Shoes for Orphans in Africa

Thank you to all of you who supplied items and those of you who were able to give 2 hours of your Sunday evening to make shoes for orphans in Africa.

We learned of the plight of the jigger, a sand flea, that lays it's eggs under the toes and in the sole of the feet for those who don't have clean environments nor shoes to protect them.
The jiggers grow, multiply, and burrow their way deep into the feet making it difficult and painful to walk to school. Sole Hope is the organization we partnered with to help provide protection,
while they take the shoes we prepared, get local Africans to sew them together for a fair wage, provide education on how to prevent/treat jiggers, and why Jesus cares for them.

We had 14 people help cut 240 pieces of fabric or plastics to make 20 pairs of shoes last night in just 2 hours! And we have many more supplies to have another Shoe-cutting party in 2013.


Here are some photos from last night's gathering – our kids helped too!

 

 

The Disney reveal and adventure

So one of the exciting things about being a parent is sharing in the joy of the newness with your child. Whether your child is biological, a foster child, or you're an adoptive family, there's new experiences together and sometimes new feats for the very first time for your child – no matter what age they come to you as. Though our foster son is seven years old, we have enjoyed many of his firsts with him like roller skating, learning how to swim, carving pumpkins, being active in a church, hay rides, roller coasters, visiting local attractions like corn mazes, Stone Mountain, and now the greatest fun – Disney World!

With all the fun and exciting newness also comes the many firsts that sadden your heart along this journey. Your child passing the year mark of a trauma-versary or being in foster care for a year. The first year of celebrating holidays with the only family your child had known before coming into care and five families in the foster system before you. New seasons are always a reminder of your adoptive or foster child's past and pain, but many new great memories can be made too.

We wanted to reveal our trip to Disney to the boys in a special way. We had decided to purchase punched-out letters at the Dollar Store that spell out the word. Each day they had good behavior we would reward them with a letter which they would use to unscramble the surprise. We quickly realized that this month wasn't the best time to reward good behavior with earning of letters, because good behavior wasn't going to show it's face too often from our foster son. After all, past anniversaries and future adoption realizations are all coming into play – all of which can trigger emotional breakdowns. So we simply began handing them letters, earned or not, to keep a positive focus on the surprise for a moment or so. Nine days before we were to leave for our trip, the boys had all 15 letters to spell out Walt Disney World. It took a few clues from us to get the 45 min. unscramble process moving along so we could still make bedtime at a decent hour. Once they got it, they got it, and with much excitement. Then, like typical children, they thought we were leaving right then. They weren't too thrilled about having to wait nine whole days! I wish I could post the video of the reveal.

A family trip to Disney with young ones can be just as exciting as it is exhausting because of the full day of energy expected from everyone. So we had some expected issues, but nothing we couldn't handle in public and nothing like the five difficult days prior to our leaving.

Lots of wonderful memories were made together and our foster son believes it was all SO magical! From the princesses (who I caught him checking out because they are pretty) to Mickey, he was enthralled. Our bio son is 15 months older and very literal so he was quick to tell our other son the truth about magic not being a reality. But we asked him to let his brother believe in it, enjoy it, if only for a short while. He hasn't had many opportunities to dream big and believe big like a child should, and so, we agree, it's magical.

To watch him act like an innocent child just melted my heart. To see him get excited that Mickey Mouse himself left us a voice mail on our hotel room phone, acknowledge that Mickey must have felt special that we visited him in person twice, get autographs/pictures with the pretty princesses (his favorite being Snow White), pretend to be a Star Wars character while dressed in costume and sword fighting while running through the parks, and sob uncontrollably when he believed Mickey was getting hurt when he was fighting the evil guys were all tender moments. We treasure these tender moments because it's in these times we can smile along with him or hold him when he was deeply sad. There were moments where we heard sweet giggles coming from the back seat. There were moments like the time I saw our foster son put his arm around our bio son just because they're brothers and buddies, and they love one another.

Thank you Disney, for a great trip for a family who is loving one another through the difficult and better days to teach there is such things like magic and simple joys of childhood. 

Overwhelming response for first Orphan Care gathering

So thrilled our fellow SHC families showed up on a recent Sunday evening. Not only did 40+ people and their children they mark their spot in a chair with a warm body, but we got to hear their hearts and passion that God has already been stirring in their lives for His vulnerable children.
We had younger couples, couples who had been married for longer seasons, single people, and staff all come together to begin a great community for this movement to make a difference. They heard testimonies from us, the Smiths, and a church staff person on how God brought us on this adoption journey.

One of the Smith's girls playing with the colorful prayer reminder clothespin dolls 20+ SHC families painted.

There are 14.7 million orphans worldwide. That means each clothespin doll Andy and Lea Smith, and us, Kelly and Steve Hopkins, are holding here represents 14,700 children who don't have parents who can care for them.

Steve setting up the technological side of things for our meeting. Yes, we even found him high on a ladder pulling wires to get the connections just right. I love my I.T. nerd.

Our dear friend Lea and her daughter detailing out the ministry's purpose and plans to put feet to it. 

We hope they left feeling encouraged, excited, and with eyes wide open for how God will continue to orchestrate things perfectly to bring them along His plans for living out James 1:27 in their lives.
And the food ... yes, Southern Baptists pride themselves on the incredible food we share when we get together.

We worked together to put a list of already generating ideas we can do in order to make a difference under one of our three focal areas.

Sugar Hill's Orphan Care ministry is about three small things for the one big thing – the orphan.
1 • We are having gatherings each month to emphasize Community in our church where families can get together and play at the park together, or lean on each other for support and encouragement while we each care for the orphan in our own ways.
2 • We will also help families by giving them Tools & Resources for those who may be on the journey to adopt or already parenting children from hard places
3 • And we will get our hands dirty by serving the needs of these children through various Missions projects 

God calls us all to care for the orphan and the widow. Does that mean it looks the same for everyone? No. What it does mean is we can all do something. You may be a single person, a high school student, an older couple who finally has that empty nest, or a family whose house is already full – but we can all make a difference for those children who need safe, loving families together.

Lessons From a Corn Husk

Our story, our family's story, begins with a corn maze. Steve and I were friends for a year until we got lost in a corn maze together. Hey, this is a clean story people! In fact, Steve didn't share his feelings for me until later that night when watching Georgia beat Auburn during their infamous black-out game. And so, our family tradition of getting lost in a corn maze each year began. Here's a photo from that moment when Steve and I were just friends back in 2007.

We hadn't realized five years later we'd be married and have a new child added to our family. We also hadn't realized this month would be the absolute most reeling and difficult month we would experience thus far in reference to our foster son's behavior. We had to lower the bar so that he could experience success and help him move forward one step at a time. This month he has had 6 good days in a row. That's about all we saw of the tender, sweet, loving, wonderful child we have grown to love unconditionally.

When we were making memories with our boys in a local corn maze recently we were halted because we had to handle a break down our foster son was having all of a sudden admist the sea of corn. I overheard Steve share with our foster son an incredible message of love and hope. (By the way, we only call him foster son on this blog so you understand who I am sharing about since I cannot use names. We love and treat him as one of our sons.) Steve pulled a corn off it's husk and asked our foster son to hold it.

He showed him the many layers of husk that wrapped around the rows of kernels. As he pulled back the husk Steve told him all those layers are the experiences that have happened to him before he came to us. Some of those layers are very painful. Some of those layers are wonderful memories. All of those layers together has made him very angry. But as we pull back those layers, we find the corn. That's the core of who he is. As those layers cover up the beautiful, gold, nutritious, vegetable, so do his layers of pain, heartache, and anger cover up the child we know is there deep down, the child God created, and we want to see more of his core. He no longer has to hide under those layers. He no longer has to be angry.

We are saddened that he has experienced so much tragedy at such a young age, that we couldn't be there to protect him, and point him to Jesus for strength through it all. We have broken hearts for our son who has so many layers covering the beautiful, strong, healthy, loving boy underneath. But we have hope because we have Christ. And so does he.

Amongst a thunderstorm of behavior we have seen this week he settled his behavior for a moment and got real and deep at bedtime in another conversation with Steve. He asked Jesus in to his heart and admits he wants to surrender his anger to the Lord. That's a life time of a lesson, to surrender all. We will learn to surrender all, together. We are thankful he now has the gift of the Holy Spirit to help him pull back the layers and we have hope he will shine like that fresh, golden corn.

One detail I'd like to share further about this community corn maze we visited. I am all at once bewildered and appreciative of decisions the owner's of this corn maze have made in response to my speaking up.

Our family has enjoyed multiple trips through the years to the Buford Corn Maze, even brought many groups from our church as well. We enjoy passing the field throughout the year and watch the seeding, growing leading up to the Fall, and harvesting afterwards. However, this year as we drove past the field we diverted our children's eyes away because of a near 20' advertisement they had posted right on the road. In promotion of the Haunted Forest they displayed an image that would normally be found in a rated-R movie – a zombie-looking bloody man and a female. I'm sure we are not unlike many parents who understand that at Halloween companies must offer a variety of events/products for all ages, but is it too much to ask that that one image be replaced with a logo of the Haunted Forest instead of real-life horror imagery? What shocked us even more is that the corn maze is located right between two family-heavy locations with an elementary school in front and a daycare behind. I have heard other parents sharing the same concern. After contacting them about this concern we were pleased to see them value the community's concern as they replaced the image with a black and white photo of woods within a week's time frame. They thanked us for speaking up. That was in August.

This last weekend though we noticed the former image was back up. We tried to ignore it so our children wouldn't notice it, but they were rubber necking as we drove past and asked many questions about the image they are well aware of us asking for its removal. It's disheartening to see a company who we spoke so highly of acknowledging a real concern go back on their word. And for that, we will no longer be patrons. I contacted them once again about their reversed decision and the next day the woods photo was re re-placed. I'm not sure why they have been inconsistent with their decisions on advertising. I hope you understand I know we can't possibly protect our children from everything they will see and experience. But what I can impact I will keep trying.

 

Praying with expectancy, even in the harder seasons

This month has been a tough season – for all four of us. We know that trials come and go and is a part of the journey of adoption as everyone adjusts to one another, and we've had them. Our days have been up and down for five months, but this month the intensity has risen to another level. I guess we got caught off guard because our foster son had 21 days of good behavior last month so we rose the bar for expected behavior, but quickly realized he wasn't succeeding this time. We are 16 days into this month and he's only had three good days. We question our parenting again as we try to implement new styles to help a child from a hard place, but then we remember this month is a significant month for him, and realize it wasn't the right time to raise the bar. The reason? He's been in care for a year and is having anniversaries to deal with – he's grieving again and is full of deep sorrow. While the reality of his future is getting less foggy, there's still darkness to lift and healing to happen as possibility of his adoption into our family settles in. So though we may be emotionally and mentally exhausted, we recognize the new found compassion God gives us for this precious child who has suffered much. Yes he may be fighting us, but it's not about us. He's fighting all the pain he has taken in and learning how to handle it. We are here to teach him how to do that in a healthy way and surrender all of it to our sweet Lord. Thank you dear Lord for letting us be a part of this child's restoration and purposeful life you've given him, and for trusting him in our care. We are trying our best to love him where he is, trusting you with the rest.

New journeys call for new memories and we have had the joy of sharing many first experiences with our son. This month we have been able to see him try out roller skates for the first time and get lost in a corn maze with us. Soon we are taking them on a surprise trip to Disney World – and we are busting at the seams to tell them! He's also recently joined a local Cub Scouts den, and though he hasn't felt comfortable enough to join the boys in the activities, he's slowly getting there through watching them be boys together. Last night at the Cub Scouts meeting, he met two new friends, one who is a foster child himself. I am so excited he will have a friend in his den that is going through a lot of the same experiences and questions. I'm praying this will be a special friendship and bond for him. Though many painful memories may haunt him for the rest of his life, we pray that God will help him heal in a way that they hurt much less, that he can choose to be full of joy no matter what life brings him because he learns that Jesus is with him every step of the way. We pray that the new memories we share as a family will be the solid foundation he can always pull from that makes him smile and knows he is loved by many.

It may seem that we have high expectations for ourselves, for our son, and for our family. But really, we are praying with expectancy that God will remain true in His promises as He always has. We know that God can do much with even a little faith. Jesus can make a blind man see, a lame man walk, a woman clean of years of disease, a leper clean, a dead friend made alive, a cut-off ear healed, calm a raging storm, multiply the provisions we seemingly have to feed the masses, have authority over this world so that water is a solid floor under his feet, a tree made fruitful again that was once withered, and withdraw demon-possessed people out from their darkness. Jesus did these miracles by touch, through authoritative words, and many without physically being present – because He is Jesus, Lord of all. All we have to do is have faith.

Debb Marquez, a fellow adoption blogger I recently came across here, shares the difference between praying with expectations and praying with expectancy:
[The Lord] wants us to have child-like faith that He will answer ~ but He doesn’t want us to tell Him HOW or WHEN to answer our prayers! He doesn’t want us to pray with expectations of the details. He wants us to pray with excited anticipation and assurance that He will answer our heart’s cry. He just doesn’t want us to go about telling Him how to do it! {ouch!}

We have faith in God's big purposes for this child's life. After all, he is one of God's own. 

Valuing what the boys see

I love the constant reminders of what it's like to see the world through a child's eyes. Most times it's so beautiful and precious, a reminder to slow down and inhale deeply the creation of God or the little things that really are important. Sometimes, through the eyes of our foster son, we see a different picture. He is altogether sweet and precious, while also not so innocent in some ways, but he's still very much a child of God and a constant reminder of God's love and healing – nothing is wasted. As we help him learn to enjoy the innocent things of childhood, we encourage their imaginations, and celebrate the little things that are huge to them, because we see that when we value what's important to them we grow closer. And so, just as we expected, their favorite stuffed animals visited us at our workplaces a few more days after Wolfie's initial day of adventure with daddy.

Thankful the Lord cares about the cares of our world and spends these connecting moments with us to make us feel loved too. Thank you Jesus for modeling everything we need as parents.

Here's a glimpse of Wolfie & friends' adventurous day with me at work.

  

And here's a second day visit with Steve at work.

Connecting on levels big and small

Both of our boys were so ecstatic to learn of one of their dear stuffed animals adventurous day with Daddy as they asked him to take Wolfie to work with him. Our foster sons eyes lit up as he told Steve how well he took care of his Wolfie for the day. Our bio son hugged Steve and told him he really is a great daddy! So this moment marks a connecting point for us and the boys – where they continue to learn what's important to them is important to us.

You see, as you add to your family whether through adoption or biologically, parents learn of the constant struggle to balance what you do for one child and another, also learning that it can't always fully balance out. Our bio son grew up with a favorite stuffed animal, and for those who know him, you know it looks like a well-loved and worn to the threads bunny that he's had since his first Easter. She, yes it's a 'she', still sleeps with him and helps him with his boo-boos. We recorded many of her adventures with our son in a digital album we printed from over the years.

So here we are – an attempt to show our foster son how much we care about the things he cares about, no matter how small.  Now they are pleading with us to now allow all of their precious stuffed animals to shadow us on work days, one-by-one. Oh my! What have we started?