Things You Never Want to See
…Your husband wearing your jeans, and they’re loose!
Everyone Go Say “Hi”
She finally did it – my sister-in-law has a blog! Go Jenny, Go Jenny! She and her adorable husband Rob live half way around the world in Carlisle, England and are expecting their first baby in July! Please go say Hi so that she will keep up the blogging!
Remaining Debt Free
I’m trying not to cross post all our adoption stuff (keeping it on our adoption blog) but since so many of you have followed our journey to being debt free, I thought I’d post this here as well.
Debt Free Adoption
For those of you that know us personally you know much of this story.
For those that don’t, I must start by telling you a little bit about
our family’s money philosophy. About 7 years ago my husband started
listening to Dave Ramsey on the radio and bringing home tidbits of his
advice. Dave Ramsey is a talk radio host and financial expert (and also
a Christian) who believes in a debt-free lifestyle. His motto, or one
of them is "Live like no one else so later you can LIVE like no one
else." We attended one of his one-day events which led us to beginning
his Financial Peace University class at our church about 6 years ago
(still going strong).
We paid off all our debt except for our house within about 2 years –
credit cards, student loans, cars (sold one of them). Then just a few
months ago, in November ’07 we reached our major goal of paying off our home. We are 100% debt free.
And then God led us to adoption, which is not an inexpensive endeavor.
We have savings that will pay for part of it but we do not have all
that we need. I began to say "Well, if we have to go into debt to do
it, then we will and we’ll pay it off as quick as we can."
Yet once again God used Dave Ramsey to speak incredible truth into our
lives. Last week I was visiting a friend in Pittsburgh. It was late one
evening and I was flipping channels when I discovered that the new Dave
Ramsey television show was on the Fox Business Chanel. (We don’t get it
at home.) I was all excited to see what it was about.
Dave was taking calls from different people. A man called in and
explained that he felt God calling him to a career change that meant
going back to school and thus, in this man’s eyes, incurring debt. I
forget what his actual question was but I will never forget the words
that came out of Dave’s mouth. It might not be verbatim but the gist of
it was, "If you truly feel like God is calling you to this then I
believe that you need to look at creative ways for you to finance your
schooling. There is not ONE example in the Bible of God calling someone to do something and then using debt as a tool to accomplish it!"
I think my jaw actually dropped into my lap. How little faith I have
had. Sure, I know that God will provide the means but I just assumed
some type of loan would be part of that. How could I short change his
power by thinking so small?
When I told Mark what I had heard he pretty much said "Well, I’ve been
thinking the same thing but I was afraid you’d be upset if I told you."
And he’s probably right 🙂
So a debt-free adoption it is! I’m not sure how it will happen but I am
totally stoked to see the amazing ways that God will help us earn/find
the funds.
Bloggy Break
I am on a bloggy break while I am in cold and dreary Pittsburgh visiting my friend Kristen. We are staying up entirely too late and eating entirely too much! And scrapbooking not enough.
At Last…My Patio
I generally like home improvement projects. But every once in awhile I bite off more than I can chew.
Such was the case with 220 sq. ft of pavers that I bought over a year ago to extend our patio and make a nice little area next to our spa.
The pavers were delivered and sat…and sat. Then it was too hot to do anything. Then one day I went out, determined to start carving out the area of dirt. Ha! About 10 minutes later as I surveyed the area I had done – and looked at the remaining area I realized that I was in WAY over my head.
I quickly realized that it was time to call in the professionals. And then I promptly got busy with too many other things to actually look for said professional – reasonably priced.
Then thankfully, it’s Art to the rescue. Art is my friend Stacey’s dad. In our last house he put doors on our office and playroom for us and reconfigured our built in media niche. He is a home improvement genius! When we first ordered the pavers both he and his wife and Stacey and Jeff had moved and so he had a long list of projects to do at their places.
About two months ago he asked me if I still had the pavers waiting – I embarrassingly admitted "Yes" and he said he had some time to do some side jobs. Then his beautiful wife Susie (who is also our realtor) was diagnosed with breast cancer. So he’s been seeing her through two surgeries and the first two (of four) rounds of chemotherapy. Somehow he managed to squeeze us in and he spent 4 days this week working on our patio.
It looks gorgeous and it was done meticulously – the border put in cement, intricate corners. WAY better than we EVER would have done it! Thanks Art! (And thanks Susie for loaning him to us!)
Of course now I’m looking around and thinking I should really get to all that other stuff on my "backyard" list 🙂
One Mom's Lifesong 