Merry Christmas and the Year in Review

   We did not send a letter with our Christmas card this year, but instead provided our blog address. We have not been the best at keeping this up to date, but you can see in the past posts that we have had a great year.  The kids are all doing well in school and their activities.  I will simply provide a few bullet point highlights of a great year:

• We were blessed this past November to celebrate our 15 year wedding anniversary...pretty incredible how time flies!  15 years, 3 kids, and 1 on the way from China!
• To celebrate our 15 years, we returned to San Francisco for the first time since our honeymoon.  Scott had a conference and Nanette tagged along but it was fun nonetheless.  While there, we were able to connect with two of Scott's cousins.
• Scott was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure (a big milestone)
• Nanette has been very busy as a taxi driver--taking the kids to all of their activities.  Bryce played a lot of soccer, Elise played softball and had girl scouts, and Benjamin played baseball and started kindergarten.
• We added a puppy to the family, an 11 pound Shih Tzu named Shelby.

   As I mentioned, we are in the process of our second international adoption.  This time we will be adopting a little girl from China.  We have often received the question why we choose to adopt and even more specifically, why we choose to adopt internationally "when there are children here who need a home too".  The short answer is that we didn't choose to adopt but rather adoption chose us.  As Christ followers, God commands us to care for orphans and widows (James 1:27).  We do not believe that everyone is called to adopt, but we do believe that God wants each of His followers to support and take care of orphans in some form.  A few statistics about orphans: first, it is estimated that there are over 143 million in the world!  Some groups estimate the number could be as high as 200 million, but while the number may not be exact, the fact is there are a lot of children that are living in situations that are not optimal.  If these precious children are not adopted, 10 to 15 percent commit suicide, 25 percent become homeless, 60 percent become prostitutes, and some statistics say that up to 70 percent become hardened criminals.  Every child DESERVES parents and every child NEEDS parents.  We feel like we have been led to make disciples of all nations through international adoption and that is the simple reason why we are going this route.

   Our first adoption was funded solely through the Lord’s provision of enough work for Nanette to provide the necessary resources.  We were able to fund the first adoption without debt, however it took another year or so to replenish our cash reserves with the help of the adoption tax credit, which to our knowledge has been significantly altered for 2013.  The downturn of the economy and the recent changes to the health care system has resulted in Nanette’s work becoming less steady and highly volatile.  Therefore, we will be soliciting donations from family and friends to assist with the expenses associated with bringing home our little girl from China.  We also anticipate that Nanette will stop her part-time work when we bring our little girl home, in order to focus on the attachment/bonding that is critical during the first year home.  This will significantly reduce our monthly income and make it difficult to replenish dipping into our emergency fund.  

If you would like to help, there are two primary ways:
1. Prayer—please pray God would tenderly care for our little girl in China until we are able to bring her home and that God would prepare all of our hearts to be together.
2. Financial support—Please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help us pay the remaining expenses to bring our little girl home.

Our church (www.brookhills.org) and Lifesong (www.lifesongfororphans.org) have graciously given a matching grant of $4,000 to help pay some of the fees.  If you would like to help, you can send your tax-deductible gift to Lifesong, a trusted organization administering the funds on our behalf and will pay adoption expenses out of funds received.  There are no administrative fees charged and 100% will go towards qualified adoption expenses.

Please make checks payable to: Lifesong.  In the memo section of the check, please write “preference Bickel #3150 adoption” to ensure the funds are credited to our account.

Mail checks to: Lifesong for Orphans

                          Att: Bickel/#3150

                          PO Box 40

                          Gridley, IL 61744

We deeply appreciate all the support that our family and friends have demonstrated towards our family.  It is exciting to see how God provides for us in this adventure to bring home our little girl!  Hope that all of your families are well and enjoy the Christmas season celebrating Christ's birth. 

“Father of the fatherless...God settles the solitary in a home...”—Psalms 68:5,6    

PHOTOS FROM 2012

Alcatraz

Golden Gate Bridge

Hiking in Birmingham

Family picture

Fishing fun!

Benjamin's first red snapper!

Elise loves dolphins!

Shelby--the puppy

Fall 2012

Time flies when you're having fun!  We have had a fun and busy Fall.  Benjamin started Kindergarten and is doing fantastic.  He starting to read and is constantly amazing his teacher with what he knows!!  He has tolerated the long days at school like a champ!  Elise is doing well as the oldest in the elementary school (3^rd grade) and enjoying her friends and teacher.  She had a fun fall softball season making new friends.  Bryce has made a very smooth transition to the Intermediate school and we are so blessed to have wonderful teachers.  He is doing great in school and has enjoyed another active soccer season.  He just turned 10 on November 23.  Scott and I are amazed that we have a kid in the double digits!! We celebrated our 15-year anniversary this November and we marvel at all the Lord has blessed us with!  We are so thankful for all He has done in our lives.   Scott was a world traveler this fall, going to China in September and Brazil in October, as well as teaching his classes, research and writing grants!  Nanette continues to work 3 days a week and some weekends to raise finances for the adoption.  Her job has slowed significantly reducing the finances coming in, so we are going to have a fundraiser for this adoption.  (We will have more on that later.)  Everything is on track for adoption #2, our dossier was sent to China in October and we were logged-in on November 13.  This date is significant because all documents have been translated and we are ready to receive a referral for our little girl!!!  The family is very excited and we pray for her every night.  We look forward to what this next year holds for our family!!

Some pictures from Halloween:

 Benjamin--black belt

 Elise - veterinarian

Bryce - hobo

From 5 to 6!

Since last summer, Nanette was feeling lead to adopt another child.  We prayed about it over the next year and then in March, we started the process again!!  We individually prayed about what country, whether to go back to Taiwan or try China.  We both felt led to China.  This was really neat to see God’s hand in this because Taiwan would be the easier route, since we were familiar with it, and China would be special needs!  All the kids were so excited and on board, so we started the process with Lifeline.  We recently heard that Taiwan just closed to international adoptions to focus on domestic adoptions.  One more piece of news that solidified God’s hand in this was that our adoption agency gained 7-8 orphanages from China!  Needless to say, we marvel at how God lead us in this plan.  Our homestudy has just been completed and has been sent for approval.  Our social worker estimates we could travel next Spring or Summer!  Please be in prayer for our little girl!! 

It Has Been a YEAR (since the last post)!

Time keeps ticking and we realized that we have not made an update on the blog for way too long!  So here is the summary of the past year….

We added a puppy (Shelby) this year! 

sports, sports, and more sports this year!

We will start with Bryce…he continues to enjoy playing soccer.  It has been exciting to see him excel, develop his ball handling skills and watching the teams actually starting to maintain their positions and play the game well.  Third grade proposed to be more challenging than previous grades because he actually had to learn to study from chapters in textbooks for the tests.  He did very well and loves math.  He took piano lessons the past year, picked it up very fast and was doing great, but by the end of the year, the excitement had worn off and he was glad it was over.  Bryce also played basketball this year and loved it.  He plays it almost every day in the driveway!  In the Spring, Bryce played for 2 soccer teams (one regular season and one ‘competitive’ team), which kept us busy with practices and games, but it was fun.

Bryce playing soccer!!

Elise tried a new sport in the Fall—softball.  She has not been shy in trying new things but is known for not wanting to continue them once started (we don’t let her quit, but we are ALL glad when the seasons end!)   However, she LOVED softball and it was fun to see her get better as the season progressed.  She had some great coaches that helped her learn the game.  Elise played ball again in the Spring and it was amazing to see how her skills improved and her team won the championship!!  Elise also took piano and like Bryce was very glad when it came to an end.  As far as school, Elise loves to read, P.E., and recess, and that about sums it up!

Elise playing softball!

Finally, Benjamin continues to grow and mature physically and emotionally.  It is very encouraging to see how the dynamics in our family has changed.  Bryce and Elise no longer cater to his every need, but treat him more like an equal sibling.  They all play very well together, so we are very blessed in that way!  Bryce and Benjamin tend to play more together outside being bonded with boy interests.  Benjamin went to pre-school 3 days/week and loved his teacher and made a really good friend named Jake.  To hear him talk about his friend was very exciting!  He played Spring tee-ball and loved it!  He can throw a ball unbelievable and all the coaches and parents noticed.  They would question us on where he learned to throw like he does and we can only say that it is a God given talent!  God has blessed him athletically!

This summer has been wonderful, but is passing fast.  We were able to go to Ohio and visit family.  Scott and I were able to get away for a few days to a conference he was attending in San Francisco, which was such a blessing!  We have been to the beach and had quite the experience with fishing and caught record sized grouper and red snapper (for our boat, at least!)  We are so fortunate to have a boat and my brother who knows where to go to catch these huge fish!  One highlight of the summer was the Back Yard Bible Club that we had the opportunity to participate in at the Birmingham Chinese Christian Church.  We had a great turn out and made lots of friends w/ our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Scott’s job is going well with his research and teaching and he just found out that he was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure!  This is a wonderful answer to prayer and so thankful that God granted him this promotion!  I continue to work 2 days a week with my home health company, Amedisys, which is a great blessing as well.  Well, this about sums up the past year.  Stay posted for the next update….big news coming!