Focus on (a few) Fundraising Families

These few featured families are all families whose buttons for fundraising are featured on our site. Please read about them and consider supporting their efforts as they pursue God’s call for their families.

The Arpin-Riccis

The Arpin-Riccis

Greetings from the inner city neighborhood of Winnipeg’s West End! My wife Kim and I have been living and serving here as inner city Christian workers with Youth With a Mission (YWAM) for nearly 10 years. While there are many challenges, such as poverty and crime, it is also a wonderfully diverse community of people from all over the world. With many Ethiopian neighbours, it was especially exciting for us to begin the adoption process from Ethiopia in late 2007. Since then, the process has been long and challenging, as many complications (common to adoption in Canada) have slowed the process down. However, we are hopeful as we await a referral which should be coming in the near future. We still face that challenge of raise the funds, but God has provided so much already, with around $10,000 remaining in our goal. People can give through our website Adopt-A-Pixel.

The Rippees

The Rippee Family

We are Randy & Rita Rippee, parents of 4 children, 2 grown biological children and 2 adopted daughters from China. We feel the hand of God moving us to adopt another child from China and are asking for you to come along side us in the journey. We have lived in China for the past 6 years and work full-time with orphans, raising our own salary to support our family. We have already been preapproved and matched with an older child on the Waiting Child Program though and are currently in the home study process.

Although we had very little finances to begin this adoption, God has provided what we’ve needed thus far in several ways. First, upon announcing that we felt God calling us to again adopt, we wiped out all the funds we had and, along with our small church in the US, pulled together the necessary funds needed to make our first payment of $1,600 to begin the home study. Since then, we have done several things to try and help raise the money. We started an adoption fundraising website so people could be updated on our adoption progress as well as informing them of current fundraising. We have had many people generously donate and participate in our first fundraiser that totaled $1,287. The 2nd fundraiser raised a total of $485. Recently, the next payment of $2,300 was due to our adoption agency, and–praise God!–we had just enough to meet that next payment. However, our current funds are again depleted, and we are working on more fundraisers to meet the next goal. Since we are also working on filing the I-800A and our dossier, we need funds for this paperwork as well. The approximate total needed for this adoption is $21,000 minus what has already been paid is $16,615 left to raise.

One way to support us is through the Silent Auction starting today, October 27th, and running through November 19th. There are many unique treasures ranging from an authentic Yixing Teapot to an incredible one-of-a-kind Queen size quilt made by Rita’s mom. If you don’t see anything there at first that interests you, keep checking in as new items likely will be listed throughout the auction.

As soon as our home study is complete, we will be able to begin applying for grants to help fund this adoption. Although we are hoping to get some grants, we are completely relying on God, who is our provider! We do not know where the funds for this adoption will come from but continue to trust Him. We firmly believe that what He has called us to, He will bring to completion!

The Kesters

The Kesters

Heidi and Brian Kester, a happily married couple from Pennsylvania, is in the process of adopting an infant from Ethiopia. They discovered in August 2009 that they could not conceive children biologically due to a rare genetic disorder and made the decision to pursue infertility treatments. After their second unsuccessful round of IVF, they felt the Lord opening doors for them to adopt internationally. They currently are in the process of completing their dossier to adopt an infant from Ethiopia and are pursuing several fundraising events in the process including a benefit dinner in the spring, selling coffee through an online vendor, and requesting sponsorship as they run in this year’s Philadelphia Marathon. They hope to raise over $10,000 by spring 2011. God has provided for them so far throughout the process by providing an amazing group of family and friends who give them encouragement through the good days and a shoulder to lean on through the bad days. He has blessed them with health and endurance as they have already ran over 275 miles of training for their race in November. To see how he continues to run beside them and learn more about their story, you can visit their blog about their adoption process and marathon training.

The Stultzs

The Stultzs

Tonya and Danny, high school sweethearts, have been married 9 years last week and are expecting their first child through adoption! Having sponsored child in Mozembique over 2 years and having her grandparents do missionary work in Africa, they knew God was calling them there. In fact, they are requesting infant twins from Ethiopia. Danny has enjoyed metal work since high school, so their fundraising efforts came naturally. He draws up the designs, cuts them out, grinds them, and welds the brackets on the back to make art of what was simply a sheet of metal. He’ll even make custom designs for you. Check out their etsy shop to support their efforts.