What a whirlwind of a weekend.  Full of faith building moments that culminated with an official court date in September and a little paperwork miracle!

Several friends are working with our family to put on an event to raise funds and celebrate the arrival of the 2 newest Cockerham kids.  One problem:  no venue.  Chris and I began Friday morning praying if an event was a way that He wanted to involve family and friends in our fund raising, that He would need to help us find a spot.   Of course facebook is the place to get ideas for all things from how to get grape juice out of your carpet and where to a find a location that could host several hundred of your friends.  Moments later there were several posts, one of which was conveniently located in Holly Springs.  The sweet couple graciously invited us over that afternoon and showed us around their farm.  We decided it would be a wonderful venue and so we set a date and were off and running.

A few hours later I received a phone call informing us that we had received a court date for guardianship of our kiddos.  Wow.  This meant we had were once again expedited to pull off preparing to travel and fund raise in just a few short weeks.  It also meant that we would be ABSENT from the original date of our planned party–as we would already be in Africa!

But more than the party I was concerned about the paperwork.  Our dossier is about 99% complete but my certified birth certificate is taking its sweet time traveling from IL to NC.  To keep our court date we needed to mail our dossier to UG by Wednesday of this week.  My birth certificate could come now or 2 weeks from now.  I had called and they were unclear what the status was.  Not helpful.  To expedite, it would have been tremendously expensive and honestly still would not have been done by Wednesday.  Once again we prayed.  Saturday we prayed, “Lord if you want us in UG for our court date and don’t want us to reschedule for a later date…please bring the birth certificate via mail today.”   Typically I am NOT a “give me a sign” kinda girl…I don’t think it is fair to God or really how he typically works.  I tabled the b-certificate and decided to compile my dossier and really get it in “good order” to be mailed if by some miracle the b-cert showed up in the mail.  I was going through my gagillion file folders full of random documents and came across about 5 copies of my birth certificate–all photo copies.  I saw one particularly worn looking copy–yellowed–but was still convinced it was a photocopy.   I ran my fingers over the corner and realized it was in fact a CERTIFIED COPY of my birth certificate.  So the postman was not the hero…but God made it clear…we were to prepare for our court date in September.  

One phone call to The Family Farm told us that they were available Labor Day weekend and so with one quick presto chango we are “on” for a party on September 2nd!  I hope you will be able to join us!

I know there are MANY unknowns we will face in UG with the judicial system, paperwork, passports, embassy, and life in Africa.  I have heard that it can be a tremendously awesome and faith-building time.  (Read through this super spiritual wording…a.k.a. SUPER CHALLENGING and STRESSFUL.)   Today looking at the past 48 hours I feel God used these little blocks to build our faith…to remind us that this adventure is far bigger than ourselves…

Thank you for joining us on this adventure.  We are SO grateful for your love, support, and prayers!

May You Be A Blessing and May You Be Blessed!

Jenni