And then there were 4!!

Well, not yet, but there will be soon!! We are hoping that within the next year there will be forth little Wyoming Betzler running around!  After lots of prayer, then some more prayer a strong and clear consistent feeling that this is the way that God is calling us to expand our family and then some more prayer, we have taken the leap and are working to adopt from the Democratic Republic of the Congo!!!!

AND we are excited! ALL of us as you can see!

We had originally thought we would adopt from Central or South America, as it seemed like the natural fit with our spanish and consistent interests.  However, the more we prayed and the more we researched  about the orphans of our world we felt like God was leading us to the DR Congo.   There are a variety of reason for this, with the main one being the immediate and great need there as well as the general situation of the country.  Some basic facts on the Congo:

• It is the third largest country in Africa by area and the twelfth largest in the world.
• The country has been marred by years of war and AIDS, creating a humanitarian crisis with more than 5 million orphans struggling daily in conditions of extreme poverty and famine. 
• Child headed families are the norm here. It is said that "it takes a village to raise a child," but the villages are overwhelmed with the shocking number of children in this country that are without families (littlemiracles.org)
• Children die faster in the Democratic Republic of Congo than in all but 10 other countries in the world ( United Nations statistics).
• 515 of every 1,000 children will die before turning 5 (IRC). In the United States, the comparable statistic is 6 of every 1,000 children.

And so the journey begins! We have been accepted into One World Adoption's Congo program and are plugging away on the paper work involved in setting everything in motion for adoption. We will keep you posted on this intimidating adventure...please pray that God would be using it for his glory.

The other big and exciting (exciting because we can't wait to how God will answer His promise) piece to this puzzle is the finance piece.  We aren't exactly sure what this will look like, but know that God has promised and will provide and so far he has.  Right down to free copies at FedEx last week! - more on that in a post to come! One way we hope to make money for this is through selling our projects.  As many of you know, we tend to be project people.  We love working on projects that involve taking old stuff and making cool stuff (eye of the beholder) with them.  We have historically focused our project energy on fixing up houses and making things for them.  But, as we are nearing completion on this house and can't imagine what our life would look like if we didn't have a few projects going on, we thought we would take this passion and try to use it to generate some of the adoption finances we'll need...so this Saturday will be our fist official go at it!   We will be joining Angela Brugger and potentially a few other families who are working to adopt, for a shopping EXTRAVAGANZA. Angela will be selling Sak Saum items.  This is seriously an amazing organization, that works for the restoration of human trafficking victims AND sells the most beautiful products. Check out their website, Sak Saum, to see all their great stuff.  We will be selling a few of our projects.  I will post more this week about what will have and what we will do. But come on Saturday to check it out and to get your Christmas shopping done in OCTOBER!!! Does it get any better than that??

WHERE - Cornerstone Church - 4351 Big Horn Ave

 TIME - 1-5pm

WHEN - Saturday, October 20th