnt tell anyone aside from a few close family and friends because i thought for sure God would "swoop in and save the day" right away!! i think i knew all along this was going to be a new season of our lives but i was just hoping it would be just a blip...

Here we are 4 weeks later, thousands and thousands of resumes sent out.... and not really any leads! I was very sick the last few weeks and finally admited to the hospital last week... ever since i came home i have been extremely depressed!!! its all really been getting to me... i have felt the Lord urging me to "come out of hiding" so to speak... and share my struggles! but i have been afraid! i have ignored his urges, and argued with him when i couldnt ignore.... Dont get me wrong friends... i believe whole heartedly that HE has an awesome plan! I know he is with us... im just grieving i think, all the security that we've lost! i can easily handle living wihtout cable or AC/heat, special foods or going shopping or to the movies...etc... but without health insurance?? or being able to pay our mortgage??? THATS. SCARY..... and above all the health insurance and mortgage...etc... my biggest fear is we will "miss" an opportunity to parent or a possible adoption will fall through because of all of this... i have felt we were SO close the last few months and now we feel so far... way

i have felt like a fraud the last few weeks talking to all of you and "acting" like everything was "fine".... so now you know! things are far from it!

We are VERY grateful that we had some money set aside (not much by any means tho) and are very grateful that we have found a wonderful church family!! But we need PRAYERS. SO SO MANY!!! prayers for stregnth, and courage, and wisdom, and faith... and so on.... Prayers for my husband to keep his head held high, even tho time are harder than harder! for him not to take on the "BLAME" for all of this... He is a wonderful man, and i could not be prouder to call him my husband!!!!!!!

So for now, we strive to make good choices, and cling as close as we can to the Father!! Pray. and wait. for our Mountain-Moving GOD too MOVE!!!!!!!

*i wrote this a few days ago and just this morning Andrew went and checked the mail... he said there was only one lonely envelope in the mail box with no return address! he opened in and it said "from all of us" and there was 200$ IN IT!!!!!!! no name or anything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THANK YOU ABBA!!!!!!!!!!!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

Paying it Forward

I am posting this via - Courtney from "Storing up Treasures" (see link below) She and her husband have completely followed Gods command to care for the orphan and are the proud parents to 10 children, 4 of which (i believe) are adopted!! Please read through this and consider donating 5$ or even 10$... WE are one of the 26 families that will be helped by your selfless donation!! Lets come together and Ransom all of these babies into the loving arms of thier families!!!!


Paying it Forward


Since we have been so blessed by the generosity of others, we have decided that we want to pay it forward. We are passionate about adoption. Not just our own family adopting, but the countless families who are opening their hearts and homes to precious orphans around the world.



After much thought and discussion, we have come up with a campaign to help other adoptive families struggling to raise funds for their adoptions. The campaign will begin today and will end after 20 days {June 4th}. We are calling it "10K in 20 days".

If you are an adoptive family in need of funds for your adoption, we invite you to enter. We are only allowing 26 families to participate and EVERY family will be awarded money for their adoption. You need to act fast because we can ONLY take the first 26, homestudy ready families.

If you have a heart for adoption or you just want the chance to get some cool giveaways, I encourage you to come on over and enter. We are giving away loads of things, but you have to enter to be eligible!

Go to our Campaign Page HERE to learn more and PLEASE help spread the word. If you know someone who could use help with their adoption, please send them over there to enter. We need as many people helping to get this off the ground as possible. So tweet about it, facebook it, and blog about it. Help us pay it forward!


Oh and if you have a business or Etsy shop and would like to promote your shop by donating an item of gift certificate to our donor prizes, please contact me!{passionate4orphans@yahoo.com} I would love to help grow your business in addition to being able to offer great giveaways to encourage more donations!
~Courtney