Amazing Friends!

   Normally, Monday morning would not be a good time for me to sit down and write anything that would make much sense, so I hope this day will be different.

  

 The adoption is moving along, and all of our paper work has been sent to China. Now we are waiting for China to log all of our information and then the agency will be able to begin matching us up with a child. Every step puts us one step closer! Although the waiting can be a challenge, we have been blessed with a peace that I could not explain any other way than to say it is God's peace. We have faith that God has the perfect child picked out to be part of our family.

   In the waiting, we have been blessed with some great friends and family who have helped support us. We have been trying to sell anything we can to raise money, and we are doing well. We have a friend who started a Scentsy fundraiser for us, and friends who have handed us money. Yesterday was a day that blew us away as a good friend handed us a check for $5000 for our adoption! It is amazing and fun to watch how people have blessed by blessing us!!

   We have now started selling Tupperware again to help out. We sold it when we were raising money to adopt Karter and had some success at it. This time I really hope we will be able to have a consistent client base that we can sell far beyond this adoption and begin raising money for KartersDream.com which we started to help children around the world find forever families, and we also use it to support our local toys for tots. We have a lot of fun blessing children and families with what God has provided for us. We also use all the profits from my Coke machines, candy machines, and snake machine at Blades and the courthouse to support these efforts, so if you are in Perryton at Blades, Capital Farm Credit, or the Courthouse, get a snack and help a child!

   As we are waiting, we are also have fun getting things ready! The past week, this has included build a giant 80 sq ft playhouse for Karter and Kayman to enjoy. Karter has been very excited to help out, and can't wait to have it finished and show it to his sister. It has been a fun project and has been build mostly out of recycled (FREE) lumber, so it has also been fun for me to design with and reuse materials instead of them going to the landfill.

   Thank you everyone who has been part of this journey! If you would like to donate, you can at the right side of this blog. If you would like to host an online or catalog Tupperware party, just send me an email at jason.vanosdol@gmail.com and I would love to help you out with that!

The papers are in the mail - Part 2

Ok, so it's the same title on a new post... but it's true. It's not quite like the saying "the check's in the mail" but sometimes it can feel that way. Now all of our paperwork is being sent for authentication by the various US agencies with a final destination to the Chinese Consulate's office in Houston. There are so many steps involved, but we are quickly arriving at the end of the paper trail! Once the documents are approved by the Consulate, all we have to do is wait!!

Since we are adopting through China's waiting child program, Heather and I got to spend a couple hours looking through their list of waiting children a few days ago. (If you don't know, this program is primarily for kids with special needs.) After looking through about 75 kids, my heart was very heavy. It was very sad to me to see little kids with some very major problems and to think they may not ever find a family to love them. I wish we had the means to help all of them, but we can't.

We did find one little girl who stole our hearts, but when we tried to lock her file (basically reserve her for us), she had already been scooped up by another family. That was sad news for us, but at the same time, I know God already has a little girl in China just waiting to become Kayman. I keep thinking back to our process in adopting Karter and realizing that if we hadn't run into delays in that process... we would not have our Karter!

God has a plan for our family, and I really have no place to question that. We just can't wait to see how it all works out and when our family will include one more!

If you would like to help us meet our goal, please take a moment to click on the donate button to the right of this page. All gifts will be greatly appreciated and will go directly to our adoption. If you do donate, you will see that it shows you gave to KartersDream.com. This is a site we started with the hope of someday being able to turn it into a foundation to help other children find their forever home!

If you have help us out, thank you so much! It has been amazing to see how much our friends and family help out. We could never express how much each and every one of you mean to us!

The papers are in the mail

Our paperwork has been mailed to Homeland Security and we are not waiting on a fingerprint appointment.

With every step the anticipation continues to grow in our family. Heather and I cannot wait to be able to put a picture with the name for our little girl, and Karter is so excited that everyday he comes up with something else he will teach, show, tell, or buy for his sister. It's so exciting to see his excitement throughout this process.

Now we are continuing to sell what ever we can to raise money. Our goal is to go throughout this entire adoption completely debt free. We know that with the help of our friends, family, and complete strangers, we can see this goal accomplished.

Many of you who will read this have purchased a cookbook from us that we published full of recipes from family and friends. We thank each and every one of you! every dollar collected puts us one step closer to our goal. If you have not purchased a cookbook, we still have a few available for $15. You can email me, catch me on facebook, or leave a comment to this blog with your information and I will contact you.

I have also started a group on facebook called Perryton Pickers for people in our area to buy, sell, trade, or give away things in our area. Everything I list for sale on there will go directly to our adoption as well.

Another way you can help out is simple by clicking on the donate button to the right of this blog. It will take you to Paypal where you can make a donation directly to our adoption. The donation will say it was made to Karters Dream which is the beginnings of a foundation we are hoping to use to help adoptions and kids in need around the world. Right now, all of the money collected goes to help us bring home Kayman.

We thank each and everyone of you, and ask that you would continue to pray for our family. Please be sure to check back often to see what's going on. You can also see our fundraising process on the Thermometer on the right side of this blog. I can't wait to see it completely full! and hopefully even more than we need so we can bless another family.

One step closer

We finished our home study this past Friday which puts us one step closer to welcoming a little girl into our family. The Social Worker said she plans to have it all complete in two weeks. Once that is finished up, we will be able to get fingerprinted and begin looking at available children. It's strange to think that we can basically pick out our child from a catalog, but that is kind of what we will be doing. I am just trusting that God will lead us to the perfect fit for our family. He already knows who she is... Now we just have to listen to His will.

Karter is very excited to get a sister, and is now thinking he needs a sister and a brother. He really doesn't understand why we tell him for now we are just trying to get him a sister. Of coarse he promises to share all of his toys with his sister, but we'll see how that works! The one thing he told us he would not share is his puppy!

It makes me more excited to see and hear his excitement grow as we get farther along in the adoption process. Many of you may not know, but Karter has been talking about and praying for his sister for probably about two years. He always leaves a seat for her in the car when we go on trips, and often picks out toys for her to play with. He have really enjoyed getting to help decorate her room and start looking at things at the store for her. In fact, we are planning a trip to build-a-bear to make a stuffed animal for her. He can't wait!

The adoption process is long and hard, but it is very exciting to think that soon we will have a daughter! Karter has been such a blessing in our lives, and I know Kayman will just add to that blessing. I just can't wait to jump on a plane and go get her!

A New Journey...

It has been awhile since my last post, and many things have changed. For starters, a few months ago I started a company called VisionMedia Productions with the purpose of bring quality family entertainment to the Texas panhandle area. We have successfully promoted 2 concerts with a great response. I am now looking forward to heading on down this road and seeing where it leads. I have made some great contacts in the industry and get many calls and emails from agencies and performers that may come to Perryton in the future. It is exciting to be able to bring in events to an area where we drive 120 miles to go to a concert. Now we are seeing people drive 120 miles or more to come to Perryton!

The biggest change since the last post is that we have begun a second adoption process! We are now in the process of filling out all of the papers to adopt from China! Karter is very excited and pr ayes for "his sister" every night. He has even insisted on us buying a couple things for her. It is a little scary to travel down this road again, but we are ready and excited to have a new member in our family.

My goal is to be sure to keep this blog updated with any updates and progress reports along the way, so here is where we are right now.

We are now in the stage of fundraising to help cover the cost of adoption. We have complied a professional printed cookbook filled with recipes from our friends and family. The cost of these books is $15 each plus $3 shipping (if you live out of our area). You can order your book by sending an email to Heather or I at Kartersmom@centramedia.net or Kartersdad@centramedia.net . If you want to pay by paypal, just let me know and I can send you an invoice. We hope the cookbooks as well as some other homemade products for sale on www.Kartersdream.com as well. If you would like to make a donation to our adoption fund, you can visit www.Kartersdream.com and click on the donation button on the left hand side of the page. Every dollar helps, and we are very thankful for everyone who helps us out.

-Jason Vanosdol

What If...

The title of this blog is The Path We Take. I have always been one who looks back at decisions I made that got me to where I am today. What if I had made a different decision?...

I just finished screening a movie that will be out this fall entitled "What If" that took a look at the exact situation. It is about a guy named Ben, played by Kevin Serbo (best known for his role as Hercules in the 1994 television series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys), who decided to take his own path instead of the path that God had marked for him. Years later he is given the chance to see what would have happened if he had chosen God's path. An Angel, played by John Ratzenderger (best known as Cliff from the sitcom Cheers), takes Ben on a journey to see what would have been different if he had made one different decision along the way. Ben experiences what his life would have been with his wife, Kristy Swanson (best known for playing Buffy Summers in the 1992 filmBuffy the Vampire Slayer), and their family. I will not going to tell you much more about the movie except that I believe it has a message that we all need to hear. Are you on the path that God planned, or are you chasing your own dreams?

For me... I am very glad that I chose to take God's path 16 years ago when I believe I was at a cross road in my life. Sure, I'm not living where I thought I would be and I don't have the profession I thought I would have... but I know that I am where I should be! I have a wonderful family and a great job! God has been so good to me even though sometimes I tend to "push" my ideas on Him. He is always there to listen and then to correct.

Where are you at in your life? Can you see God at work around you? Can you sit back and know that you are where you should be? If you cannot answer yes to these questions, I challenge you to get on your knees and seek out what God has for you. I promise that even though you may always look back and wonder "What If"... If you are where God wants you to be, there will never be any better place!

Be sure to look for "What If" in theaters later this year, and plan to take your friends and family to see it. We really need to support good wholesome films and show Hollywood and our local theaters what we want to see.

Learning through a 3 Year Old

It is amazing to me to watch Karter change. He seams to learn something new almost everyday. It was even more amazing to me when I realized things that I could learn from him.

It all started last year while Karter was going through the "terrible three's." I know, everyone says it is the "terrible two's," but trust me in this case it was when he was three.

It seemed to me that he would never listen to what we would tell him, and many times even telling him multiple times did not seem to matter. If you are reading this and knew me at that age, I know what you are thinking... "yep, it's payback time". That might be true, but it has nothing to do with this story! One day, while standing in the hallway less than three feet from Karter, I was trying to talk to him when I realized he did not even notice I was talking. So I simply said his name, which got absolutely no reaction. Like any parent, I kindly repeated his name in a slightly louder tone. Again... no response. So, just like I learned from my childhood experiences, I repeated his name again. This time with that tone that says "you better pay attention or else!" You guessed it, he simply went on playing. This of coarse really got on my last nerve and I yelled (excuse me, I mean spoke loudly); "Karter you better pay attention or you will lose those toys for the rest of the night!!! Why don't you pay attention to us when we are talking to you?"

That's when it hit me like a ton of bricks. How many times do we respond to God the same way Karter was responding to me. When I asked Karter why he does not pay attention when we are talking to him, God instantly spoke to my spirit "Why don't you?"

My attitude changed immediately when I realized that I treat God the same way Karter was treating me. All to often I am too busy "playing with my toys" to hear what God is trying to tell me. The difference is that unlike me, God does not get mad or yell at His children.

Maybe we need to slow down and pay attention to hear what God is trying to say to us, and what we are supposed to be doing.

It is amazing to me that I can learn about God from a three year old, but God does say that He will use the simple things to confound the wise.....

Father, as I go through this day,

please help me to not only hear

your voice, but to listen to what

you are saying. I don't want to

miss what you want to say. I don't

want to miss what you have for me.

So today, I just want to take some

time; sit quietly; and listen....

Give me patience and the will to obey.

Thank you for you loving hand

and that sweet still voice that calls

my name.

Amen