Home Study is Underway

We had our first home study meeting yesterday.

In my mind I had this built up to be an intimidating/they are out to get us kind of thing. I pictured a cold-hearted Nazi-like person coming into my house to prove that we are terrible people and that they may even take away the children we already have...not really. But, I was anxious.

It was actually really good. The lady who his walking with us through the home study is fantastic. She was extremely helpful and encouraging. We will meet with her a couple more times. As we go she has to gather information about our background (she is a certified investigator). We will fill out a bunch of forms, get our finger prints done, get references etc. It is a lot to do but each part is one step closer to the end or really the beginning...


On the fundraising front, we need to raise about $15,000 more. That sounds like a lot but God has provided so much already that it really doesn't seem like a big deal.

Here are some of the things that the remainder of the money will cover:

International Service Fee $4,500
Medical Tests $450
Document & Translation Fees $600
Airfare for 2 trips to Ethiopia $6,000 ($1,500 per person, per trip)

There are more things but this may help you know where all this money is headed.

We have seen God provide in amazing ways so far and are excited about how He is going to do it from here on.

Please continue to pray for us to love our child and that God would bring him/her home quickly.

Moving on...

These past couple of weeks have been full of adoption craziness. Right after we sent in our first big chunk of money and paperwork we began to aim towards scheduling our home study.

Our agency, AGCI, is based out of Oregon so they can't really do the home study. We are having it done through an agency here in South Carolina, called Adoption Advocacy. They sent us a bunch of paper work to fill out as well as scheduled our home visit. They will come and check out our life on the morning of May 26.
After that visit we will meet with them once more in their office.

We also received a package from AGCI that includes our adoption planner notebook, more stuff to fill out, and a workbook for our on-line course we have to take. There is much to do!

On the financial side of things, we have been blown away by God's provision. we are just over a month into fund raising and are just about to pass the half way mark. We had one person, that we don't even know, send us $5000 just because she has a heart for Ethiopia. God is being so good to us.

We know that this whole thing is from Him and we are humbled that HE is letting us be part of it.

Please pray for our home study. It is kind of stressful to think about have your life dissected...

Big Day Today

In my previous post about our BBQ, I mentioned that we were $500 away from our first big goal. Today, we move on to the next goal....

We had a check in our mailbox today for $500! Thank You Lord!

This is such an amazing journey.

BBQ

Yesterday was such a good day. We are constanly blown away by God and how he uses people to help us out. He even uses BBQ...and it was really, really good. I consider myself an expert on eating BBQ and my very sensitive and refined tastes judge this bbq to be beautiful to the taste.

There two basic things about the day that really humbled us. One was that we made just over $2200! We were expecting around $1200. There were several peopl who voluntarily paid WAY more for their BBQ than the $6 we were charging. That was very humbling. So, with that amount we are roughly $500 away from our first goal of $7300.

So we are so thankful that God provided for us financially again and proved to me that my faith is pretty small....why can't I learn?

The second that blew me away was the people who served us. It is one thing to see money come in but it is such a humbling thing to see your friends give so much of themselves. Thanks to Neal, Joel, Hunter, Krystal, Walt, Andrew, Amber, Cory, Matt, Megan, Sara, Katelyn, Jimmy, who worked all day cutting meat, holding signs, setting up, cleaning up, serving people...YOU loved us well.

Then there are the pastors of Crossopint Church, Jason, Jeremy, and Ken who gave us free reign of the church facility and helped us promote the BBQ. Great friends and pastors!

Finally the Bennetts a.k.a "Slap Yo Mama BBQ", from Rock Hill SC. Jim, Annette, Samual and David (also a student at CLemson). They drove 2 hours, slept in the church parking lot cooked the meat, worked all day Saturday then drove home. THAT IS CRAZY! But it was such a gift of love towards us.

We are thankful. So thankful. And, just a little closer...

Emily's Lemonade Stand: The Georgia Extension and a Good Reminder

It is so cool how life and faith work...

I got a call from my sister last night (Thursday). Her two sons, Caleb (10) and Ben (8), have decided that they want to do a lemonade stand to help us out. They will be up and running Saturday, April 24 (Dana's birthday) starting around 2 p.m.

WHAT GREAT COUSINS! Thanks Caleb and Ben!

We continue to be humbled by all the ways that God is filling in all the blank pages of this story with His faithfulness. He really is good.

On another note I had a great moment in prayer this week. It has been so easy to anxious about the financial side of all this. It really does seem impossible at times. So I have spent a good bit of time praying for that part of the process. A couple of nights ago, as I was praying, I realized that I have spent much more time praying for the $$ than I have for the child who will come into our family. OUCH.

It was a great reminder that this about a life, a child, a Hunt that is on the way and not money.

I pray that we will love our coming child now more than the money we need to pay for the process. Please pray that with us.

doug

Notarization and Gifts of Grace and BBQ

Just over a week ago all 4 of us headed to the bank to sign, get notarized, sign, get notarized...over and over and over and over. It was all of our contracts etc. for our adoption agency, AGCI. It felt like a very non-exciting moment but I kept reminding myself that each time we signed we were one tiny step closer to bringing home our new daughter/son.

We also sent out a batch of letters in our first big step in raising funds. That is such "faith moment" for us.

Along side of that we have received a few very unexpected gifts of grace from surprising places. It is very humbling to be loved by people...

We do have another great fundraising event in a couple of weeks. A student in our ministry at BCM has a dad who competes in BBQ contests. He has offered to come to Clemson and help us by putting on BBQ fundraiser. In the process our church, Crosspoint, has offered to support our BBQ by allowing us to hold the event in the church parking lot and letting us sell tickets at the church.

If you are anywhere in the Clemson area on May 1 from 11:30 am -2:00 pm you should come by Crosspoint Church on Hwy 123 and buy a BBQ sandwich. If you can't come but would still like to make a donation you can either do that on-line through the button on this blog or send it through the mail to:

Doug Hunt
416 Rock Creek Rd
Clemson, SC. 29631

Let's Eat!

The Lemonade Stand for Ethiopia

It has come and gone...Emily's Lemonade Stand. It was an amazing day of grace, being a proud father, having a lot of fun, seeing the Lord provide. It was great seeing friends, college students, kids, strangers, neighbors, all take part. Even the mail man delivered a couple of envelopes that had money from out of town friends that were to Emily and for her lemonade. I haven't figure out how to mail those cups of lemonade yet...

Her stand was open from 1:30-4:30.
When we were all done and counted the money there was $447.85! BOOM! Thank you Father.

Best part of the day was when we were about to count the money. Emily prayed out loud and said, "Thank You for answering my prayers". Before she counted the money, she knew God had answered her prayers.

What a day...

Our child from Ethiopia, that is not even here yet, has such a wonderful big sister! Can't wait for the day I get to tell him/her about the lemonade stand.