Roasting

I know I've mentioned my best friend JJ here before. There's lots of reasons why she's so very near and dear to my heart, and not the least of these is her heart for adoption. She and her husband already have three rather rambunctious boys (ages 9, 7, and 2), and they recently decided that their family was missing a child. Specifically, a little girl.

They have been through a wringer of fundraisers: a massive yard sale, selling the children's Christmas book she wrote, doing fundraisers through various organizations; all of this, with the end goal of finding their daughter and bringing her home.

They were approved by America World last year, and they are now waiting as they wade through miles of red tape, recommended reading, home studies, spending more money, facing possible delays due to several countries who have recently closed their doors to international adoptions, getting physicals, and more paperwork and still more waiting. Once they've cleared the paperwork, they wait some more, for a referral for their little girl, who will come from Haiti.

I can't imagine the anguish of knowing your daughter is out there, but you have no idea what she looks like, or how long it will be before she comes home. It must, in some ways, be like the parents of the missing kids who used to be on milk cartons...except you have no picture to post, no name or description to give. You have nothing but the certainty in your heart that tells you your child is out there, waiting for you. And you don't know how many days must go by before the someday of her arrival at home finally gets here.

I know she's recently been discouraged, by the closure of Ethiopia and the Congo to international adoption, by the dwindling balance in their adoption account without a whole lot seeming to show for it, by the pressures of continued fundraising to bring home their daughter while enduring an interminable wait and yet not forgetting that they have three little boys already at home to love and raise.

One fundraiser that JJ had desperately hoped would take off well was their sales page through Just Love Coffee. It's a simple fundraiser; you order great coffee, and their adoption account gets a cut of the profits. In fact, this is a core tenet of Just Love Coffee's business model: they help with fundraising for adoptions while selling some pretty fancy-schmancy, really good coffees. And hot chocolate.

They have coffees for every palate, really, from mild roasts to dark. For Christmas, I bought some Jamaica Blue Mountain, one of the best coffees in the world, for Hubby (who was shocked, knowing how good—and expensive—it is). It's so good that Hubby says it's too refined for his palate, and he has to mix it with another coffee because he's so unsophisticated. I bought coffee for Jester. I bought hot chocolate for Mitzy, who is not a coffee fan the way Jester is.

So, for all of you coffee drinkers out there who read my humble little blog...would you consider joining Hubby and me, and my family, and treat yourself to some really good coffee, and help bring a little girl home? If you're not a coffee drinker but you know people who are, would you share that link with your coffee-loving friends and encourage them to shop there? Would you consider sharing this post or the link on your blogs? (I'm placing a link on my sidebar tonight that will lead directly to JJ's Just Love Coffee page.) It's not every day you can indulge your caffeine addiction and do a world of good for one special little girl at the same time.


Disclaimer: While JJ reads my blog, she didn't know I was doing this tonight. Call it a belated Christmas gift to her.