God uses the tired...

I am tired.

In every sense of the word, I am plain exhausted. 

It has been quite the year at our house. We started the year off with finding out the my mom had cancer... and the very next week we found out we were very unexpectedly expecting a new little bundle. We spent the spring time with me traveling back and forth to Missouri to spend time with my mom and being super sick pregnant and all the exhaustion that comes along with it.

My mom died. She loved the Lord and even though I know she is in a better place than this broken world, it is hard. It is a gut wrenching, emotionally draining, physically exhausting kind of difficult to lose my mom. Thinking of doing the holiday season without her makes me emotionally exhausted. I really miss her.

And then October came and we had a baby. And that is an entirely different kind of tired. This baby is amazing and wonderful and I didn't even know how much I needed this little guy, but by golly... I'm tired. I've done it 4 times before, so I thought I could jump back into it... but it has been a while and I am a tad out of practice with the up every 2 hours. 

On top of that... there is just life. Life of having 4 other children that are involved in activities, have school projects, trying to build their character without crushing their spirit,  a husband that works and travels... it's just life, and everybody does it... but sometimes y'all, we just get tired.

But guess what? God uses the tired. He uses the exhausted, run down, don't know how to add something to your plate person in the most beautiful and unlikely ways. 

If you know me personally, or have ever read my blog, you know the Lord likes to use my children to get messages across to me. God uses these little people in my life to do HUGE, AMAZING, WORLD CHANGING things. 

If you don't know... here it is from the beginning...
Several years back, my husband and I decided that we needed to scale back on Christmas. We celebrate with Santa in this house, but we wanted to make Christmas about giving rather than receiving. So we decided that Santa would bring 3 gifts to our kids on Christmas morning, and our gift to our children was to give them $50 each that they have to spend on someone else. 

The first year we did it, it was really more fun for us to watch than them I think. :) We got the Samaritan's Purse catalog and they spent the longest time looking through deciding what to do with their money. Did they want to buy chickens, or goats, or school supplies, or medical supplies, or combine their money and buy something bigger like a donkey? It did this momma's heart good to watch them spend hours looking through to decide what to give others. I think all in all that year we ended up with mosquito nets, chickens, school supplies for 50 children, and a goat. Not too shabby for $200.

The next year when they were looking through the catalog in October, Brayden (8 years old at the time) was reading each section. He was very thoughtfully reading the description of what each thing would provide, and trying to make the best choice he could with his $50. He said, "I think we should supply clean water for Christmas." I told him, that he didn't have enough for the hand held water pumps. They would clean water for 1 household for up to 3 months. But it was $250. I told him he would have to convince his brother and sisters to combine their money, and then they would have to try to raise $50. He said, "No Mom, for a whole village. I want clean water for the whole village." I kind of laughed and said, "well buddy, that is $10,000. I don't have $10,000. We only have $200." He looked at me with the most sincere and serious face and said, "well... we have to try."

That is where the idea was born. I could not turn him down. I knew it was a long shot, but I wanted him to know we did everything possible. I wanted him to know God could do BIG things. So scared to death, we let the kids write a letter to friends and family.

We spent the next 2 months doing so many little odds and ins chores for generous people. The kids were 3, 5, 7, and 8... so we were a tad limited on what we could do. But people came up with some crazy awesome things for these little people and we did it! Sorting Legos, picking up sticks and pinecones, decorating Christmas trees, feeding farm animals, addressing Christmas cards, making Christmas cards... if people thought of it, we tried to do it! We baked about 9 million cookies for cookie exchanges and Christmas parties. The kids went through all their toys and started selling them. They gave their birthday and Christmas money to the cause.  A local paper picked up the story, and MOPS international picked up the story. We had all kinds of people sending money in that were far away, but wanted to help us reach our goal! Any where from $2 to a $2,000 donation came in. It was unbelievable and humbling.

As we got into December we learned that Christian Relief Fund (another amazing organization) had an anonymous donor that would be willing to match whatever we raised! We were so excited! All in all the kids ended up reaching the goal and building the well! It was such an AMAZING lesson for my children God can do ANYTHING! February of 2014 when the well was dug, they sent us pictures and it was the amazing awesome feeling all over again!

Every now and then we check in to see how things are going in the village where the well was built. We received this message from our contact in the village: "Chemurgui Well has given amazing help to the community here; in fact, this is the busiest well in that location.  Because of this particular well, we have planted a church here and the community has been touched. This is the place we have built our Bible school: Victory Christian Training Institute.  In fact, it became favorable for the training because there is plenty of water there, thanks to the donor. The Bible School students use the water from here; the church uses the water from here; the community uses the water from here; the children likewise.
Because of the busy use of the well, the cry of the community is to help them put a solar and a submersible pump and tank on it so it can increase its flow in the community. Water can be pumped by the solar pump and run everywhere. The school is also working on horticulture, once water can run to the farm. I don't know if the donor is comfortable to help with this number one need. However there are other several small needs, such as goats and cows to help the area."

So last year God moved in ways beyond our wildest dreams. The kids had a goal of earning $6,500 to provide the solar pump for the village. We sold pasta sauce and salsa and did a few odds and ends jobs, but God provided us with an amazing partner WE HELP TWO... we had no idea what was about to come. 

The socks gave us so many opportunities to reach people. We got to share with kids in the public school system about Kenya and solar well pumps. We got to educate people about homeless and needy in our area. When delivering socks we got to share our story. People from all over the United States jumped on our crazy sock bandwagon... and it was AWESOME! I watched my children become little evangelist... sharing our story and what God was doing with total strangers. It was the best Christmas present I received!

The generous hearts of people from all over the United States raised $8,029.33 to help a little village in Kenya! We were so much beyond the goal of $6,500  that they purchased beds, and mattresses, and lots of goats and chickens for the community in addition to the solar well pump!

And beyond helping the village on the other side of the world, y'all bought a ton of funky socks! And with the generous WE HELP TWO we provided 550 pair of warm socks that were distributed all over the state of Maryland, Washington DC, Missouri, and a few states in between for people in need over the winter time. And not only that... but 174 pair of fun funky socks for kids in the hospital!

I'm going to be super honest here... I had ZERO intention of doing any sort of fundraising/outreach this year. 

ZERO.

We were still going to let the kids spend their $50 each on helping someone, because that is our Christmas gift to them. We feel that is important. So on the way to school last week we were discussing what they wanted to spend their money on. Their reply: "What about the socks?" I told them I wasn't really planning on doing anything this year. It had been a really hard year and I thought we would take the year off. They had such disappointed looks on their faces. And then that little voice from the Lord... "When have I ever taken time off?" Dang it! Conviction through the eyes of my children. 

Y'all... I'm tired- remember? But you know what... God uses the tired. 

Matthew 11:28-30“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

These kids constantly remind me, life is so much bigger than me. There are so many ways the Lord can use us. God does the real work... we are just the hands and feet.

Here are the kid's goal for this holiday season:

-Buy a cow for the Chemurgui village

-Provide needed supplies for the school there

-Put warm socks on 200 local people in need

How can you help?

- Pray. Pray, pray, pray that we reach the people that need to be reached and that we continue to make this about God and what He can do.

-Buy socks! We are SUPER excited to be partnering with We Help Two again this year! They have new prints that are super cute! If you are so excited and can't wait to order you can go

HERE, but we are working out a few details and will post more on the official sock campaign later this week.

-Sponsor shipping cost for warm socks.

-Spread the word. Share our story.

We are so excited to see how God works this year! 

This is a wild (and exhausting :) ) life... thanks for joining us on the journey!