Update for the week and Giveaway Winner announced

This photo has not much to do with anything, but it made me smile and everyone likes a cute photo, right? So... do you want an update to our grand total for the Mowen family?! As we stand on this fine Friday morning they have $140. It's rally time! Is there anyone you know that needs to know about Give1Save1? A blogger? A friend? Could you send them a quick email and help us spread the word far and wide? It means so very much to each and every family on here! You guys are awesome.

OK, well it's time to announce the winner of the giveaway. Congrats to Carrie Nelson, and thanks for helping spread the word. I'll be in contact to get you your copy of RadLab. And thanks so much to the Boutwells for donating it!

Shared rooms for lots of siblings

so this week we're celebrating (and fundraising for, don't forget to give!) the mowen family's set of siblings. if you're new, check out their story here. but basically, they are giving little jacob several more brothers and sisters. we're not sure what their age or gender is yet and of course, we'll let you know as soon as we find out. but anyway, it got me brainstorming about shared rooms. all those little bodies probably mean that somebody's going to be splitting a room. we're working on setting up our shared room over here too. and you know what i do when i'm brainstorming... i hit the pinboards! here's some treasures i found today. click the pic to go to pinterest and do some more digging.









i can't wait to get started on ours! i'll let you know how it goes. all i can promise is grey walls!

giveaway time

in honor of our mama of the week, tara, and her love for taking pictures, i've enlisted the help of some of my photography friends. did you know that i used to be a photographer? true story. now i blog and clean and play hide and seek. which is cool. not complaining at all. i'm also adopting a couple of girls from ethiopia and that's what brings me down this path. but anyhoo, the point is that i too love photography and i miss my photo friends. so hey, photo friends, this is what i do now! worlds are colliding today, so let me welcome the slew of photographers coming over today for the giveaway. welcome. here's what we're about on give1save1. we support an adoption a week by giving a dollar to the family. and we try to get as much money as possible for a family adopting from africa. and since a dollar isn't very much i very much need this to go viral.  it's a nice thing to do and adopting families have other stuff to deal with besides stressing over a loan.

so here's the scoop for today. you know those lovely boutwells? well, they have kindly donated a copy of RadLab to us this week. here's how you can enter: after you give your dollar over there to your right up at the top(cause you were totally going to, right?) help me spread the word about give1save1 or the mowen family. facebook or blog or email or whatever. and then come tell me what you did. i am blown away by RadLab! watch this video to see some of its' insane capabilities. thank you so much to the boutwells for donating! oh, and by the way, did you know that chenin has a rockin mommy blog, fudge banana swirl? check it out. all kinds of fun stuff over there. so go ahead and give and network and help me get some money for this family! comments close at midnight thursday night. i'll announce the winner friday morning. good luck!

new week, new family: say hello to the mowens

you guys, i would like to introduce you to a really cool family with a really special heart. say hello to the mowens. tara and brad adopted little mr. jacob last year from ethiopia. isn't he stinkin' adorable?! well, while they were there they got to meet so many other children and developed a heart for the older children and the sibling sets. you see, siblings are actually quite hard to place. and the bigger the sibling set, the harder it is to find homes for the sweeties. well, the mowens are up for the challenge. pretty much immediately after the completion of their first adoption they got started on the next one! they are now being approved for a sibling set of 2-3 kids ages 0-10.

We just brought our son home from ET in May and couldn't wait to get started again. We fell in love with the older children while we were there and can't wait to see who God has for our family!

you've just got to read their letter from mom. this is a truly amazing family! usually we're raising funds for one kid, but this week the mowens are trying to bring home possibly 3! going from a house of one baby, to 4 kids is brave and bold and will take all kinds of organization, patience and planning. it's not always going to be easy. but WE can do something to lift a burden for these guys and let them focus on the important stuff. so go ahead and give. and then spread the word far and wide. maybe this is our Break $1000 week!

donate over there on your right. the top button goes right to the mowen family this week. so do that if you want to give more than $1 or if you just want to give to them. right underneath it you'll see the Dollar Mob. that will sign you up for $1 every week automatically. it's new and i'm going to update it daily. right now it's a little embarassingly small but we can get those numbers up, right?

adoption in ethiopia vs. congo

happy friday! so this post is to educate just a tad. i am certainly no expert on congo adoption (i'm not even an expert at ethiopian adoption, learning as we go!). but today i'm going to try to shed a little light on the two countries, some pros and cons of adopting out of each, and a little about life in each. that way if you're considering adopting out of africa you know a few little tiny tidbits to help you choose your path. so... here we go.

kathleen is our mama of the week and she was in an ethiopia program and made the switch over to congo. here's a little email where she shared some differences:

In my opinion Ethiopia almost feels like it's a "big city" compared to areas in Congo. Our orphanage is in Kinshasa. That's the "capital city" of DRC. In an email our agency sent out earlier in the week, she said, "One of our adoptive families once described the local copy center - a woman on a street corner with a small copier with the power cord going down the street. During my trip, I saw what I lovingly refer to as the Congolese Petsmart - a chicken, a monkey, a goat, and a stray dog - all either in a cage or tied to a tree on the side of the road. So, as you might imagine, nothing in Congo works anything like it does here and definitely NOT in the timeframe we Americans are used to."
I can't wait to see all of this first hand!

As for the program itself. We are with One World Adoptions out of GA. Terri is our caseworker and she has been fantastic. Make no mistake, the program is WAY different then Ethiopia. With Ethiopia being so popular, the agencies had a lot of experience in dealing with the courts, the people, etc. There were monthly conference calls, emails, etc... 
That's something we are having to get used to. The DRC is so new to international adoption that agencies aren't really there yet when it comes to constant contact with adoptive families and keeping them up-to-date on the happenings.
I will say that over the past month or so, our agency has really stepped up the communication with it's families. That's been wonderful to see.
One World (Terri) is so great to get back with you via email/phone when you have any questions or concerns. It really has been a delight to work with them.

so that's kathleen's experience so far. i'd love to hear from any of you guys who have compared the two countries. as i understand it, the wait time is generally shorter in congo since it's still a fairly new program. but it has less experience for the same reason. any of you guys have any input for people who are still looking at countries?

just some pretty pictures.

click on pics for sources

just some pics today of the life and people living in the congo. tomorrow we'll dig into some differences in culture and adoption from ethiopia to congo for any of you interested in exploring the DRC route. the ellis family was in an ethiopia program and switched to congo, so they have some great insight on the similarities and differences of each one. have you given to the ellis family yet? if not, you can do so right over there on the right at the top. see it? thanks so much. your donations really mean the world to this family.

uh-MAZING new prints from vol25

guys, i gotta show you this new awesomeness coming from vol25. we love jessica already, right? she designed the look and art for the give1save1 site. these are so perfect in every way. here are my faves. i just bought 'live simply'. can't wait til it gets here. and if you're in love with these and need a reason to buy now, well here it is. 40% off! the code is SAVE401. go shopping!