Susy's Puzzle Piece Fundraiser

Susy's Puzzle!

There are 300 pieces and when they are sponsored at $10 each and added to her Angel Tree Fund,  it will be enough to cover her required orphanage donation with a little left towards the provincial fees in her country.  Will you join us?  It would be such a relief to have that particular large fee off my mind!

If you'd like to help in this way there are a few ways to do it, and two of them are tax deductible.

1. Donate through our Family Sponsorship Link with Reece's Rainbow.  Use the donate box on the right side border or this link  http://reecesrainbow.org/102427/sponsorlanz-4 

This can be done through Paypal, or if you would prefer to send a check, please note in the memo that it is for Susy and the Lanz family so they know where to credit it. Mail to:

 Reece's Rainbow
PO Box 277
Monrovia, MD 21770

2. Donate online through our Shepherd's Crook Orphan's Ministry dedicated fund.  To donate online, select Susy in the drop down box found here https://theshepherdscrook.cloverdonations.com/giving/

NOTE: We won't be notified when you donate so please comment here on the blog or drop me a note at Grant4Susy@gmail.com letting me know what to put on your puzzle piece(s).

or 3. Paypal the funds to Grant4Susy@gmail.com .  Sending the funds directly to us through Paypal is not tax deductible.

You may not think that your $10 helps. Believe me, every little bit helps! International adoption is very expensive and way beyond what our family budget can handle on our own. We are grateful for every gift, no matter what the size, to help us get our treasures home! And perhaps just as important, every time we see even a little increase in one of the dedicated funds we are encouraged that we aren't in this alone.

Thanks friends for standing with us one again.

And it has launched!  Thank you, Mom for getting us started!

Thank you, Hartsough Family!

Thank you to the Carpenter family!

Thank you to the Tibbetts family!

Thank you, Carrie!

Thank you, Freeman family!

Thank you to a friend who requests to remain anonymous!

Thank you, Aunt Beckie!

Thank you, cousin Marley!

FSP Reece's Rainbow

We have done fundraising with Reece's Rainbow for all of our international adoptions.  They advocate for and help raise funds for special needs orphans across the globe.  "Susy" was part of their Angel Tree focus at Christmas time.

To have an FSP  (Family Sponsorship Program) link one must meet certain document requirements and have the adoption confirmed by the social worker.  This is to ensure that the families are legit.

We just received our FSP yesterday, and are excited to see our ZERO balance change.  To kick off our first fundraiser with our FSP we're seeking puzzle piece sponsors.

If you were following with our other adoptions, the other children all had puzzle pieces as a part of our fundraising.   

Abigail & Jen's puzzle, 2013

Isaac's puzzle, 2014

Patrick's puzzle, 2015

We wrote the sponsor's name on the back of each piece and framed the puzzles in double sided glass. 

the back of Isaac's puzzle

Of course, our Little Miss needed to have a puzzle too, just to keep things fair!  I chose this popular Chinese icon for her.

Susy's puzzle, 2016

There are 300 pieces in her puzzle.  When they are sponsored at $10 each and added to her Angel Tree Fund,  it will be enough to cover her required orphanage donation with a little left towards the provincial fees in her country.  Will you join us?  It would be such a relief to have that particular large fee off my mind!

If you'd like to help in this way you may use the box on the right hand side of this page to sponsor through Paypal, or  if you would prefer to send a check, please note in the memo that it is for Susy and the Lanz family so they know where to credit it.  Mail to:

Reece's Rainbow

PO Box 277

Monrovia, MD 21770
 
And one final step.  We don't receive a notice when a donation has been made, so please note in the comment area (below) how you would like your piece(s) to read, or drop me a note at Grant4Susy@gmail.com   Thank you!

Our simple little Christmas celebration...

Our traditional picture in front of the tree with the new Christmas pajamas.

When does Christmas with five children seem like a small celebration?  When just a week prior you had your extended family celebration with more like THIRTY people!  

We don't give a lot of gifts on Christmas, but the stockings are sort of amazing.

We take turns opening our actual gifts one at a time, but the stockings are fair game.  Just open!

It worked so well for the extended family, that we went simple on all of the meals again for Christmas Day.  This year my sanity was worth more than the fancy table and food!

Opening the gifts after breakfast.

Jen had been playing with her new doll for a little while when all of a sudden it started singing.  At first it scared her, and she jumped - but then she realized that the doll had just scared her and she threw her head back and laughed, and laughed, and laughed!

Tikvah helping Isaac get his Wii drum out of its box.

And add a guitar and we have a band!

Each of the younger kids got a set of the Magformers.  They were a big hit!

It was a low key day with just our family, and we enjoyed it a lot!

Awaited

Since adopting children "from hard places" it just doesn't work for us to run around and keep crazy hours, especially when things are so out of the usual experience on the holidays.  We do, however, try to pick a few things that will be meaningful and memory builders.  This year we chose again to make the show "Awaited" one of the things that we would make room for in our schedules.

Awaited is a creative retelling of the Christmas story, presented by one of the larger churches in the Cincinnati area.  They have written their own musical score, have highly skilled musicians that perform it, and the costumes and special effects are nothing short of amazing.  For instance, that was actually a camel suit with a couple of people inside it that just walked through, but wow!  It surely looked real!

There were giant fiber optic flowers carried by performers, dancers seeming to fly from the ribbons hung from the ceiling, and it even snowed - inside!

An experience unlike any other, it was well worth keeping the kids out late.  I hope we can go again next year!

The Shepherd's Crook Orphan Ministry

   The Shepherd's Crook Orphans Ministry has set up a dedicated fund to receive contributions on behalf of Susy, and to help defray the costs of her adoption. If you aren't familiar with them, they are a (local to us) non-profit organization dedicated to finding safe and loving homes for special needs orphans.

The costs of international adoption are overwhelming for a family budget, and we would be hard pressed to complete one without the kindness and generosity of friends and family who see the great value in these children and help in a tangible way.

If you would like to be a part of helping us to get Susy home you may send a check to:

The Shepherd's Crook Orphan Ministry
P.O. Box 773
West Chester, OH 45071 

Please specify on the Memo line that it is a gift for Susy being adopted by Ethan and Randi Lanz.

If it is more convenient, you may  donate online here.

Thank you so much for your love for the orphan and your kindness towards us!

Awesome News!

Whoooooooooooooooooooooooot!  Do you hear me yelling over here?  Last week I asked my Facebook friends to pray for my skinny minny Little Miss who is waiting on the other side of the world.  I have been so very concerned for her as she does not seem to be thriving.  After sharing some of the details with our homestudy agency I was surprised to hear that the lady with whom I had been speaking does some volunteer work in China, and might be able to help if the orphanage was willing to accept it.

This note arrived a few minutes ago.  "I just wanted to send you a quick note to let you know I was able to talk with some LWB staff and we are able to send the best high calorie formula for six year olds to Susy's orphanage for her .  We will send 1 case for now and see how she does.  I hope this will help improve her health/nutrition while she waits for her family."

Please keep praying for the safe delivery of this case of formula and that they will actually get Susy to drink it!  Such wonderful news!

Five in a Row Curriculum -- Owl Moon

Owl Moon* is a delightful story of a little boy who has waited to be "big enough" to go out after bedtime with his dad to look for an owl.  This unit unfortunately fell between Thanksgiving and Christmas so I did a poor job of remembering to take photos or notes, sorry!

An especially good conversation starter for our family was talking about the rules the little boy had to follow in order for the owling experience to be successful.  That led into why WE have certain rules in our household that must be followed for everyone to stay safe and provide a calm and neat atmosphere in our home.

We also discussed flexibility - the father was flexible in allowing the little boy to stay up late -- and how sometimes we are flexible to allow for special events.  With the holidays upon us this was a good discussion!  Our children (who spent years in an orphanage) really depend on routine, but holidays call for being flexible!

It was actually a warm (for winter) sunny day so we went out to investigate shadows.  Here is where I say "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" because I know I took photos and they are just gone.  They had a good time chasing their shadow and guessing what other shadows were from -- ie the van, the house, etc.

Another thing my children really enjoyed was learning about the tracks that different animals make in the snow.  One can find several books along this subject line and here are a few that we enjoyed:

After learning about different types of tracks they worked on pictures where they stamped the foot print of various woodland animals and stamped and/or drew their habitat.

 

We studied a little about the moon itself and its different phases.  For a sensory experience in learning about it check out episode 9 of The Treeschoolers (from Signing Time) "In this episode, Simon gets worried when he sees the moon slowly disappearing! As Rachel and the TreeSchoolers set out to solve “The Mystery of the Missing Moon,” they learn about the sun, moon, stars, planets and the scientists whose questions and curiosity led to important discoveries about our universe."

We read several books about various types of owls (and I regret not getting the titles written down before returning them to the library!)  But probably the most favorite thing about this unit was watching a movie called  Owl Power on Netflix  It was so fascinating that the kids asked to watch it a second time - when it wasn't school time, just for fun!

I hope you won't let my holiday neglect of record keeping give the impression that this book was a dud.  Give it a try!  There is a lot of fun learning to be had!


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