Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Check It Out!!!

Fred and I found a new fundraiser... Pocket peelers, Take a look at the side under FUNDRAISERS and check it out! Let one of us know if you are interested!

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

4:08pm

Today at 4:08pm I mailed our first packet of papers to Madison Wisconsin to get certified! On to the next set of forms and waiting for our passports to get in before we can finish some other forms! FORMS FORMS FORMS... I can't wait until all have to do is WAIT!!! It feels good to be moving forward!

Monday, March 29, 2010

What a DAY!!!




We took the weekend off of adoption running but we had a blast at our Church's AWANA Grand Prix! I won 1st place for design in the adults division! I think everyone had a lot of FUN!!! I can't wait for regional April 24th. Today it was back to the grind! I am so happy I got a whole stack of forms notarized and even though it took the better half of my day I finally got all those forms scanned and sent to Lyndi! I praise God because I didn't get those forms sent until about 10pm tonight but Lyndi was able to get back to me right away so now tomorrow morning I can get all these forms sent to Madison to get apostilled! I hope this paper work craze will be over soon! Keep praying!

Saturday, March 27, 2010

From The Beginning...

I thought it might be nice to share where the title to our blog came from it's kind of a long story but a very good one! As most of you know Fred and I have been trying for close to three years to conceive a child naturally and have been unsuccessful. It has been awful to watch people all around me have children and take those beautiful blessings from God for granted. It is equally as hard to continue to be unsuccessful and everyone around you tell you "Oh it's ok, it will happen for you I KNOW IT!" or "Did you try... (fill in the blank)" I know the comments are coming from a good place, people want to encourage but one day the pain of watching another person that didn't even want to have a baby get pregnant was too much. I fell on my face before God and prayed that if having children of my own was not something that He had in plan for my life right now that the desire would go away so that it didn't hurt anymore. I believe God is a God who answers prayer and who loves us so much he does not want to see us in pain or hurting! Now that being said this belief is only able to be a belief through TRUST! So I prayed this prayer and I had no idea how he was going to take this desire away, a desire that has been so strong for so long in my life and make it all ok! Like I said, it takes a whole lot of TRUST which is Faith! Fred and I have always talked about adoption we just thought it would be an option we looked into down the road. I know it sounds funny and a little ridiculous but I remembered an episode of "King of Queens" where Doug and Carry couldn't get pregnant and decided to adopt and when they did and the baby was coming home they found out that Carry was pregnant. For whatever reason the idea stayed on my mind. A few days later I was working with one of my participants and out of the blue he wanted to look at his baby pictures. Those pictures struck me and got me thinking, that evening I went home and started looking up adoption for children with disabilities (I'm not sure if at this point I was really thinking about adoption as a real possibility or if I was just trying to trick my body and maybe a little bit God too?)abut before I knew it I found Reece's Rainbow. The next few weeks I read everything I could find about adoption (which if you know me personally you would know that is huge because I HATE to READ anything that I don't NEED to read)but before I knew it God had answered my prayer. It is funny how He works and answers prayers, I would have never guessed this was how he was going to change my path. He didn't take my desire away but he changed the desire of my heart to fit the plan he has for my life and now I could not image my life without this this crazy, scary process in it! With every step forward we take the more I see what my FAITH can do! Praise God in ALL THINGS! A lesson I have learned well!!!

Thursday, March 25, 2010

I Think I Finally Got It!

This Blog buisness takes some getting used to but I think I got it! My Daddy comes home tomarrow and I heard he did NOT like flying AT ALL!!! Poor guy but I am happy I get to pick him up form the Airport! I have been working on this blog for much to much of my night I think I am going to head to bed! Night!

Our Family and Friends Letter

Dear Family and Friends,
Fred and I have decided to start the next chapter of our lives together… PARENTHOOD!! For those of you that don’t know Fred and I were married five years ago, September 25th 2004! After being married a year we became HOME OWNERS, which was a FUN and STRESSFUL adventure! Not long after that we rescued our pup Suki from the Wisconsin Humane Society! Fred and I have always wanted a large family and about 2 and a half years ago we started trying to conceive. After a year of trying I went to the doctor and went through some NOT so fun tests. Thankfully all the results came back OK, but we were still having NO luck getting pregnant. When you’re trying so hard and nothing is happening it becomes very frustrating, as I’m sure you can imagine, so one day I got down on my knees and prayed to God that if having children was not in my future that he would take the desire away from me so that it didn’t hurt anymore. After a few days I was feeling better and I was on the internet and thought “Hey, why don’t you Google “adoptions”, just to see what pops up. Fred and I always talked about adoption but we planned to look into it after our birth family was complete. As I looked into it more and more I believe God answered my prayer, He didn’t take my desire to be a Mom away he just the changed my desire to fit His plan for our life. I found an adoption ministry that is run by a Christian woman and she helped guide us to the point we are at today! Fred and I are now committed to two beautiful children, a little girl her birth name is Anna and she will be 2yrs old June 26th (My Mom and Dad’s anniversary), and a handsome little chunk named Everett he will be 1yr old Aug. 22nd. Both of our children live with Down Syndrome. People may wonder why we chose to open our hearts and home to children with a special need and the answer is this plain and simple… No one wants them. We are adopting from the Ukraine and over Seas children with disabilities are not treated at all, they are taken from their parents and placed in an orphanage where they only stay until they are four, then they are moved into the institutions where they receive even less care than the orphanage. I have heard it said that most children do not make it past a year in the institutions. This broke my heart and that is when I knew what God’s plan for our life was. As our Friends and Family we wanted to include you on this HUGE decision in our life, we are at the beginning stages and already it has been a roller coaster of emotions. Fred and I are asking for your love, support, encouragement and prayers. These are things we need or I don’t think we will make it through! We set up a blog that we encourage you to follow along with us as we are on this adoption journey. www.whatchwhatfaithcando.blogspot.com There is a small link to our sponsorship page where you can help financially as well, all donations through this link are tax deductable, an international adoption will cost about $18,000 to $20,000. We have some fundraiser ideas in the works but if you think of anything that would help to raise money please let us know. Thank you for taking time to read this and thank you in advance for any kind of help you can offer Fred and I, we truly believe this is the path God has for us!

Sincerely,
Amanda & Fred Karol
akarol25@yahoo.com (414)550-0342
calvarysoftball09@gmail.com (414)550-6986

Balance...

I am having a hard time balancing work, Church functions, school, bills, house-hold chores and ALL THE PAPERWORK that goes along with the adoption process! I wish I could take time off work to get all this stuff done! I am afraid that with all this paper work I might miss something or not get something in on time! I wish this was easy but as my husband says "If it was easy then we wouldn't learn anything!" Please Pray for me to find a good balance!