Before Matt and I had kids, we decided it would be a priority in our household to sponsor children in poverty-stricken countries and situations “overseas”. We decided that our family would add one additional sponsored child per biological (or adopted) child in our household. We figure if we can afford to add on a child to our mix, we should make it a priority to afford a $30/month sponsorship as well. God has blessed us beyond measure and we trust He will continue to enable us to glorify Him, even if things get tight. Priorities require sacrifices, but some sacrifices are so right they feel like breathing.

With that being said, we first picked our Lidia back when Rachael was a baby. Sweet Lidia was the youngest child available that day when we walked into a local Family Christian bookstore and checked out their “World Vision” sponsorship rack. Sweet Lidia was just a petite little almost two year old (who looked more like a new one year old) when we first sponsored her and is now a thriving five year old starting school this year.

When Abi was born we discussed another sponsorship child. Our dear Tofic fell into our laps when the youth group was no longer able to provide funds to upkeep the little guy’s needs. So we joyously took on our dear Tofic in Abi’s honor. Tofic is currently an active seven year old (his birthday was 8 days ago) enjoying his second year of schooling. We love the hand-drawn pictures he sends us.

Lidia and Tofic are precious in our family as we learn about their loves, lives and families. We have clocks hanging on the wall to remind us of their real-life times and schedules. We pray for them at meals and talk about them during the day. They are two sweet kiddos who have just been  dealt a hard hand and we are so beyond blessed to come alongside of their families and their communities to help them “learn how to fish” in a desolate place.

So with the addition of Hannah to our family on the horizon, Matt and I took the girls back to the bookstore to the familiar World Vision rack. We studied the faces, learned new name pronunciations and worked together to pick out Hannah’s sponsor child.

It was a given when we came across her. Valentina from Colombia. She’s a cute little two year old with a birthday split between Rachael and Abi. The sweet thing is the only child of a single mom, for whatever reason, who is doing everything she can in upholding a daily wage earning job to try to provide for herself and her little girl. Valentina is growing up in a poor community in Colombia. World Vision just recently expanded their efforts in Colombia to come alongside struggling families after a devastating earthquake.

While we still have much to learn about Valentina and anxiously await our packet of information about her that we will be getting in the next few weeks in the mail, it was so neat to watch Rachael’s excitement and curiosity about this precious life. And our dear Abi clung to Valentina’s brochure with joy. We read and reread the few paragraphs we have about her before bed that night and since then.

It’s such a blessing to watch our children’s eyes slowly opened to the precious opportunity we have to love on children in the name of Jesus that we may never meet.

So welcome to the crew, Valentina. Rachael wants you to know that she loves you very much.

*** This post is in no way to bring glory to us, but to give it to God in thanks for the privilege of bringing Him glory in our daily lives.