Bake Sale

We had the privilege of sharing with our church today... telling them about our plans to go see Tejan next summer and offering the opportunity for others to join us...

We also had a bake sale to begin our fundraising efforts.

I baked ALL week. A few friends brought over things they had baked, and we had oodles of cookies, breads, muffins, scones and even some fudge, caramel apples and my favorite, cinnamon bun popcorn for sale.

We had dinner with some friends Saturday night and they asked me how much money we were hoping to make. I told them I had no idea... I wasn't planning to price things, but planned to set out a donation jar and let people give whatever they felt like giving. In the back of my mind I was hoping for around $500.

The sharing went well. I was able to tell a bit of our history with Tejan, explain our desire for others to come with us, shared that we had sponsorship profiles if anyone wanted to support COTN that way. (Our church has a really fluid congregation, with about 80% college students, so most of our current congregation were not around back in 2007/2008 when T. lived with us.) I was thrilled to get two kids sponsored... who had both been waiting for quite awhile for sponsors, one of whom we personally know!

People came out between services, talked to us about the trip and bought treats... we sold almost everything. After the second service, we packed up, came home and gathered around on the living room floor to count the donations.

I opened the lid to my covered oatmeal cannister, again, hoping for several hundred dollars and trying not to get my hopes up too high... I have just the teensiest bit of faith... I want to believe God is going to provide, but I'm still learning.

I assigned different denominations of money to each person. Ethan gathered up the $20 bills, Savannah the tens, Kyler the fives, Asia the ones and I found all the checks. When we had split up all the money, we began to count. Ethan counted his twenties. When he got up to $800, I began to cry. We kept counting, adding everything up to the grand total of $1822.95.

I am blown away by God's provision.

Granted, we still need a lot more money before the trip becomes a reality.

But I really didn't expect to make anywhere near that amount by selling baked goodies in my church foyer.

Thank you, Jesus.

And thank you, New Community, for getting behind us so enthusiastically.

I am humbled and thrilled and SO excited.