Chocolate Festival

This past Saturday, I was a vendor at the Chocolate Festival. Tyler heard about it on the radio on Thursday, called me and and I contacted the coordinator. Luckily, she had had one cancellation that morning so I was IN! We found a babysitter for our five kids so Tyler and I could do the table together. The Chocolate Festival anticipated 4,000 people attending. That morning, we dropped off the kids and went over to set up early. It went from 10am to 5pm. An hour into the festival, Tyler got a phone call that said he had to pick up all five kids and find alternative accommodations for them (the babysitter wasn't certified to watch special needs which she found out after we had dropped them off...) so Tyler took them to Richard and Valerie's house (we are so grateful!) and returned two hours later to help me. Here is the spread:

I was on my feet for 7 hours. We sold 35 bags of Choffy, one French press, and gave out over 500 samples. It was crazy busy and we had the busiest table in the whole room. We were even featured on a local news channel! It was a great experience for me and I loved having Tyler with me. He has a lot of experience with sales and he enjoyed it, too. I am looking forward to growing my Choffy business here in OH. For more information, to order, or to sign up as a distributor, go to my website: www.drinkchoffy.com/jillpierce

Keith has an appointment to see the developmental pediatricians on base. I think he has autism and I want him to be evaluated. 

Yesterday, I was asked by Cindy at church to share my experience in staying with Anya Bigun in Ukraine during our adoption of the twins. The topic of her lesson was charity. I am so grateful for her asking me to say a few words because it altered my memory of that time with Anya. Background story: I was in Ukraine for 5 1/2 weeks during the adoption of Keith and Iryna. Tyler stayed for 3 weeks and then had to go back to work. For the remainder of that time, I stayed with Anya. She opened her home to me. She is poor and doesn't have much in the way of material things. But I never felt more welcome than with her and when I left, she hugged me and told me tearfully that she loved me. When I think of where I live and all that I possess, it humbles me that God would allow this dear woman to show me charity during my time in Ukraine. I will forever be grateful to Anya for her kind service and for Cindy who allowed me to associate the word CHARITY with ANYA BIGUN, because those words belong in the same sentence.