Mission Trip Update

Wow - I can't believe it's less than six weeks until I leave for China! The time is going quickly and I'm starting to think of all the tasks that need to be completed before I leave. I have packing lists to make and freezer meals to prepare, but most of all I'm trying to keep my eyes on God and stay rooted in Him. I feel so blessed to have this opportunity and I want to make the most of it.

Over the last couple of weeks our group has been able to get more information about the children in the orphanage. We know of at least 40 children and young adults between the ages of 0 and 21 years that we will be working with. As far as I know, most, if not all of these children, have special needs. We also know that there are other children in the orphanage with more severe needs that were not listed and we are praying that we will be able to minister to them as well. Our team is busy collecting games, craft supplies, toys, books, etc. that we can take to share with these children and leave at the orphanage.

I am so thankful for everyone who has generously given toward the cost of my trip. I've been blown away by the funds that have come in from family and friends and I'm very close to having all the money I need to be fully funded. Depending on the final cost of our trip I should only need another $100-$450. I will need to pay this additional amount in ten days, September 18th. If you are interested in contributing to the cost of the trip you can read my previous blog post for details or talk to me. Any extra money I raise will be used to buy supplies for the orphanage. So far our team has been able to purchase 30 special bottles for the babies and toddlers with cleft lip and palate. We will also be buying diapers once we get to China. You can imagine how many diapers they use in an orphanage!

The biggest need I have for this trip is prayer. Would you please pray for me as I prepare to leave next month?
*that I will be able to get all the important tasks done
*that God would keep Jon and the kids safe and healthy while I'm gone and that Jon would have the help he needs
*for the children in the orphanage - that God would protect them and provide for their needs.
*that the children in the orphanage would all have the opportunity to become part of a family and be orphans no more!

I plan to update this blog again before I leave with more information about my trip and additional prayer requests. I truly appreciate everyone who has been praying for me and this trip. You are all a blessing to me!

I recently shared on Facebook that I made the decision to travel to China this October for a short term missions project. I thought I'd use my blog to share more details about the trip. Going on a mission trip certainly wasn't on my radar, but Jon and I had spent a significant amount of time one day talking about how we wanted to find a way to visit Libby's orphanage, or at least help them financially or in some other way. (We weren't allowed to visit her orphanage when we adopted her.) Later that day I coincidentally found out about a Facebook page for people who had adopted from Libby's province and became a member. Within minutes of joining I was told about a mission trip to her orphanage in October. My knee jerk reaction was that it wouldn't work. After all, I have small children at home and a 5th grader that I'll be homeschooling, not to mention the cost of the trip, but I couldn't get this opportunity out of my head. After praying quite a bit and talking it over with Jon we decided I should just do it. As I was about to sign up I found out that the team hadn't officially been given permission to travel to Libby's orphanage. I was disappointed and decided to wait just a little bit and find out what was going to happen. I continued praying about the trip, hoping God would provide a way for the team to go, but praying that his will would be done. I eventually decided that I would take a leap of faith and sign up not knowing for sure what our destination would be. This time as I was getting ready to fill out the application I found out that the team had officially been denied access to Libby's orphanage. Now I was at a crossroads. Should I assume this meant I wasn't supposed to go on the trip? I really wrestled with my decision for a couple days. What had started out as a huge desire to help in Libby's orphanage had transformed into a desire to go and help wherever God was leading. I had been reading blog entries about other groups' trips and seeing the pictures of the beautiful children they were serving brought me joy and broke my heart at the same time. I thought about the time my daughters spent in their orphanages and how it would have been a blessing to have people come to care for them and love them before we could bring them home. I felt God was leading me to take this passion I have for orphan care and do something about it.


The mission organization I'm traveling with is ACT, a division of American World Adoption. They arrange many mission trips each year to serve in orphanages around the world. We will spend about a week working in the orphanage doing whatever will best serve the children and orphanage staff. It is my understanding that most, if not all of the children have special needs. Most orphanages in China are understaffed and I assume this orphanage is no different. It is my hope that we can be a blessing to the nannies by relieving them of some of their work and that we can lavish love upon the children. The cost of the trip will be approximately $4000, but hopefully less since we are traveling at a less expensive time of year. The scary part for me about deciding to go was that I need to raise $2,200 by August 14th. Yikes! Yes, that's in less than a week. At that time our airplane tickets will be purchased and we will know the remainder of the money we need to raise, which will be due in mid September. It was tempting to let the cost stop me from going, but I felt that God wanted me to take a leap of faith and trust him to provide. If you are interested in partnering with me in this ministry there are several ways you can help. First and most importantly, I need prayer. I'll have a lot to do to get ready before we leave in October. I would also ask you to pray that God would prepare my heart for whatever work we'll be doing and that he'll give me extreme and unconditional love for the children and orphanage staff. Also, please pray that God will give our team wisdom to know what will truly be helpful to those we are serving. If you would like to help me financially you can give a donation online to the link at the bottom of the post. Just select "Act Mission Trip" under the drop down menu and make sure to reference my name as the participant. It would also be a good idea to make a note that I'm participating in the October 2014 trip and that Martha Young is the trip leader. You can also send me a check directly. If you make the check out the American World Act it will be tax deductible. Thank you for prayerfully considering how you can partner with me.


In Him,
April

America World Adoption Link


You can also send a check to this address:
America World Adoption
Attn: ACT Missions Dept
6723 Whittier Ave. Suite 202
Mclean, VA 22101

Just make sure to put my name in the memo line and a note that this is for the October 2014 trip and that Martha Young is the group leader. That will ensure that the money gets to the right place.

John 14:18, “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.” What better way for Christ to go unto the Fatherless, but by the hands and feet of His own children? We firmly believe this was His plan for reaching the whole world with the gospel of Christ.
(taken from the ACT mission statement

A Few Pictures!

Happy Girl

I'm so happy to report that Noelle has really come out of her shell! It all started yesterday when we went to the medical clinic, of all places. All children adopted from China need to have a medical exam before they can be brought back to the states. I was worried that Noelle wouldn't be too happy getting checked out, but she didn't mind a bit. She even smiled at the doctor. As we were waiting to be seen, another adoptive mom gave her a car to hold and she decided to get down and play with it. She started throwing it around and walking after it. This was huge because up until yesterday we hadn't been able to get her to play at all. She also started smiling at people and waving. As you can imagine, Jon and I were ecstatic! It was so good to see her happy and having fun. Today has been even better. She is smiling at us constantly and will now walk around our hotel room and explore. She obviously feels comfortable with us because she's also started throwing some major fits when she doesn't get her way, but at least they are short lived. I'll try to post some pictures separately, but no guarantees because I keep getting kicked off Blogger! In fact, this update is from 3 days ago, but I'm just now able to publish it.

Making Progress

Noelle is still a sad little girl, but she seems like maybe she’s starting to turn the corner. Yesterday we were able to go visit her orphanage and I’m so glad! It was good for us to see where she has lived for most of her life so far. We were able to see her bedroom and crib and look into some of the classrooms. One little boy in our travel group had the crib right next to Noelle and they were also in a class together. His parents brought a cake for him and his classmates to eat, which was so sweet of them. When we got to the orphanage Noelle did not want to be put down, but she had no problem going and sitting at the little table when they started serving the cake! She’s my kind of girl!! Many of the nannies and Half The Sky workers said “hi” to Noelle and some even held her, but she was happy to come back to me, so I think that’s a good sign. After visiting the orphanage we went to the finding spot of each child in the group. Noelle was actually found by the gate of the orphanage so we were able to take pictures of the area before we left. Our guide told us that they have security cameras right by the gate, so she was most likely left in a box a little further down the road where she would still be found. After leaving the orphanage there were still 4 other children in our travel group that needed to see their finding spots, so we got a nice driving tour of the city. Guangzhou is huge! I believe it’s the third largest city in China and it seemed like we drove and drove and never saw the end of it. It was fun to see a lot of different sights. When we got back to the hotel we rested awhile and then went out for a little shopping. There’s a nice grocery store down the street that we’ve visited almost every day. It also has a department store and we decided to go get Noelle a toy last night. Some little boys at the orphanage were playing with an electronic toy that she seemed interested in so we figured she might like something that made noise. We got her a toy cell phone that says the numbers in Chinese and plays a lot of Chinese and American songs. She started pushing the buttons so I think she likes it. This might not sound like a big deal, but she’s shown absolutely no interest in playing since we got her, so it made us happy. The other thing we bought was sushi. They sell really yummy sushi for cheap. I’ve been eating it almost every day and I’ve found out that Noelle likes it too. Today we went to the Chen Family Academy. It was built between 1888 and 1894 for offspring of the Chen family to go when they were studying for exams and other things. There was some interesting artwork there and they had some cool gift shops where were able to get the girls some nice souvenirs for when they’re older. Now we are back at the hotel and Noelle is taking her nap. She seems to be happier today. She still cries when daddy holds her, but she seemed to enjoy being out and about in her stroller. She was playing with her shoes and she gave out a few small smiles. She does this thing where she rolls her eyes to the side in a flirtatious kind of way. It is just adorable!! Tomorrow we go to the medical clinic for her exam. This is required before we can bring her back to the USA. I’m pretty sure she’s not going to be happy about it, especially since she’ll need to get a tb test. I just hope it’s not too traumatic for her. I mentioned on Facebook that Noelle had a fever a couple nights ago. Fortunately, that went away, but she still has a runny nose and a little bit of a cough off and on. Please pray that this doesn’t get any worse. We are so appreciative of everyone that’s been praying for us and been interested in our girl! I’ll try to update this blog as much as I can, but access to blogger has been really bad the last couple days. If you don’t hear from us, that’s why. We can email, but Facebook is also not working great. We are looking forward to coming home in a week!!

A few more pictures

This pretty much sums up our day today

At the Guangdong Province Civil Affairs Office

Day 4

Today was another rough day for Noelle. She’s still a sad, sad little girl so I’m a sad, sad mommy. She wants me to hold her all the time unless she’s sleeping. I love holding her and snuggling her, but I wish she would get down and play a little bit. I feel like she must be bored of just sitting on my lap, but apparently not. I really wish I had bought a baby carrier for her. She tolerates the stroller okay, but I think she’d be much happier riding in a baby carrier when we go out. Tomorrow we get to go to her orphanage for a visit. I’m really glad we have this opportunity to see where she has lived for most of the last 23 months. I hope that the visit isn’t too traumatic for Noelle. I’ve heard some adoptive parents say that their children actually seemed happier after the orphanage visit and I hope that’s the case for her! I will try to load some pictures later. My vpn keeps cutting in and out on me!