Sharing...

Today we received the best gift of the Christmas Season!  
Background:
We have been talking with our oldest son, Matt (8 years old), about what it means to be a Christ follower for months now.  We have asked him how he feels about waiting on Christ's return?  His answer: He was excited, but nervous too because he wasn't sure if God had chosen him to be apart of His kingdom.  We began pouring into Matt with the truth that God had already chosen him, He sent Jesus to die for him and that all God was waiting on was for him (Matt) to trust Him with his life.  Matt asked some questions and we talked about this again for several nights.  I finally asked him "What was stopping him from confessing to God that He needed and wanted Him to be in his heart?"  He said he wasn't sure.  So, that was a few weeks ago....

Today:  
David Platt preached an awesome sermon about what Christmas is truly about. There were no Sunday School classes today for the children, so they were in service with us.  Matt also had a friend join us for church today which made it all the more proof to me that it was God at work in his little heart.  Matt usually doesn't listen much to the sermon and falls asleep if he can sneak it in on us.  He is usually fully distracted when a friend is any where near us, but today was different.  Matt listened so intently to the sermon and when David asked "are you certain that you are going to spend eternity in Heaven?"...I was watching Matt, but he didn't know that I was.  He said "yes" and David asked several other questions about knowing Jesus as your personal Savior...Matt answered "yes" to those too.  Next came communion.  We have explained to him over and over that he can't join us in communion until He has asked Jesus into his heart and been baptized as a believer.  Today, he was begging to participate and saying that he had asked Jesus into his heart.  With tears in my eyes and joy in my heart, I said "Yes buddy, you can have mine".  Seeing him take communion and be excited and joyful about it, made me thank God that much more!  You pray for their hearts to seek God and for them to truly have a relationship with the Lord, but when it happens...it is such a gift.  That transition from your child to your brother in Christ is as powerful as the day they became your child.  We are looking forward to the discussions in the days ahead and to seeing how God will chose to use him for his glory, but for now and for this Christmas, I am rejoicing that my oldest child will be in Heaven with us one day praising our King!   

I feel like our job as parents has gotten that much bigger...pray for us and for him as we help him deepen his relationship with Christ.

On the adoption front:  We are still in the home study process.  Keith has to complete his autobiography and individual interview.  We are pushing to have the home study complete by the end of January.  We have lots of Hague training ahead and completing our child desired forms.  Please pray for clarity as we decide exactly what special needs we are equipped to handle and what we are not equipped for as a family.  This is one of the hardest sections of the process so far.  May God Bless you all and Merry Christmas!

God’s faithfulness through the adoption process truly amazes me every day.  God has given us yet another blessing and once again it is through the Grace Klein Community.  Grace Klein Community is a community of Christ followers desiring to serve our communities and cities. Birthed out of desire to serve the “needy” in our city, Grace Klein Community wants to be faithful to the commands of Christ to love and provide for the needs of the ones in our city. They are a non-profit organization with a Board of Directors that serves alongside.  We have been adopted by the Grace Klein Community to help bring our little girl home.  While they have been donating for our Garage Sale on October 6^th, they have now opened the door so that all donations given to us can now be tax deductible.  If you would like to donate money to help with our adoption you can do it online @ www.gracekleincommunity.com or you can mail a check to:

Grace Klein Community

1678 Montgomery Hwy. #104

Birmingham, AL  35216

 

Please put  “Adoption” in the memo line so that the funds will be allocated properly. 

 

We have had many people ask how they could just give money to help and have put them off because we hadn’t gotten to the point where it would be deductible yet so this is a huge blessing.  Most people didn’t care if it was tax deductible or not but we felt that we didn’t want to take monetary donations until it was.  Grace Klein Community has been a Godsend to our family.   

I was recently asked to write something about why we chose to adopt for another website that is advertising for our garage sale and found it interesting how God has completed so many of my thoughts on why adoption.

 

Why Adopt?

    We all have a t-shirt that we love to wear for many reasons: it's yellow, it always draws peoples attention and it sparks many conversations. The front says "Why Adopt?". And under that it says "For the Bible tells me so." And it does..James 1:27 says "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world". We love the questions we get and the responses our children give. It makes my heart proud to hear my 8 year old say "We are supposed to adopt, God told us to". The reality is that we were adopted into God's kingdom as son's and daughter's (Ephesians 1:5) and without "adoption" we would live eternity in hell. God makes it very clear that orphans are close to His heart and therefore, they should be close to ours.(John 14:18)

    It all started when I was a young girl, God began tugging on my heart about adoption. I have always talked about it and dreamed about it. Keith and I talked about my desire before we were even engaged. Our best friends adopted 3 years ago and we were blessed to be apart of their journey, but it wasn't the time for us. About 2 years ago, I started researching adoption and stalking others blogs. "Once our eyes are opened, we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows what we know, and holds us responsible to act". (Prov 24:12) I would journal about it, pray to the Lord to open a financial door for us, and weep about the orphans out there who needed us. This past December, God opened the doors for us to proceed with this adoption. We have been so blessed since committing in obedience and so overwhelmed with the love that God has for us. I can honestly say, that when you chose to adopt, God will teach you things that he can't teach you any other way than through the adoption process.

There are 147 million chances waiting to show you the love that God has for you!

We would love your prayers as we continue this journey. Specifically:

*That God would get all the glory throughout this process.

*For the garage sale: that the Lord will bring people to the sale that need what we have. For it to bless them as much as it will bless us.

 

*For the conversations we will have with the patrons of the sale, that they be pure, sincere and full of what the Lord has done for us.

 

*For our hearts to be ready to give our daughter what she needs and deserves in a forever family.

 

*For our boys (Matt and Eli) to never feel left out of this process, but for this to draw them in to the heart of our Lord.

 

*For our little China doll to adjust quickly and for her heart to come to know the Lord.

 

*For our extended family and friends who may not understand adoption, for them to see God's heart for orphans and to see changes in us that would reveal to them who He truly is.

 

*For the people in China that we will come in contact with, for them to see something different in our family and for their hearts to be pricked by the Lord's light.

Sincerely,

The McDonald Family

Keith, Mary Margaret, Matt, Eli and soon Avery
www.anotherpairoflittleshoesatthedoor.blogspot.com

Huge Garage Sale Fundraiser

Hello Friends,

We are working feverishly to get everything ready for our Garage Sale Fundraiser on October 6, 2012 @ The Church at Cahaba Bend.  This church has been gracious enough to offer their church campus for our garage sale.  We are getting started a little early and putting lots of stuff up for sale.  Here are some pictures of the stuff we are currently selling in case anyone's interested:

Power Wheels ATV $125

Power Wheels Jeep Hurricane 175

Huge Bird Cage $75

Awesome Foosball Table $200

Complete Twin Bed set with everything $550

Look for new postings on our progress, we haven't been very good about it but we will try to keep everyone posted on our progress from here on out.

Coffee Anyone????

Coffee...everyone loves it, others need it and we are providing it!  Well, we are partnering with JUST LOVE COFFEE to help raise money to bring Avery home.  All you have to do is go on-line to https://justlovecoffee.com/about/beneficiary/mcdonaldadoption/ and place an order.  It will be delivered to your home and we will be given a portion of the proceeds.  It is that simple...


So, go to the website and check it out...Great Blends available.  We are so amazed by the hearts of those that love orphans and support adoptions as much as we do!  This organization is GREAT!


DRINK UP, fill your cup while our cups overflow from your love...

It has been so long since I posted an update, sorry for the delay.  We had our first home visit on July 11th.  It was super exciting to actually be getting this show on the road.  We met our case worker, Ashley, for the first time and she is so calm spirited.  It was refreshing that she wasn't nervous or uncomfortable, it truly kept us calm as well.

When she first arrived, Eli ran to the door to answer it.  We invited her in and exchanged greetings/introductions.  She asked the boys to give her a tour of our home...I bet she got way more than she bargained for!  Eli showed her the baby's room and his "new" room with Matt.  He showed her the garage (packed wall to wall with garage sale donations) eek!  He even showed her our drink coolers in the garage and said we store our waters in the here...we all laughed.  Matt was a little bit more reserved and just showed his quite, easy going side.  He was a embarrassed by Eli's "diarrhea of the mouth" as we Discovery Girls like to say.


We sat in the living room and talked for 2 hours.  One neat question she asked was "How do you know that Keith loves you?" and in return, "How does Keith know that I love him?"  It was like a really mushy date which is always a neat time of refreshing in your marriage.  So, overall, we enjoyed our home visit and could physically feel God's peace all around us.  


My prayer: Oh Lord, how I long to always be in this comforting, peaceful place with you.  In your will and enjoying your good works. Amen


Where we go from here:  Going forward, we are planning our huge garage sale (Thanks to so many of you for your donations!) for October 6th at the Church at Cahaba Bend in Helena.  A big THANK YOU to Grace Klein Construction for all their donations.. Jenny and Jason, thank you for your gracious givings, you have blessed us so much.  Also to Greg Maxwell for delivering the donations to our door.  Thank you for being our community!  We appreciate each and every one of you and the role God is allowing you play in our journey...Even the smallest deeds done in order to relieve the cry of an orphan will be seen and blessed by our Heavenly Father!

Home Study Orientation

Yesterday, we started our official adoption process by a beginning home study interview.  We had many friends praying for us during this 3:30 - 4:30 time slot and it was felt.  Within 2 minutes of our conversation with Ashley, our social worker, we had already hit the tough stuff to talk about.  The ugly stuff of your family that you never really want to admit or share, but it was fine.  Ashley brilliantly displayed God's grace to us and extended her acceptance of us and our "stuff".  She fed us hope and promised that by the end of this journey, God would be glorified and that we would satisfied in Him.  Jesus covered our "yuckies" with His grace and showed us exactly how he loves us, UNCONDITIONALLY.

We will make our first official payment toward adoption today!  Words can not express how much we appreciate your prayers and support.  We have been overwhelmed daily by the love that God has for orphans and for us.  He makes the impossible, POSSIBLE.  We are so ready to see our little ones face,  touch her hands, kiss her cheeks and to wrap her up in some good ole McDonald love.  Red and yellow, black and white, we are precious in HIS site....

JOY!

Today is our oldest son's, Matt, 8th birthday!  We are so blessed by his witty, shy, kind and loving personality.  The Lord used him yesterday to break through to my family about our adoption.  It was unprompted by us and such a blessing to hear him proclaim with joy where our family is going in the future.  He and Eli, our youngest, are both excited.  We worked in their bedroom yesterday trying to get their baseball cases and baseball photos hung.  We are slowly merging them into one bedroom in preparation for our sweet girls homecoming.  They are super pumped about sharing a room (hope that lasts for a long time).

Matt also received a phone call from Coach Jeff Crooks telling him that he had been chosen for Baseball All-Stars!  We were all blown away by Matt's reaction.  He was so happy.  Keith and I never thought he would be interested in All-Stars.  He is very nonchalant about everything in life.  We are very thankful for this opportunity for him and pray that he will give it his all!

Today also marks the day that we hand delivered our Adoption Application to Lifeline!  It was uneventful really...I truly expected more:  like a drum roll in the background, friends at the door to greet us, smiles and hugs...Oh, wait...that's what happens when we return with our little China doll, right?  I prayed this morning that this would be memorable for all 4 of us and I think God granted us that.  Matt had field day today at school and I helped with one of the activities, so we were both smelly and in workout clothes.  Nana did not make Eli brush his teeth today and he had the same play clothes he had on yesterday.  I did manage to change his shirt before we left for carpool.  Keith met us there straight from work in a PetStop T-shirt.  Needless to say, we were looking rough.  We looked like we came straight from the backwoods.  I am certain that for our next visit with a Lifeline associate, we will look and smell better! We are all excited that we have taken one step forward in our journey of obedience to God.  That feels GOOD!

Easter Egg Surprise

On Easter Weekend, we hosted our Sunday School's Annual Easter Egg Hunt.  It was so much fun with children running in every direction.  We played a little egg toss and had egg on a spoon races, the Easter Bunny made a grand entrance in the decorated golf cart (thanks to my wonderful neighbors)!  We had more good food than you can imagine.  It was a great day.  By the time we had cleaned up and our last group of friends headed home it was 9:00pm.  The boys both needed baths and Keith still had to go to the grocery store for our own Easter Dinner on Sunday.  I put both boys in the bath and walked into my bedroom where I was shocked to find 5 plastic Easter Eggs sitting in all different drawers of my jewelry box.  One of them said "McDonald Party of 5!" and the others had more sayings and shouts of praise on them.  As if that wasn't exciting enough, I opened them and they had money in them for our adoption!  What an awesome surprise.  I immediately teared up and grabbed the phone to call Keith.  He was headed back home and couldn't believe it.  I hung up with him (and checked on boys), then sent a text to all the ladies that were at the hunt to thank them.  This is just an example of the God we serve: providing everything we need and in such a neat way.  THANK YOU, sweet friends, for being obedient and for allowing your hearts to be opened and changed by adoption.  Our little angel and her family thank you~

So Grateful!

Our unofficial adoption fundraising coordinator, Dana Owens, planned a very special Girls Night Out to help raise money for our princess. Melodi Isbell opened her new home to us for pasta and painting for a purpose. Her home is gorgeous and inviting! Melodi earned the title "Swirl Specialist" and you can look at our pictures to see why. It was an awesome night together.

My friend and fellow Mississippian, Cecily Lowe, led us in painting a canvas cross. She is a local Birmingham artist (blog: chillart.wordpress.com) and is an amazing person. Her love for Christ radiates through every area of her life. You are a precious sister in Christ Cecily Lowe! Thank you for your sacrifice of time, talent and materials for our special night.

We painted a cross that will also be on the back of our Adoption T-Shirt from Southern Belle. It has a blue background to represent November's birthstone and adoption awareness month. On the cross outline there are pink polka dots to represent our sweet girl and most importantly, THE CROSS, the reason we are on this journey! We all chose different color schemes and different scriptures, but in the end they were all gorgeous.

So, I waited until I got home to count our wonderful gifts. You girls raised a whopping $240!!

We were completely blown away and very grateful for all you special ladies. Thank you for being the accepting and supportive sisters in Christ that God calls us to be for each other.

Our First Fundraiser...one step closer!

One of the very first people that I shared our adoption decision with was one of my very dear customers. She is such an exuberant Christian wife, mother and daughter. It is almost as if she glows as she walks in our door with the love of Christ beaming from her. She has always been an inspiration to me. She shared with me that she was a representative for Thirty-One Gifts and I casually asked if her company did any fundraisers for people trying to adopt. She lit up even more, as if that were possible, with a resounding YES. Then she said, "Are you guys adopting?". Nervously, I said YES! So, we got the ball rolling on the first fundraiser for our little Ming-Ming as she has become known around our house. With both of our birth sons, Keith nick-named them before we had official names picked out. So, it is only fitting that our princess have one too.

The fundraiser went very well considering we hadn't told anyone that we were adopting yet. We had no expectations since this was our first fundraiser. God provided half of our initial enrollment fee, which was awesome. He also showed us what a great group of supporters, friends and prayer warriors we have around us. I know we will need them as we travel this road the Lord has put before us. God uses all things for His glory and He provides our every need!

"The LORD has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy!" Psalm 126:3

How the journey came about!

I grew up saying that I wanted an Asian baby, but not necessarily an Asian hubby. Not to stereotype, but most Asian men (at least the ones I knew) where not very tall. Boy, isn't God funny... as he totally provided me with a shorter man than myself! I have always had a heart for children and orphans. When Keith and I began dating, we talked about my desire to one day adopt and he was totally on board with it. We talked about the idea of adopting before we tried to start our own family, but never felt led to do it. Never felt like we were ready.

For over a year now, my heart has ached for the orphan population as a whole. I expressed my desire for adoption again to Keith and just asked him to begin praying about it. His big hesitation, like many others, is and was the expense. We both have been praying about it for awhile now and in Jan. of this year, God gave us a plan. We are both on a budget and we can now see hope in this journey to our daughter.

For now, we are planning fundraisers and praying quite often that God will be glorified and hoonored through our adoption process. It will take at least 18 months once the paperwork is filed and we have to have a certain amount of $$ before we can start the paperwork. So, truthfully, we are looking at July to start the initial paperwork. This would put us traveling to China in Jan. 2014 possibly, which seems a long way off. We have a lot to do in the next 2 years... no procrastination allowed!

To think that our daughter may not even be born yet is a thought I can't seem to wrap my mind around. It is amazing to be praying for, hoping for and desiring a person that's possibly not even created yet. I know that is exactly how our Father in Heaven felt about us before we were born and how he feels about those of us who haven't been born again. Right now that desire to know her, to hold her, to bring her home and to love her like our Father in Heaven loves us, is the motivation to get busy!

To wrap up, we would covet your prayers and your encouragement as we embark on a journey through the unknown. We would ask that you pray in the following ways:

* That we would follow God's lead in every step of the process and seek Him first

* That our extended family would be a source of support and encouragement

* For our commitment to a "radical" budget not be broken and remain urgent over the 2 yrs

* For our precious jewel in China: her health, her caregivers, her nourishment, her development, her heart for Christ and her transition into her forever family!