Call us to inquire about your situation and where you would like to be served. At this point, we have connections in 20 different states.

It is too awesome for words. Meeting her adoptive parents was a beautiful, almost spiritual experience. We were all at peace and totally connected. But when you think about it…there is nothing more special that we could have had in common than a child.

I just wanted to thank you for all the help you’ve given me over the last couple of months. You have been very supportive. It has really helped ease some of the pain. You’re such a blessing to so many women in my position. It’s nice to know that someone is looking out for the best interest of the mother, as well as the child.

Thank you so much for helping me place my baby with a loving Christian family. You all have been so wonderful to me. I don’t know what I would have done if it weren’t for you all.

Eighteen years ago we came to CFS and brought this precious baby home. As everyone said, the years have passed unbelievably fast! He will graduate from high school in two weeks. He is an honor student who will be attending college on a scholarship. He loves the Lord and has brought many of his football buddies to the Lord. Thank you for the work you do in changing lives for eternity.

Tuesday, November 1
Begin Adoption Month by celebrating your family’s story and sharing it online! Don’t forget to also write it down or print it out and add it to your lifebook/scrapbook.
Wednesday, November 2
-Light a candle as a family for children in foster care who are still waiting for adoptive families. Set the candle outside in a safe place. Ask your neighbors to join you by lighting a candle as well.
Thursday, November 3
-Have secret pals all month long! Place each family member’s name in a hat and have each person draw one. Secretly perform several acts of service for this person or leave them small treats or gifts. Draw a new name each week.
Friday, November 4
- Contact your local paper and/or news media about National Adoption Month. Encourage them to run a positive story about adoption – consider sharing your own story.
Saturday, November 5
- Write out a family mission statement. Ask each member to write down ideas that they feel are important for a great family to have like respect, sharing, and/or honesty. Include goals and dreams.
Sunday, November 6
- Look for events in your area celebrating National Adoption Month and the focus of foster care adoption.
Monday, November 7
- Read adoption themed poems as a family. Consider writing your own to place in a lifebook and/or to send in to adoption@about.com for possible publication on About Adoption.
Tuesday, November 8
-Work on your life books together. Get out those piles of pictures and saved school papers and add them in. Make a goal for each family member to complete 2 pages.
Wednesday, November 9
-Write a thank you note to a foster care agency and thank them for the work they do to help children. If your child was in foster care consider writing to the social worker or judge from his/her case.
Thursday, November 10
-Contact a children’s organization or foster care agency and ask how you can help. For ideas see Ways to Help Children in Foster Care.
Friday, November 11
- Choose a country and discuss as a family how you may be able to help a child in that country who waits in an orphanage. Try researching on the Internet ways to donate care boxes or money. Check references and beware of scams.
Saturday, November 12
-Create your family tree. Complete one about your child’s birth family (if information is known) as well as your adoptive family.
Sunday, November 13
- Create a fun craft as a family. Great gifts for birth and/or adoptive family. Can be easily saved for future reunions with birth family too.
Monday, November 14
-Do something to keep the children in foster care awaiting permanent homes in your thoughts this month. How about cutting out 107 paper dolls (1 for each 1000 in foster care who need adoptive homes) and display in your windows? How about 107 ribbons tied to the limbs of your trees.
Tuesday, November 15
- If you have one, ask your place of worship to offer a special prayer next Sunday for children in foster care waiting for adoption.
Wednesday, November 16
- Subscribe to an adoption themed magazine or one dealing with a specific culture.
Thursday, November 17
-If your child was adopted internationally display the map of his/her homeland in a prominent place in your home. Make a special dinner that is common in your child’s country. For more ideas read Focus on Culture.
Friday, November 18
- Call your local adoption agency and ask if there is a family who needs mentoring as they wait for a child to be placed in their home.
Saturday, November 19
- National Adoption Day!
Sunday, November 20
- Join an adoptive parent support group in your area. If there isn’t any, consider starting your own.
Monday, November 21
-Rent a movie with an adoption theme and watch it as a family. Pop some popcorn and/or make root beer floats.
Tuesday, November 22
-Ask your child to write a letter to his birth parents. Have your child think of questions, tell about himself, and about your home. Include hand drawn pictures and photos. If unable to send, keep for a possible future reunion. His birth parents will cherish this gift.
Wednesday, November 23
- Donate books about adoption to your local or school library.
Thursday, November 24
-Thanksgiving. Enjoy with family and friends. Go around the table and take turns sharing something that you are thankful for.
Friday, November 25
-Decide as a family to join a toy drive or sponsor a waiting child for Christmas. Join the holiday rush to shop and buy some items for the toy drive or sponsored child.
Saturday, November 26
- Have fun with a book about adoption as a family and enjoy the craft and recipe that goes along with the story.
Sunday, November 27
- Search for music with an adoption theme on the Internet.
Monday, November 28
-As a family create fliers detailing the need for adoptive homes and ask to leave them in places of business or use one of these posters. Don’t forget contact numbers to your local foster care/adoption agencies.
Tuesday, November 29
-Take a family photo today. Have a copy framed for each member of the family to be placed in his/her room.
Wednesday, November 30
- Donate book bags and/or suitcases to a local foster care agency so kids don’t have to use trash bags when moving home to home.

Each year, the focus of adoption month changes to target different areas of need, such as older child adoption, or simply awareness of the huge need for more adoptive homes. This year’s Adoption Month targets adoption professionals by focusing on ways to recruit and retain parents for the 107,000 children and youth in foster care waiting for adoptive families.

This theme continues to build on public service announcements (PSA) by the Ad Council, Children’s Bureau, and AdoptUsKids. This year the campaign is targeted toward the recruitment of adoptive families for preteens or what I’d call school-aged children (8-12 year olds).

History of National Adoption Month
•The basic story behind National Adoption Month started off as a week long celebration in Massachusetts in 1976. Way before it blossomed into the current month long celebration.

Presidential Proclamation
•Each year, the President of the United States makes a proclamation to announce that November is National Adoption Month. (This is updated as soon as the proclamation is made.) Presidential Proclamation for 2010.

National Adoption Day
•Along with the month long celebration is the very special Adoption Day. November 19, 2011, will mark the 12th National Adoption Day. It’s a special day because thousands of adoptions are finalized in court rooms all across the United States. The celebration grows larger each year as more and more states and courtrooms become involved.

On Orphan Sunday, Christians stand for the orphan. We are a people called to defend the fatherless… to care for the child that has no family… to visit orphans in their distress.
We are a people called to prayer and action.

Could you talk to someone in your church about participating in Orphan Sunday this year?
The event is simple:
- Pray for the orphans
and
- Do something to help them.

Maybe this is a simple prayer for the world’s orphans and a special offering to help support the many children that CRF reaches.

Maybe it’s a sermon about helping the least of these and a table with information and sponsorship forms for CRF children who are waiting for a sponsor.

Whatever you can do, we invite you to join us on November 6 in remembering the millions of orphans around the world through prayer and action.

If you would like to organize an Orphan Sunday event, please reply to this email and let us know so we can supply you CRF brochures, child sponsorship packets, or any other materials that you need.

We are blessed to partner with you in caring for orphans!

ORPHAN SUNDAY
NOVEMBER 6, 2011

It is hard to compare which disaster is the worst, but I heard a guy from the U.N. say that the famine in the Horn of Africa is the worst crisis in the last 50 years— and it is hard to argue differently. CRF has been helping in this area for the last two years, but the problem has escalated enormously in the last few months. Since there has been no rain in certain areas of Somalia for two years, people were starving to death. Militant Muslim groups were preventing relief agencies from bringing in food.

As a result, Somalis started fleeing the country to find food. They were hindered and sometimes killed by the same militant groups. Many risked their lives to get to Kenya in order to obtain food. However, Kenyans had been victims of the same famine. When Somali refugees got to the camp of Dadaab, there were over 500,000 there in a place designed for 30,000. And there was very little food. Another camp in Turkana has an even more desperate situation.

Francis Bii, the famine relief leader for CRF in the Horn of Africa, (pictured left) tells stories of mothers having to leave some of their children on the road because of a lack of food. Others found their children dead on their backs at the end of the journey. The stories are staggering. When Francis entered Turkana with food and saw the situation, the only image that seemed to describe it was “hell.”

Christian Relief Fund is there helping. We have the ability to bring food into the worst of the places in the famine. We have been delivering food and water to the refugees and also to those who are starving at their own homes. And we will continue to do so. But we need a lot of help. The price of food there has tripled in the last year.

We are taking food into the large refugee camps at Dadaab and Turkana. We are also helping at places where CRF’s own works have had people starving recently like Barwessa and Eruli. We are drilling water wells as fast as we can. We need you to help us with funding. But we need you to also pray for rain. Francis said that the people there no longer believe that God sends water from the sky. But I still haven’t
given up hope. Please give. Please pray. – Milton Jones, CRF President

For more information go to: crfinfo@christianrelieffund.org

On April 27th, tornadoes ripped through Cullman, Alabama , destroying or heavily damaging 910 home and 98 businesses. Fortunately, the Cullman Church of Christ and Childhaven, Inc. were located in the first electrical grid to recover electricity. Immediately, disaster relief efforts were begun, with the congregation and the children’s home working together to meet needs. We are neighbors – our facilities next door to one another, an easy stroll!

Relief efforts included providing hot meals to thousands, providing cleaning supplies, food, hot showers, chain saw crews, coordinating volunteers, coordinating and storing relief supplies, providing refrigeration for donated fresh food stuffs, and a host of other immediate activities. Childhaven assisted her home congregation by providing volunteers (including the Chhildhaven children who worked registration tables, prepared food, served on food lines in several relief locations, and helped unload and distribute supplies,) refrigeration and storage space for supplies, and relief coordination services. Though the date of this release is the last day for providing food, many of the other services will be in place for months to come.

Within a few days, supplies began arriving from across the brotherhood, and notably from another children’s home, Potters Children Home and Family Ministries. Potters collected supplies and brought two large trucks to Alabama, accompanied by volunteers. They delivered and worked here in Cullman, then went on to work in Tuscaloosa, AL. The cooperation and partnership exhibited by various brotherhood agencies was and is truly encouraging.

Approximately 2/3rd s of the state of Alabama has been declared a disaster area, but we are making slow progress. The Cullman Church of Christ immediately established a dedicated Disaster Relief Fund. Contributions can be mailed to: Cullman Church of Christ Disaster Relief, P O Box 265, Cullman, AL 35056.

Horrible tornados came through Cullman and Alabama this past Wednesday. Fortunately, Childhaven was spared any damage or injuries. Vicki Rhode’s and my Executive Adminstrator, Rhonda Sharp, was not so fortunate, her home was 100% destroyed. She and her husband Steve were with her Mom in a Birmingham hospital when it hit – her Mom is fighting cancer. Her grown children and daugher in law made it into their storm pit just in time – no one injured. In Cullman, 432 homes destroyed or damaged, as well as 63 businesses destroyed or damaged. (Just within our city.) The tornados were on the ground for 38 miles of destruction.

Also, AGAPE of N. Alabama’s Executive Director Danny Holmes home was also completely destroyed. Danny and his wife also made it into their storm pit – and came out to find their home completely gone, but they are unharmed.

We celebrate God’s goodness, and are praying for the Sharp’s and the Holmes’ families.

The webinar will provide an overview of the different online fundraising options available to nonprofit organizations from FirstGiving as well as others, including on-site donation options, e-cards, virtual gifts, Facebook applications, peer-to-peer crowdfunding sites such as FirstGiving, social media fundraising and mobile giving.

We’ll also peek into the (not-too-distant) future and offer our predictions about the future online fundraising.

Key takeaways:
An overview of on-site and off-site online fundraising options available
What is a Facebook application and how it is used for fundraising
What is social media fundraising
Where social media fundraising is going

For more information go to www.firstgiving.com