The Rathbone Family

CHRISTMAS UPDATE

DEC. 2024

Away in a manger...

There's so much to love about Christmas. Whether it's the miraculous story of Jesus' birth or the cherished time we spend with family and friends, this is truly a blessed time of year. Thank you for being part of our extended family. We pray you are enjoying time together with your family and friends this Christmas season. Your love and support of our family of three make such a difference.

Thank you!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

Alan, Mary and Chloe Rathbone

UPCOMING

Dec 23 - January 5th

Chloe off school, Rathbone Home Services and Moms Adopting Moms closed for the holidays


Dec 26th - Jan 4th

We depart for a short trip to England to see Alan's mum Margaret and the rest of his family. Please pray for safety in travel and a wonderful time reconnecting.

Prayers for the holidays


Merry Christmas to all our sweet friends and family. We pray this newsletter finds you filled with joy, love and peace as you trust God for every day. Isn't He good to us? Even in our hardest struggles like my mom and dads current situation - God is still incredibly good and His mercies are new every single morning - praise God!


Our family has continued to thrive this past year under God's mighty hand. Alan's business, Rathbone Home Services has never once had to be advertised in the last six years he has been in business thanks to all of you. He has helped you with your home projects as well as hopefully ministered to your spirits through his hard work, honesty and sense of humor. He's also just fun to talk to, isn't he? Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your continued support of him and his business. Keep those calls for your handyman needs coming!


Our precious Chloe is now 13.5 years old and I feel every day of it! haha But truly she is a doll - so smart, so loving and she tries so very hard at all she does. From hours of homework each day at an incredibly difficult school to participating on the swim team to volunteering in our church nursery or navigating friendships and the tough teenage years, she has done so well. Recently she competed in a 100m freestyle event at a swim meet and beforehand she commented to us that she really did NOT want to swim this particular event as she thought it would be too hard. Well, guess what? She did it and she WON! She had an amazing time, beating her personal best and her mom and dad were so very proud. Oh to push through all our fears so we too can win!


For me, if I were to sum up the last year for Moms Adopting Moms that word would be "amazed". Yes, we were setup as an all inclusive, you can hold any worldview and still be a part, charitable organization (as my number one goal is to see those that are lost find Jesus through our work) but sometimes I just have to marvel at how truly good God has been to us this past year. Christina (the former bio mom of the four foster children that came into our care twice but who is now in long term recovery, engaged and the co-founder of Moms Adopting Moms) and I are both humbled and honored that He chose us to run this organization and that He continues to show up in our mama's lives day in and day out. To know these women and men feel they are no longer alone, that the God of the universe fights for them in so many ways and through so many people is the best thing ever. To play a small part in getting them through recovery from addiction, back together with their children and thriving in their chosen career (due to a lot of time spent in classes at night after working all day) is such a blessing. They have overcome so much pain and abuse but now are thriving. God is good indeed!


This last year alone we have seen nine families reunified back to their children and in long term recovery. We have over a dozen more families somewhere in the process of getting into or completing rehab, fulfilling the requirements of getting their children back home and taking classes to better their career prospects.


As an organization we began relationships with UGA, Athens Tech and the University of Kentucky for accepting interns to assist us as we mentor them into the social work field. We hosted seven this fall and will host eight starting in January. I am also utilizing my technology background to build a resource, guidance and reward app for our moms called the Journey Home where our mom is the heroin. The adventure game helps mom take the steps necessary to reunify with her children from detox and rehab to finding a job, getting resources like counseling and parenting or finance classes and finally ensuring she can get a vehicle, a place to live and a better education. Unlike the Department of Family and Child Services which chooses the stick approach ("if you don't do A, B and C within 365 days we will terminate your rights to your children"), Moms Adopting Moms has chosen to be encouraging and loving and supporting providing the necessary resources every step of the way. A service learning team from the UGA New Media Institute will finish the work my Microsoft friends started and build a prototype of this app for us next spring that we can pitch back to Microsoft or Apple and hopefully garner their support to spend the 10-15 million dollars it will take to build it into a professional, nationwide, AI driven resource and machine learning app.


Right now, we just finished delivering Christmas gifts for over 20 moms and 46+ children through the generosity of several organizations and many individuals and families in our area. We are also building a gift closet in our home so that when moms do big things like get into rehab or graduate from it, complete finance or parenting classes, attend all their visits with their children or get better jobs that we will reward them with points they can spend in our closet on everything from gifts for their children to pots and pans and cleaning supplies to gift certificates for some pampering.


We are also endeavoring to fix up cars and resell them to our moms, taking meals to foster families, speaking at conferences and recovery events, getting some very gifted people on our board and just taking everything one day at a time, waiting for God to tell us what's next. Oh the blessings He has poured out on us and all those that support us! It has been amazing to see. Never would I have guessed that God would take every piece of my background and weave it together in such a beautiful way to do something to help others like He has done. Whether it be through hospitality or technology, missions or philanthropy - every single piece of my story is being utilized now and I am overwhelmed with thankfulness.


About one hour ago I searched again to see whether our 501c3 had been approved and God in his goodness chose today for it to finally say we had been approved! What a wonderful Christmas Eve gift! With our determination letter in hand we can now begin to receive tax deductible donations that we will use to hire more moms that are in long term recovery and have lived experience in the foster care system to be peer mentors for us. We can continue to fix up cars and host moms in our homes for meals and encouragement. We can continue to work with foster families encouraging them to "adopt the whole family for life" rather than just adopting the children away from their bio families. We can assist them in building a relationship with the whole family where they never again have to say good bye and have their hearts broken.


There is so much wrong with our current foster care system - never mind the 30 billion the USA spends on it every year. So please consider donating to further our work. Checks can be mailed to our address below made out to Moms Adopting Moms. Stock donations can be made directly to the North Georgie Community Foundation in Gainesville on our behalf. You will save on the capital gains tax while receiving a tax deduction for the amount on the day of transfer.


We have been told by many that what we are doing and the model we have introduced has the potential to end the foster care crisis. Will you help us continue our work?


From our family to yours - we are grateful, thankful and so very blessed. We thank God for you!


With warmest Christmas wishes,

Alan, Mary and Chloe Rathbone