Phew! What a couple of weeks! Sorry there
haven't been any new blog posts lately. We have just been busy with
life. Work, planning, work, Mother's Day, work, research, etc. I felt
like it was time for an update. Please read on for awesome ways YOU can help!
Will
and I have been hard at work trying to come up with some fundraising
ideas for our adoption fund. We have been gearing up for a huge garage/
yard/ rummage sale. We have 1/2 our garage full of amazing donations
from friends who have gotten donations from their friends. It has been
yet again, an amazing outpouring of support. We are so appreciative of
the support we are getting and the amazing love people are showing for
this cause. It seems to have affected everyone in some way. It is
great to have all of these donations, but we are struggling to find a
place to host it. We would love to host this event in a large public
place with good traffic flow. There are some neighborhood garage sales
we may be involved with, but it is amazing that there is no place that
will let us borrow a parking lot or unused / vacant lot for our sale...
without wanting a deposit and proof of liability insurance. Who would
have thought! So anyway, we were hoping to be able to post a date and
location for our great sale to all of our wonderful blog readers,
friends, and family - so stay tuned it will happen, but we're still
working on the logistics. We are also planning some other avenues to
sell items through
CafePress,
as a direct "gift" for assisting with our costs. I hope to incorporate
some of my photographic work as art for sale for this cause as well.
What are some of your favorite fundraisers either to participate in or
to purchase from? How did you guys raise funds for your adoption or
other cause? Keep in mind, Will and I are not a 501c3 non-profit
corporation, donations to us are not tax deductible and therefore most
common fundraisers don't apply - large companies or organizations aren't
going to allow us to participate in their standard fundraisers because
it is just like giving money directly to a person's bank account - not
their school/ church/ business / charity etc. That kind of muddies the
water and a lot of places don't know how to deal with that request. You
can't even legally do a basic raffle without a gambling license. It's
really hard to raise money now-a-days. Not to mention - Have you seen
the economy lately? (Sorry, that's all probably a little too
pessimistic) We have been very blessed with the assistance we have
gotten so far. It is wonderful, appreciated, and amazing! Even if we
get nothing else, it will be more than we had when we started :).
Make
no mistake - we are also tightening our belt around here - no summer
vacations, no major home projects, less eating out. We have been
working really hard to pay down all of our debts for the last year and
we are getting really close.
Dave Ramsey
has some good insights on setting up a budget and systematically
getting rid of your debt in a manageable way. If you're looking for
some advice in that area, we highly recommend his books. It helped us
see things a little differently. We're not always the best pupils, but
we know we can make a dent in our finances. You can also search for a
ton of topics on his website or radio show- even for adoption savings
advice.
While on the topic of resources, I've also come across and like the advice and perspective given by the podcast and website :
CreatingaFamily.org.
This is a site that deals with all aspects of "creating a family".
They discuss fertility, adoption, and all of the tough decisions and
situations that may arise in between. There is also the book / website
for
Adopting Without Debt. I plan on applying for as many grants as I can find that we qualify for. Of course, there is still our
GoFundMe site as well. So many options :)
Finally we have added a banner add over here in the sidebar
If you are looking to purchase items from Amazon,
please use the link here to access all of Amazon's items and we will
get a portion of the proceeds for "advertising for them". Just another
great tip we've learned from the Adopting Without Debt website.
Anyway,
we're still here plugging along toward our ultimate goal of adopting
our son or daughter - hopefully in the near future :).
