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davenna
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Name: Rhonda
Gender: Female
Interests: reading inspirational novels, shopping, watching chick flicks over and over, ebay!
Expertise: selling the most amazing skin care on the market, killing plants
Occupation: Admin. Assist., L'Bri Skin Car
Message: message me
Website: visit my website
Member Since:
10/16/2006
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| Today is Sunday and I just got home from church! I absolutely have to share about how incredible God is to His children! As most of you may know, we have been doing a fundraiser for the last couple of weeks to help offset some of the costs of our adoption. I knew that God was going to amaze me at how He provides, but it's always cool when He surprises us with things that we truly don't expect! I love that about Him! We have had lots of sellers from here, North Carolina, and Alabama working so hard for us over the past couple of weeks with this fundraiser. God has continued to surprise me through this whole process! We have had people offer to sell who we barely know and God has truly used them! One lady who bought from this person in our church said something to the effect of "I can just have children and don't even have to think about it hardly, and I can't imagine what it is like to NOT be able to have one of my own. So, I'm going to do everything I can to help this couple have a baby!" She proceeded to buy all of her Christmas presents and spent close to $100!!! Amazing! I don't even know this person nor do I really know the person who was selling for us! AMAZING! And that's just one of the amazing stories!
Another surprise happened when we were sitting in Sunday School this morning and at the end they announced a car wash they are planning with the 5th graders and our Sunday School class (adults) to raise money for US!  I was almost in tears that they had been doing all of the planning and we didn't even know about it! GOD IS SO GOOD! The coolest thing about this story is that the idea to do this came from a sweet little girl who is about 12 years old and just loved Brian at VBS this summer. She said to her mother and later her Sunday School Teacher, "Mom, we just have to help Mr. Brian and Mrs. Rhonda get their baby. I want to do a car wash!" Oh if only we would all just listen to God the way this sweet child did. She told her Sunday School teachers what she wanted to do and this sweet couple said "let's make it happen!" Then our Sunday School class got into it! AMAZING!!!!
Then, after church I was standing in the lobby by our little brochure and a lady who I've never seen before came up and told me that she and her husband were trying to get it cleared with our Pastor to do a Ribeye Cookoff to support our adoption! AMAZING!!!!!
I am just absolutely in awe of my Savior at this moment! He has used people who I don't even know and sweet little children who are willing to sacrifice their Saturday when they could be outside playing in the yard to get together and wash cars just to help us bring home our baby! Absolutely unbelievable to me!!!!!! IF THIS ISN'T THE BODY OF CHRIST COMING TOGETHER TO SERVE ONE ANOTHER AND BE JESUS' HANDS AND FEET, I DON'T KNOW WHAT IS!
I just was about to explode and thought, I have to go share this with other believers who I know will be amazed and in awe this day of what God will do to make His will become reality for the Hills in little McKenzie, TN.
Go tell someone today how amazing YOUR Savior is! I'm blown away and His provision!
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| One more thing to check off the list! Brian's passport finally arrived
yesterday so we officially both are ready to travel! Too bad we have to
wait a year for that part. I am off for a couple of days in between jobs
so I am getting fund-raiser stuff out to our teams and am getting all
of the final home study documents completed. We still have to both get
physicals at the doctor, get a police report done, and we have to get
our water tested. After those things are complete, i think we are
almost done with our Home Study! What a relief! At that point, we will
begin to finalize the dossier and hopefully be ready to submit that in
October.
Also, on the table now is the fund-raiser through Home
Interiors! We have set up three teams. One in McKenzie, one in
Birmingham/Nashville/Georgia, and one in North Carolina. We are selling
products (candles, bath beads and gels, air fresheners, etc.) ranging
from $5 to $12 in price and half of the profits go directly to
supporting us with the adoption costs that will be due very soon. We
are so thankful to those who have agreed to sacrifice their time to
sell these great products for us and we look forward to seeing God
provide through these wonderful people willing to help us out! If you
would like to purchase a product, feel free to email one of the three
of us listed below and we will all be happy to take your order!
Think Christmas! Think teacher gifts! Think Birthdays! Or, just think
about helping to unite a family that God has chosen to put together. The blessing you will be giving us is more than we can fathom right now. Below are the team leaders' information and we are all ready to go!
Melody Hemphill- Birmingham/Nashville/Georgia
mhemphill4@gmail.com
Carolyn Barnes- North Carolina
cshortbarnes@nc.rr.com
Rhonda Hill- McKenzie, Tennessee
rhill1205@gmail.com
Thank you all for your prayers and support. We'll keep you updated on how things continue to progress! | | |
| I have some good news that I can finally share! I have been praying for an opportunity to change jobs for a long time now and it has finally happened for me! I was offered a job a couple of weeks ago in the Business Office of a local Eye Clinic. I will start the day after Labor Day! My last day at my current position is this Wednesday so I will have a few days off before I have to start at the Eye clinic. The doctors are a father and son optometry team and they have been very intentional about making their office environment like a family and they are both very strong Christians. The ladies that they have on their team (about 10-12 of them) have been so friendly to me through this whole process and it really feels like one big family! In fact, when they presented the offer to me they worded as, "we want you to come and be a part of our family." That was music to my ears! I haven't felt that at all in the office that I have been in for the last year and I so look forward to actually enjoying going to work as much as anyone possibly can! The work week is a little shorter so I will get every Thursday off. I will have to work a few hours on 3 out of 4 Saturdays but I can handle that since overall I will only have to work 33.5 hours each week! This will hopefully give me some time to build my L'Bri skincare business since I haven't really been doing much with that since we moved. I am hoping to put the money that I make with L'Bri towards the adoption costs if things go the way I am hoping!
We are also planning to begin a fund raiser next week where we will have 3 teams of people who will be selling Home Interiors candles, bath beads and gels, air fresheners, etc. with 50% of the proceeds going towards the adoption! We are very excited to see what God is going to do through this! I'll put more details on that in the coming week if you would like to get involved! Thanks to those of you who have already agreed to be sellers for us! You're the best!
We are having a couple from our church over for dinner tonight and my oven is now preheated for dessert to go in so I better run! Just wanted to give a little update!
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| I have to apologize to all my xanga buddies who depend on this blog in order to find out about what's going on with the Hill family! I have just flat out been lazy about posting even though things are going on with us!
I'll give the Cliff Notes version of an update so as not to bore you.
1. Things are moving right along with the adoption process. We are continuing to complete the paperwork and the Home Study process. We are two thirds of the way through the home study and the last things are to finish up the paperwork we have to do and have the visit in the home so she can make sure a child would be safe here with us. Hopefully we will pass that with flying colors! We are also preparing for a fundraiser through Home Interiors where we will get together teams from different locations and they will sell a variety of products for immediate profits that will go directly to the adoption fees that are due along the way. If you would like to be a part of that in any way, please let me know! It's extremely easy! More details about that will be coming soon. For more details about the adoption check out www.hilladoption.blogspot.com. We update there regularly about the process.
2. Brian's program/job is going very well! He has around 40 kids all to himself in his program this year which is more than double what he had last year. Needless to say, he is busy!!!! He is doing camp right now which means he is putting in 14 hour days for a couple of weeks. They will be doing a play "The Matchmaker" in September and "Fiddler on the Roof" which is a musical in November. In the spring of next year, they will be doing a production called "Seussical" which is a musical based on the Dr. Seuss books. Should be TONS of fun! He is really excited and is doing awesome work with these kids. I am amazed when I watch him work. Reminds me why I love him so much. He's just amazing.
3. The Bible Study that we had in our home last year we are gearing up for again this year. We are hoping that it will double or triple in size based on the numbers of kids we will offer it up to. And, word travels so hopefully we will have so many we will be looking for a new location (our house ain't that big) and we will do our best to bring the word to these kids! That truly is why we are here so I'm looking forward to that!
4. More to come in the next few days about me and my situation with working/job stuff. Good News, just can't let the cat out of the bag quite yet.
5. It's HOT UP HERE! I'm sure it is everywhere but MAN IT'S HOT UP HERE! Can't wait for fall. I'm sick of my summer clothes and sweating all the time!
6. Church is going well. We are plugged in to the Music Ministry and Brian kicked booty at VBS!!! He was rockin' with about 300 kids in the room and it was incredible to watch. He was the music rotation leader and he taught kids ages 3years - 5th grade songs that they performed the last night. I loved watching him in his element there. He's going to be an awesome dad! Can't wait to see that too. I'm amazed at his gift with children. I have a feeling we are going to get to Russia and if we are allowed to go into the orphanage, we may come home with 15 kids instead of one!
I fear that this update is now passing the point of being too long so again, I apologize. Maybe I can update more frequently in the weeks to come and make them shorter so you aren't asleep by now!
Love to all!
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| Saturday, June 9th I opened our packet of information to prepare us and
get us started with the adoption process. Wow, I can't believe the
amount of paperwork and documents needed in order to bring home a
precious little girl! I am already praying for her, her birth-mother
and birth-father and for her health and safety. It's very strange to
not know anything about the child you will call your own, but I do know
the Creator of this child, therefore, I will choose to trust and be at
peace with how and when He chooses to create this little life. Join me
in praying for our little girl.
A couple of things I have learned since reading through this information:
1. I am not as patient as I'm going to need to be.
2.
I was hoping/thinking that the child we would adopt would be 8-10
months old, when in reality she may be much older based on the
time-frame in Russia when children are actually turned over for
International Adoption. So, I need to rethink my expectations.
3.
The wait time could be much longer than I anticipated. Given the amount
of documents that have to be completed, notarized, appistilled etc. it
will probably be a while longer so I need to look more towards two
years from now than one and a half.
4. I am not as patient as I'm going to need to be.
5. I should have gotten a passport a long time ago.
6. Always read directions before you begin filling out documents! I think I've already messed up one of them! 
Well, that's more than a couple, but needless to say, I need to learn a lot!
I'm
anxious to begin this and make it as quick as possible, so i will spend
part of my day today collecting documents and making a list of the
things we need to start on first thing Monday morning! Number 1 on the
list, turn in our request for a passport!
Thank you for your continued prayers! We will update as things progress!
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