A New Frontier

Matt and I have been parents for quite a while...

Today we have officially entered into a new realm:

We are the parents of a TEENAGER!!!

There are 13 candles on Taylor's pumpkin pie this year!

But he's still his mama's boy!

We love you, Taylor, and we are so proud to be your parents (even though today you are making us feel pretty darn old.) Happy Birthday!

A Special Day with a Special Boy

Today, I had a home study appointment with a family that lives on a farm about 2 hours away. I thought the 4 hour drive would be a good opportunity to spend some one on one time with a kiddo so with the family's permission, I brought Noah along. He had a great time with the family's two sons who played with him on a tractor tire swing, in the dirt with army guys and showed him around the farm while I interviewed the parents. Noah came home asking for a mule!

After the hs interview, I took Noah to an orchard to pick apples. Noah took the job quite seriously as you can see. He picked out the perfect tool for the job and searched the orchard for the perfect fruit on the perfect tree. Then, he weighed the fruit, payed for it and loaded it into the car. He has big plans to make caramel apples for the whole family.

Noah is such a smart, sensitive, kind-hearted and funny little guy. He's going to grow up to be quite a man someday.

But I'm not in a hurry for that. I'm enjoying every minute that I can with my favorite seven year-old boy!

The Siblings are Waiting too...

Since we started paperchasing in September of '05, this is the 4th school year now that we have been talking about and waiting for Meili. The last two years, the kids came home from their first days back at school reporting that they had received lots of questions about Meili and when she would finally be coming home from teachers and classmates. I was just thinking last week that the kids hadn't talked about being asked lots of questions yet this year when Audrey came home from school with a story that made me want to laugh and cry at the same time-

There is a little girl (1st grader but the size of a preschooler) from the Philippines that rides the bus with Audrey. This little girl has attached herself to Audrey-sits by her on the bus to and from school, asks Audrey to walk her to her class, and holds her hand as they walk. Audrey just loves it.

Apparently, one day last week on their walk from the bus to the little girl's class, Audrey was stopped by 6 different adults at 6 different points along the way who accosted her with congratulations on FINALLY BRINGING HER LITTLE SISTER HOME FROM CHINA!!! Poor Audrey didn't know what to say and the little girl must have thought the world had gone mad thinking she was the sister of this blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl. It was very sweet, though, for her former teachers and aides to show such enthusiasm.

Audrey had a good laugh when telling the story but I could tell that she was sad to still be waiting for a little sister after all of this time. There have been lots of questions that begin with 'when' and 'why' in our house this week and when her three brothers are getting on her nerves, Audrey will look at me with very sad eyes and say, "When am I going to have a little sister?"

I spend a lot of time putting my own feelings about the wait in check (primarily by griping about it on this blog.) So, this was a good reminder that I need to remember that the kids are waiting too. When she finally does come home, Meili is going to be one lucky little girl to have 4 older siblings who have been making room for her in their lives and in their hearts for such a long time.

New Blog Theme Song...

We are loving our new look-thanks to Danielle! Check out her site if you're ready for a makeover-she's wonderful to work with!

It was time for a new song to go with our new look. It's fairly appropriate that for our family a song by an AI winner would sum up where we are at in this adoption process right now. Some of the words fit all too well...

One Step at a Time by Jordin Sparks

Hurry up and wait
So close, but so far away
Everything that you've always dreamed of
Close enough for you to taste
But you just can't touch

You wanna show the world, but no one knows your name yet
Wonder when and where and how you're gonna make it
You know you can if you get the chance
In your face as the door keeps slamming

Now you're feeling more and more frustrated
And you're getting all kind of impatient-waiting

[Chorus:]
We live and we learn to take
One step at a time
There's no need to rush
It's like learning to fly
Or falling in love

It's gonna happen when it's
Supposed to happen and we
Find the reasons why
One step at a time

You believe and you doubt
You're confused, and you got it all figured out
Everything that you always wished for
Could be yours, should be yours, would be yours
If they only knew

You wanna show the world, but no one knows your name yet
Wonder when and where and how you're gonna make it
You know you can if you get the chance
In your face as the door keeps slamming

Now you're feeling more and more frustrated
And you're getting all kind of impatient-waiting

[Chorus]

When you can't wait any longer
But there's no end in sight
(when you need to find the strength)
It's your faith that makes you stronger
The only way we get there
Is one step at a time

[Chorus x2]

Look who's 35!!!

My dear husband turned 35 today. We celebrated a day early with bowling (He skunked us!)and a trip to our traditional burger and ice cream shop.


On Sunday, the official b-day, Matt was up to his eyeballs in church meetings so we squeezed in his favorite dinner (chimichangas) and favorite dessert (lemon ice box pie.)
Happy birthday sweetheart! We love you!!!

Trip to Urgent Care

In preparation for our Olympic festivities last week, I had tucked a plate rack on the floor behind the desk in the office to make room for food on the kitchen counter. I never guessed that my 'hide your extra kitchen crap' place and Noah's perfect hide-and-seek hiding place were one and the same. The result was a one inch cut that wouldn't stop bleeding or stay shut with a butterfly bandage. These things only seem to happen on evenings or on weekends so off to Urgent Care we went.

Here he is sporting his new bracelet:

And feeling pretty brave before he learned that needles would be involved...
He should have had two stitches but the doctor was lucky to get the one in with the fit he threw.
We were supposed to return to the dr. in 10 days to have the stitch removed but mysteriously, it disappeared the next day. Not sure what happened there but it stayed shut so we're not complaining!

Xander's First Day of Preschool

I sent my littlest guy off to 'big boy preschool' this morning.

He is so excited to be in the same class as his buddy, Evan.

He came home reporting that preschool was 'awesome and amazing.' He's going to do great!

29th LIDversary

Referrals this month went through January 31st, 2006. That leaves 38 LIDs ahead of ours. Back in the day, that would have been something to do backflips about but today I think I'm going to have to officially let my dream of a December referral go. I'm thinking March is more likely if current trends hold.

08-08-08 Was Great!!!

The Opening Ceremonies last night were amazing! I'm going to have to go back and watch it again to figure out how they did half of what was done last night. I thought that the huge LCD screen was really cool and the martial artists moved in such unison that they looked like they were CGI's. I really feel sorry for the country that has to try to top that next time. I don't think it can be done!

We had so much fun last night and feel very blessed to have such wonderful friends! When the last of them left last night, I couldn't believe that it was almost 11:30!!! I guess time really does fly when you are having fun! Here are the pics as promised!

Kid Table #1

Kid Table #2

Poor Noah fell asleep about 30 minutes into the evening (shortly after this photo was snapped.) The first week of school must have been catching up with him. First words out of his mouth this morning were, 'That stinks!!!' He was so upset that his friends were over and he basically slept through it!

Our March LID buddies-Shannon and Doug. Check out their blog for more pics of the festivities.

Lisa-China Adoption buddy and soon to be Kazakhstan Momma!

Ed (aka 'fit olympic man') and Keira (who promises to start a blog soon!)

Mark and Heather-We are going to sucker these guys into coming back to Mandarin class next session...

I usually prefer to hide behind the camera but thought there ought to be proof that we attended also...

Linda and Rich-Our wonderful neighbors and parents of Audrey's BFF, Brenna

Audrey was so happy to have Brenna here to offset the testosterone!

Ready or Not...

Here it comes!

It's a tough day. I keep thinking that Meili should be here... I never thought that the olympics would arrive before she did. I'm glad that I have party preparations to keep me occupied. We're eating chinese food and watching the opening ceremonies with friends tonight. Since stepping into my home=giving permission for your face to appear on my blog, I should have some pics to post tomorrow.

1st Day of School

The Whole Brood

Taylor-Do you think he has enough crap to lug around?

Audrey-Going to 5th grade but can officially share mom's shoes...

Noah-Off to 2nd Grade!

Xander-Part-time only child.

One Last Hurrah

Today was our last day before school begins so we decided to have one last adventure. The oldest 2 kids wanted to go to the state museum. The youngest two kids wanted to ride a bus. So, we combined the two and rode the bus to the museum!

Here are the kiddos waiting at the 1st bus stop.

On our way-
Made it to the college campus-
At the museum-
103 degrees=need smoothies!
Waiting for the bus home-

which felt more like the NY subway-

X-holding on for dear life-
We must have looked like newbies because one bus driver asked us, 'What happened to your car?' Imagine his look when I told him, 'Nothing, we're just doing this for fun!' I've decided that public transportation would be fine if everyone observed basic hygeine. All in all, we had a great time and the kids came home begging for a nap! I'm going to miss these turkeys tomorrow!

Are we moving forward or backwards???

Remember this post? Well, it looks like it's burrito day again over here. We haven't received official word yet, but all signs point to another 2 day batch of referrals this month. It's happened only once before that I can remember but feels worse this time around for some reason. It must be the combo of having come so far and waited so long and still not knowing when our referral will come plus having the lovely opportunity to renew our paperwork for the third time and pay handsomely for it right around the corner.



Here are the results of yesterday's retail therapy-Meili's new carseat:

I love it! It's safe, girly, has a drink and snack holder-vital!, and the sides are deep enough to support her head when she falls asleep. We learned about the need for that the hard way... It also looks like it comes apart for cleaning quite easily which is great because each of our 4 children have puked in the carseat at one time or another. Best of all, it was less than a hundred bucks!!!

I also found a ladybug crib set here that I liked better than the one we bought previously so I switched them out. It looks much different in person than it does in the photo-much less pastel. The ladybugs are red, not pink and I really like the black details.

We had a great time shopping, but I still need a burrito...

Parents Passing Through

My parents and youngest brother and sister and grandma stopped by this weekend on their way to New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma. Here we are after dinner playing Bingo for hokie prizes..

My Mom turns 53 in a couple of days so we celebrated a little with a hostess cupcake tree. It's one of mom's favorite treats and didn't require the use of an oven so it was a winner. Happy Birthday Mom!
All of my kids just love their Uncle Jared! Here's Noah getting a cuddle while he can...
They spent the night on Saturday night and headed out Sunday morning as we were headed to church. Here's all of us-minus Matt who was behind the camera.
The Brood