Happy 1st birthday Chase!!

Tonight was a special night for Jon and I. We spent the evening with our friends in ministry (Janie & Matt) celebrating their son's (Chase) 1st birthday! Chase became a part of his forever family a few months ago and is doing great! He is yummy, cuddly, cute, and loves to explore and of course put things in his mouth too! Chase was adopted from The Home of God's Love orphanage in Taiwan, which is where baby Elswick will be adopted from! We are so excited that Chase and baby Elswick will have history together and will be buds! Please continue to pray for the Mehaffey family...what a gracious God we have! P.S. Isnt' Chase so yummy!?!? I just love it!

(Posted by: Melissa E)

BIG UPDATE! :)

Hello dear friends and family!

It’s been about two months since our last post about our adoption process! Phew! There has been a lot going on in the Elswick world…the most time consuming and exciting (aside from the adoption) is our new church plant! We are planting a new church in South Florida (Crossway Church) in January 2010 and have been working very hard with preparations and planning. God has been gracious to us and we are excited to begin this new work!

The reason we haven’t updated for a short while is because we were in the waiting process regarding a change we made in our adoption journey. After much prayer, talks, and seeking wise counsel, we made the decision to stop our adoption to South Korea and turn out attention towards pursuing adoption from a small orphanage in Lo Tung, Taiwan. This is the same orphanage our sweet friends (Janie & Matt) recently adopted their son, Chase, from. Chase will be celebrating his 1-year birthday soon! Golly, time flies!

After successfully completing our Home Study, we met with our social worker to discuss our desire and opportunity to change from South Korea to Taiwan and she was 100% supportive! Her words of encouragement and desire to help us become first-time parents through adoption were so comforting! She truly loves her job and said that it’s not about where you adopt from…her job is to help families become families!

After a series of events, followed by applications, references and some paperwork, we received an email from the orphanage director last night at 12:08 am that we are officially on the waiting list! I, of course, ran upstairs to wake Jon up to share the great news and we are very excited! We still have a lot of work to do throughout the process and promise to keep you update every step of the way.

Now that we have officially made the switch to Taiwan, our updates will become more frequent again. J So, check back often and pray for us! Thank you for coming along on our journey through adoption – what a beautiful one it is!!

Proverbs 16:9 (ESV)

The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.

(Posted by Melissa *E)

Katherine Heigl adopts from South Korea!

Was so excited to hear about Katherine Heigl's adoption from South Korea to a baby girl with special needs! So cool! You can also check out pictures of her lil' beauty here. I love adoption stories! More updates from our adoption story coming soon!

(Posted by Melissa *E)

Love going to the mail!

Extra! Extra! I went to the mail box yesterday and was thrilled to receive our fingerprinting appointment with the USCIS!! We will be heading down to the Hialeah office on August 12th to have our fingerprints taken. This is one more big step in the process! Can I get a yee-haw!?!?

P.S. You can click here to enjoy a short clip of our friends, Janie and Matt, when they arrived in Taiwan at the airport...it's the first few moments of meeting their son, Chase! Love it!

(Posted by: Melissa *E)

Yard Sale - a huge success!!!!

Jon and I are overjoyed from this past Saturday! We hosted (what seemed to be) Broward Counties largest yard sale!!! Haha! The yard sale was held to raise money for towards some of our adoption costs and we are thrilled to announce that we made $2800 dollars!  Yee haw! There are so many people who donated items, helping at the yard sale and made financial contributions - and for that we are so grateful! 

Here are a few pictures from the yard sale to enjoy:

This is the night before with our house filled with goodies to sell!

Jon and I at the yard sale! 

The Claxon Family - who generously offered their home for the yard sale! We love them!

Even Janie & Chase stopped by for a few things! Thanks guys!

Needless to say, the South Florida summer heat did not disappoint! It was extremely hot but nothing a Freeze Pop and ice cold water bottles couldn't cure! We are once again so thankful to everyone for their encouragement, prayers and support during this adventure!

Our hearts are so grateful. We thank our gracious Lord for all of you!

(Posted by: Melissa *E)

Yard Sale & prayer request

Hello family & friends!

Jon and I have been very busy (along with the help of our family & friends whom we are so grateful for) preparing for the Elswick Adoption Yard Sale this Saturday! Woo hoo! We are 3 days away! We have received lots of great donations to sell and are hoping this fundraiser will put a big dent in our next adoption payment due in August. Please pray along with us as we trust in our gracious God to provide all we need financially. This will take us one step closer to Baby Elswick next year!

Also, please visit this blog and join Jon and I in praying for the King family. They were a part of our church family last year and moved due to a job relocation. They are such a wonderful family and we love them dearly. Carson (their son) was just diagnosed with leukemia. Would you join us in praying for him? We would be so grateful.

We will keep you posted on the yard sale...until then remember what they say, "One man's trash, is another man's treasure!"

(Posted by: Melissa *E)

Pursuing Chase - the pursuit has ended! :)

Tonight was a special night for Jon and I! Over the last few months, we have been updating you all about our friends (Matt & Janie) on their adoption process of their son (Chase) from Taiwan...well, tonight we finally got to meet Chase live and in the flesh! Woo hoo! He is even cuter in person and is such a happy and content lil' man! :) Janie and Matt are wonderful parents already and it was such a blessing to talk with them about their travels to Taiwan recently and to ask Janie a bunch of questions about their transition back to the US with their son! This will be a reality for us next year and we are so grateful to have friends locally to talk to and walk with through our adoption journeys. Check out the pictures of the "Chasenator" - isn't he yummy! :) God has shown Janie and Matt His grace and providence through this process and for that we are so grateful. 
 

Rejoicing at the blessing of adoption tonight...

(Posted by: Melissa *E)