Julie Gumm - Author

Great orphan conference

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If you are passionate about the orphan there are two large “main” conferences each year. First is the Christian Alliance for Orphans Summit, the second is Together for Adoption. The latter is going to be in Phoenix in October so you’ll hear plenty about that later this summer and fall. In fact I will personally hound all my friends until you sign up.

But I’m getting super excited for CAFO which is May 12-13 (so I’ll spend my birthday in airports) in Louisville, KY. Last year CAFO was my first orphan conference and I loved every bit of it. So much awesome worship and energy coming from like-minded people. Fantastic keynote speakers and so many great breakout sessions it’s hard to choose.

We’ve got a couple World Orphans staff people presenting breakouts and taking part in panel discussions related to what we do as an organization. Then I get to share about a personal passion of mine – creative fundraising for adoption.

Mark and I did our entire adoption debt free and I know that the cost is what holds a lot of people back from adopting. I want to help them understand that there are so many ways that you can raise funds. I don’t want dollar signs to stand in ANYONE’s way.

Registration is up and there’s tons more details on the web site.

Help a girl with her Starbucks addiction!

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There is power in numbers. We want 2011 to be the year that World Orphans starts a movement of people who care about orphans and want to spread the message. So much that our boss has thrown out a little challenge to us staff members and is bribing us w/ Starbucks gift cards out of his own wallet 🙂 There’s a competition to see who can recruit the most members to two causes on Facebook (see links below).

Help orphans AND fuel my caffeine addiction – it’s a double win 🙂 The competition ends at our staff retreat in just a couple of weeks.

Will you take two minutes and “JOIN” both these causes? (These link give me “credit” as the recruiter.) Feel free to post them on your FB as well 🙂

World Orphans

Traffic Jam (Our anti-trafficking campaign)

Help get this beautiful boy home!

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A couple days ago during my daily blog reading I came across the story of Davids, a 15 year old boy from Latvia, who was in urgent need of an adoptive family. It is not uncommon to see urgent pleas for a child on someone’s blog. But there was something about this particular boy that tugged at my heart. Maybe because he’s a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, LEGO-loving boy like Noah.

You can read the whole story here, but basically Davids got to come to the states last summer during an orphan host program. His host family was not able to adopt him but felt led to host him and advocate for him while he was here. Well last July they had a family commit to adopt him and they thought things were proceeding normally. Davids was told (and was ecstatic) but just days ago it was discovered that this family was backing out of the adoption.

The seemingly insurmountable obstacle was that Davids only had until Jan. 23rd to have a homestudy-ready family commit to adopt him and get an I-800 filed. On the 23rd he turns 16 and he is no longer adoptable – giving him a bleak future.

But PRAISE GOD that in just the last couple of days as Davids story has made the rounds of Facebook and blogs, a family has BEEN FOUND.

There remains just ONE obstacle – funds. Even with some fees being waived this amazing Christian family is going to need $15,000-20,000 to complete the adoption.

Project Hopeful has agreed to allow TAX DEDUCTIBLE donations for Davids’ adoption. Just REMEMBER to put DAVIDS in the comments box so this money goes directly into HIS fund! I’m personally familiar with Project Hopeful and they are a completely trustworthy organization. Be assured that your money WILL get to this adoptive family.

Will you consider donating? Even just $5 – it all adds up as Davids’ story is told. Yesterday alone $1,000 was raised.

It is obvious to me that God has an amazing plan for this young boy and you get to be a part of it by giving.

Please also repost to your blog and Facebook if you feel led.

Update: As of about 8:30 a.m. this morning the fund has reached $4,000 – what a blessing! Keep it going!

1pm Update: Donations are just over $8,000!!! Go God!

8 pm update: $10,000 raised in just 24 hours. A miracle! About another $6,00o is still needed.

Updated 1/14: Here’s a link to the family that is adopting Davids (and another boy from Latvia).