Note from Brent:
MckLinky has obviously eaten up much of my writing time for the last week. Looking forward to getting back to writing blog posts and working on several books.
Open Season Answers From Michelle
Kristina asked:
Still wondering how God provided for your family financially for your adoptions. Any financial suggestions for someone looking to adopt?
That is the scary part of adopting for most families. I had a friend tell me when I was first adopting, "if God calls you to adopt, the He must provide the way" Meaning He won't ask you to do something that He doesn't give you the means to do.
Raising money for our adoptions has not been easy, but as impossible as it seemed at the time, it always worked. Abby is praying every day for a new baby brother. I would love to have another child. I would love to make her wish come true. I will need to pray some more before I will have the courage to take the plunge.
Special needs adoptions and older child adoptions are sometimes less expensive and easier to get grants for. Many things that are labeled special needs, are really fairly minor challenges. Some special needs that seem very scary, are in reality, very easy to treat chronic illnesses, like for example HIV.
Some great sites are: Brittney's Hope http://www.brittanyshope.org and affording adoption http://www.affordingadoption.com and http://www.redletterscampaign.com
One thing that worked particularly well for us is to send out fundraising letters to our friends and family. I have a friend who raised $4000 by doing a garage sale. We also raised money by selling cookbooks.
I would love to hear others ideas for fundraising.
J asked:
I know this was asked before, but I can't find the answer... What kind of leukemia does Abby have? I've seen other blogs of kids with leukemia and usually it seems to be ALL or AML. Does Abby have one of those or a different type?
Abby has ALL, but with some genetic markers that make it hard for her body to handle the chemo it needs to fight her cancer.
Jarka asked:
Could you pray for me, as I´m flying to Kenya today and please pray for the kids in the orphanage where I´ll volunteer...I know that this sounds more like *pray for me, pray for the others* but I´m leaving today, so I wanted to ask...thanks :)
I am glad you posted on Open Season. We would love to pray for you!
Janice asked:
Please help lift up Pablos family in prayer. They need our compassion and strength . Their very courageous 6 yr old is losing his very brave battle with cancer. Tonight, his parents have made the very painful and selfless decision to take him home to die. My heart is just breaking for this family.. www.getwellpablo.blogspot.com/
I read on his blog that Pablo passed away. Thanks for posting this, so that others can pray for his family. He seemed like an incredible kid.
Beauty and the Beast Pics

Abby got to go back stage and meet "Beauty" who is the
daughter of some of our friends from church.

Abby was wide-eyed getting to see everyone up close.
Open Season Friday
Ask your question using the form below. Don't be bashful, ask anything you want... questions about:
- our family, our life, adoption, cancer, parenting, marriage, marriage, family
- blogging, photography, technology
- marketing, personal finance
- the Bible
- what we do professionally...
- ask for advice
- WHATEVER.... hey, it's OPEN SEASON!!





































