Fundraising! Garage sale anyone?

Yesterday morning Eli came into the living room wanting to "sell toys to get money for kids who don't have any." I assumed this was to help with our big garage sale we'll be having at the end of this month, but after filling his box, clipping a tie on his Mario t-shirt and putting on his Angry Birds winter hat, he was ready to go sit in the 100 degree heat to sell his stuff to "get money for his sister."

When he didn't get anything more than a wave, he and Kyle decided to try something else and set up a drink stand. We made do with some Light lemon/limeade and half frozen ice. Honestly I wasn't sure if anyone was going to stop--do people still do anything like that these days? So when I watched through the screen as the first person stopped I wanted to cry from the perfect picture of this sweet young guy who stopped for a little boy selling limeade, and for my big hearted little boy who already loves the sibling he's never met and knows nothing about, and for the little sparrow we will be welcoming into our home who will know love in ways they may not have ever encountered before. And then more and more people came. It wasn't "people lining up" like the image Eli had in his head, but in real life I saw people's faces lighting up when they found out this was "to adopt his sister." One lady gave $20 because she was adopted after being found as a newborn in the park and believes in adoption so much she would give to complete strangers like that. In the end we went through three pitchers of limeade and Eli made $35.80!

I've been a little worried about the cost of the adoption. It's made me hold back on getting anything  done quickly because of how much each step costs. Thankfully the agency we're going with has it  spread out pretty evenly, and I've seen so many other adoptive families who never knew how it could be done watch as the money just came together. God has shown us so much over the last few years how he will always provide for us and I know he won't stop now, so we're praying and getting busy with some fundraisers. Once I get this blog a little more organized I'll be able to show dates of events that we're doing and ways that people can help.

For now we do know we will be having a garage sale the last weekend of this month--July 26-28th. We will also be having a book sale soon after and if anyone knows a nice place that is free or very inexpensive to have it then please let us know as we plan to make it a pretty big event with time for people to browse through the hundreds of books and cd's that will be for sale. There will also be baked goods/drinks (limeade anyone?) for sale, and who knows what other fun stuff we can come up with. If anyone has any thing you would like to donate towards the garage sale and/or book sale we would gladly accept it!