Always Winter, and Never Christmas

Sometimes you have a day that just humbles you.

By all accounts, today was a wonderful day. It’s been a wonderful month.

God has shown us much victory in our journey.

Let’s walk backward a bit.

We had been planning our big fundraising event for April 29th for months and I’m telling you, God knew his timing. On April 28th, I went into the doctor’s office and hit the goal we’d been aiming for!

For those of you following along, this goal was something that we needed to hit in order to ensure our documents could be sent off to China and get approved! It was so much hard work but every step was worth it. God and my family and friends stood beside me every step of the way! What started out as a broken hearted moment, turned around into a blessed victory. The most amazing thing, this part of our journey didn’t slow down our process at all.

Then, to top it off, we had an amazing night on the 29th! We had so many friends help us out and had the great team from Masterworx Theater on hand put together a very emotional revue of song and dance that touched our hearts in ways that we will remember for the rest of our lives.

Our family can’t express enough how thankful we are for the talent and hard work that went into pulling that night off. Not only did we put a dent in our financial goals for the adoption, we had a fun night of celebration and had a chance to share the journey of our family.

Always Winter, Never Christmas

Our family loves Christmas. We’re the family that begins putting up ornaments the day after Halloween. We look forward to it every year and honestly see it as a time when we can celebrate the biggest gift that has ever been given to mankind, Jesus.

With that in mind, it’s fitting that I’ve been cast as Father Christmas in Masterworx Theater’s production of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. I’m sure the beard helped.

I’ve always been touched by C.S. Lewis’ writing and tonight, what struck me was the idea that during the reign of the White Witch in Narnia, it was, “always winter and never Christmas.” 

I’ve read that line so many times but tonight it really sank in.

First of all, tonight was opening night for our show. It was amazing! Renee and Caleb were super impressed and loved the atmosphere, acting, music and costumes! Everyone did an amazing job and we had a huge opening night audience for our outdoor show. By any measurement, it was great! My wife confessed to me that she got excited tonight at the show, when Father Christmas arrived in Narnia to usher in Christmas for the first time in years. In her words, “I had a cry ball when Father Christmas came onstage. Not because of you, but because FATHER CHRISTMAS WAS THERE!!!”

After the show, a little girl ran up to me, gave me a hug, and asked, “What am I going to get for Christmas this year?”

I left tonight with a huge smile on my face. Once again, God, bringing so much victory and joy to our life.

As soon as I got home, though, I read about what Christmas is like for children in an orphanage, and I was humbled because with every celebration and joyous moment we have, we know there is someone waiting for their Christmas. Waiting for their hope.

I get to celebrate Christmas any day of the year with my family.

For our little boy half a world away, it’s “always winter and never Christmas.”

I get to share the stage with other actors and bring Christmas to the fictional land of Narnia each night.

For our little boy going to sleep not knowing he has a family tonight, it’s “always winter and never Christmas.”

We get to go to sleep knowing the love and hope that comes with the gift of Jesus.

For our little boy, it’s “always winter and never Christmas.”

I can’t wait until we can show our little guy what it means to have the love of a family and what it means to have hope.

We can’t wait to show him that even in the darkest of winter, we’ll still have Christmas.

The gravity of what that means is no longer lost on me.

“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given” ~Isaiah 9:6

 

Take me home, country roads…

Well, here we are. It’s April.

Can anyone believe that we started this journey over six months ago!

While in some ways time has flown by, in others it has crawled. During this time we ache, knowing that our little boy is over 7000 miles away and we can’t be there for him right now like we can for Angel and Caleb. Honestly, that’s our biggest prayer right now. Pray for our little guy in China. It’s terrifying, as a parent, knowing that you can’t personally meet your child’s needs right now. Even more so knowing that, even under the most optimal conditions, in institutional care there will be many unmet needs. If our guy is hungry, we can’t be there to get him something to eat. If he just wants to play, we’re not there. If he wants someone to give him a hug, we’re not there.

We do know this. He is loved. The waiting is hard though. God is teaching us the patience that goes along with waiting for His will to be done.

This morning at church, we were blessed to be reminded of the verse,

“But those who wait on the Lord
Shall renew their strength;
They shall mount up with wings like eagles,
They shall run and not be weary,
They shall walk and not faint.” ~Isaiah 40:31 (NKJV)

“Almost heaven, West Virginia…” ~John Denver

In the midst of all this waiting, we have milestones. No matter how big or small, we try to celebrate them all!

So, in an exciting development, we’re going to West Virginia later this week! First, though, let’s step back!

A few weeks ago, we finally received our finalized Home Study in the mail! Woo hoo! We had been waiting so long to have this done we wanted to document the day for historical reasons.

So anyways, back to John Denver.

Who can’t think of some John Denver when you learn you’re going to be taking a country road (see what I did there?) off to West Virginia! This song rang in our heads when we opened up our mail from the DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY U.S. CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION SERVICES!

So exciting! You read that right! We got some mail from the gov’t. It all started when we mailed off our i800A in late March after getting our homestudy. I could go into all the details but here’s the cliff’s notes version.

It’s a form.

We filled it out.

We mailed it.

It was received!

…then, a few weeks later, we got a note in the mail confirming our fingerprint appointment. (They want to make sure we’re not criminals or something)

Once again, we had to document the occasion!

We are so excited to be heading off to Charleston, West Virginia. Should be a fun time!

dossier
noun | dos·sier | \ˈdȯs-ˌyā, ˈdäs-; ˈdȯ-sē-ˌā, ˈdä-\

I never used the word dossier in conversation this much since back when I used to play Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

Well right now, dossier has been part of our daily conversation. For instance, at breakfast, one might ask, “Can you pass the dossier please?”

I’ve also realized that the French don’t like their t’s or their r’s.

But seriously, the dossier is the bit where we compile a bunch of documents about our family and send them to China.

Now you might say, “Hey, that doesn’t sound hard.”

I would say, “Welcome to the biggest paper chase of your life.”

For instance, documents include, a recent birth certificate of the parents. Of note, our birth certificates have to be less than 6 months old by the time we send them to China. Having been born over 30 years ago, this required us ordering a new copy of our certificates. From California. Good times!

You have to supply all the details of your assets and finances.

Dollar bill’s y’all! Dave Ramsey would be proud of the level of detail you have to go into!

It’s not all technical stuff though. We also have to send some photos of our family!

Here we are playing Scrabble™
Scrabble is a product of Parker Brothers and is in no way affiliated with the O’Neal Family Adoption.

Anyways this seems like such a huge effort but just like everything on this journey, we are taking it all one step at a time and celebrating the small victories as they come.

For instance, we really felt accomplished after spending a good 20 minutes at the FedEx® Office copying documents! We copied passports, birth certificates, income verification documents, had some more photos taken.

As much fun as it is, I won’t be sad to say au revoir to the dossier.

Aslan is on the move

I (Scott) will be busy the next 6 weeks or so with Masterworx Theater’s production of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe where I’ll be playing Father Christmas. This also means that my chin won’t get a respite from the heat.

Excited to be part of this production. It should be fun. My beautiful daughter Angel will be part of the crew for this show as well and we can’t wait to see how audiences respond to this beautiful C.S. Lewis tale.

Little known C.S. Lewis fact. He and I share a birthday and this is actually my second run in with Mr. Lewis on the stage, having previously done some tech design work for a production of Shadowlands with Volcano Theatre Company.

We’re thankful for the community at Masterworx as it’s given our family a mental break from the hustle and bustle of the paperwork pregnancy but also because they are made up of such an amazingly supportive group of individuals who we’ve been blessed to get to know. As mentioned a few months ago they, unknowingly at the time, played a role in this journey and we’re so thankful.

Back to beard talk, around the time the kids go on summer break, my beard might have a chance to go on summer break as well.

Lights, Camera, Adoption!

As we mentioned in our last post, we’re so excited to be planning a super fun event on April 29th! We’ve had so much support helping us put this event together!

First, Masterworx Theater is going to be providing entertainment for the event. Thank you so much!

We’ve had a ton of businesses/individuals come along side of us as sponsors and we have some great items available for raffle/auction!

Items include:

1 week stay in villa for four in Palm Beach Shores, FL @ Palm Beach Shores Resort
10 Flex tickets to a Liberty Flames sporting event
Gift Certificate for Rivermont Makery
TGI Friday’s certificates for kids meal, appetizer and dessert
$25 gift certificate for Bubbles & Bows
Gift Certificate for room at Locked Up Lynchburg
Gift Certificate for Massage Envy
10 Hillcats tickets and Hillcats ball cap
Admission for 1 to One Way Out
Dehydrator
Gardening Gift Basket
30 minute session with Clark Street Photography and Design
2 – $25 Gift Certificates to A Dream is a Wish Designs T-Shirt company
1 Month Tennis Clinic with Crosswhite Athletic Club – $60 value
1 Month Unlimited Bootcamp with Crosswhite Fitness – $75 value
Free Consult and 2 Training Sessions with Crosswhite Fitness – $105 value
4 tickets and two concession items per person for The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe with Masterworx Theater
2 bottles of oil, 2 bottles of vinegar and a $20 gift card to Favored Flavors – Tasting Shop & Little Bistro
Baking Gift Basket
Gift Certificate for 2 Giant Pizzas at Mr. Shipp’s Pizza & Subs
$10 Gift Certificate to All Fired Up
$25 Gift Card to Big Lick Tropical Grill
4 Passes to Regal Cinemas
$50 Giftcard to Wolfbane Productions

We have more items but these are simply the items that we’ve physically received so far! We’re so thankful for all the donations and look forward to this funraiser. Yes, you heard that right. This is the fun train and we’re going choo, choo!

Please come and check us out.

Click here for more information and Click below for tickets!

Finishing the Race

We are looking forward toward our event and have had so many folks come along us to help. A friend of ours recently held a book sale to help raise money for our adoption and we’re so thankful for it and thankful for everyone else who participated.

Some of you have asked how you can help us outside of an event or a book sale.

One way is to contribute toward our AdoptTogether account.

You can view our profile by clicking on the button below.

The great thing about AdoptTogether is that any donation made through them is made to their non-profit and is tax-deductible. From there, they can give us a grant based on certain expenses we spend toward our adoption.

We have a little over $10,000 left to pay in definite fees. Everything after that will be travel related expenses (Chinese Visas, Hotel Stays, Airfare) which can vary depending on the time we travel, but we expect it to be over $10,000 by itself.

In the end, we know that God will provide on this journey and have been blessed and awed at seeing God move through others as they’ve helped us along. I don’t know what we’d do without our community.

By the numbers

7526 – Miles from our house to our little boy.

196 – Days since we first learned about our little boy.

72 – Pounds lost by Scott since November as part of our adoption journey.

7 – Age of our little boy.

3 – Number of sleeping children we wish we had in our home right now and the number of sleeping children we know will be nestled in their beds this time next year.

Au Revoir

Until next time, thank you for taking the time to hear how our story is going. Please keep our family in your prayers as knock down barriers racing to bring our little guy home. I can’t say enough that, while this is the hardest thing God has ever asked our family to do, it is the most rewarding thing as well! God has made our family closer throughout this journey. We know that it was His will for us to start this journey and

I can hear the song in my head now and I just want to tell him that, like a country road, “We’ll bring you home, to the place, you belong.”

Save the Date “LIGHTS, CAMERA, ADOPTION!” – April 29th!

Early Month Gets The Worm

Do you ever have have that visitor that arrives way too early to a party? You’re super polite. You offer them something to drink. You want to make small talk, but let’s be honest, you haven’t finished cleaning the house. You probably still need to shower and you’re not nearly done cooking the tasty meats.

For me, this is the month of March. March just showed up when I wasn’t expecting it. And I really should have expected it. It’s on my calendar. Not just this year. Every. Single. Year. It’s there.

At my age, with all the gray in my beard, I really should have gotten used to it. To be honest, I don’t even blame March. I blame February. February doesn’t even pull its fair share of the year. It finishes 28 days, drops the mic, and exits stage left.

Next year February, I’m going to show up when you least expect it.

They say that the early bird gets the worm, but the early worm gets eaten. Moral of the story, it’s not always good to be early. You might get eaten by a giant bird.

All this to say that time is flying by this year!

Just know you’re not alone. ‘Cause I’m going to make this place your home.

We’ve gotten a draft of our Home Study and should have the finalized copy soon! It will be exciting to start the next steps of sending off our i800A for immigration. Even the longest journeys are made up of thousands of little steps.

Speaking of those little steps, Caleb’s room is getting ready. We have two beds for the room! It’s all coming together and we can’t wait for our home and family to increase by one!

It was red, and yellow, and green, and brown, and scarlet, and black, and ochre, and peach, and ruby, and olive, and violet, and fawn, and lilac, and gold, and chocolate, and mauve, and cream, and crimson, and silver, and rose, and azure, and lemon, and russet, and grey, and purple, and white, and pink, and orange, and blue!

This weekend, Angel and I had our first few performances of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamgoat (er, Dreamcoat) with Masterworx Theater! We talked a little bit about that in the last blog post, if you recall. It’s been such an exciting journey doing a show together and both of us can’t wait to do this again! Our whole family has gotten in the act too (pun intended), with Renee and Caleb helping out as ushers over the weekend! We can’t wait to share these experiences with our newest family member in the coming months!

Now, while we’ll definitely miss this show once it ends next weekend, life in our household is often like a musical. When things are sad? Sing a song. When things are happy? Sing a song and do a dance. When there is conflict? Have a dance off.

If only Joseph’s brothers settled their differences with a well choreographed dance off, things would have ended much differently.

Speaking of Joseph, while he was great at interpreting dreams, could he interpret a dream within a dream, Inception style?

Mind blown.

Overall, we can’t thank the other cast and crew members enough for being so welcoming to newcomers! It’s been a nice break from all the craziness of life right now!

Where’s the Party At?

We’re so excited to announce that we’re finally moving forward with our first fundraising event of the spring!

What: LIGHTS, CAMERA, ADOPTION! – O’Neal Family Adoption Fundraising Dessert and Auction
When: APRIL 29th 6:30 – 8:30 pm
Cost: $5.00 for individuals, $10.00 for families
Where: Timberlake United Methodist Church @ 21649 Timberlake Road, Lynchburg, VA 24502
Additional Details: We will have several items available for silent auction and raffle. So far we have vacation stays, a dehydrator, several gift baskets full of wonderful items, tickets to sporting events and more! Come dressed as your favorite film character, actor, prop, or yourself! We promise a fun night you won’t easily forget! Unless you fall off a yacht and end up hanging out with Kurt Russell for a few weeks.
Contact Information: 
Renee O’Neal – (209) 256-5877 – reneeoneal@me.com
Scott O’Neal – (209) 304-9800 – scottoneal@me.com

We are currently working on entertainment and additional raffle or auction items. If you are interested in buying tickets and/or would like to contribute to food/entertainment/auction/raffle items, please let me or Renee know!

I know one of the big things we’re hoping to put together are several themed baskets to auction off. For example, maybe a “Movie” basket with movie tickets and stuff for a movie night at home. Or a “Craft” basket with items for craft projects as a family. A “Sports” basket with sporting tickets, etc. Honestly, if you can dream it, then you can make it real!

We can’t do this alone. We promise it will be fun and a wonderful time and will help bring our little guy home! We have a little over $15,000 left to raise, a lot of which will help with the travel expenses to/from China to bring our boy home and you can help!

We can’t thank everyone enough who has helped us get to this point with all of their support!

I’ll take Substances for $1000.

This flows freely but is of constant volume, having a consistency like that of water or oil.

What is “liquid?”

On Monday, March 12th I start a liquid diet for one month. Sounds fun. Seriously. I couldn’t be more excited. Water. Broth. Protein shake. I’m not trying to discriminate against solids and gasses but you gotta do what you gotta do. Me and liquids are going to be building a strong relationship over the next few weeks and exciting times are surely ahead! It’s all for a good cause though so, bring it on!

It might as well be spring!

In May, we’ll be hosting a yard sale fundraiser so if you are looking to get rid of anything, don’t hesitate to contact us. We’d be happy to take anything off your hands to include in our yard sale in the spring.

I don’t know how many of you have hosted yard sales before, but I’ll be honest, some of the most interesting characters stop by on those days. Sometimes it’s like stepping into an episode of Hee Haw. Yep. Hee Haw. 😐

The Reprise

1. Time Marches on.

2. Home studied.

3. Go, go, go see Joseph before it’s too late! http://www.lynchburgtickets.com/joseph

4. Save the Date – LIGHTS, CAMERA, ADOPTION Fundraiser! How can you help?

5. Man doesn’t live on liquid alone.

6. Have stuff? We’ll travel.

Until next time friends, thank you for reading! Thank you for being there for us. Thank you all for being so awesome! God is doing amazing things in our family!

Romans 5:1-5 ~ “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”

 

There are no small parts…only small actors.

“Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast.”
~Friar Lawrence, Romeo & Juliet
~William Shakespeare

I know it’s been awhile but it’s been a busy month for us even though it feels like not much has happened. Seriously though, it’s been busy.

Renee and I celebrated a great 8 years of marriage!

I’ve lost 42 lbs since December 19th! Thank you Crosswhite Fitness!

The reality is, as I’ve said over and over, the adoption process teaches nothing else, if not patience.

While our Home Study is complete, we’re still waiting for the draft. We’re so anxious because once we get it finalized, we can send off for our i800A immigration pre-approval and from what we understand, that process can take months.

We also thought it would be a good idea to do another shirt sale. We had a lot of folks ask us and show interest in getting more shirts. In the end, we sold far less than our 500 shirt goal (we sold 6 shirts this round). But that’s okay, we know that God will provide and we’re so thankful for you six and everyone that got shirts last fall!

We could be discouraged by the waiting for paperwork and the waiting for financial provision, but I can see God refining us and forcing us out of our comfort zone on this journey.

A detour 

One thing that Renee and I have committed to during this process is to ensure that Caleb and Angel aren’t missing out on having a Mom and Dad throughout this process. We never wanted the gravity of this big process to overshadow the joyful days, weeks, and months in our household.

In January, Angel auditioned for the children’s chorus for Masterworx Theater’s production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. She had asked me to audition with her and while I wanted to, I didn’t see how I could fit it into work, my exercise regimen, school, home life, adoption business. I said I couldn’t do it. The timing wasn’t right.

A few days after auditions, she was so excited to find out she was cast. I took her to her very first rehearsal, where they said they needed more men. “We need more men…” seems to be a common phrase in the theater realm and I can’t say I was surprised to hear it. Anyways, when they said, “We need more men,” Angel looked at me and said “Dad, do it. Please!”

I couldn’t say no.

So…there I was. The newest cast member. I soon was shuffled off to join rehearsal as a member of the men’s ensemble.

Has this taken up more time?

Yes.

But to be honest, it couldn’t have come at a better time. You see, many of you don’t know that one of the reasons our family relocated to Virginia was to either start or get involved with a family oriented theater company. So here we are, finally getting back involved with theater nearly four years after moving to Virginia.

Now, there is a little bit of background to this. It was in September of last year when this adoption journey began and I saw such a mountain before us and I had several thoughts.

We can’t overcome that!

It’s too expensive!

We’ll never be able to achieve it!

Of course, these are all the lies that the enemy tries to sell you. To paraphrase Philippians 4:13, I should have been listening to God tell me, “I give you the strength to do all things!” God’s funny though. He speaks to us in different ways.

Literally this same week, my daughter asked me to take her to a musical where her friend was in the ensemble.

Now, Angel and I love our Daddy/Daughter dates. We love theater. With this, of course I was happy to oblige…and…the musical Angel wanted to see was the Masterworx Theater product of Annie. Yep. Annie, the musical where the title character goes from life in an orphanage to adoption by a loving Daddy Warbucks. I sat in the theater that night with tears in my eyes, knowing what God was asking our family to do.

I may not be Daddy Warbucks but we have room in our home and room in our hearts. With God, we can accomplish the rest.

And that literally kicked off this journey that we are on.

Now for the second funny coincidence. This musical Angel and I are doing, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, was frequently on rotation in my Grandma’s house when I was a child. It was, as I remember it, the first real exposure I had to musical theatre. I fell in love with the music and around 1993, I purchased the cassette soundtrack to Joseph with Michael Damian as the title character and quickly memorized every word to every song.

A few short years later, I found myself having the guts to get up on stage myself and found something that I really loved. When I met my beautiful wife, we quickly bonded over our mutual love of theater and the rest is history. Eight years of marital bliss kind of history!

This is all a long way of saying that, I’m thankful for the catchy tunes of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice for introducing me to theater. It has had an amazing domino effect on my life.

So it’s fitting that, at a time when our family is going through such an overwhelming process, it feels great to go back to my roots and experience this all over again from a different perspective. It’s great to see my daughter, at the same age I was in 1993, singing the same songs I was nearly 25 years ago. This time though, she’s on stage. I’m on stage. We get to sing these songs together.

What better way to celebrate family than to do life together and share in our experiences.

It’s not just confined to Angel and I either. Our whole family, Me, Angel, Renee, and even Caleb, spent the day today helping build the set for Joseph. We can’t wait for the show to open and to see all the work that’s been put in come to fruition. Can’t wait.

Even more than Joseph though, we can’t wait for the opening night of our family’s show. The opening night where, someplace in China, our family officially grows by one more. The night where all the work and effort, both on stage and off, comes alive as we greet our son and welcome him into our arms and into our hearts.

We have to savor this preparation and recognize that each step is in God’s timing. Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast.

 

Running for Adoption

It’s been a few weeks since our last updates and boy, do we have many updates.

In the last few weeks we’ve celebrated one New Year and in a few weeks our family will celebrate another New Year.

The kids went back to school, only to be dealt with snow days, which were wonderful fun of course!

And…our oldest is now a teenager. A teenager! Ahhhhh….

All of this was hard knowing that our family is missing a member. We just can’t wait to share all of these experiences with our new little guy. God is teaching us patience though. After all, it is a fruit of the Spirit.

On to business.

One thing we’ve learned about this process, is that this is a journey with many moving pieces and something that couldn’t be done alone.

It’s been filled with confident moments and celebrations and discouraging moments and heartache but in the 3+ months since we started this journey, we’ve come so far. Every step has been worth it.

So how are things going you ask? (I’m assuming your interested if you’re here)

Where we’ve been

We have received Pre-Approval on our intent to adopt from China. This is super super exciting and means that our little guy’s file is being held for us while we put together our dossier.

We have wrapped up all of our home study meetings with our great social worker. While the process and paperwork seemed overwhelming, the paperwork was the hardest parts. The meetings with our social worker were great and we had great conversations about adoption and the impact it will have on our entire family.

We have sent off the application for Angel and Caleb’s passports. It will be exciting for them to get a chance to travel with us and enjoy those first family moments together.

We’ve completed all of our required training for China, our Home Study Agency and the Placement Agency. All in all, we’ve completed over 30 hours of training as we learn what it is to really make a home for our newest member. The training was great and brought to light a lot of things for us to think about and prepare for. So thankful that we went through it.

Where we are

Right now, focused on fundraising, fundraising, fundraising. We’ve been so blessed by everyone’s support that as of tomorrow (after a stop at a few banks) we will have raised around $20,000 of the $40,000 goal we have. Once our Home Study is finalized and approved, we can start applying for grants, etc but we still have some fundraising plans.

These include:

-Pancake Breakfast (Need to find a location)

-Selling a week vacation in South Florida

-Another Yard Sale (Spring Cleaning anyone?)

-Shirt Sales

-Songs for adoption (You make a donation and give me a topic of a song you want, and I’ll give you a song about your chosen topic)

God has humbled us so much through all of this support. We can’t say thank you to everyone who has helped enough times.

Immigration. Once we receive our finalized Home Study we will apply for immigration pre-approval. While the paperwork might seem like a lot, it’s really nothing and every time we can check a box and say “This is done” it’s a great feeling!

Fitness. As part of our journey, I’ve been working on my (Scott) health while we move forward. On December 19th I started with a goal to lose around 90 lbs by June. As of Thursday morning I have lost 25.6 lbs and feel like I might hit 30 lbs this week!

This part of our journey has required a complete change in lifestyle. I’ve cut out breads, potatoes, dairy and really sticking to meats and good veggies. In addition, I’ve been walking 3-6 miles a day and working out twice a week at Crosswhite Fitness with a personal trainer. This has challenged me in ways I haven’t been challenged before. I thank Jesus for guiding my heart through this journey and giving me the strength to take each day as it comes.

2 Chronicles 15:7 ~ “But you, take courage! Do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded.” (ESV)

If you read this and feel even a hint of a desire or calling to make those types of big changes in your life. Do it. Don’t wait until tomorrow or until the “perfect time.” The “perfect time” will not come. Life will always be messy and at first, it will always seem inconvenient. With God, you can do it. I know that His desire is for us to take care of ourselves. While we are only given our bodies temporarily for our time on earth, He does call us to be stewards of His creation, and that includes our own bodies. God created you. Take care of yourself. I only wish I recognized that years ago. At 36 though, God has awakened a fire in me and I’m thankful for it. It’s never too late.

Where we are going

China. ‘Nuff said.

After all, it’s only nine more sleeps ’til Christmas!

You know, one of my favorite Christmas songs is “One More Sleep ‘Til Christmas” from The Muppet Christmas Carol.

Who can resist the dulcet tones of Kermit the Frog singing about Christmas.

There’s magic in the air this evening
Magic in the air
The world is at her best, you know
When people love and care
The promise of excitement is one the night will keep
After all, there’s only one more sleep ’til Christmas

Maybe we’re just a bunch of big kids but we love The Muppets in our house.

If you really pay attention, here is Kermit, as Bob Cratchit, super excited about Christmas while having the weight of the world on his shoulders, supporting his family and handling Tiny Tim’s medical issues.

You sense here that Kermit/Bob Cratchit understands that joy is condition of perspective, not of situation. You get the sense that if he had Twitter, he’d be saying #blessed.

And, we all have reason to feel #blessed. After all, we all have a moment to sit back and realize that regardless of where we are, we can celebrate the birth of Christ. And the amount of JOY found in that is endless.

Now, as far as our family is concerned, we know that next Christmas, we’ll have another. It’s hard to not put another present under the tree for the little guy. We know he’ll be here soon enough but God is helping us demonstrate our love through patience. His timing will be right.

We’ve had a pretty exciting few weeks. We’ve sent out most of our Christmas cards (we ran out of envelopes so there are a few left, sorry if anyone gets them late). If you don’t get a Christmas card, I’m really sorry but send me your address and I’ll mail you an autographed hand drawn picture of me or something.

Seriously though, things have been exciting as we move through this process. Our Home Study is going nicely and we’ve been going through the training process. Renee is doing a great job working to learn Mandarin while I hear her say “Zǎoshang hǎo” in the morning and practicing our chopstick skills for our travels. P.S. We know that “Panda Express” isn’t authentic Chinese food. We were hungry, it was close and we seriously wanted to practice using some chopsticks. It was that or McDonalds and eating a burger with chopsticks wouldn’t end well. Or maybe it would. I honestly haven’t tried.

We’re also to the point where we want to start preparing the little guy’s bedroom. Although we have months to go, there is a bit of “nesting” going on. LOL

Speaking of nesting, we’ve continued to sell leftover yard sale items online and have seen the floor of our basement again, which sounds small but it so exciting. (I work from home and my office is in the basement. For awhile I felt like I was working inside the storage unit of one of those TV shows and people were bidding on me. Seriously, I’m having flashbacks of someone saying, “Don’t forget to pay the lady!”)

We sent out a lot of letters this month, with our Christmas cards to let folks know how they can make year end tax-deductible contributions toward the adoption fund. At the very least, we’re excited to share our story a little bit more with those who might not know.

Sharing the story of adoption and why we are doing it has been a huge blessing. Both Renee and I have found a lot of support in the workplace and even among total strangers, when given a chance to share what God is doing in our lives. That brings us back to Kermit/Bob Cratchit.

The world has got a smile today
The world has got a glow
There’s no such thing as strangers when
A stranger says hello
And everyone is family, we’re having so much fun
After all, there’s only one more sleep ’til Christmas

Don’t be afraid to step out and say hello to a stranger this Christmas season. You never know what good news you can share with them and what they might share with you. You never know how you can bless them and how they can bless you. At the very least, a simple conversation may give someone that connection they weren’t expecting. I had a conversation with someone a few weeks ago where I brought up what our family is going through in the adoption process and they had no idea. Tears were shed and they stated they felt so blessed because they too were adopted and they felt it changed the trajectory of their life and they were encouraged to know what we were doing. I was encouraged to hear the story of someone who was adopted and was able to reflect on it so positively now, as an adult. Hearing how thankful they were for the opportunities and love they were given as a result just blessed us an immeasurable amount.

So, when you go out on Christmas Eve to get that last minute gift, instead of trying to go in and out like Jack Bauer on a stealth mission, stop and say hello. After all, there’ll be only one more sleep ’til Christmas.

We have a lot to be thankful for!

It’s been a busy few weeks. To start, our shirts came in! We love them and thank everyone that bought them! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Not only do you now have a beautiful shirt to help share the message of adoption, but you also have helped contribute to bringing our little guy home. The shirt sale alone raised almost $400.

As we went through the month, we were working on our paperwork and working on our Mandarin. We finally completed all of our paperwork for the home study and had it sent off via old fashioned mail.

Now, these days we don’t mail a lot of things but nothing makes you feel like you’re taking a step back in time than making a stop at the Post Office. Next stop, Pony Express!

With everything sent off we were able to move forward with our Thanksgiving festivities and our upcoming Yard Sale fundraiser.

Let me say, we’ve been overwhelmed by the support we’ve had for the Yard Sale fundraiser. So many of our friends donated items for us to sell. Having moved from California only three and a half years ago we didn’t have a ton of big stuff to sell. I mean we could have sold our beds and couches, but then, the next several months would be mighty uncomfortable. Thank you everyone for all that you did. It humbles us so much.

We’ve also had several folks contribute financially and again, so humbling. We can’t thank everyone enough. We couldn’t do this without you. Everything helps!

My brother, sister-in-law and niece and nephew all came up for Thanksgiving for a few days and it was great having family around and help with the Yard Sale.

Here’s cousin Eliam and Caleb looking for some nature on a walk. I think E might have wanted something in Caleb’s nature bag.

We are planning the adjustments we’ll be making to Caleb’s room. Personally I’m excited to build another bed. Exciting times. I’d say that getting to build stuff is like being a grown up with Legos except that I like Legos too!

We smoked a turkey and ham and they were delicious. I certainly wish I had taken a picture.

Then, we took a risk and on Black Friday and the day after, we hosted a yard sale fundraiser.

Things started slow and then, one by one people came and they blessed our family so much. Not only did we have people come by and drop off additional donations to sell but several people overpaid for items. There was one lady that stole a few items on her way out but you know, it didn’t really bother us. We had so much fun and we had a chance to share our story with so many folks. We even had one person that couldn’t fit a piece of furniture into her van so we had an opportunity to personally deliver it after we were closed down for the day! Some folks came by and thought I was Saint Nick! I’m not sure why they would have thought that!

Even Jack O’Neal had some fun!

When all was said and done, we made nearly $600 from the yard sale and several hundred more in private donations. Thank you Jesus! So far we’ve raised nearly $6000 of the roughly $40,000 we’ll need. So as Thanksgiving has come and gone, we can’t stop being thankful for each and every thing in our life.

As we go through these holidays and enter into the Christmas season, we recognize that next year, our family will be +one and we can’t wait. We’re going through training to prepare for the adoption and it has given us great insight into the needs of children in these scenarios and while the journey will be difficult, we know that God is there with us each day and that we have so many friends and family ready to support us.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

 

A break from paperwork…Christmas before Halloween

Enough paper to make Dunder-Mifflin millions!

So we’ve all had to fill out paperwork at one point or another. You want to join your local grocery store loyalty club? Paperwork. You want to rent a movie from Blockbuster? Paperwork. You want to go to college? Paperwork.

It’s no surprise that the thing in life that requires the most responsibility requires a large amount of paperwork. It’s that thing where you say, I promise to put my life ahead of someone else’s life. It’s that thing where you say, I am willing to love and take care of another person. It’s that moment where you say, I will love and care for the most vulnerable among us (children). This is being a parent and every moment has been worth it to know that we are one step closer to our goal. I can definitely say that during this process, I’ve felt like a pregnant man. Please see picture below as an example. The swelling is especially key.

Along with all this paperwork comes some big wins! Our passports arrived! Woo hoo! It was a moment where you realize that in less than a year, we’ll be heading to China to grow our family. We still have to get Angel and Caleb theirs but it’s one step at a time.

We also mailed off our acceptance of referral to help the matching process. Once again, one step at a time. These little victories really help and give us something to celebrate at each step along the way.

By the time this process is over I feel like we’ll be sending thank you notes to everyone in town. Thank you Front Desk person at the Doctor’s office. Thank you Notary. Thank you Postal Worker. Thank you Tin Man. Thank you Scarecrow. You get the picture.

Christmas is coming…the goose is getting fat!

Another big thing we’ve done in the last few weeks is decorate for Christmas! In fact, as an extra treat for our family, we actually put our decorations up before Halloween. I know for some of you that is scarier than a clown standing outside your window at night holding a balloon but that’s just how we roll.

We really want to thank Renee’s friend Heather for the special ornament that reminds us next Christmas, we will be a family of five! So exciting!

Grim grinning ghosts come out to socialize…

Now, right now you’re thinking…Scott, you didn’t let the kids dress up for Halloween?

Well, although Renee and I aren’t big into Halloween, we did let the kids dress up.

Next year we’ll have an extra costume to come up with! As a family of five we could do a themed costume. For instance, we could all dress up a as a hand. We can each be a finger.

Anyways, Pikachu and Catwoman had a great time and collected a bucket of candy and we move forward into the Christmas season.

You’re thinking, But what about Thanksgiving?

We didn’t forget. We’re just super thankful for Jesus’ birthday so, what better way to celebrate Thanksgiving than to celebrate Jesus’ birthday.

So that’s where we’re at. Paperwork. Halloween. Christmas (with a dash of Thanksgiving).

Life still moves forward in the O’Neal household as we push forward. We appreciate all of the support we’ve gotten. Speaking of which, our final shirt tally is 36 shirts! We couldn’t be more humbled by that support. On top of this, we’re planning a rummage sale, but more on that later.

God has blessed us so much during this time and our prayer right now is to watch over this little guy over the next several months while we wait for him to join our family. We know that God is a Healer and that He is working miracles to knit together a family.

-Scott

Where to start

“Why are you adopting?”

This is a common question that we’ve been asked by folks who aren’t sure why or how our family got to this point. Then, among the folks who understand why we are adopting, they may ask,

“Why are you adopting internationally?”

As Marie Von Trapp said,

As parents, adoption has always been part of our life story. As a young boy, my parents divorced and I became all too aware of how broken a family can become. However, both of my parents remarried and I learned that parental love isn’t predicated on blood.

 

Now let’s pause for a moment. God is AMAZING! His plan, as noted in Genesis 2, is for man and woman to become one until the end. However, after the fall, life has become messy. He still though is able to work miracles through mankind’s curse and I’m thankful that I have two sets of parents that love me as a son.

Like I said, this exposed me, Scott, to the idea that familial love transcends blood. I could go on and on with other examples within my family of how this love is demonstrated but…

Let’s fast forward a bit.

On a beautiful snowy day in California. February 14th, 2009 to be exact, I married the love of my life, Renee. I was doubly blessed on that day though because Renee brought with her a beautiful daughter, Angel. As soon as we were back from our honeymoon I worked to adopt Angel.

The circumstances didn’t make it easy but on Christmas Day, 2010 we were told that I could adopt Angel. It was the best Christmas present and the adoption was all finalized in May the next year.

(I know it’s a blurry picture but it was a great day!)

Now, the adoption had no impact on my day to day life as a father, but it was just another affirmation of where our life was and the love that I have for Angel.

So here we are, several years later with another little one in our family.

Yep, here we are. Renee and I love our kids. They are such big blessings to our lives.

A few years ago we talked about how if we were to grow our family, it would be through adoption because we know that there are parents out there who, for one reason or another, aren’t prepared to be mothers and fathers. We are so thankful that these parents chose to give their children a chance at life and we felt that, if called, we would love to give a child a family. And when it comes to international or domestic, it didn’t matter because every child, no matter where they are from, deserves a loving family.

We waited.

And waited.

Procrastinated.

…

…

Made other plans.

We thought it would be a good idea to maybe look into having our kitchen remodeled soon.

Then one day, in Sunday school, we heard a story about a young boy from China with a few medical conditions that was really struggling to find a family. My wife and I wrote notes to each other during Sunday school about wanting to give this young boy a home (sorry Gabe, we promise we were listening too!).

The more we learned about this boy and as our family went forward in prayer, this was continually confirmed. I remember, days after hearing his story, watching a production of the musical Annie and realizing, God was telling us,

“I have a little boy for your family.”

“Your home is ready.”

“Your hearts are ready.”

“Bring him home.”

Needless to say, we’ve cancelled the kitchen contractor.

Instead, we’re bringing him home.

Here we go!

“Come on, everybody! Here we go!” ~Peter Pan

We want to share the journey we’re taking toward growing our family with each of you. Friends. Family. Brothers. Sisters. Strangers. We are inviting you to walk alongside this journey we take.

You might think, “Why share your journey with strangers?”

“Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.” ~James 1:27

When God brings amazing things to our life, we want to share what He has done for us.

We’ve been so blessed by this journey and want to share this blessing that God has given us as a testimony of His transformative grace.

We look forward to having you all along for the ride.

-Scott, Renee, Angel and Caleb