"And when they saw the star, they were so ecstatic that they shouted and celebrated with unrestrained joy. When they came into the house and saw the young child with Mary, his mother, they fell to the ground at his feet and worshiped him." (Matthew 2:10, The Passion Translation)
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As we all celebrate the wondrous miracle of Christ’s birth, we pray that you will sense His presence and peace in a deeper way than you ever have before.
Thank you for being part of our family's journey.
May your Christmas overflow with family, friends, joy, peace, and most of all, His Love.
In Christ,
Jonathan, Amber, Josiah, Ainsleigh, Seth, Levi & Alysia Herron
There are moments in life where you can't overthink your reaction.
All you can do is pivot and make it happen.
Take for instance the adoption of our youngest: Alysia Hope.
Adoption wasn't even on our minds.
We thought our family was complete with four kiddo's and a wiener dog to boot.
Isn't it funny how life interrupts our perfectly-laid plans?
That's when we got the phone call out of the blue: The birthmother of our one-year-old son, Levi, had just given birth to a baby girl -- Would we be willing to adopt her?
"Yes" escaped our mouths before our brains had a chance to catch up with what our ears were hearing.
We committed to a major life-change and significant price tag in a matter of 15 seconds.
Suddenly we were responsible for coming up with over $20,000 in 7 days plus preparing our home for a newborn.
We had to make it happen.
I didn't panic, I ran to the internets and did what any good daddy would do: I started a telethon to raise 20 grand!
Every hour on the hour we went live with stupid human tricks, lip-sync battles, and improv games. The goal was to pay for our unexpected adoption in cash and bring Baby Girl home.
We had to make it happen.
Here's the thing:
When you boldly declare what you want, multiply that with grit + hustle, and then seek help with compassion, empathy prevails and magic happens.
Together with friends and strangers on the internet, we made it happen.
What giant obstacle are you facing today?
What if you leaned in toward the challenge and fearlessly declared what you wanted to do?
How might people around you rally around your cause?
Today let's all dare to make it happen!
It was an honor to welcome local tv crews from NBC25 & Fox 66 News into our home to share about how our family has been touched by adoption. They set up three cameras and turned our home into a television studio!
I hope you enjoy this extended long-form interview that recently aired on The CW. Stay tuned: Fox66 News will also be airing a portion later this month as part of National Adoption Awareness Month!
Our five month journey through an unexpected adoption has come in for a landing.
Alysia Hope is now officially, legally, forever a part of Team Herron!
Our story began five months ago with a phone call out of the blue.
That led to a frantic online telethon and a little baby girl.
And now, she is ours!
Five months ago our lives were interrupted with crazy amazing news:
The birthmother of our (then) youngest contacted us asking if we would ADOPT her newborn infant baby girl!
We had always dreamt of having one more little baby girl, but we had no idea how that would happen due to the sky-high costs of adoption combined with our stage of life.
Never allow your circumstances to dictate your destiny. God is BIGGER than your roadblocks!
Our mad-dash to come up with thousands and thousands of dollars for this unexpected adoption led to a bunch of cool new stories like this one:
'Never allow your circumstances to dictate your destiny. God is BIGGER than your roadblocks!'— Jonathan Herron
Fast-forward five months and things are going GREAT:
Our children ADORE their baby sister and Alysia Hope is happy, healthy, and fully-bonded to her Mommy and Daddy!
We are blown away by the support of our church family. They really stepped up and came alongside us during this insanely-stressful season of quick change.
Every adoption story is different, with many twists and turns in the areas of emotions and legal milestones.
Thankfully, we have an open and healthy relationship with Levi and Alysia’s birthmother — she is an amazing young woman who made an extremely loving plan for her children’s lives.
Our stories are now forever linked and intertwined,
and we are the better for it.
The final legal milestone takes place TOMORROW!
We’ll get the kids out of school before lunch, road trip across the High Five State, walk into a Grand Rapids courtroom, and celebrate as the Judge signs the Adoption Finalization Paperwork that grants Alysia Hope the permanent last name: “Herron!”
THANK YOU ALL for your prayers, your support, and your kindness.
The past five months have been lighter because of you.
Follow us on Instagram as I’m sure Amber and I will blow up our Instagram feeds and Insta Stories after the finalization in Court tomorrow!
My life just got turned upside-down.
Can you relate?
To catch up to our crazy, life-changing story, first watch this Facebook Livestream.
Still with me?
Sunday afternoon we got a phone call from one of our adopted children’s birthmoms.
She had a baby girl on Saturday and asked if we would adopt her baby.
Here’s how we broke the news to our kids:
Yesterday my wife and I were in Detroit and met our new Baby Girl!
If you SUBSCRIBE to my new YouTube Channel, you can see all the brief video updates we shared!
And yes, we are proud to publicly announce our Baby Girl’s name on YouTube.
As you can imagine, infant adoption is expensive… and this fell into our laps suddenly, so we’re racing to raise funds!
Thankfully, our friends at Adoption Associates have cut the adoption fees by 50% because of the rare circumstances involved!
We have to raise just over $10,000 in two weeks.
Our friend Monica Lynch designed exclusive new Raising Arrows gear based on Psalm 127 (tee’s, hoodies, Under Armour hats) that benefit our adoption HERE.
We’re also thankful for everyone who has pitched on our new GoFundMe.com/TeamHerron page — you all rock!
THANK YOU for your prayers, encouragement, and support during this crazy journey God has called our family into.
We love you!
This is my darling Ainsleigh. One year ago she turned our lives upside-down.
I'm often asked, "What country did you adopt her from?"
I always pause for a moment before responding.
With a mischievous smile I will casually reply, "Detroit!"
Ainsleigh was born on a Sunday. We received the phone call on a Wednesday.
And we finally met her on a Saturday.
She was melting everyone's hearts immediately and began sharing her infectious giggles by two-months-old.
Where did this first year of life go?
Why are you growing so fast, little Ainsleigh?
* sigh *
Our lives are so much richer because our family has been touched by adoption!
Recently I was asked to share about what we've learned having a blended family --
here's the video of my message:
You can help other families bring their dream of adoption to life
in a quick, simple way: Save the Adoption Tax Credit!
