All three got their matching grants!!!

Elizaveta, Aubree and Raymond all made their matching grants!!!

 

Thank you so much!

 

We made it on the very last day, but the donor still had a little something left over for Rita.

 

But they are not ready to reveal the amount just yet.

 

Stay tuned!

Victoria has a family!!!

Remember Victoria?

Well that little sweetheart has a family!

 

Victoria had been waiting on RR for YEARS.

 

But once she was found all the advocates for Victoria started celebrating all over the Internet!

 

Here's a post our friend Julia wrote while crying.

Here's a post our friend Mandy wrote while packing to go adopt Igor.

Here's a post our friend Pamela wrote while jumping up and down.

Here's a post our friend Cheryl wrote while screaming and yelling.

Here's a post from Beth's blog devoted to adovcating for Victoria.

Here's a post from my own blog.

 

You wanna see Victoria's new family?

 

The Sayer family!

 

And guess what?! They are already an AMC family!

 

Jeri emailed Bring Hope during our Rita sharing campaign. Rita had a commitment so they started praying about adopting another AMCer.

 

After writing back and forth about Victoria we got the best email in the world from Jeri. It read: "My husband just got home and saw all the stuff you and Sarah have sent to us.....and we are ready to do this!"

 

!!!

 

Read more about their family here.

 

Mysterious Bonus for Rita

Bring Hope: "So can you tell me more about this 'bonus for Rita' that you are dangling like a carrot over this matching grant?"

Anonymous donor: "What kind of hint do you want?"

BH: "Is it money, well-wishes, flowers... trading cards?!"

AD: "Haha, definitely monetary."

BH: "So....... a million dollars? Two million?!!"

AD: "Three million! Okay no. Actually the money came from a retirement account I had forgotten about that wasn't very large. So there's a definite cap on what I can give. And you know I believe the Bible says to care for orphans, but it also says to care for widows, hurting, lonely, our neighbors and to care about injustice. So there are lots of causes to consider. I came to you first only because you bother me endlessly about helping."

BH: "We'd like to think of it as 'encouraging.'"

AD: "You would."

BH: "So why not tell the bonus number and not leave us all guessing?"

AD: "Because as days go by that number shrinks."

BH: "As you give it away?"

AD: "As we give it away. And if you meet all three matching grants by October 31st, there will definitely be a few dollars as a bonus for Rita. But let's just say if you make your goals faster there will be a bigger bonus for Rita. So I can't say the number because that number changes."

BH: "So if we make Aubree and Elizaveta and Raymond's matching grants today, say, then how big would the bonus be?"

AD: "Big."


We love our anonymous donors and we definitely play by their rules! To donate to Elizaveta click here. To donate to Aubree click here. To donate to Raymond click here.

Rita's new family!

Mayr family 2010

 

 

Mayr kids and the dog 2011

Mayr family 2012 (dad taking picture)

 

 

 

 

Rita has a family! The Mayr family has stepped up to start the process of adopting her! Meet the Mayr family! From Kelly Mayr:

 

Paul and I got married on a mountain top in Colorado in July 1997. We bought a house, got a dog and then were pregnant all in the first three months LOL. Our oldest son Jack was born in May 1998. Grace was born in 2000. She was our entrance into the world of special needs. She was diagnosed with Noonan syndrome at one year old. Today she is 12 and doing great. Next we had our back to back boys 15 months apart.....Daniel and Michael. The last in our troop was Maggie. We realized that we were done having babies, but not done growing our family. We started doing training to become foster parents. It was at this time that we heard about an 18 year old without a family. Since we always have room for one more, Rose joined our family. We started fostering infants and toddlers in 2011. We tripped across Reeces Rainbow a few year ago. As I tell people "once you know about special needs orphans...you can't 'unknow'." So the plight of orphans with special needs has been heavy on our hearts for a long time. Our daughter Grace has had several bake sales to send money to some of the children on Reeces Rainbow with zero in their accounts. We started our home study at the end of the summer. We were just waiting for the right child for our family. We saw sweet Rita and fell in love. She is just a perfect fit for us! We also felt that her situation was more of an emergency. We couldn't bear the thought of her getting transferred to an adult institution.

 

We usually don't get any family info on the day a family commits to one of our AMCers, but thankfully Kelly had contacted us during the sharing challenge. She was excited to know just how many people shared Rita's profile! As the Mayrs goes through the paperwork to set up a family sponsorship page we will be on the lookout for ways to support them.

 

In the meantime while Rita's situation is working itself out, please considering donating your $12 monthly gifts to either Elizaveta, Raymond or Aubree. We have until October 31st to get their matching grants! Also as an added bonus our anonymous donor has said that if all three AMCers get their matching grants, then there may be an extra bonus in it for Rita (once we can donate to her family). So please please please consider even a small amount towards one of these kids! Thanks!

 



 



Three matching grants in Rita's honor!

We have a MATCHING GRANT!!! Well, not just one, but THREE!!!!!!!!!!

(Ah the wonderful times when your charitable gifts double as if by magic. ;)

A donor has mentioned that she'd love to help kids who have been featured on previous months to catch up some of those fund raising goals that weren't quite met. She wants to offer $500 to Elizaveta, Aubree and Raymond. (For a total of $1,500 for our kids!) Her personal reason for giving is to see if these children have "enough support." If they don't, and we cannot meet the conditions of her grant, then she will put her funds to use elsewhere. (Although not said, I believe she may give more in the future if we show we are behind these kids!)

Oh we'd love to see our kids have that extra money!

Elizaveta

 

Elizaveta (our June child) has a hundred bucks in her grant fund right now. If we get it up to $600 then this donor will put in $500 more!

Aubree

 





For Aubree (our September child) to receive the bonus $500, her grant fund needs to read $615. Right now she has $115 in her account. If we get it up to $615 then this donor will put her over a thousand!

Raymond

For Raymond (our August child) to receive the bonus $500, his grant fund needs to read $1,700. Right now it is at $1,202.60. Getting this matching grant would put him over two thousand! He, like Rita, is close to aging out of his orphanage and be transferred!

Since we cannot give to Rita, let's help catch up some of our kids who could really use the money! Just click on a child's name under their picture to give. If any of our three children reaches their goal they will receive $500 the day that happens. If any of our children cannot raise $500 then they will not receive the $500 matching grant.

This matching grant ends October 31st.

Rita does not have a donation account set up to helf off-set the cost of her adoption. It may be because she's so close to transfer and they don't know where she'll end up. Regardless of the reason, we only have her file for a VERY SHORT TIME. But if a family commits to adopting her then we can donate towards their adoption through a family sponsership page and all is well. (Seriously we just need one family to step forward and save the day!) We do want to help with these costs and people have wanted to continue to give their $12, but we just cannot do that for Rita at this time. What we can do is share her link: http://reecesrainbow.org/?s=rita. And try to find her mommy! I have personally seen about 50 shares on Facebook alone in the last couple of days. Thank you so much!

Sharing Rita

Have you shared Rita with your friends? On Facebook or Twitter or your blogs?

 

I used to be embarrassed to share anything but the occasional George Takei photo on my Facebook wall. I hate sappy stuff. I hate political debates. I even avoid "awareness." I just wanted to keep it light. That's my personality and shouldn't my social media reflect the real me?

But when I wasn't in a position to help financially I found myself wanting to do something. What can I do? Well it turns out sharing on Facebook actually helps needy children find families. Even though I doubted my cousins or high school friends would appreciate it I started to share.

I learned about transfer. How awful that was. I learned about the fate of kids with arthrogryposis in Eastern Europe. I shared more.

 

I have had a person see a child I've posted and say, "Yes, this is my child. Thanks for sharing!" It's an amazing experience. Life changing.

 

Another member of Bring Hope happened to sit next to a stranger one day and happened to mention a girl waiting for a family on Reece's Rainbow. A few weeks later we found out that woman had committed to adopt that girl! Our jaws dropped!  

 

It happens.

 

Yet another member of Bring Hope blogged about a very similar situation where a friend of hers shared a link at the bottom of her email and helped two children find their family! Read about that cool story here.

 

Those are our experiences from this tiny group of women who have our own lives but find the time to occasionally take a few moments to share about orphans. My challenage is that you (yes YOU! Our favorite reader!) share Rita's link. You can share it any way you want. Copy and paste this address: http://reecesrainbow.org/?s=rita.

 

I'd ask for your $12 donations, but Rita does not have donations set up at all. She's desperate for a family and we're desperate not to lose her. Right now we're just sharing.

 

Let's share Rita with her mother.

 

 

~

If you are interested in more information about Rita, or if you have any questions whatsoever, please email Andrea about her. Andrea's email address is andrea@reecesrainbow.org. I have inquired about kids before who I didn't end up adopting, but just so I could get a bit of information about the child, country and process. Andrea responds pretty quickly.

 

 





Introducing our focus for October: Rita!

Rita

 

URGENT: Rita is very close to aging out of her orphanage and transferred to an institution. Maybe you've heard the stories and maybe you haven't, but we're talking about an adult mental institution. This is hell for a child. Rita is seven. She's beloved by the orphanage nannies and director or they would not fight to keep her as long as they have. Most children are transferred between the ages of 3-5.

 

At this time there is no way to set up funds for Rita. Reece's Rainbow doesn't have a donate button set up. We're just desperately trying to find this girl's family.

 

Please share her link (http://reecesrainbow.org/?s=rita) or this post. Please share and find her family.

 

From a medical standpoint, little has to be done surgically since this child is walking and mobile. Without intervention she is already at the place where a lot of us have toiled to get our children.

 

From a personality standpoint, you don't keep a child around past the age of transfer unless they are wonderful. If they are hard on you or your staff you have to transfer them. She is not. She is wonderful. And they have obviously been engaging with her on a level that you don't often see. She has no mental delay! In fact they speak of how smart she is! Even my 22 month old with AMC had a mental delay just from having had no parents or one-on-one attention. Not this girl!

 

To read her bio click here.

 

Are you her mommy? Act now. Act fast. Let's save this little girl from the absolute worst trauma of transfer.