Direct My Steps.....

”A man’s heart plans his way, but the 
Lord directs his steps.” Proverbs 16:9

Whoa... here we are with just a few days of October left.  This means that we have about a month to be prepared to travel.  I am not sure the reality of that has really hit me yet.  I have begun my packing list which has been fairly easy to pull together due to the wonderful advice of those who have went before me that I have saved back in numerous documents. 

This line from Alicia's travel notes jumped from the page "My best advice for whomever travels next is to be open minded, have a curious mind and heart, and be willing to form and explore your own thoughts, opinions, emotions, and relationship with this country that is where our children were born.  Many will try to force their mentality on you or their opinion or their way.  Listen to it, but make sure you develop your own!  It is your own experience and it has the potential to be amazing!"  

At this point we are still unsure when we will be able to travel.  Right now the United Nations has placed a travel restriction for non-urgent travel from Nov 21st to Dec 15th.  The election results should be announced on Dec. 16th.  We are hoping to have approval on our i600 hopefully around the week of Thanksgiving.  So all the details of the whole process are going rely heavily on how this election goes and how our paperwork/appointments go.  Our prayer is that we are able to travel before the end of the year - but I am soaking up the wisdom in Proverbs, that I can plan but God will direct my steps.  

"Leave the hand open & be" (One Thousand Gifts)

We had a very exciting last few weeks as several families and our director traveled to the Congo.  Our director took a photo book of our family with her and Zalen Moise was able to see his family for the first time, and maybe understand for the first time that he had a family.  Julia wrote: "Moise loved his book. I think he was going to cry when we left because he thought he would be going home with you. Other children where so nice to him."   

And then Alicia wrote:
"Moise is super cute!!! He loved your book but did not get to look at it for very long because all the caregivers there were looking through it and oogling over things.  Blondine asked me to bring her back a wedding dress like in the picture (That was a picture of my SIL Tabitha) because she wants to get married in May.  I told her I didn't know how I could do that."  She later wrote: I can't wait for you to meet him in person! He will steal your heart! He is a precious one!!

And then I got a few pictures that overflowed my heart.. And I have decided to share one of them.  Our paperwork is now official on the DRC side and almost on the US side so I am comfortable with sharing his picture at this point in our process.  It has already been on facebook, it was the best smiley picture ever and taken right after he looked at his photo book.

I do believe He has already stolen my heart....

 So where are we at?

PRAISE God from whom all blessings flow because our FOREIGN FEE is PAID IN FULL thanks to our matching Grant from LifeSong and the donations received through that.  What an incredible gift that was.  Once again, just in time - we were really pushing the deadline to pay that off.  

So where does that leave you?

• We still owe our agency $1500.  We are hoping to raise the additional $1500 through our Lifesong Support letters.  E-mails and Snail Mails have been sent out.  Our deadline to meet the rest of our goal is November 15th. 

At this point we have met our matching grant, but we still prefer donations to go through them due to tax reasons.  Your gift through their organization is tax exempt so it benefits you as well when you donate and allows us not to have to claim that money as income.  

I have sent out e-mails and written letters on how to donate through this fund.  You can also donate online through Pay-Pal.  If you would like to donate online click the link below and make a one time donation with the memo Fuller#2233  so that it goes to us.  When you click the link below  it will take you to a page that looks like this:

One-Time Gift
On the PayPal screen, please indicate where you'd like your donation to go. Please note that PayPal does charge an administrative fee (1.9% to 2.9% + $0.30 USD per transaction). The donation will be decreased by the amount of this fee.

Click donate and then memo your donation with Fuller#2233 on the purpose.  (if you don't memo it, it will not get into our account so make sure you memo it)

Click the link to below to make an online donation through Lifesong:
http://www.lifesongfororphans.org/donation.html 

Or you can donate by sending a check.....

Please make checks payable to: Lifesong for Orphans. **Please preference how the donation may be used by writing “preference Fuller #2233 adoption” in the memo section of your check.    (*Note: In following IRS guidelines, your donation is to Lifesong which retains full discretion and control over its use.)

         Mail checks to:

         Lifesong for Orphans

         PO Box 40 / 202 N. Ford St

         Gridley, IL  61744

• Next step after that is to raise the additional $2,500 we need for travel.  We are hoping to raise the rest of the $1,500 we need through our Lifesong Support Letters - so we can use our Grant Gift from Kinsman Redeemer for travel.  That gives us that $4,000 to use for travel (which pretty much just covers our airfare tickets) plus we have managed to save back around $2,000 ourselves by pinching our pennies.  I estimated around $8,500 for travel and that is dependent that airfare will not continue to go up. 

We are hoping to do a dinner fundraiser to help raise funds for this last $2,500 that we need for travel.  It has been difficult to plan this due to the busy schedule of the next few months.  We have a tentative date of Saturday, November 19th.  I wanted to do it the weekend before, but we have revival - and it is the only time I think we will be able to do it.  I will hopefully release more details in the next week or so.

A big thanks to those that have bought T-shirts!!!  We are working hard to sell the EXTRA's that we have.  Sold several in the last few weeks but still have more I need to sell.  Adult Med, Lg, and XL. (Will ship to you for an additional $2 per shirt) We made these T-shirts to be a voice for adoption in general but they also highlight the Congo subtly with a yellow star emerging from the outline of the country.  I found this online about the Congo flag - "Red stand for the "the blood of the countries martyrs, yellow the country's wealth; and the star a radiant future for the country."  It said the blue stood for peace, therefore the blue shirts.  If you would like to order one please e-mail me (fullertessy@yahoo.com) or facebook me.

Also I am still wanting your pictures of you wearing your shirts!!  I have had a few more trickle in and they have warmed my heart.  Keep them coming!!  Check them out:

I have been seriously blessed by the Butner family who have also walked the adoption journey, more then once.  This picture makes me tear up every time I look at it.  

This shirt made it all the way to Coney Island.  Candy is a good friend of mine and it touched my heart that even on vacation she was thinking of us and proudly wearing her shirt and praying for us.  Love you girl, and thanks for walking this journey with us.  

My mom and her friend Don wearing their shirts :-)  My mom has been such an amazing source of encouragment and support.  I am thankful that Zalen Moise is going to have such a loving Grandma.  She has stood up with me and for me among the critics several times.  I love you mom!

Our next "Wear Your T-shirt & Pray Day" will be 

Monday, November 7th

Even if you don't have shirt, please join in praying anyhoo!! 

I am asking for serious prayer on this day.  There is so much that has to come together in order for us to travel by the end of the year. 

• Please pray for a miracle in our paperwork -- Please pray that our i600 approval will be issued not just timely but ahead of the normal.  We are really needing to get our embassy appointment scheduled but need our approval to do this.  Please pray for wisdom for our director J. as she will be estimating the unknowns of the paperwork trail and needs guidance on when to do so. 

• Please pray specifically that we will meet our financial goals as described as above.  We only have one month left.  We are still waiting to hear back from two different grants.  The one grant we won't hear from until the end of November.

• Please pray for the DRC as a country and the upcoming elections.  Pray for peaceful demonstrations and that God will intervene and put a leader in place that will bring healing to this war torn nation.  We will also be having another "Wear Your Shirts & Pray" Day on November 28th which is the day of the elections. 

Thank you for your love and prayers!  This has been an amazing journey and I am thankful that I have not had to go it alone. 

"Wear Your Shirt & Pray Day" - Tues., Oct. 18th

I have my first T-shirt picture of some of the teens at church that are praying Zalen Moise home.  I love those guys :-)  Still wanting your T-shirt pictures -- e-mail to fullertessy@yahoo.com  -- Wanting to put them in a photo book for Zalen Moise so he can see all the people that loved and prayed for him.

Tomorrow is our second official "Wear Your Shirt & Pray Day"  Right now there is several families in the DRC who are bringing home their children.  All the families are adopting from AFDECO, which is the orphanage where Zalen Moise is.  After this group -- we will be the next group.  Can you believe it?  Our director took over a picture book of our family (and paperwork) with her, so Zalen will be getting to see us for the first time.  My friend Tami, that I met in KC when we did our fingerprinting appointment flew out on Sunday.  She promised to bring back pictures.  I cried the entire way through Alicia and Matt's blog post as they described meeting their son, Cohen, for the first time.   

Please pray for safe traveling mercies for the families and timely exit letters.   Also please pray for our director Julia who is doing some extra traveling on this trip to visit a new orphanage.  Pray for her safety and that she can accomplish everything that she needs to on this trip. 

On our end of things....we really need a lot of things to come together so we can travel before the end of the year.  

• Paperwork - I just pray that you specifically pray that my i600 approval is issued quickly and we can proceed in a timely fashion.

• Emotions - I know as we draw closer and closer to travel it is going to be hard to keep up with everything and keep my emotions steady.  Praying God's strength will overcome my very human mind and heart.  Not sure that the reality of all of this has hit me yet.  It all still seems far away even though we are close to bringing our boy home now.

• Pray for Zalen Moise -- I constantly pray for his protection against sickness and for his safety.  But I also have been asking God to prepare his heart for his new family.

• Finances - Support letters are out concerning our matching grant through Life Song.  We have already been amazingly blessed once again but at this point are praying to raise another $2,000 to be able to pay off what we owe our agency. We have until November 15th to raise this amount. Below is a donate button that will allow you to donate to our Lifesong fund. All donations are tax exempt. To read our support letter click here  God has given me amazing peace about the finances and already has worked amazing miracles in this department every step of the way.  Please pray that we are able to raise the amount needed and that we will get blessed with another grant gift to help with the rest of our travel expenses.   If you would like to donate online click the following link and make a one time donation with the memo Fuller#2233  so that it goes to us.  When you click the link above donate it will take you to a page that looks like this.  Click donate and then memo your donation with Fuller#2233 on the purpose.  (if you don't memo it, it will not get into our account so make sure you memo it)

One-Time Gift
On the PayPal screen, please indicate where you'd like your donation to go. Please note that PayPal does charge an administrative fee (1.9% to 2.9% + $0.30 USD per transaction). The donation will be decreased by the amount of this fee.

Click this link to to take you to the Lifesong donation page:
http://www.lifesongfororphans.org/donation.html


Thank you to each of you who are praying us through this adoption journey.  Your love, support, and encouragement has kept us going.  God's miracles and fingerprints are all over us bringing home our little boy.  Just reading back on my blog makes me stand in awe of God's mighty hand.   I will not forget all He has already done, but I know He has much in store as well.

"Wear Your Shirt & Pray Day"

Tomorrow is our first "Wear your Shirt & Pray Day" - Thursday, October 6th.  We will be leaving tomorrow morning for Kansas City and will be doing our FBI fingerprinting.  We decided to make the most of our trip and stay a couple nights to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary which is October 13th.  What an adventure those ten years have been.  I feel very blessed!  I have to laugh a bit because at one time my dream was to go to Hawaii for our tenth anniversary.  That seems kinda lame when you think of going to Africa to bring home your son!!  :-D

I still have lots of extra shirts that I really, really, need to sell.  So if you would still like one please let me know!!

Prayer Requests:

•  Sending in our i600 today.  Please pray that our paperwork goes through smoothly and ends up in capable hands.  The timing of this paperwork is crucial to allowing us to travel before the end of the year.

•  Pray for safe traveling mercies to and from Kansas City.

•  Pray for Zalen "Moise" and the children and care takers at AFDECO.

•  Continue to pray for God's direct interference in the upcoming elections.  The results of this election will also directly affect our adoption process.  Pray that God's hand will be mighty and direct this country to healing and peace.

• Our agency director and a few other families will be traveling mid-October to bring home their children.  Please pray for them.  My director is taking a photo book for me to show to Zalen Moise.  It will be the first time he gets to see our faces. 

I also wanted to share this video from One Small Step.  The orphanage that is featured in this video is where we are adopting from.  Helene is the one who started the orphanage where my son is from.  One Small Step is a great organization who has the goal of making the orphanages they assist self-sustainable.  Until that self-sustainability becomes a reality, they help orphanages with the funds for operating costs: rent, building maintenance, food, clothes, mosquito nets, transportation and medicine.
  They also help raise funds for the children to go to school.  You can sponsor a child through their organization.  A year of schooling is only about $160.00.