PIO, Estrace Scramble, Ironman, & More

IToday started my first PIO shot. I have to say this time around, I just warmed the syringe and went for it. I did not use a heating pad on the injection area like I have in the past. Short of trying to stop bleeding afterwards, it was a breeze. I have decided that this time around I will listen to Paul Washer sermons. Each shot is a 15 minute process and I do it 2x a day. So, I can listen to a sermon every two days. : )

I misplaced my main Estrace bottle. I have two Estrace bottles. One I put one week's worth of pills in, and the other I keep put away and use it to refill my little bottle. Why do I do that? Well, it makes it a lot easier to count out pills if I am not sure if I took a scheduled dose or not ; ) This morning I took my morning Estrace (the last in the little bottle) and went to get the "master" bottle and, uh, well, it wasn't there. Now, thankfully, there weren't that many left, and I am sure they will turn up, but I had to call a refill in. Well, my pharmacy had 8 pills. Yep 8. Well, that wasn't going to get me through the trip to the NEDC. So, I started calling around. I finally found a pharmacy (not around the corner that's for sure) that had 20 more tablets. Since Dr. K reduced me to 2 tabs a day, getting 20 would work. I drove to the first pharmacy and picked up my 8 pills and then Rhea went to get the others after work this evening. Whew! None of that was on my to-do list, but very grateful for the results. I panicked for a split second when my pharmacy said they were out. I calmed down ever so quickly and trusted the Lord and his absolute sovereignty over even the smallest detail in this adoption as one of my prescriptions!

Tomorrow we will be attending a graduation ceremony of one of Dustin's very best friends. Of course the graduation would be on "Ironman Day". Yes, Ironman Day means that moving around our area is...ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE most of the day the competition is going on. This is the 3rd year for Ironman to be in our neck of the woods and I know we have a great bike route and all with the scenery and curving roads, but the rest of us everyday folk cannot get out of our neighborhood and run even one errand on that day unless you have hours to spare. So, we are packing a cooler and are blazing a trail, at a snail's pace in the morning. 

Finally, we received a donation for $200. So, to refresh your memory....We needed $7,805. We have raised $6,454, and now only need $1,351 with 3 days to go! Amazing!!! Speechless at what the Lord is doing here!

Our ebay Store!

Here is a link to our ebay store for you to browse or share with others. Some items are from our home or Rhea's A/V business. Other items were donated for us to sell. Thank you for taking a peek!

Here is a pic of our sweet little Sarah on Friday morning at our Yard Sale.

Final Total

I cannot keep my eyes open, but I wanted to post the final weekend total for our Yard Sale. The total for both days was $1,505. This brings our total so far to $4,265! Our Lord is truly gracious!

We only have $3,135 to go!

Yard Sale Day 1 Totals

Today would not have been possible without some amazing people in our lives. Thank you to everyone who came over today to help set up, sell, haul furniture around, reorganize, clean up, bring dinner, and help us gather things last minute today to sell tomorrow. All of you know who you are and we truly appreciate your love for us and these little babies. I have a dear family friend who took lots of photos of the sale today and she will be uploading the photos to share with me. I will post all of those in a couple of days so you can see our sale in progress.

We had beautiful weather and a great turn out of shoppers. At the days end, we raised $1,126! That brings our new total to $3,886. We just passed the 1/2 mark!

Rain Delay and Missed Call

Well today was pretty much a wash! The rain continued until mid morning, so we chose to not have the sale today and use today as an organizational day. I will take pics after it is all set up tomorrow morning. We have a few families coming to help in the morning until about lunch time.

All of the kids have worked so very hard. The boys went and made multiple runs with Rhea in the trailer picking up loads of donated items. The boys hauled stuff, set up stuff, and now are sleeping outside "guarding" all of the donations. Rebecca has been amazing helping price and care for the littles. Elizabeth is a huge help. If she isn't helping with Sarah, she is getting drinks, carrying boxes and helping keep things picked up. She always has a smile to share, especially as we grow weary.

As I was busily working today, I missed the call from Dr. K for our phone consult. I was ready on time, but he was running a bit late and when he did call, I didn't hear my cell ring in my pocket when I was outside. So, I emailed the office to reschedule.

So, today was a wash of sorts as both "big" things for the day were postponed. We are grateful for the Lord's timing in everything and we look forward to the big sale tomorrow and Saturday and my rescheduled Dr. K appt. very soon.

Our goal for the weekend sale is $3,000. I will post tomorrow evening with an update!

Tomorrow is Day 1 & Follow Up with Dr. K

Yard Sale Day 1 is tomorrow. Houston is having a VERY unusual cold snap for April. It will be 39 degrees tonight! We are usually in the 60's for lows this time of year.
There at least will be sunshine instead of the rain we had all day today. It will be 46 in the morning. We will need to sell hot cocoa instead of iced down water bottles! lol!

Praying the shoppers still come. There is always Friday and Saturday if not ; )
Did you see our thermometer total today? With grant donations and eBay sales, we are now at $2,560!!

I will have kiddos take pics tomorrow at the sale. I'll post tomorrow night with the Day 1 total!

Oh yes, I have my phone follow up appt. with Dr. K tomorrow. Busy day most definitely!!

Yard Sale Week Is Here

This will be one very busy week for our house! Today Rhea and the boys will leave late afternoon to go make pick-ups from 5-6  different homes to collect the furniture donations for the Yard Sale this week. We have previously scheduled appointments today and Wednesday. That leaves tomorrow to really get to sorting and pricing. It is supposed to rain most of the day on Wednesday, so truly, tomorrow is our pricing and sorting day. If you are reading this and live in our area we could definitely use some assistance with pricing items & sorting and hanging clothing on Tuesday/Wednesday. If you have the time to come help us Thursday or Friday during the sale, it would be most helpful.

We look forward to the coming week even with its busyness!! : )

Over the weekend, more eBay items sold and were packed and shipped. Our thermometer total is rising! We are now at $1,648! That means $5,752 to go : )

I will take some pics of our sorting and pricing time with our "little" helpers as we begin to dig into the clothes bags this evening. It's about time I get some pics posted ;)

The Heat Is Rising!

I installed a thermometer in the right sidebar for you to follow as we move forward to reach our needed goal of $7,400 for this next transfer of our 4 little ones in May. We started at $0 over the weekend. In 3 days, we have raised $593. That is $100 since last night's post y'all! : )

The Lord is blessing us and we are obedient to see this all the way through, even though we know we may never hold any of these babies this side of heaven. He is a gracious and loving God who loves and cares for these little ones. Yes, we pray He has chosen for us to raise more kiddos for Him, but we first and foremost trust His will and will follow as He leads.

There are so many frozen babies waiting to be adopted. Embryo Adoption is not for everyone. Adopting internationally isn't for everyone either. Whether the child is waiting to be placed by a birthmother, the child is waiting in an orphanage across an ocean, or the child is waiting frozen in a tank in a warehouse, we as Christians are all called to care for these through prayer, support, or bringing them into our homes.

We were called to bring these precious 8 tiny babies into our home and so many of you have been faithful to pray and to give monetary assistance to bring these babies home. Thank you for being faithful to His Word.

May the Lord bless each of you!

 "Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to your name give glory, for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness!" Psalm 115:1

Looking Ahead

Thank you for all of your kind comments in our last few posts. We have been blessed by family, church family, and friends who have grieved with us as we have mourned the loss of our 4 precious babies. As  I shared in our last post, we have 4 more little ones waiting in the freezer. The May cycle at the NEDC will be here sooner than we think, so we have been on the phone and communicating by email with everyone at the NEDC planning for our next cycle.

I had my final beta yesterday and the results showed that my hCG level was back to zero. So, now we wait for my next cycle to begin and I will be assigned my protocol for the next transfer. I talked to nurse Katie today and she said she may even have our transfer date ready by the end of next week!

When we adopted Sarah and her siblings as embryos we held a HUGE yard sale (see here and here for posts). We set a goal of $3,000 and the Lord brought the items and buyers and we met that goal! For this upcoming transfer, due to an additional cost we had not planned on and the fact that airfare is higher this trip for some reason, we will need $7,400 to return to the NEDC.

Yes, that seems like a large number, but did I ever share our final total for the first phase of this adoption? We needed over $13,000 during a time when Rhea had no work and we were living on savings. The Lord provided through many means over $11,000 for the adoption of these 8 little ones.

Monday, we set up a new expense page to calculate the cost for this 2nd transfer and as I shared it comes to $7,400. We have seen the Lord move in mighty ways through this current adoption and we looked at the $7,400 total and prayed and then got to work.

• I listed a good number of items on eBay and am continuing to do so with items people have donated and items we found around the house. If you would like to look at our items, contact me and I will give you our eBay ID. 
• We will be hosting a yard sale in 2 weeks and sent out requests for item donations.
• We still have our coffee account up with Just Love Coffee Roasters.
• We still have our grant fund set up with AdoptTogether (where donors will receive a tax deductible form for their taxes)
• We are thinking through some more ideas to quickly get going.

Now, since just this past weekend, look at what the Lord has blessed our family with:

• close to $200 in eBay sales.
• Several families calling today to say they have furniture, household, and many other items for the yard sale. Two of the calls were from families in the area who are moving and want us to come get all the stuff they do not want to move. 
• We received a check for $15 from Just Love Coffee Roasters for the profits on a sale of coffee that was placed.
• We received an anonymous $200 donation to our AdoptTogether grant fund just today.

So, in just a few days, we already have $415 and a yard sale inventory that is growing and growing! 

 "But as it is written, 'What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him' " I Cor. 1:9 

The Most Recent Donation

Okay, I did leave y'all hanging, but not meaning to, really.

Rhea and I were going over our finances for the adoption a couple of weeks ago. We went over everything several times and we still came up with the same numbers. We were just shy of needing $5,000 to finalize everything from remaining agency fees,  travel to Knoxville for the FET, the NEDC fees for the FET, medications, ultrasounds, and blood work.

We knew we had the funds to go for our first trip to the NEDC for our Mock Transfer. Rhea decided that we would make that trip and if we didn't have the funds for the FET, we would have to reschedule for May. Upon our return from our trip this past week, I realized it was time to send in our grant request from AdoptTogether. We requested a grant for $3,000.00. This was the amount remaining that we owed our agency in order to finalize and release our little ones to be shipped to the NEDC from ReproTech where they are living currently.

As I was filling out the form, I saw where AdoptTogether needed a statement/invoice from our agency. I emailed our agency and requested one. I was at that time informed that Rhea and I had been granted a  scholarship from the Babushka Fund. This is a scholarship fund that is funded my donors to assist families adopting special needs or hard to place children. We did not apply for this scholarship or even inquire about it since our agency had already been so gracious to work payments out with us.

So, let me tell you, when Rhea & I saw the amount of the scholarship, I cried. Rhea was speechless. We were both in shock. I crumbled like a cookie. I was humbled once again at our Lord's perfect provision as we look forward. What amazing documentations of the Lord's provision we have to record in our precious ones' baby book. They will see how much they are loved by their Creator. Rhea and I shared the information with the other kiddos during family worship that evening. All of their mouths dropped open. Yes, even Elizabeth's who is just five years old. She knows a big number when she hears it. Nightlight Christian Adoptions awarded us a $2,000 scholarship.



Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it. 

1 Thess. 5:22; 23 ESV

Finalizing Finances?

As I shared in an earlier post, Rhea has decided to move forward with our scheduled appointments as planned. We went over all of our expenses to date and all of our donations & total of our personal savings given to date and came to the new total we need to raise by the end of February.

Our total adoption expenses including travel come to $ 13,818.00
Our total adoption expenses that are still outstanding $ 10,572.00

Our total donations/personal savings given balance: $ 9,033.26
Our total donations/personal savings used so far balance: $ 3,246.00
Our remaining adoption funds to use: $5,787.26

Additional funds needed by 3/1/2013: $4,784.74

Rhea's work is at a STAND STILL. We have no extra resources to draw from. We are organizing to get ready to prepare to collect items for a garage sale. We will be selling school books and small items on eBay/Craigslist and whatever else we can think of. Please join us in prayer as we prepare to bring these precious babies home out of the freezer!

Thank you so very much to each and every one of you who have purchased items, donated your own personal money, and supported us through prayer and encouraging emails throughout our process. We are so very grateful for family, friends, acquaintances, and strangers for their support and love of our frozen little babies.

Happy New Year Adoption Update

We had a wonderful Christmas. I admit, once again, I enjoyed the Christmas festivities myself and was not behind the camera as often as I had thought.

We did capture a few moments of the morning:

The kiddos put together one final update video for the Give1 Save1 fundraiser website. Follow THIS LINK to go see the video and the grand total. What a wonderful gift the boys gave in making this video with their friends and what a tremendous blessing Give1 Save1, our family, friends, and so many we have never met have been as they gave to us this Christmas to help bring our babies home. 

We have had many people ask how things were going with our adoption. Here is where things stand at this point:

Our adoption is finalized between the genetic family and our adoption agency, Nightlight Christian Adoptions. Nightlight needs a final payment and they will ship our tiny babies to the NEDC in Knoxville, TN where Dr. K will transfer our little ones to my womb. 

Rhea and I need to make a trip to Knoxville for a mock transfer and check up with Dr. K. Currently, we have an appt. set for Feb. 6th.

We need to pay our agency and the NEDC all final fees by March 1st

Dr. K will schedule us the week of March 19-21 for our Frozen Embryo Transfer.

Pretty exciting huh??

____________________

You guys have also asked how do the expenses break down for this type of adoption and do we have all the funds necessary for our adoption? 

We started this journey needing $15,000 and then found out recently that we were in need of $2,000 more. From the beginning, we have put in money from savings and have been blessed in so many ways by others who have helped us bring these babies home. Here is where we are:

Application Fees/Homestudy Update/Fingerprints & other official docs: $1,350

Nightlight Snowflakes Agency Fee: $8,000

NEDC Program Fee, Dr. K fees, labs/meds to prepare my body to receive our babies: $4,847*

Travel (trip 1 for Mock Transfer) $1,100

Travel (trip 2 for FET) $1,750*

Grand Total: $ 17,040

What we have (personal savings, fundraising, donations) $12,005

What we still need to come up with: $5,035 

We are in need of funds for the "*" items above. The fees to the clinic are due March 1st. The travel funds for the second trip will be needed 

around that time too to purchase airline tickets. We have hotel points saved and our hotel stays will be free :) 

We are praying we do not have to postpone our scheduled appointments. Dr. K is booked for months out and we may not be able to get on the schedule again 

until May or later. 

We are still hopeful and praying. 

It is hard to imagine that if we are able to raise the needed funds, I will be on Estrace in just a couple of weeks to prepare my body to have the best possible environment to accept these little lives. We are getting pretty excited around here at the Robison home!

ORANGE Your Ready for a Fun Video Update?

Merry Christmas!

See what the kiddos did now...

CLICK and smile!! and share it with all!

Week 1 Video Update--HOBBIT Style!!

Our boys are having fun! Here is their end of Week 1 total update video submitted to the Give1 Save1 website--Hobbit style!  If you haven't had time to see the adoption video the boys and their friends made, please do so by going HERE. We are still in need of another $6,000 for the adoption agency and program fees. Will you share our link with all those you know? We were blessed to be given an additional week on the Give1 Save1 website. Just so you know, every little $1 truly helps and is appreciated by us more than you could ever know. Thank you.

Country Christmas Video Update

The Give1 Save1 website posted this today:

Ready for a little Country Christmas update?

If you have not had the opportunity to "meet" the Featured Family of The Week, The Robison Family, and see the amazing video that their sons put together with their friends, please CLICK HERE to see the video and learn about Embryo Adoption, hear some beautiful Christmas music and see what these kiddos did for their family! 

Oh, and while you are at it, remember at Give 1 Save 1 we encourage you to give just $1 by clicking that donate button. It takes just one more click after that and in seconds you are helping this family get closer to bringing their babies home! So hop on over to see this family. Prepare to SMILE!

Here is the promised update video for their Day 4 Give1 Save1 totals... (but don't forget to come back and GO HERE to see their Family Video)

Questions about Embryo Adoption? Ask away!

Day 2 Give1 Save1 Update Video!

The Robison children have done it again! Here is another a festive & creative  update for their Day 2 Give 1 Save 1 Total. We knew you would love seeing this one too!

If you have not had the opportunity to "meet" the Featured Family of The Week, The Robison Family and see the amazing video that their sons put together. 

Please CLICK HERE to see the video and learn about Embryo Adoption, hear some beautiful Christmas music and see what these kiddos did for their family! You will be BLESSED.

Oh, and while you are at it, remember at Give 1 Save 1 we encourage you to give just $1 by clicking that donate button. It takes just one more click after that and in seconds you are helping this family get closer to bringing their babies home! So hop on over to see this family. Prepare to SMILE!

Here is the promised update video for their Day 2 Give1 Save1 totals... (but don't forget to come back and GO HERE to see their Family Video)

Give1 Save1 - Day 1 Total! (cute video by the boys)

Thought you all would like to see what the boys did again...

Thank you as always for sharing our links as we move closer to bringing our babies home!

Click HERE to go see what the boys did this time ;)

We Have Been Chosen! Watch our Video!

Awhile back, I posted about a group of websites which focus on adoption. There is a website for each specific region in our world. These are places adopting families can go for information, encouragement, or to connect with others who have traveled the road before them.

Each Monday, Give1Save1 introduces a Featured Family of the week they have chosen from the numerous video submissions they receive. They feature this family for one week. Their vision is that if those who watched the video were to give just $1, that these dollars would quickly add up and become so much more to help a family with their adoption expenses.

Well, a couple of months ago, our teenaged boys and their friends from church decided they wanted to produce a video as a gift to their family & to their future adopted brothers and sisters. They spent weeks planning and many hours filming, editing, composing, recording, eating not so healthy munchies, editing some more, and though they did not procrastinate, worked on the project until just hours before the deadline. Always smiling, even through sagging eyelids, these young men came with their Christmas offering.

We pray that you are blessed by their efforts. We hope you will take 5 minutes to open & see their gift.

Click HERE to go to Give1Save1-Domestic 

**we would love if you would pass the link to this post or to the Give1 Save1 post to as many as you can.** 

Merry Christmas!

The Auction Has Begun!

The Auction starts now and runs through Wednesday the 12th!

There are close to 25 items currently listed with more on the way.

Follow this link on our blog or this link to our FB page for details and to see all the donations up for bidding.

All items are brand new and donated by special friends. 100% of final sales prices will go directly to our adoption agency!

Here are some samples of what you will see...

Fundraiser Blessings

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Our kiddos enjoyed seeing cousins earlier in the week and then had fun spending time with their grandparents the rest of the week. We had the traditional fare and believe it or not...we actually served and ate pumpkin bread and enjoyed it! You think after baking so many loaves we would be tired of seeing the stuff, but we didn't eat any of the yummy goodness until all orders were prepared and delivered to each family.

For those who have undergone fundraising efforts for their adoption process, they will tell you that fundraising is hard work! Our family knows that the Lord called us to adopt these little ones. We know He will provide the finances to see these babies into our family. However, to sit back and "wait" for the money to drop from heaven is not being a good steward of our time. So, sometimes the efforts we, as adoptive families, put into fundraising will bring large sums and other times small sums. Our family has been on both sides. What we share with our children is that we trust that the Lord will provide what is needed in His timing alone. If we only raise $50 or $100 that does not equal a "failure" in fundraising. It is just the perfect amount the Lord intended and we add it joyfully to the adoption jar. The Lord will provide and when we truly trust in that, the efforts we put into fundraising become a joyful process and our hearts are not anxious as we diligently move forward blessed that we were chosen to care for these precious unborn babies.

Currently, we are gathering beautiful & fun items for our online auction that will launch next week. Right now though, we want to share with you how the Lord was gracious to us through church family, friends, and even strangers to provide for our unborn babies who are frozen in a tank in another state. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.


Pumpkin Bread:
61 loaves baked, 56 sold and delivered.
Total donated: $1,232
Total for supplies: $205
Total Pumpkin Bread profit: $1,027

Pampered Chef:
25% of total sales donated by PChef to our adoption agency: $150
free product earned: $100 (this amount we used for Christmas gifts and we were able to move $100 of our Christmas budget money into the adoption fund)
Total Pampered Chef profit: $250

AdoptTogether Grant Fund:
donated during the past 2 weeks: $25

Just Love Coffee Roasters:
Sales during last 2 weeks: $170.20
Total profit earned: $44

ebay Sales:
profits for last 2 weeks: $107

Other donations:
cash: $25


So, our grand total for the two week fundraising effort is...

$1,478.00

See how all the little things add up?

Thank you again everyone!

Our coffee fundraiser continues. We earn $5 for every bag sold. Please click HERE to shop. Those who have purchased have sent me rave reviews about how great it tastes and these reviews come from particular coffee connoisseurs ; )

Also, if you would prefer to receive a record of your donation sent to you for tax purposes, AdoptTogether will mail you one. Click HERE to adopt to our personal grant fund.