Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Want to Help?

A few people have recently asked if there was anything they could do to help us out with Tizita's adoption. All the prayers and good wishes have been a great help and encouragement to us, so first of all thank you for that. But there just happens to be a way for you to help in another capacity. The orphanages that care for waiting children need help obtaining some basic supplies.

The transitional house that Tizita is currently staying at asks that families bring donations to help cover some of the costs of caring for the children. We brought a few things on our last trip but would like to help out even more.

Unfortunately, donating via the Rudstroms is a bit of pain due to our remote location but there are a few options if you're interested.

1) Shop in person and ship it up.

2) Shop online and have the company ship for you.
or
3) If you live in Brevig, just drop it by our house

Our address is:

AnnMarie & C.O. Rudstrom
P.O. Box 85105
Brevig Mission, AK 99785

If you'd like to go with option two I suggest www.drugstore.com , they will ship to us for free if you spend $50 or more. I looked and they have quite a few options for formula and diapers there. And if you're an ebates member you will also receive 6% back on your drugstore purchases.

Update: A friend of mine had trouble with drugstore.com, they said the contents were too heavy and they would charge extra for shipping.  Amazon , however, worked well for her.

It can take up to a month for items to reach us both through the USPS and even drugstore.com so we wanted to make sure and get this information out to you as soon as possible. We will hopefully be going back to Ethiopia sometime at the end of February or early March which is surprisingly just around the corner.

The basic donations need list:

diapers of all sizes
formula with iron
infant and toddler clothing
your extra plastic grocery bags could also be put to good use

*Diapers and formula are a higher priority than clothes but clothes are just plain more fun to buy.

I'm not sure how many of you will send donations but I'm going to think and hope big. No matter how much is sent to us we will find a way to get it to Ethiopia. One of the adoptive families traveling at the same time as us had waivers from the airlines to check extra bags of donations for free. So excess baggage shouldn't be a problem.

Please spread the word and share this with anyone who might be interested in donating. The gifts of others before us has helped our adoption and sweet, sweet Tizita. I pray that we (you and I) can be a blessing to those who are still to come on this amazing journey of adoption.

~AnnMarie

4 comments:

James and Charity said...

This is so generous of you! Is it acceptable to send gently used clothing?

You really want those plastic bags?!?

Charity

The Rudstroms said...

Yes the plastic bags can be used as garbage liners. And the used kids' clothes are o.k. as long as they look new. I think they're trying to avoid and mass of faded, stained, worn out clothes making the long journey to Ethiopia and being useless. All the kids were dressed very nicely, I think that's important to them.

BTW - I was wondering to C.O. about who would most likely donate and said, "I mean, I know Charity will but I wonder who else." =)

The Litrenta Family said...

When do you guys go back? I have some formula samples that I'd love to send to you, but figured if I wait until after I deliver (in the next 2 weeks) maybe I'd round up some more. Holli

The Rudstroms said...

Holli,
We're not sure when we go back but it could be any time in the next few weeks. I think waiting 2 more weeks to send it will be too late. If you can send what you have now, it should arrive in time.

Congratulations in advance for you new little one!

Thanks,
AnnMarie