My Dream Come True

A few Saturdays ago, the Pioneer Woman's (Ree) holiday special came on. I happened to be feeding little K at the same time. Since this is the only time I have to watch television, I immediately tuned in. Much to my surprise, so did my son! We watched the remaining of the show, live and together. Something that has never been done before!!

My son loving the Pioneer Woman's show is a big deal to me because:

A. I'm in love Ree

B. I read her blog every day

C. I own her books

D. She is my go-to woman for all of my recipes

E. I think of her as my best friend because I feel like I literally know everything about her

F. So much so that, when I went through my final Christmas card list making sure I didn't forget someone, I went, "Whoops I forgot The Drummond family." Yeah I'm a nerd.. That might of or might not of sent the card....

 

So Long

Wow I feel like I should re-introduce myself! Our names are Trevor and Tawny. We have 2 kids, a crazy life (especially during the holidays) and are in the process of adopting! ;-)

Last week we had a big snow storm/blizzard.

I made me a delicious, big cup of decaf coffee and sat down at the computer while kids were napping to write a blog post. The Internet was down. I called Internet company and they had a network outage due to the storm. They obviously had a hard time fixing it because they Internet has been down for 8 days now. When I checked it this morning, much to my surprise, it was working! Hallelujah!

I prayed for you during Christmas. I prayed that you experienced the Joy of the Lord in each of your households. I pray the time spent with family was a time filled with happiness and peace. I prayed that Jesus was celebrated because that's what the season is truly all about!

We had such a great time at each family's house! Thursday we took off and drove to my parent's in Lubbock. We ate at Outback. Which is a big deal. We talked while there about how it was a huge thing to go to Outback growing up, and even now! It was probably only my third or fourth time to go :-) Needless to say, we enjoyed every bit of our bloomin onion and steak! We then went and looked at Christmas lights and decorated cookies. Mom thought this would be a great tradition to start. As you can see in the picture she was no where to be found ;-)

 We did actually enjoy decorating and seeing every one's creative side!

The following are just some pictures of the day!

 My dad dancing with little K. Such a sweet time!

 Little Curly Sue!

Big brother was very anxious and so willing to help sister open her presents!

We left my parent's on Christmas Eve and ended up at Trevor's mom's house by that night. We love going up there because it's 30 miles from any civilization. It's always so relaxing and such a house filled with love! We opened presents Christmas morning and went sledding. This was Big K's first time and oh how much fun he had (we had a blast too)!

Kohen this is what you have to look forward to next Christmas. I know Big brother will be more than willing to show you how to do it!!

We finished up our Christmas last night at his dad's house in Boise City. Keldon got his John Deere bike and immediately took it for a test drive! Since the Allen cousin Christmas in Amarillo had to be cancelled, we had 100 lotto tickets to scratch (it's a tradition at that Christmas to get tickets from New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas)! About $40 was won!

Since we chose to not to do Christmas presents this year it was definitely less stressful and more relaxing!

Super exciting to know that by this time next year there will be one more in that picture with us!! Kohen baby, it's going to be a GREAT Christmas with you...

More Than Enough

"Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think." Ephesians 3:20 

Last Monday morning I checked off the final step of our dossier to-do list: Contact Tonya before sending the dossier. Later that morning I received a reply back reminding me to put with our dossier, a $4500 check for the first part of our foreign fees. I read it in disbelief. I knew we had $11,000 in foreign fees coming up but I wasn't expecting it now or in such a large chunk. I called Trevor crying, wondering where in the world we were going to get that kind of money from. As of last Monday morning, we had only sold $110 worth of raffle tickets. I began to fill out paperwork to try and get the interest free adoption loan. A great friend of mine happened to call, not realizing she was going to have to do counseling and give a huge pep talk (if it wasn't for the fact that I knew, knew, knew in my knowings that we were called to adopt, I would have given up that day). She sweetly reminded me that the e-mail was no surprise to God. He's known all along. He's called us to adopt, He wasn't going to keep the tools away from us to accomplish His will. She began praising Him with me in advance for what He was going to do! My attitude changed. The kids and I put praise music on and we began thanking Him for the money.

I was very hesitant on doing the raffle fundraiser. I can't even ask my parents for $5.00, much less friends and family or better yet, strangers. But that was part of God's plan. That was a way He was going to get the funds to us that we needed to complete the next step of the adoption process. Starting Tuesday morning, raffle sales went crazy. It seemed as if anywhere I went I was getting money. I made three trips to the bank last week! As of Saturday afternoon, when the raffle came to an end, we were lacking $400 to send in our dossier. Sunday morning at church, we received a $500 check. God not only supplied the $4500 we needed, but He gave us an abundance.  I've gotten on my hands and knees and jumped around praising Him and thanking Him for accomplishing infinitely more than we could ask!

If you gave or prayed for this raffle, thank you for being a part of His plan. Long before this, He chose you to help bring our +1 home. We truly could not have done it without your obedience to His call! We appreciate and love you...

All glory and honor belong to Him!

Our Cup Runneth Over

The raffle fundraiser has come to an end. We are beyond amazed at the support we received. We had many people sell tickets and post on Facebook, many many people donate and buy tickets and many encouraging words spoken.

This morning I received my daily e-mail from a sweet lady in our church who sends out encouraging mass e-mails. God gave her the words this morning that summed up our raffle fundraiser.

2 CORINTHIANS 9:6-15

     "Remember this:  Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion,  for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written: 'He has scattered abroad His gifts to the poor; His righteousness endures forever.' Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food  will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God's people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ,  and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift."

Thank you so much for your generosity that each of you gave. You supplied the needs of God's people. You supplied the needs for His orphans. You will reap generously and abound in every good work! Words cannot even describe how thankful we are for each of you!

To the exciting news!!

We sold

 TICKETS

TO

 PEOPLE

THAT LIVE IN

 DIFFERENT CITIES

AND RAISED AN ASTOUNDING

ARE YOU READY FOR THIS

DOLLARS!!!!

Because of your generosity, we doubled our goal. This brings us one huge step closer to bringing our +1 home to Texas!!!

Raffle Drawing Details:

1. I was sick to my stomach

2. My friend told me I needed Prozac because I was stressing out about this

3. I wanted everyone to win

4. I wanted everyone to win

5. A sweet lady who didn't know us, or purchased a ticket, named Sandy, drew all of the names

6. We used the adorable purse being auctioned to draw names out of for good luck

7. Speaking of good luck. You need to become friends with Heidi Kinnamon. We drew first for 3rd place. Heidi's name was drawn. We drew for 2nd place and Heidi's name was drawn. She only purchased 4 tickets! 2 out of the 169 tickets were drawn for Heidi! We put her 2nd name back in and drew another. Lupe Smithermann from Lubbock won so we gave her the cookies and Matilda Jane outfit since they were in Lubbock and gave Heidi the photo session since she lives in Dalhart! It worked out great!

8. The grand prize went to Deb Twyman from Boise City. It was really neat to see that there was a winner in every city that sold the most tickets!

9. Know I prayed and prayed over this raffle. I know it sounds silly but I prayed that God would have complete control over it. I know those who won, won for a reason!!

169 tickets in the beautiful bag!

Sweet Sandy drawing the first name!

I close this post out by once again saying how incredibly thankful we are for everyone doing their part in helping bring our +1 home. We know times are hard right now. We know Christmas is right around the corner. But most of all we know that this money is going to be used to accomplish something that will truly change a life forever. Thank you and May God bless you and your family!!



Fundraiser Update

We have less than a week until the big raffle drawing! I am so excited I can hardly stand it. Whoever wins is going to get some great prizes!

We have sold about 20 tickets. Our goal is 50 tickets. I know we can sell 30 tickets this last week. We are very aware that money is tight for the Christmas season. We completely understand. We challenge you to give up your Starbucks drink this week, or lunch out and donate that money! Just send a check by Wednesday so we can get it by Saturday in time for the drawing or pay with PayPal!! You don't want to miss out...

A pampered chef stone to go with the PC items already here was donated by MaryAnn Sanderson. 3 Scentsy bars was donated by Mandy Rysavy and 2 dozen Christmas Cookies were donated by Bella Creations!!!

Will you be part of the 30?? Can you help bring our little baby home?? We appreciate and love each and every one of you!!! Thanks for being a part of our journey...