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Monday, November 14, 2011

thank you for your support!!!



thank you so so much to everyone who ate chicken tonite to help us bring our baby home! if you are looking at this site because you got a flyer on your car... thank you for taking the time to look at it & hopefully you got to enjoy some chick-fil-a tonite as well. :) we pray that you will read over our blog & see how the Lord has led us to adopt & will keep up with our journey. our God is so gracious to us & has made us a part of His family & He desires to adopt you into His family as well. 
thank you again! we will let you know how it went when we get the check from chick-fil-a! thank you to CFA by the way. they are great! if we ate meat we would eat there. ha. 
the barkers

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

still waiting...

trusting the Lord's perfect timing & waiting on Him. He knows our baby & guards their life. we cannot wait to see their sweet little face! Jude's favorite thing to say right now, "my get my baby myganda." :)
our family is waiting to rejoice over this little one. pray for him or her... we covet your prayers for them.
the barkers

Saturday, October 8, 2011

slowly, but surely

we had a yard sale today... we made about $500! a little closer to getting our baby!
as we were working today, at times it was very frustrating & we were pretty tired since our boys got up at 5:30, i thought about how the Lord fights for us... labors for us! how weary we get when it comes to serving the Lord!!!
He who promises is faithful! He is SOOO faithful & we are so unfaithful. it makes me want to work hard for this baby, to rescue them, to give them a home & a family.
He rescued us... "I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." John 14:18
He is good.
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al

Sunday, September 25, 2011

it's becoming more real

there are days that i forget that we're waiting to adopt a baby, it's so surreal! i'll just be driving along with my 2 boys in the back seat & then think, "oh my gosh, we're #2 on the waiting list to adopt a baby from Uganda!"
this is all the Lord's doing! all His timing! ALL for His glory!!!
i need to be more faithful to pray for our baby. i am so grateful for the aunties that are caring for our baby even now... it's 5:45 in the morning in kampala. our baby will be waking up soon. i rejoice that this sweet one is in the Lord's hands. He holds them with His right hand.
i just watched these 2 "gotcha day" videos from families that have already adopted... pretty much i cried A LOT! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
al

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LMFqU1WaVE&feature=player_embedded
www.youtube.com/watch?v=duyL9UjLrdM&feature=player_embedded

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

we can now legally leave the country :)

so i had to apply for another passport to get my last name changed. :) & we had to apply for the boys' passports...
WE GOT ALL 3 OF THEM IN THE MAIL OVER THE PAST WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! they said it would take up to 6 weeks & it only took about 2... praise the Lord! we're one step closer!
we also received an update from our agency, that there's no update. :) His timing is perfect!
please continue to pray for our sweet baby.
al

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

#2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

we found out about a week ago that our family is #2 on the waiting list!!!!!!!! 2 families in front of us have received baby referrals & 2 families asked to put their processes on hold for a while, so that moved us up pretty quick. God is so so good & His timing is perfect! our adoption agency told us that they are working on our referral & they should have it to us "soon"!!!
we cannot wait to see the pictures of our sweet baby's face! to be able to give them a name & show the pictures to our boys & explain that this is their little brother or sister!
we're just a little excited!!!!!!!!!!! :)
al

Friday, July 8, 2011

purpose in the wait

we are about number 6 on the waiting list for a baby. the babies home recently hired someone who will go through all the babies' paperwork & place babies with families... prayerfully that means it will happen quickly. :) we have decided to take the boys with us to Uganda when we pick up our sweet little one. our family is so excited!!! we can't wait to post & let everyone know we are buying our plane tickets! ;) thank you for your continued prayers. His timing is perfect! we still need about $2,500.
al

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

BEYOND EXCITED!!!

OUR GOD IS SO GOOD! His timing is perfect! we just received our approval from US Immigrations to adopt from Uganda!!! I want to pack our family up & go get our baby RIGHT NOW! :) we had our biometrics (fingerprinting) done on May 10th. now we will send some more money in & our agency will send our baby preferences to the babies home in Uganda! we will just be waiting on the Lord & His timing to bring this baby home to us.
I am filled with so much joy & so many overwhelming emotions for this baby that we don't even know yet! how much more does our Father rejoice over us as He calls us His own & adopts us as sons & daughters!!!
thank you to all who has supported us, please continue to pray for us!!! we are one step closer!!!
al

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

paperwork sent to immigrations!

PRAISE THE LORD!!!!! our homestudy, copies of birth certificates & marriage certificate, our I-600a application & application fee have been sent to US immigrations! we put it in the mail yesterday! we are quite excited! we will probably be waiting a few weeks to hear from them. in the meantime we'll start working on our dossier. God is so good! we feel more excited everyday!

Russell Moore (author of Adopted for Life) is speaking in Jackson, Tn this Thursday at Fellowship Church. the church's adoption & orphan ministry has offered for families that are adopting to setup a booth to raise money. so cool! we will be selling our hymn cd, car decals, comedy dinner tickets & cupcakes! :) please pray the Lord blesses our efforts.

fundraising:
*we are now selling fair trade organic coffee through justlovecoffee.com - we get $5 for every bag sold
*Uganda car decals $6
*hymn cd (<<click the link to donate & download our cd)
*millie's bake shop is open for business! a dozen cupcakes for $25. like it on facebook!!

love u all,
al

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

home study complete!

hello!
our home study is complete! we went to read it over this past friday. there are a few corrections that our casework needs to make & then she'll be sending it to our adoption agency for approval. (our agency has to approve it because they know how Uganda likes the study to be written.) we will then send our home study & the I-600 form to US immigration for approval for international adoption!!! after we are approved by them we will have to go get fingerprinted again. then shortly after all that we will send our information to the babies home in Uganda & wait for a baby referral!!!!!! 
it is so crazy to think that our baby could be in Uganda right now in the babies home, on it's way there or still in it's mother's womb. the Lord could be knitting our sweet baby together EVEN NOW! our God is so so great! His purposes are good! this baby is His! 
our hearts are growing more & more everyday for this sweet life & for orphans all over the world. there are currently 147 million orphans worldwide! Father, thank You that You know everyone of them by name! You see their hurt & fears, You hold them! lead our family in how we are to be more involved in helping orphans. all for Your glory alone. amen.
love you all! thank you for your continued prayers & support!
al

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

one step closer

hello all,
our home study is complete! we are meeting with our social worker this week to read it over & make sure it's all correct before we send it to the adoption agency. we're one step closer. :)

we have made close to $600 from our hymns album! thank you for all your support! please continue to spread the word. (see the link to download our album to the right of the page.)

we are about 2/3 of our way on the funds needed to bring our baby home. God is so gracious! all glory to Him!

more exciting news... we (the barkers, the olingers & the brentons. 3 families in our church that are adopting from Uganda.) are putting on a Comedy Dinner Extravaganza!!!!! April 15, 6-8pm at Centerpoint Church. it will be an evening of food, fellowship & laughs with 100% of proceeds going to adoption from Uganda. tickets are $15 a person, $40 for a family & $5 for children that will be in the nursery. you can email me at bstillnno@gmail.com to buy tickets. this event is open to ANYONE! please come & support these families' adoptions.

al

Thursday, February 24, 2011

our hymns album!

we finally finished our Hymns album to raise money for our adoption! Mike & I recorded it at home & it's just out voices & guitar. Jude made it on there too! ;) please check it out: www.centerpointchurch.net/barkerbaby. (suggested donation of $10) feel free to pass the link on to friends & family that would be interested in donating.

update on our process:
our social worker has started writing our home study. we are still waiting on one form from the state of Alabama. once the home study is complete we'll read it over & then send it to our agency to approve it. THEN we'll send off to the US to be approved for international adoption. so exciting!
Mike & I have completed 2 of the 5 online adoption courses that are required. it's been really interesting to think through & talk about all this. we're so blessed & so excited! our God is good & our child that's in Uganda is HIS!
the barkers

Monday, February 21, 2011

home study visit!

yay! we had our home study visit today! we've been working so hard to complete projects around the house & clean. I'd say it's time for some quality family time. :) going to do something fun with the boys tonite, then dinner out, then sorbet at sweet cece's. blessed & waiting on the Lord's timing for our home study to be completed.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Home Study

We are about 2/3 of the way done with our home study! We have completed pretty much all the paperwork. We are just waiting on things to come in the mail & make sure our social worker has everything she needs to write it. Mike & I need to complete 10 hrs of adoption training online. We're very excited to start that! Our actual home study visit will happen on Feb 21st. It's all getting done pretty quickly. Yay! The Lord is good. He is ordering our steps. We'll keep you updated!
Al

Our first fundraising letter

Dear friends and family,                 

We are writing to you with the exciting news that the Lord has led our family to adopt from Uganda! The Lord put this on our hearts over the last month. We’ve always wanted to adopt, but we didn’t know what the Lord’s timing would be.

“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” James 1:27 As the body of Christ we all have a responsibility to care for orphans and we believe our family’s current role is to bring a child into our home and make them our own. Adoption is a picture of the Gospel. Christ adopts us as sons and daughters and makes us His own. “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” John 14:18

Mike has always wanted to adopt anytime, but the Lord had to soften my heart. Really He had to bring me out of my selfishness of wanting to “have all of ‘our’ kids first” then adopt. We know that His timing is best. The Lord first brought adoption up through a story my friend told me about a baby that wasn’t cared for, my heart felt so much compassion for a child I didn’t even know. I wanted to rescue that baby. Over the following weeks I kept thinking about adoption, my heart longed to bring a baby into our home that would otherwise be orphaned. Some friends of ours told us that there was a great opportunity to adopt from Uganda and they were beginning the process. Immediately Mike and I
felt we were supposed to do the same.

There are currently 2.5 million orphans in Uganda, a country that has the population of California and is the size of Oregon. One million of these orphans are orphaned by aids. We have decided to adopt from Uganda: one, because the Lord led us to, two, because children in Uganda are less likely to hear about the Lord than orphans in the states and three, orphans in foreign countries have harder living conditions than those in the states.

We are beginning the application process and it is likely to take about 12 months till we have a baby in our home. There is much to go through… paperwork, interviews, home-studies, waiting for approval, fundraising. It will be hard, but so worth it for a precious life, a life that might not even be born yet. We ask that you and your family would prayerfully consider giving financially for our adoption. We ask that you would be in prayer for us and for our baby.

We have setup an adoption fund through our church so donors will receive a tax write-off. Please send funds to our address, but make checks out to Centerpoint Church (in the note: the Barker family adoption).

         We love all of you!
         The Barkers

Welcome Welcome

Hello all,
Our family is in the process of adopting a baby from Uganda.  This blog is a way for us to keep in touch with everyone who is supporting us through prayer and financial aid.  There will be more to come later, but we wanted to quickly let you know that we're currently in the middle of our home study right now.  After our home study is finished, we can apply for grants and submit the necessary documents to the US government.  It's an exciting time as we continue to check things off our list of to-do items!

Also, we are finishing up our album of hymns.  It's just Mike and Al and a guitar, but we think it's turning out pretty good.  We'll post a link soon to the site where you can donate and download it.

If you have time, check out the website for the babies home that we're adopting from:

Here's a little about our family:

Mike- is the worship pastor at our church, Centerpoint Church in Lakeland, TN. He really enjoys his job & is quite gifted in leading our congregation in worship. He is so good at working hard for our family & trusting the Lord to provide. He is an amazing husband & father. Jude & Sammy look up to their daddy so much & can't wait for him to get home from work each day. Mike has an amazing servant's heart for his family. We are blessed by his kindness & love that he so freely gives.

Allison- I am a stay at home mom & I absolutely LOVE my job! I enjoy serving my family by cleaning, cooking yummy vegan food, keeping our home organized, making our home feel like a home :), & just having fun with them. Michael, Jude & Sammy are my favorite people to be with in the whole world! I adore my boys. I am so blessed!

Jude- is the sweetest 2 year old boy! He loves loves loves to sing! His favorite songs right now are "Holy, holy holy" & "Jesus loves me". He adores his little brother & is always concerned about him. Jude is a big help to mommy! He has the cutest sense of humor. He's a great big brother & he prays for our baby from Uganda often.

Sammy- is 5 months old & quite busy. He's ready to be running around with his big brother. Sammy thinks Jude is so funny. They laugh a lot together. He smiles all the time & is working on crawling. He tries to grab anything that's in front of him, so meal time with him in my lap is always interesting. :)

The Barkers