These are the feet that belong to our DAUGHTER!!!

What a whirlwind this journey has been .. We started out in India, switched to China, then back to India.

In January we were matched with Little Panda in China. Then God closed door after door. None of it made sense at the time. After much prayer, we went back to the India program and we rejoiced in June when we found out Little Panda had a family!!! Once our homestudy was approved by India, we dug in to wait for a match. We waited six weeks... then we were matched with a precious, three year old little girl. Unfortunately her orphange would not respond to repeated email requests for photos, videos, or health information. We asked India to intervene and the orphanage still would not reply. Week after week seemed to drag on. This was a very difficult time since school had started and that's already stressful enough, then the added anxiousness of waiting.. and waiting..After seven agonizing weeks we prayerfully decided to withdraw the match at the advice of our case worker. This was another difficult and confusing time for us. A day or two later a little love showed up on the database. Barely four years old. Our case worker had not seen her.. until we had released our first match. I knew when I saw her, she was ours!

And here we are, in love with a teeny 4 year old butter bean from India! She's beautiful - fearfully and wonderfully made. I wish we could tell you more but we can't share her photos, her name (which we are keeping), or where she's from on the internet so you'll just have to take our word for it.. She is just gorgeous. This time everything makes sense.. all the road blocks, the waiting (we started this adoption in Sept 2014, over a year ago!), the confusion.. none of the roads would have led to her at any other time than right now. HIS perfect timing... Which admittedly isn't always easy for my flesh to accept.

This is a text we received last month when we were matched with sweet Miss SJ 

Thank you for praying with us and we covet your prayers as we endure the long wait to bring her home! We anticipate it taking about 12 months since we have to amend our home study and immigration documents before we can wait for India to begin their process of clearances and court proceedings. Of course we pray it's much quicker than that but adoption is unpredictable so we know to expect the unexpected.

We are rejoicing that these are the feet that belong to our precious daughter! 

We are SO SO close to an adoption UPDATE

DYING to spill to beans but we'll wait a bit longer...... besides..... changing the subject here...  so many of you have asked for me to bring back the old "My heart is for India" shirts and I'm honored they've been loved by so many but.. I wanted to come up with something a little different this time. Fund the Nations helped design this snazzy shirt and ALL proceeds will help bring our little love home from India. They are available in youth sizes too (extra small and up)!!! I'm really excited about that!

These are a soft style shirt and run a little small so order a size up if you need to.

The shirts are $20 ($3 extra if you need them shipped to you). If you need more than one shirt shipped, I may be able to combine shipping, please ask.

To order, you can Pay-Pal $20 to natashachalker@gmail.com with your size and address. Deadline to order is October 23. Local friends, can get cash or checks to me, no shipping fees if you come get them from me. :)

2XL and 3XL shirts are $2 extra.

Thanks for having a heart for India, too! #myheartisforindia

SHOE DRIVE!

Hello friends! As we wait to be matched with our Indian daughter, (update : we were matched in September These are the feet that belong to our daughter ) we've embarked on a gigantic fundraiser. We have until March 12, 2016 to collect 10,000 pairs of new or gently used shoes. The shoes will be sent to developing countries to be sold, providing income for less fortunate people and some of the shoes will be recycled. If we collect 10,000 pairs our adoption agency will receive $5,000 on our behalf. That pays for two plane tickets to India. Travel is the biggest expense in international adoption so this will help so much! I kept wondering how or if I could pull this off and whenever doubt creeps in, I remember, Matthew 19:26 :: with God all things are possible.

So far I've bagged up 300 pairs and I have at least 300 more in my garage that I haven't been able to sort yet. UPDATE - we are at 6,000 pairs of shoes!!!

As I tie the laces of tennis shoes and rubber-band sandals and heels together, I pray over these shoes that will make their way to the other end of the world. I think about what men, women and children might wear these shoes. I wonder what their stories might be ....and the same for those who will be selling the shoes and earning a meager income.

If you would like to join our story, and their story, please contact me and I will be willing to pick up shoes for local friends (Enterprise, Dothan, Ozark). Also, we will be in Mobile August 29 and I can get shoes from our Mobile friends that weekend. 

Thank you so much! Be blessed!

Finalized, registered, approved and waiting

Things are moving along as we work to bring sister home. It's been almost a year since we announced our plans to adopt again. This journey has not been without bumps, twists, turns, ups and downs which is typical of international adoption! 

Our homestudy was finalized in early May which is a huge praise since we started it in October. Changing programs and agencies will throw lots of kinks into *our* plans but His plans are best so we are resting in that now. We were registered in India May 13 and India approved our homestudy June 19 (while I was serving in India on a mission trip no less!). Now we are just waiting to be matched with a little girl between the ages of 3 and 7. I wake each day and check my email for a message saying we've been matched since India works while we are sleeping. So far no such message but I know God is working. He has chosen our daughter, He is preparing her heart and ours. We will see her face soon so until then we are soaking up the last days of summer before it's time to head back to school.  We are moving bedrooms around at home so sister can have big brother's old room which is right next to Ryan's. While in India I found some things to decorate her room with... Lots of color, lots of India! Can't wait to start working on that! 

A heart for Nepal

Back in mid March I started receiving phone calls from a number in Nepal. At first I thought it was a telemarketer or scammer so I didn't answer. The calls always came during the morning or evening, but never at night while I was sleeping which would be daytime in Nepal. I googled the number but didn't come up with anything other than the number orginated in Nepal. After 2-3 calls, the caller started leaving voicemails. Nothing was said but I could hear background noise in a cracking, hollow sort of way that made me believe the person on the other line was across the world, possibly in Nepal. I became intrigued after the calls continued and returned a call one afternoon. We both said hello to each other but we couldn't understand much else so I hung up. I couldn't figure out why someone from halfway around the world would want to call me and how this person even got my phone number. Not long after that I signed up to join a mission trip India with a possible side trip to Kathmandu, Nepal. The calls continued over the next few weeks, usually going straight to my voicemail. On April 25, Nepal was rocked by an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.8. Since then there have been over 100 aftershocks and larger earthquakes. The phone calls stopped for about a week, then on April 30 I received another voicemail from this same number. I was relieved that the person on the other line was ok even if I didn't know him personally. I was trying to piece together what God wanted me to do with this information about Nepal, and  I pulled up at church to the VBS sign that read the VBS theme was Mount Everest which happens to be in Nepal. I told God, Ok, I'm listening... but still confused about Your will here.....

Not long after that I connected with a Christian woman who lives in India who was asking people to support an orphanage in Nepal that had been damaged by the earthquake. We follow each other on Instagram. :) I later found out that this orphanage, Langtang Children's Home, is a home for disabled children in Kathmandu. Their home was damaged and the children were and still are sleeping/living in tents in an open field. They've had to move their tents to the streets and other "safe" areas after multiple aftershocks. To add insult to injury, this children's home lost their monthly sponsor just a month before the earthquake which is when I started receiving the calls from Nepal. Currently they need immediate relief and another sweet soul I met has set up a Go Fund Me page to help with current needs:

http://www.gofundme.com/langtang

I have yet to receive another call from my "friend" in Nepal since I became connected with Langtang children's home. I know God used this person to open my heart to God's hurting people in Nepal because I know so very little about the country itself other than it's a neighboring country to India and home of Mount Everest. These people have endured so much over the past month - earthquakes, aftershocks, storms, flooding, landslides. Everything they've known has been ripped away from them and it breaks my heart that vulnerable children have to experience tremendous heartache. I'm praying about a permanent way to help Langtang children's home find a new sponsors. I'm open to ideas and suggestions so if you have any, please use the email tab and send me a message (yellow triangle on the banner to the right).  I'm also looking at a possible mission trip to Nepal as well so if you'd like to be a part of that, please let me know. 

Adoption Update

It's been such a slow homestudy process waiting for our oldest to turn 19. Her  fingerprints and clearances were stuck at the FBI and deemed "unclassifiable" so we had to contact ABI and get that squared away. We are really hoping this home study will be complete by the end of the month since we started it in October....

We also had to make the very difficult decision to withdrawn our letter of intent for Little Panda. It was gut wrenching but God has confirmed that we made the best decision several times even though I don't understand much of it. I've spent the last several weeks grieving for a little girl I never met and most likely never will. I have to believe there's a reason we were connected with her and I hope and pray we find out that reason this side of heaven. Would you please pray that Little Panda's mama and daddy will find her ?  

As for adoption, we are still moving forward but have transferred back to the India program. Once our homestudy is finished we'll start on the Indian dossier. 

Thanks for praying for Little Panda. God hears all your prayers, especially those said for his precious children. 

Birthday Reflections

My thoughts were so heavy last week as I reflected on this precious kid and all that's he has endured in just one year with us and three years on this earth...

When he wakes he will be three. On his birthday, I know his first mom must be thinking of the baby boy she said goodbye to... I wish I could show her how much we LOVE him and I pray I'm doing right by him. I hope that she would be proud of how we are raising him. I wish I could send her a picture of him eating spaghetti with tomato sauce all over his face. Could she ever imagine he would be living in the US? I wish I could share a video of him pointing to each person in our family and hear him say the words FAMILY. Could she ever imagine THIS family for him? I wish she could hear him when he looks at pictures of babies or animals and hear the words, "awww cute". Could she ever imagine he would speak English? I have so much adoration for this brave woman. I can't fathom ever having to make such a sacrifice.. This year I pray there are less women in India and around the world that will have to choose adoption for their children. All families should be able to stay together and I'm forever thankful to be Ryan's plan B. We love our little chocolate muffin and can't imagine life without him.