The Hanna Clan

A Difficult Year, But Not Without Blessings

2011-12-19T09:32:00.003-05:00

I haven't posted in such a long time but I realize that I should. Our family has been through alot this year. My mother was diagnosed the first week of February with stage IV Lung cancer that had spread to her brain. We lost her May 9th after a very courageous battle. Our lives will certainly never be the same without her. Our family has persevered through that experience and we will always cherish every memory of her.

This summer our whole family ventured to Gulf Shores Alabama for the first time. We didn't pick the greatest hotel, but it all worked out and we had an amazing time. I'll post some pictures from that adventure later.

This fall all 3 of the kids played recreational soccer and that was just insane to keep track of lol ;-) That being said, all 3 of the kids did an awesome job and we couldn't be more proud.

Our family has attended Grace Bible Church pastored by Steve Atwood. This church as been such a blessing to our family and we thank God for them.

Our neighbors are currently in China adopting a 2 yr old who was in Audrey's orphanage and we are sooooo happy and excited for them ! I posted a link to their blog, E makes 5 in the links.

More later ........

ACCA Reunion held by Cirque de Chine

2010-07-11T20:33:00.020-05:00

Yesterday we attended an adoptive family reunion for Chinese children held by the Cirque de Chine (Chinese acrobats that have their own theatre and perform right outside Gatlinburg and Pidgeon Forge). This was only the 2nd year the event had been held and I wasn't sure what to expect but I am here to tell you that it far surpassed my expectations and the kids loved it !!! The event opened at 9:30 am and we left home at 7am so we could get there when it opened. The Chinese acrobats had craft and activity centers set up all over the theatre lobby and halls going to the theatre. The Chinese acrobats were in their performing costumes and they helped the children with each craft and activity. They were wonderful with the kids and they let us video and take pics to our hearts content. After the crafts and activities we were treated to some icecream and then around noon we were served a buffet of authentic chinese food. After lunch the kids played on the stage where the acrobats perform until 1:45pm. It was quite a sight to see them all dancing around the stage. Our trio had stage fright so there was no getting them up on the stage except to run across it to the other side lol. At 1:45 there was a pre-show where performers from the "Soul of Shaolin" did an opening act which really made me want to see them perform at their theatre which is right up the street from the Smoky Mountain Palace where Cirque de Chine performs. The Soul of Shaolin is a tony award winning martial arts play and I was in awe even with the short preview we witnessed before the acrobats performed. The two performances together lasted 2 hours and 15 minutes with a 15 minute intermission . Audrey and Lei were entralled with the whole show and I've never seen them so into anything like that before. Rachel did really well although I think it was a little long for her. While we were there we also were interviewed by Channel 8 news out of Knoxville but I'm not sure if we will be on the air or not. There was a little about it on their internet site so that was fun to see. I'll post some pics from our trip and here are the links to Cirque de Chine and Soul of Shaolin.
http://smokymountainpalace.com/
http://www.easternshanghaitheater.com/

Happy 7th Birthday Audrey !!!!!

2010-06-16T10:37:00.004-05:00

We celebrated Audrey's 7th B-day with a Pool Party and Severe Thunderstorm last Thursday evening. Everything worked out in the end and we all had a great time, but we ended up with the pool party in our house for over an hour which we really didn't plan for; we were finally able to go to the pool, swim, sing happy birthday and have cake and cupcakes. The kids had a blast swimming and this will definitely be a birthday party we won't soon forget ;-) Here are a few pics.

WoW, It's been a Year and 3 months since I've posted !!!

2010-06-07T12:26:00.002-05:00

I'm here to tell ya, that third child was a doosy ;-) I don't mean that he was a difficult child or any more trouble than Audrey or Rachel, but 3 is alot ! Maybe I'm just a lightweight or maybe it's because I'm 42 ................. who really knows, but I can tell you without a doubt that I feel my age these days. I am finally starting to see daylight again this year and I think our family is finally achieving a "new normal".

I am going to make a concerted effort to update our blog once a week because it is really a wonderful thing to look back at the past few years on this blog and see how far we've really come ! I'm hoping to start following others blogs again too. I truly miss seeing all our old friends and reading about their worlds.

Quotable Quotes

2009-03-02T19:20:00.005-05:00

Over the past few months, Audrey and Lei have come off with some interesting comments and questions so I thought I'd post a couple of them. It goes without saying that neither of these comments were given further discussion. There are just some things kids say that you can't touch lol ;-)

1) Audrey at dinner table "Mom, you know you and dad don't have to go to China if you want another kid, you could just make one"

2) Lei speaking to Daddy while Mommy is in the bathroom overhearing conversation "Dad, where did you and mom fall in love, on the floor or in the bed?"

Temporary February warm days and park visit

2009-02-22T23:13:00.004-05:00

After an unseasonably cold winter, we had a short warm spell and were spoiled briefly. We took advantage of it by visiting one of the local parks and the kids had a blast ! See a few pics

CNY costume pics

2009-02-22T23:07:00.002-05:00

Crazy busy times, but very good times !

2009-02-22T22:36:00.008-05:00

Sorry I haven't posted in what seems like eons, but having a 3, 5 and 6 yr old and homeschooling definitely keeps me hopping. I'm sure many think I'm insane for homeschooling and some days I wonder myself ;-), but honestly it has been a wonderful blessing and we are enjoying it more than I ever would have imagined. Friday we did school in our P.J.'s because I just was not feeling great and we accomplished everything I had planned and even more. Audrey and Lei are already reading easy readers to me. Ms. Rachel is able to write quite a few of her letters which I'm very impressed with since she isn't quite 3 and a half yet. I have no idea how long we will homeschool, but I'm definitely planning to next year. I also want to mention that the kids are attending a co-op once a week with other homeschoolers at our local YMCA which has been a Godsend. They take Spanish, Music, PE, and Karate for 4 hours every Tuesday and it gives us all a little break from each other too which is perfect.

Audrey, Lei and Rachel are all taking gymnastics and enjoying it all. Lei is a maniac when it comes to gymnastics or anything athletic and he's so fun to watch ! His English is progressing so quickly it is hard to believe. Other than his pronouns being off occassionally or just saying things a little akwardly, he can communicate anything he wants to anyone.

I am posting some pictures from December and Chinese New Year since I'm way behind on my posting, then I'll post a pic from February.

New Video and Slide Show posted to youtube

2008-12-07T19:28:00.004-05:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNY4el-If7Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJ234X-5dW4

I tried embedding a video and slideshow here but the resolution was awful so I just decided to post the links. When you click on the link, make sure at the bottom of the video window to click on "higher quality image" so it is in the higher resolution.

Daddy and Lei

2008-11-14T09:12:00.001-05:00

Belated Halloween pics

2008-11-14T09:08:00.002-05:00

I took the kids trick or treating and Lei was all about it ;-) He raced to each door and had impeccable manners, thanking each person when he left. Audrey's dress was a little long and we had it pinned up all over the place. Her shoes were a little high and at one point she fell down someones stairs but was still in one piece and ready for more. Rachel really enjoyed it but insisted that I visit each house with her and come to the door which I did proudly.

Leaf Hunting with my Posers

2008-11-12T21:43:00.003-05:00

Our Homeschooling Journey has began

2008-11-12T21:28:00.003-05:00

After having Audrey and Lei in public school for almost 3 months, it became abundantly clear to me that this was not God's plan for our family. It was a totally necessary move to keep our family sane during Lei's transition into our family and Rachel's adjustment to our new family dynamic, but It wasn't the right choice long term. I started out thinking about homeschooling next year, then thinking about homeschooling after Christmas, and then thinking "If I'm going to do this, why wait?". So, we became an official homeschooling family on Monday and I already know this was exactly what we were supposed to do. Audrey and Lei are rested, relaxed and totally into their school work. Neither of them expressed any real regret in not returning to school. Rachel seems to be thoroughly enjoying having her brother and sister around all the time and they are all getting along much better than I could have ever hoped for.

We have started out using Abeka's Phonics, Reading and Writing program and Saxon Math. We are using the reading list from Amblesideonline.com as well. We don't have a formal science or social studies program yet, but since this is Kindergarten, we didn't think this was critical in any way. For Bible we are just memorizing verses from the KJV now, but plan to either create our own curriculum or look into others soon. An FYI, I love Abeka phonics and so do the kids so far !
Saxon math seems well thought out, but the K5 version is too easy in my opinion and I think alot of kindergartners could start with Saxon Math 1 and do fine.

I'll post more as we go along, but I'm wore out tonight !

"I love you all of my days"

2008-11-12T20:54:00.004-05:00

I rarely think to post some of the wonderful things the kids say to me, but this one is really special because it comes from Rachel. Over the past few days Rachel has told me on more than one occassion "Mommy, I love you all of my Days". It hasn't been that long ago, that Rachel didn't say "I love you" in any form whatsoever, but now she says it more than anyone else in the family and we are eating it up :-)

I am extremely happy to report that Ms. Rachel is making so many leaps and bounds since she turned 3 that I can't even keep track of them. She is becoming very social and just plain sweet towards other kids, mom and dad as well as her brother and sister (when they aren't attacking each other lol ;-)

Her speech is improving exponentially now and things she said just a couple of weeks ago that I didn't understand, I understand completely now.

Long story short, Ms. Rachel is doing awesome and she is just giving the whole family warm fuzzies :-) Just had to share ....

Lei's 6th Birthday

2008-11-09T14:51:00.003-05:00

Lei turned 6 the end of October and the day after his surgery at Vanderbilt Children's hospital. Needless to say, we celebrated his birthday the weekend before his surgery. Lei was very excited to receive his first video game (Leapster) and a new basketball which he specifically requested. Lei is going to be a very successful athlete, mark my words ! He's been in gymnastics for just a couple of months now and he is amazing to watch. Here are some pics of his birthday party we gave him. Oops, also wanted to mention that Daddy made Lei's birthday cake and it was pretty cool ;-)

Rachel's 3rd Birthday !

2008-11-07T14:37:00.000-05:00

Rachel's birthday was the end of September and I'm ashamed that I'm just now posting pictures, but we had a wonderful family birthday and she just loved every minute of it. I also brought strawberry cupcakes to her preschool class and we had a little happy birthday celebration there as well. The pictures speak for themselves. Our little munchkin just insn't that little anymore and she is full of big ideas ;-)

Audrey's 5th Birthday

2008-11-05T17:42:00.002-05:00

Audrey's birthday party was at her grandma and grandpas house the day before we left to bring home Lei from China. We had a great turnout and lots of family were there. Audrey's birthdays are always memorable.

2008-10-26T23:25:00.001-05:00

Long Overdue Update

2008-10-26T22:57:00.003-05:00

Yes it has been a ridiculously long time since I've updated our blog but it is definitely a side effect of how busy we've been. I truly feel like I've lived at either the doctor's office or dentist for the past three months. All three kids have had their physicals (Lei has had two, one was for dental surgery), all three kids have had dental cleanings, Lei has had one tooth extracted and a crown and a pulpectomy (nerve repair). Lei had his final surgery to correct his so called special need last Thursday at Vanderbilt childrens hospital and it went perfectly. I can't say enough good things about Vanderbilt; the hospital and the staff were exceptional. Lei was the most exceptional in how he handled everything that was thrown at him and his recovery has been amazing. The sad news is that he has to have dental surgery to finish up his extensive dental work on November 6th. Once his dental surgery is complete, he should be as healthy as anyone I know and actually healthier than most!

Enough about our medical and dental adventures now because I want to say how well Audrey and Lei are doing in Kindergarten. They are both getting ready to receive their progress reports for the first 9 weeks and we couldn't be pleased more. Lei is mastering english so fast it makes my head spin. Unfortunately he has lost the majority of his mandarin but this was expected since none of our family or friends speak more than a few words of mandarin. His english is very broken at times but then he will just spout out perfect sentences too. I can only imagine that he will be speaking completely understandable english in a few months.

Rachel is doing much better these days and adapting to our expanded family really well. She's now sleeping in her own room, in her own bed and getting along with Lei much better. She is also becoming more social and interacting with other children which is wonderful to see. She has attended two birthday parties in the past two weeks and had such a good time.

I'm going to have to keep this short tonight since it's late but I just wanted to say that while the past 4 months have been a definite character building experience, our family is so much stronger for having went through it. I just thank God everyday for blessing our family with these children.

As soon as I can, I'll post more about everything going on as well as some current pics !

Spilling the Beans

2008-08-12T22:01:00.004-05:00

Well anyone who knows us knows I've been talking about homeschooling for over a year now and I seriously wanted to do this. As much as I hate to say it, the timing to start right now has been about the worst it could possibly be. Putting it mildly, our family dynamic is drastically changed since Lei came home and I'm lucky to keep my sanity just taking care of the kids much less actually teaching them. Ok, cutting to the chase, Audrey and Lei attended their first day of Kindergarten today and appeared to really enjoy it. One huge blessing that we have is that our elementary school has an ESOL department with a woman who speaks fluent Mandarin. She tested Lei today and said he qualifies for ESOL classes (I was thinking duh ;lol) Ok, enough of my sarcasm, Lei and Audrey went to school all day today and when I picked them up they were both very excited and had lots to tell me. Lei started spouting out some english and was using some pronouns which he hasn't been doing. He kept pointing to me and referring to me as "you" which was I was loving. His most memorable sentence though was "Baby Jaguar is a cat" hehe. He also kept saying "animal" so I guess that was the word of the day ! When we came home, Lei got out his folder with his work and he was so proud and tried to explain everything to me, even what he had for a snack. His teacher really knows how to treat her students because from what he told me, it sounds like they had chocolate dipped strawberries ;-) Audrey on the other hand had goldfish, poor lass ! Audrey's reaction was exactly what I had anticipated since this child is a veteran of preschool and just a wee bit spoiled ;-) Audrey of course commented on the sufficiency of the playground equipment, the fact that she would prefer to eat in the cafeteria from now on (I sent her lunch), and that she enjoyed the tour of the school, the end. Audrey expressed to me that she enjoyed her first day of kindergarten but she was a little nervous. I of course told her that it was normal to feel a little nervous the first day of school.

Rachel and I had a mommy and me shopping extravaganza, ok, well not exactly since it was just Target and Wal-mart. We played the game "I'm an only child", and Rachel was loving every minute of it ;-) We actually had several people approach us and make over how cute Rachel was which I know she was eating up. I have to mention this one crazy lady though who certainly meant well but severely stuck her foot in her mouth when she said "I just love those kinds of children". I have heard so many ridiculous comments over the past 4 years that they hardly bother me, especially when they are not meant the way they come out. Of course they do bother me when Audrey is with me, but I will say that when I have Audrey and Lei too, nobody comes up to us which I appreciate. I guess when they know the child won't understand their comments is when they feel the need to openly share what they are thinking ...

I don't want to forget to mention that when the teacher was bringing Lei and Audrey to our Van today, I was standing outside the Van and when Lei saw me he just had the biggest smile and came running up to me so excited. Tonight he asked me to carry him up to his room to go to bed and he sat in my lap while we said prayers. It's a pretty unbelievable experience to bond so strongly with someone that you don't even speak their language.

Lastly, I know I always make it sounds like Lei is perfect which in my eyes he is, but he is also a typical 5 year old and going through a traumatic transition period. He doesn't cry very often at all but he sure does have a temper which I think is amplified by the fact he can't ever fully express to us what he is mad about. The closer we get to him emotionally the more he seems to be open about expressing how he "really feels". Tonight he was acting out because he was mad at one of his mei mei's and I finally had to get really firm with him which I rarely do. I guess this just means he is officially really one of ours now ;-)

The pictures I'm posting are from just before school and Rachel riding her tricycle after we came home this morning from taking Lei and Audrey to school, and Lei in the bathtub last night. Its weird the things that come to mind when you adopt a child older. As I was helping Lei get his bath, it occurred to me that I didn't have any pics of him in the bathtub and I have so many of the girls. It's so sad that we missed his baby/toddler years, but I'm so glad we have him now !

The Transition continued ...............

2008-08-10T21:34:00.003-05:00

Hmmmm, I was going to wait until I was rested before I posted and as you can see it's been almost a month and I'm still not rested so decided I better go ahead ;-) We are all feeling and acting somewhat human at this point which is a huge improvement over our first 3-4 weeks home. Without a doubt this adjustment period has been the most difficult of our adoptions. I totally underestimated the effect having a new 47 lb addition to the family would have on everyone. That being said, I'd do it over again in a heartbeat ! Our new son is so amazing I can't even tell you. He is very artistic and loves to draw and color, He is extremely intelligent and can print almost as well as I can, He is a perfectionist which I'm not used to but I'm liking better every day ;-), He is a serious Chinese nationalist at the age of 5 which has been interesting. He loves China immensely and speaks passionately about it whenever given the chance. As one of our travel families so perfectly put it, "He is not your typical orphanage kid". When you meet Lei you will find a child who is ahead developmentally if anything and who (other than dental care) is as healthy as his new sisters.

Lei refers to the orphanage director as "Mama" along with some chinese words which I don't understand but I find it interesting that she was a mother figure to all the children at his very small orphanage. Lei has a couple of photo albums from the orphanage and at least a couple times a week we get them out and he tells me about all of his friends and the director. I find it very unusual because he understands some of the childrens special needs and actually will explain them to me. Last night he was explaining one of his friends and showed me a picture and proceeded to mimick a cleft lip repair and even pointed inside his mouth I'm guessing referring to palate problem and swallowing. It was really mind boggling to me that a 5 year old was describing this to me. Another thing he was showing and mimicking to me was the "Gotcha" days of some of the children I had photos of that were from a couple years ago from the orphanage (other families had given to me). He would talk about their "Mama and Baba" coming from Mei Guo (America) and then he would mimick crying and I wasn't sure if he was talking about the parents crying or the babies or both. What an amazing thing for him to remember and I'm so glad he has his own Mama and Baba now :-)

The language barrier has not been easy but we have not had any major issues related to it. I'm so happy that over the past week Lei has really started taking off with his English. Because he was so proficient in Mandarin it took a little longer than we expected for him to become motivated to speak english. His pronunciation of just about anything is fantastic. The other night he came up to me and said "hummingbird" as plain as day. We have a feeder outside the kitchen window so we talk about the birds alot and he obviously has picked up on it. Also, this morning him and Audrey were playing a game and I hear him say "It's my turn". Now that he is enjoying using English, I think he is going to learn very fast. He is so self-driven and motivated to learn whatever he wants to it is scary.

Audrey and Rachel are doing really well now, but this transition has been as hard on them as anybody. Ever since we arrived home, Ms. Rachel has had some major sleep issues and we've ended up co-sleeping with her. The poor thing broke out in eczema patches all over too which she only does when she is seriously stressed. Audrey has developed a major case of premature PMS lol. She has always been my most even tempered non-moody child but as I said before, we've all had major adjustments ;-) Lei has been fairly content with the exception of getting really mad at his sisters occassionally which he gets over fairly quick if left alone.

Ok, I've said more than enough, but I'll end on a funny note. The other day someone came up to Lei at the gymnastics center and started talking to him. Audrey was standing there and she promptly intervened and told the little girl "He doesn't understand you, He's still Chinese" ;-) This may be my favorite quote of all time lol.

Above I've posted a few Pics we took before church this morning.

First Slide Show with New pics of Lei and the girls

2008-08-10T21:27:00.003-05:00

I put this slideshow together last night using pics from our first days home until now. I used a song that another adoptive mom used recently to make a slide show of a large number of adoptive families children which I loved. I just could not resist using this song because it was perfect for our situation. I will say though that Lei loved his "big family" (what the orphanage director called his nannies and other children). He was obviously given alot of love and good care there so I doubt he will ever regret the time he spent there. He was not your "typical orphanage child" because his orphanage was in no way typical. Although the conditions were not great (ie, building and furnishing), he was definitely treated like a member of a big family verses an orphan which is why he has handled his transition to us so well once home. He was taken on lots of field trips and even playdates at a beautiful city park which we visited while with him and the director.

Yes, we are still alive ;-)

2008-07-12T22:00:00.005-05:00

Yes, we are still alive, but barely lol ! This past week has been brutal and I wish I were exagerrating. It has not been brutal due to the jet lag although that wasn't fun either. I am here to tell you that we have all had a very healthy dose this week of sibling rivalry and major adjustment issues. I think there is light at the end of the tunnel though so I hope the end of it is close ;-) Our main clashes have been between Lei and Rachel because I think their personalities are both very strong, not to mention Rachel has just had a really hard time since we came home. If I would have known how tough our absence was on her, I think I would have taken her with us to China. Lei is doing wonderfully and adjusting just fine. He hasn't openly grieved again since we came home, but I'm sure in time he will grieve more. He is speaking some english now, but it is taking time. Tonight when it was bedtime, I said to him, "Come on Sweetie" and he promptly repeated the same thing back to me lol. He has a great sense of humor too. He is calling me Mommy and calls Audrey and Rachel by their names now, albeit yelling their names alot because they are taking his toy, etc lol. He is very comfortable with his daddy and openly says "I love you" to him all the time. He already seems to be attaching to us and tonight he kept wanting me to pick him up and hold him, all 45 lbs of him lol ;-) which of course I loved ! Our biggest hurdle right now is giving everyone enough attention so that nobody feels left out. Due to Lei's age, him and Audrey interact and play better together which I think evokes alot of jealousy in poor Rachel so we are trying to really make an effort to include Rachel in their activities as well as do some special things with her. Honestly, adopting out of birth order is probably a bigger deal than we had anticipated. We know everything will be fine eventually but getting to that point is going to be challenging. Ok, well I've said more than enough so I'll post some pictures of the crazy crew ;-)

Hangzhou Airport and Guangzhou pictures

2008-07-01T07:05:00.003-05:00

Our Last day in China "Ming Tian Mei Guo"

2008-07-01T01:17:00.004-05:00

This morning Lei woke up with a big smile on his face and then began watching his chinese DVDs that teach english. Our hotel room has the bedroom where Lei was watching the DVD and Alex and I were in the sitting room. Lei kept poking his head through the doors and saying english words and letters, most memorable, Banana ;-)

We all got cleaned up and ready for breakfast and Baba was in the bathroom. As Lei and I were sitting looking out the window at the skyscrapers I could only think that this would be Lei's last day in China and while I'm so anxious to return home, I can't help but acknowledge his loss. Apparently Lei and I were both having the same thoughts because I looked over at him and his lips were making the shape they always do before he gets really upset. I didn't know what to say so I first asked him if he was sad. The next thing you know he has big tears in his eyes so I thought maybe explaining that we were going home soon would help. I then said "Ming Tian Mei Guo", translated "Tomorrow America". Lei just started crying uncontrollable tears and started saying what he calls the director of the orphanage which begins with Mama. Lei had not visibly grieved since we left Hangzhou so I knew this was another positive sign. I just comforted him as much as possible and then told Baba that we needed to go ahead and go to breakfast with Lei crying. Once we got out of our room and downstairs where they serve breakfast Lei was fine and he was his wonderful sweet bubbly self. He has been so affectionate and loving today. We are blessed beyond measure.

We are going to the consulate for the swearing in so if possible I will post pics when we come back.

All our Love,

In Guangzhou and ready to go home !

2008-06-29T07:22:00.002-05:00

We still have two full days left in Guangzhou, but I can tell you that we are completely ready to go home. The trip has been nothing short of amazing and of course nothing less than exhausting ;-) Lei is doing extremely well, but is testing us daily and always stretching boundaries. He appears to be a typical 5 year old boy in every way. I would say the language barrier has been the most challenging aspect of this adoption because Lei is so verbal and it's obvious he is frustrated with us when we don't understand him. We are able to communicate with him for all his basic needs, but he loves to tell stories, ask questions, and describe things so this is where I'm sure he feels quite isolated and lonely. He is extremely smart and catches on to everything amazingly fast so we know the language barrier won't last long, but it's still really hard now. This past week has also been really difficult because we miss Audrey and Rachel so much. I can't believe we've been away from them for so long.

I'm really feeling that Lei having his two Mei Mei's will make all the difference in the world for him. Lei looks alot like Audrey but his personality has many of Rachel's traits so I just can't wait to see them all interacting together.

Lei is really good with other children and especially with younger ones. He must have been in charge of some of the little ones at his orphanage because he is very protective and interactive with some of the younger children we've met. I have a feeling Rachel will love having him for a big brother since she loves alot of attention ;-)

Lei has been much more affectionate the past couple days letting us hold him and hug him with even an occassional kiss so we are really happy about that. I really don't think there are going to be many issues with bonding or attachment except it will of course take longer since he is older. He was clearly attached to the orphanage director and other children at Jiaojiang SWI.

Also, I want to thank all of you who have posted comments. We have been able to read your comments in Hangzhou and Guangzhou and they have been so comforting.

I'll try to post a few pics soon.

and More

2008-06-26T07:52:00.004-05:00

More Pics

2008-06-26T03:54:00.003-05:00

Lei's adjustment continued ....

2008-06-25T16:51:00.003-05:00

Well It's 5:45 am or so and we are all up for the day, not my choice for sure ;-)

I'm going to where I left off, after Lei came into the hotel and decided to stay awhile. We all turned into bed around 8:30 pm. On Tuesday, our guide Jessica picked us up at the hotel at approximately 9:00 am to take us to get Lei's final adoption certificate from the civil affairs office where they were preparing it and then back to Taizhou where we had to return (a 3.5 hour drive) to get Lei's passport. Our trip to the civil affairs bureau was uneventful and we received our adoption certificate and finalized the adoption in the eyes of the Chinese, took a few pictures and we were off ! Lei mostly talked to our guide Jessica the whole time and quickly befriended her again. Lei spoke to Jessica non-stop for nearly 2 hours on our trip to Taizhou and then passed out cold and slept almost the entire remainder of the trip. Alex and I just took everything in stride knowing how difficult returning to Taizhou again would be for Lei. When we arrived in Taizhou, we met director Liu and some of the orphanage staff for lunch at a really good restaurant Director Liu had treated us to before. The lunch was delicious, but the mood a bit sad and Lei's expression during our lunch kept me close to tears the entire time. As I sit here typing this it still saddens me to think about it. But, again, we did what needed to be done, smiled as much as possible to show our sincere appreciation and headed for the gov't office where Lei's passport would be issued. Director Liu conducted herself in the most loving and professional manner the entire time and I can't say enough about how much we respect her.

It took about an hour to get all the paperwork straight and while we waited, Lei mostly talked to our guide Jessica and Director Liu. We did have one instance where Lei and I really connected as he taught me a song he knew with the hand gestures that accompanied it. I actually posted a picture where he is with me smiling as we do the gestures together and he sings this song. When it was time to leave the gov't office, Lei again resumed the saddest, most confused expression, but he resigned himself to leave with us. Director Liu hugged us both and I fought back the tears as we did what needed to be done, yet again. On the way back to Hangzhou, Lei spoke mostly to Jessica our guide and told her stories again, such as "the Monkey king", "Cinderella" and "Snow White". When he told Cinderella he put his own spin on it because he has quite the imagination. He told Jessica that when the prince tried the slipper on Cinderella's foot that Cinderella's foot stunk ;-) After finishing the stories, though, Jessica informed us that Lei was telling her that he wanted to go back to the orphanage and that if he was forced to come back to Hangzhou, he would walk back to Taizhou. Jessica spent alot of time talking to Lei and reasoning with him. She finally was able to get him to agree to to come to the hotel again, under the premise that she would be back on Thursday to see him. Alex and I were at a loss and just prayed for God's wisdom in all of this. We never have had any doubt that Lei is our son and although his feelings have been difficult to bear at times, he is an amazing child just having normal reactions that any well treated, loved child would have when he has lost so much.

I don't have time to post more now, but I will tell you that Wednesday was a major turning point and we now have the sweetest, most high energy, most intelligent, loving son we could have ever hoped for. He has accepted us :-) He is speaking some english and very well I must say. He only knows a little english and he will occassionally just blurt out spontaneously, I love you mommy, daddy ! It doesn't get any better than that.

The Wild Ride !

2008-06-25T07:37:00.002-05:00

The subject line pretty much says it all ! The past 2 days before today were very difficult for all of us, but most of all for Lei. I believe in our attempts to make his transition to us go more smoothly, we may have in fact prolonged his grief. We spent almost 2 full days in Taizhou with Lei and director Liu before coming to Hangzhou for the formal adoption. While we loved visiting with Director Liu and spending time together with her and Lei, I think Lei was confused about everything going on. Everytime we were with Director Liu and his nannies and then we had to leave, Lei was visibly shaken and upset. His most emotional separation occured when we arrived in Hangzhou and we had lunch with the director, driver and assitant director. After Lunch the Director and staff left for their own hotel and we decided to walk up the street to our hotel. Lei was so grief stricken when we left separately from the director that he screamed and cried and baba had to pick him up and carry him the whole way to the hotel (a short walk thankfully). It truly felt like an abduction, but we did what we had to do and it was heart wrenching.

Once we got Lei to the hotel he calmed down some. In the afternoon, we let Lei watch some Dora DVDs we had brought that were in Mandarin and taught English. Lei watched these for over two hours and didn't want to stop. They took his mind off his troubles temporarily but once we turned off the DVD player, another meltdown ensued. We all went to bed at 9pm exhausted to say the least.

Monday was adoption day and we were very nervous as to how Lei was going to react to seeing Director Liu again. To our suprise Lei handled everything amazingly well with the exception that he was extremely over-stimulated and ran around the conference table no less than 100 times ;-). After the adoption our guide Jessica took us to a local market where we purchased a few things we needed and a few we really didn't. We picked up some Mcdonalds to take back to the hotel and we were suprised to find out that Lei knew exactly what he wanted, a hamburger. He ate a whole hamburger and small fries in record time lol. After lunch I decided to be really brave and take Lei swimming at the hotel pool. The swimming was wonderful and so funny because Lei thought it was like a big bath tub and proceeded to strip. I promptly explained to him that he had to wear his shorts ;-)

When we finished swimming I had no idea what I was in for. We dried off but still had our wet swimsuits underneath our clothes. I was planning on going back to the room to change, Lei had other plans. The pool was on the first floor so Lei decided to make a straight line right to the lobby doors. He went out on the front steps outside the door and refused to come in. I can't remember the last time I felt so helpless or at a loss as to what to do, but I truly believe the lord had a hand in what happened next. After about 5 minutes of pleading with Lei to come in a young chinese woman came up with her baby boy in hand and said hello. She was smiling at Lei and showing him her son. Feeling completely desperate I asked the woman if she spoke english and she said "some". I then tried to explain to her my dilemma and asked if she would speak to Lei and persuade him to come in. She spoke to Lei for several minutes and informed me that Lei said his friend was supposed to pick him up at 8 oclock. I had no idea what he was talking about at the time, but later found out that our guide had told him this and the guide was the friend, except it was supposed to be 8 oclock in the morning ! Long story short, this woman convinced Lei to go to our hotel room. I promise that things get better with this story but it takes a day or so. Lei is sitting next to me right now watching "Ultraman" on his portable dvd player. He is stopping to explain the movie to me every 30 seconds so I'm going to have to finish this post later.

Taizhou Pictures & Adoption Pic in Hangzhou

2008-06-25T06:50:00.007-05:00

First the pictures

2008-06-25T05:05:00.005-05:00

Sorry we haven't posted in several days but more about that after the pictures ;-) Lei is just a little more of a "swashbuckler" than we first expected ! As I am trying to compose this blog submission, Paul Lei is on his third Kung-Fu Balloon Volleyball Tourney, and will not stop. A melt down on the event calendar? we do not know.... as usual time will tell.

Our first full day with Lei and the Orphanage visit

2008-06-21T16:54:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was a day full of much happiness and some sadness. We began our day eating breakfast with our guide Bruce, then meeting Director Liu, her assistant, another nanny and our Lei. We then first visited the orphanage and took many photos. Visiting the orphanage was a very humbling experience but still brought us so much joy. We couldn't help but feel sadness for the beautiful children still waiting for their families and especially for those who will never know one. Despite residing in a facility that only provides the bare necessities, We have never experienced so much genuine love before, both from the children, nannies, and director Liu. There was no sugar coating of words during our visit, only the direct truth as we were told the expected fate of many of the children and shown the living quarters and bedroom of our new son. I can't really think much more about the orphanage visit right now, but I will post more later. I do want to mention that it was so very obvious to us that the children of the orphanage were and are very important to Lei. He just shined with happiness as he played with his friends for the last time. The children of Jiaojiang CWI are so much a family in every since of the word.

After the orphanage visit, we took a tour of Jiaojiang and surrounding areas in Director Liu's minivan and took alot of video and photos. We also had the privledge of visiting Lei's finding place, but only took pictures from the Van.

We saw the old orphanage which the children left in 2001 so Lei was never there except to visit it with Director Lei because her office is still there today.

We visited the site for the building of the new orphanage which Director Liu is so excited and enthusiastic about. She just beamed with joy as she showed us the new site and earlier showed us pictures of the plans for the new facility.

We ate lunch at a restaurant and we ate some of the best seafood I've ever had. Since we have visited Jiaojiang, I've overeaten at every meal. I guess that just says it all. Director Liu has made sure that we have never had the chance to become hungry ;-)

After lunch we were invited to visit Director Liu's home where we were given a tour of her house, watched some TV and ate Chinese plums (a local favorite), and drank some very delicious Tea. Lei has been living with Director Liu for awhile now and he was very comfortable in her home ;-)

Director Liu also provided us with another trip to a beautiful park where Lei often was taken to play and we watched him feed these amazing white pigeons. The pictures we took there are going to be amazing as well as the video.

We then went to dinner for another delicious meal where we also had the privledge of meeting Director Liu's boss, the bureau chief and his wife. After dinner, the hard part came .....

Director Liu took us back to our hotel and Bruce gave Lei a piggyback ride into the hotel. As soon as Bruce, Alex, I and Lei were in the building, she made a quick getaway and there we were, alone with our son and Bruce for the first time.

During the entire day, Lei was so happy and content because director Liu was with us. He was very friendly and sweet to us, but it was obvious that he is very attached to director Liu. When we were first left alone with Lei in our hotel room, he was ok and watched some TV, tried to converse with us in mandarin some, and was just checking everything out a little. When we tried to get him to change his clothes is when he started getting upset. The next thing you know he has went and grabbed Director Liu's business card and he is insisting that we call her. Bruce's hotel room is across from ours so I went and got him and he came and called Director Liu for Lei. She spoke to Lei and reminded him that he promised he would stay with us tonight and that was that. After the phone call, Lei told bruce he wanted to take a bath before he put on his pajamas. The bath was the final straw and then came the saddest meltdown I've ever seen. After Bruce was gone and I was trying to help Lei get his bath, he just started crying and crying and speaking to me in mandarin. He got in the bathtub and was trying to wash but just couldn't stop crying. He was trying to tell me something and I had no idea what it was so I just kept telling him "don't be afraid", "dont worry", and "it's ok" in mandarin, some of the few phrases I know. He was so upset, that I finally just helped him rinse off, picked him up and put a towel around him. He let me help him get dressed and then we just put him to bed and he was asleep in no time. He is a fantastic sleeper and slept last night from 9pm until 6am at which time we woke him up just in getting ready. This morning he is like a new kid and very happy and content. I'll post pictures when we get to Hangzhou because we leave at 8am this morning, very soon.

Lei is truly a dream come true and I just wish I had more time to post. He has the sweetest, kindest nature with just a little "swashbuckler" in him. He is perfect for our family in every way.

Final note: I brought a book called "Chinese for adoptive families" made by an adoptive mom and this book has become my security blanket. I cannot thank amy kendall enough. It has kept us from feeling helpless in communicating with Lei. We have also learned pinyin pronunciations which is invaluable.

We have met Lei Lei !

2008-06-20T16:22:00.006-05:00

At approximately 3pm at the Jiaojiang Bus station we were greeted by Director Liu and our new son Lei as we stepped off the nearly 6 hour bus ride. First, Our son Lei is absolutely, undeniably adorable in every way. He also appears smaller to us than we expected, but it may just be us because we really don't have any frame of reference right now. We are just hoping that all the clothes we brought aren't too big. Ok, back to our first meeting at the bus stop ..... When I stepped off the bus, I first saw director Liu and hugged her, then I looked down and saw Lei being urged towards me with a very large bouquet of cream lillies and coral roses. Alex and I looked down at Lei and saw the sweetest face you could ever imagine. In a split second, he looked up at both of us and said as plainly as I've ever heard it, " I love you, Mommy, Daddy " . To say that we are both in love with our Lei would obviously have to be an understatement.

Now, onto reality .... We were almost immediately whisked into Director Liu's mini-van with our guide Bruce, two of Lei's nannies, and Lei right after we arrived. Lei was sat on the edge of my chair and sat there for a couple seconds, then jumped his little hind end over to daddy's chair ;-),too cute ! Did I mention he already has daddy wrapped very tightly around his little finger.

Once we arrived at our hotel, "The Phoenix Villa", we went up to our room with Director Liu, the assistant director, Lei and our guide Bruce. We all ended up sitting in our guide Bruces hotel room visiting for over an hour. It took a little while but we eventually we were able to see a lot of Lei's personality coming through. I am here to tell you that he is quite the character and very outgoing. He also has no problem expressing himself fluently in Mandarin. Director Liu had said Lei is shy, but this must just be around new people or strangers because we certainly did not see it. He is quite full of himself and appears to be extremely smart.

While we were in the hotel room, Director Liu and Lei showed us some of his school work he has been doing and he can already write all his uppercase english letters amazingly well. He also writes many chinese characters and he has written the names of many of his friends from the orphanage. Director Liu gave us a photo album with many great new pictures of her and Lei with the other children from the orphanage at at the local town square playground and park recently. While we were in the hotel room, Director Liu mentioned to Lei that he could stay with us in our room last night but this didn't go over well at all. Poor Lei was visibly upset and big crocodile tears rolled down his cheeks. Since we are going to be in Jiaojiang two nights, we told director Liu that if it was ok with her, Lei could stay with her instead until he got used to us. I think tonight Lei is supposed to stay with us, but we are hoping that since we are spending the day with him, it may not be quite as traumatic for him.

Last night after we left the hotel room, we went to a banquet room in the hotel where we ate a large array of delicious sea food selections ordered by director Liu. We had a wonderful meal with Director Liu, the assistant director, another nanny, our son Lei, and our guide Bruce. Director Liu is such an amazing lady and we feel so blessed to be spending this time together with her and Lei. After the meal, we all rode down to the local square and walked around and saw all the people and the lights, water and large number of Taizhou natives dancing to some pretty entertaining disco music ;-) We also saw many children rollerblading which seemed to spark Lei's interest. While we walked around the square/park, Lei held both our hands whenever we requested it which was most of the walk :-) Lei seems to really enjoy lifting both of his feet up in the air and having us swing him quite frequently which was alot of fun for all of us !

After our visit to the park, we returned to our hotel room where Director Liu tried to coerce Lei into staying at the hotel with either us or our guide Bruce, but it was a "no go" because Lei was tired and not wanting to be left with strangers which we completely understood. Director Liu and Lei left for her house at approximately 8:15 pm. Alex and I promptly passed out and we are now getting ready this morning to visit the orphanage. We will post a few pics below and hopefully alot more tomorrow.

We also wanted to share that whenever Director Liu mentioned to Lei about staying the night with us, Lei would go grab Director Liu's business card. He was obviously making sure he could reach her in case of an emergency. As we have said before, he is extremely smart. Director Liu also said he has been giving her alot of lip service, such as that when he comes to America, he will grow up, be boss of large company, and send orphanage many donations ;-) We are definitely going to have our hands full with this child lol !

Shanghai Site Seeing and more about Paul Lei

2008-06-19T09:55:00.009-05:00

Our guide Bruce told us this morning that he spoke to our son on the phone last night because Director Liu called him and let Paul Lei talk too. He said that Paul has been taught to say Mommy, Daddy, and "I love you" in English. He also said that Paul's Mandarin is very good. We are just so excited that we finally get to meet Paul tomorrow afternoon. I am posting some pictures of our siteseeing in Shanghai. The pictures include the Yiwu Gardens, Oriental Pearl Radio & TV Tower, Pudong Airport, Shanghai museum, The Bund, and a local restaurant. We will post more as soon as we meet as our son.

News about our upcoming meeting with Paul Lei

2008-06-18T16:50:00.004-05:00

We are in Shanghai now with Bruce Yu siteseeing today. We will leave Friday morning for Taizhou and we have found out that our son Lei is actually living at Director Liu's home until we arrive. We are not sure how long she has had him at her house, but obviously We are suprised and very happy to hear this. Bruce says she wants to teach him some things before we receive him. Bruce also says that Director Liu says Lei is very happy about his adoption so it will be interesting to see if his happiness lasts once he realizes the magnitude of everything happening to him. We are actually taking a bus to Taizhou from Shanghai and Director Liu and Lei are meeting us at the bus station. I can truly say this is not how we ever envisioned our first meeting with our son, but We are loving every minute of it.

Michelle

Shanghai , We're Here !

2008-06-18T11:50:00.002-05:00

We arrived in Shanghai about an hour late, but made good time. Our guide Bruce met us and we checked into our hotel, about an hours drive from Pudong Airport. We went to a local restaurant, visited and ate with Bruce. The food was excellent, but we aren't completely sure what we ate ;-) The important thing is that it's after midnight here and no tummy troubles ! We will sitesee in Shanghai with Bruce tomorrow for the whole day and then Friday morning we will take a bus to Taizhou (where Lei's orphanage is). Bruce has informed us that Lei has been staying at Director Liu's home and that Director Liu and Lei will meet us at the bus station in Taizhou when we arrive. This is going to be one interesting Gotcha day I'm here to tell you :-). To our family, we want to let you know that we did receive our panda phone and we will be calling home soon !

I will try to post some pics of our site seeing adventures tomorrow.

New Pictures of Paul from May !

2008-06-10T22:25:00.003-05:00

We just received about 40 new pictures of Paul today from a very thoughtful family who just visited the orphanage because their son was adopted from there. I made a smilebox slideshow which I posted at the top of the blog. These recent pictures of Paul are amazing and we are so thankful to have them !

Getting Ready to Travel !

2008-06-08T22:17:00.003-05:00

Well this post is long past due, but I'm wore out and we haven't even left lol ;-) So here's the scoop. Our consulate appointment is June 30th but we are leaving on June 17 from KY where both our families live. Please see our itinerary below.

June 17 - Fly to Shanghai
June 18 - Arrive in Shanghai and meet our guide Bruce at the airport in the early afternoon - check into hotel and site see
June 19 - Site see in Shanghai
June 20 - Take Bus with our guide Bruce from Shanghai to Taizhou, Zhejiang province where our son's orphanage is. Site See
June 21 - Visit our Son's orphanage and meet him and orphanage director
June 22 - Ride with Orphanage director and our son from Taizhou to Hangzhou (provincial capital of Zhejiang province).
June 23 - Meet our son at civil affairs bureau and formalize adoption
June 24 - finger printing and other paperwork
June 25 - 4 hour bus ride back to Taizhou to receive Paul's passport (we had no choice in this)
June 26 - Site see in Hangzhou West Lake tour
June 27 - rest and then fly to Guangzhou
June 28 - medical and take visa photo
June 29 - Visit Safari Park
June 30 - Visa appt.
July 1 - Take visa in afternoon
July 2 - Fly out of Guangzhou and head home !

Have TA now, waiting on Consulate Appointment !

2008-05-28T15:44:00.009-05:00

Our agency received our TA yesterday and requested our consulate appointment. Now we just wait and it can take up to 5 business days for the consulate to give us a date. Can you say excruciating wait ;-) Our first choice was 6/23 which could put us leaving for China 6/11, yikes ! Our 2nd choice was the week of 6/30 which is fine too, but of course we just want to bring our little guy home asap. I can't believe we are so close to being a family of 5. I'm posting some pics from the last week of the girls, these will be some of the last we will have with only them ;-)

Audrey's first graduation

2008-05-28T15:18:00.006-05:00

Audrey isn't even 5 yet and she's had her first graduation from Preschool ! I kept making fun of the fact that her preschool was having a graduation ceremony but in the end I loved it ;-) The staff there did an amazing job and I was almost in tears by the end. Here are a few pics from the Ceremony. By the way, I wish I had video, but I was a bad mama and forgot the camcorder !

Updated Spring 2008 slideshow

2008-05-20T22:20:00.003-05:00

I deleted the last slideshow because I updated it with new pics from April and May. So about half the pictures you may have already seen, but there are quite a few new ones and I really liked this Martina Mcbride song ;-)

Waiting for TA and Travel Plans

2008-05-13T15:30:00.003-05:00

I'm here to tell ya, this is going to be one interesting trip ! I'm already going nuts trying to decide everything about our trip and our TA hasn't even arrived yet ;-) We should receive our TA in a couple of weeks if they arrive in the usual amount of time. Since the Olympics are right around the corner and we've already been to Beijing twice, we are opting to fly into Shanghai this time. Shanghai is also alot closer to Hangzhou where we will be adopting Paul Lei. Since our adoption agency's travel agency (BOIT) doesn't have a representative in Shanghai, we had to hire a guide. As luck would have it, we have been blessed to find a private guide who knows our son's orphanage director. We found this person through another family who has adopted from our son's orphanage in 2005. Long story short, we are hiring this Chinese guide to come to Shanghai and take us siteseeing, then he will ride with us by bus to Taizhou (4 hour trip to our sons hometown and orphanage). We will be able to site see in Taizhou and visit our son at the orphanage. Then, the orphanage director has suggested that we ride by bus with her and our new son up to Hangzhou (4hour drive) to carry out the adoption at the civil affairs bureau. Never did I imagine we would get to meet our son at his orphanage and ride to the main city with him and the director. We are really excited that we are going to have such a personal experience spending time with Paul and his caregivers.

We have LSC/LOA for Paul Lei !!!!!!!!!

2008-05-04T21:57:00.003-05:00

We have our final confirmation that Lei is ours ! This is our "letter seeking confirmation" from CCAA. We should receive our TA in about 3-4 weeks and hopefully travel mid to late June. We are excited beyond belief and running around crazy trying to prepare. We didn't receive the call until 8:40 pm Friday night so we were really shocked. We just can't wait to meet our new son !

Latest on the girls and Paul's adoption

2008-04-01T08:40:00.008-05:00

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile, but life is moving at warp speed lately ! Rachel is now potty trained and she has moved into Audreys room in her own big girl bed. The transition has been a little rough but overall much easier than we anticipated. Rachel is still not making it through the night dry but we are determined to have her potty trained at night as well so guess I'll just be doing a little extra laundry for awhile ;-) Rachel's crib is still sitting in Paul's room but I'm hoping to sell it soon and begin preparing his room for him. Since Paul seems to really like horses his room will have them as it's central theme. I recently received a few pictures of Paul receiving his care package. I am so amazed at how big our son is getting ! He looks a little sad in the pics but I'm hoping hes just irritated because he had to get dressed up and get a new haircut for the pics ;-)

This past weekend Wendy and Dan Bowyer came to visit and stayed with us. Both their daughters are from Audrey and Rachel's orphanages and we traveled together for both adoptions.

We are still waiting for our LOA or LSC (letter seeking confirmation) for Paul which is the main piece of paper we need before we can get ready to travel. The way things are moving now, we probably won't receive it until late May. I'll post as soon as we hear something.

Questions orphanage answered about Lei recently !

2008-02-27T23:06:00.001-05:00

What is his personality like?

He is active, smart, industrious, and sensible.

When does the orphanage usually tell children they are being adopted and when is it ok to send a care package?

After we submit his file, we told him: “we’ll find a warm family for you. You’ll have Daddy and Mommy in the family.” After we received your pictures, we showed him the pictures right away, and told him it’s his parents. Please feel free to send care packages to him, we’ll definitely give them to him and tell him: Your Mommy and Daddy really care about you and love you very much.

Is there anything we can send for the children and caretakers of the orphanage ?

We have everything here, nothing needed in particular. Thank you for your kindness.

How does Lei feel about being adopted?

LeiLei hopes he has a real family. There are daddy and mommy love him. So when he heard there is a family is going to adopt him, he was very excited!

Is Lei close to any of his caretakers and if so, what are the names?

He lives in our big family. We all love him and he gets along well with everybody. And he is very close to us.

What are Lei's likes and dislikes? Does he have any favorite toys? Favorite Foods?
He is not picky. He loves remote airplane and cars. He loves KFC!

When Lei is upset, how do you comfort him?

Give him a hug and kiss him, usually he’ll be happy again.

Does Lei like animals? If so does he have a favorite?

He likes rabbit and kitty. He dreams he can ride horse and walk on grassland.

Celebrating Sisterhood

2008-02-24T10:32:00.007-05:00

Thought it would be fun to create a slideshow with pics of Audrey and Rachel together since Rachel came home. A good friend is making a scrapbook for the girls and she is the one who gave me the idea to make a slideshow just celebrating their relationship. The song is definitely a little more country that I would prefer but I had to use it because the words were perfect ;-)

We will be Officially DTC Friday !!!!!

2008-02-11T17:40:00.000-05:00

We just received an email from Terri at CHI and our dossier will be hand carried by Stefani Ellison on her trip to China this Friday. We are so excited and relieved that the paperchase is over and we are anticipating a February Login date. Now the wait begins. I think on average it is taking 90-100 days or so to get the LOA once you are DTC and have PA. If this comes true for us, we will probably travel early July, but of course this is only a guess. It will be a long Spring this year .........

Thanksgiving to Valentines Pics and Videos

2008-02-11T14:33:00.000-05:00

Sisters and Friends

2008-02-01T14:15:00.001-05:00

Just thought I'd post some recent pics of the girls playing. They truly are best friends although they spend alot of time abusing each other ;-)

I 171H finally received last week !!!

2008-02-01T13:50:00.000-05:00

After nearly 9 weeks of waiting, we finally received our I-171H for Liu Lei, soon to be Paul Lei Price Hanna. What is really sad is that after 9 weeks of waiting, they didn't fill out the I-171H correctly. They forgot to mark that he is a special needs child. Fortunately our agency told us to go ahead and use the original I-171H for authentications and just take the updated I-171H to China with us with the original. So, we are finally about to be DTC. We should receive all of Paul's documents back from the courier in DC by the middle of next week and hopefully be logged in with a February LID. If we are logged in February, we are guessing we will travel late June or early July. This paperchase by far has been the worst of all 3 of our adoptions. I'm sure some of this is due to the fact that we know our son is waiting .
The girls are doing great and they are looking forward to having a big brother. The girls will be staying with Nai Nai and Papa while we travel so this will be our first trip to China with just Alex and I. We are looking forward to the trip even knowing it may be really rough with Paul's initial adjustment. We also know that we will miss the girls terribly. Niether of them has ever spent a night away from us since they were adopted....

Audrey's video Journal 2004 trip to China

2008-02-01T08:39:00.001-05:00

I thought it would be fun to just make a video of clips from our trips to China that are not edited and have the actual audio so I made a video journal of Audrey's adoption and I plan to do one for Rachel this month as well. I think they will be nice keepsakes for the girls.

The Girls, Paul's adoption and Remodel

2008-01-22T21:59:00.000-05:00

The past couple months have been crazy to say the least, but I'll try to do a little catching up. First, Audrey and Rachel are doing great and growing up way too fast. Rachel is finally starting to talk albeit a little slower than we would like. Just in the past month she has finally been able to say her name. She can say "I want that " of course lol. She says' "I eat", "that my momma", whenever she feels Audrey is getting too much attention. "Breakfast Bar" and many others. We've decided that Rachel is learning to talk on a "need to" basis. She never says anything without a purpose for saying it ............... and then there is the big sister who talks continuously 24/7 regardless of whether there is a need to communicate anything at all lol. It is no wonder Rachels speech has been a little slow in developing ;-)

There are so many funny things the girls do these days if only I could remember them all. Of course the one today is still fresh in my mind so I"ll share it. We were in the kitchen earlier this afternoon and I hear Audrey yell "No Rachel, Mom Look, she thinks it's Chapstick !" I turned around and Rachel was coating her lips real good with a glue stick sigh lol. I can only laugh now because it was made for kids and non-toxic of course. I was able to wash it off promptly too. It did teach me to be a little more careful about where I leave such items !

The other day Audrey was playing with one of her toy horses and she said it was a girl horse. I asked her how she knew it was a girl and she said emphatically "Because she has eyebrows". I was like "who knew" ;-) lol....

We tried potty training with Rachel in mid December and it was definitely a bust. Rachel had been holding it quite a bit in her pullup but for some reason when we put her in panties, she became a mad peeing machine. That girl went through 6 pairs of panties in 90 minutes and I'm not exaggerating. Needless to say that ended potty training 101 for a while. We are now in the phase of I want to use the potty whenever I feel like it but I will still pee in my pullup and I won't poop on the potty to save my life ! What is up with the fear of pooping on the potty I ask???? I've talked to so many moms and this seems to be a big issue. Ok, enough about potty training. It's bad enough to have to do it, much less write about it haha.

On to the paperchase ....... The paperchase for Liu Lei, soon to be known as Paul Lei Price Hanna has been exhausting to say the least. We are still waiting on the I-171H and have been for over 8 weeks. I called our congressman a week and a half ago and they called Memphis USCIS last week and were told it will still be 2 weeks before we have it. This makes the time from our homestudy and prints being received till we receive the I-171H 10 weeks which is insane. Long story short, we will probably end up DTC mid February and travel late June or early July.

As far as the remodel goes, its almost over and thank goodness ! Don't ever stay in your house while your kitchen is being remodeled with two sick kids and a husband out of town on business the whole week. It wasn't pretty and that's all I"ll say about that lol !

Lastly, make sure to watch the video clip I posted. My favorite part is where Rachel mimicks Audrey and says "Nai Nai and Papa" with the most serious southern draw you ever heard ;-)

My apologies that I rarely post, but I am going to try to do better, especially now that the holidays are over and this crazy remodel is too !

Audrey and Rachel Christmas 2007

2008-01-22T21:58:00.001-05:00

I guess this is better late than never lol, but thought I'd share a few clips of the girls from December. Rachel can't even talk well yet and already has the serious southern draw going on ;-)

Home Improvements or Nesting ???

2007-12-20T10:41:00.000-05:00

I have to laugh because everytime we start a new adoption and finish up the paperwork or come close to it we also begin furiously updating our home. With Rachel we ended up putting down hard wood floors in our entire upstairs and making our loft into a 4th bedroom. With Lei we are now adding a floor to ceiling bookshelf in our formal living room, Adding crown molding to 2 upstairs bedrooms and our upstairs bathroom, then the biggie is we are remodeling our Kitchen. We are replacing the tile, updating the hardware on the cabinets, replacing the countertops and replacing the appliances with stainless. We are also adding ceiling fans and some new lighting as well as updating some trim work downstairs. Ok, I'm now dizzy just thinking about all of it lol. When it is all said and done, we will then immediately proceed to the poorhouse ;-) The book shelf is almost done so once it is finished I will post a pic. It is awesome and I'm so glad we had it built. I know it will be a nice selling point one day when we sell. I definitely think there is a connection between our preadoption home improvements and Nesting .....

USCIS Memphis and Lei

2007-12-20T10:30:00.000-05:00

I fed-ex'd our homestudy a second time on December 6th and Confirmed it was received on the 7th. Memphis USCIS did say that they will honor the original receipt date of November 16th so we shall see. If they take the maximum time they say it may take we may not have the I-171H until January 16th which seems like forever to me. We have all of Lei's docs back from being authenticated by the Sec of State's offices except my birth cert. which goes to California which is scary in and of itself lol. California charges 20.00 to authenticate one document. Thank goodness we live in TN where it cost 2.00 per doc !!! :-) Gotta love the Southeast.

The closer we get to the end of the paperchase the more I feel like this was meant to be and that Lei really is our son. I think we have all completely bonded to the few pictures we have of him. Now we are just preparing ourselves for the upcoming travel and all the trials and tribulations that will most likely follow. I'm currently reading a very good book called "Our Own", parenting the older adopted child". So far it seems like a very good reference and gives many scenarios as to what to expect when adopting an older child. I know this will be a comfort to have once Lei is home too.

A Blue Christmas Without You

2007-12-06T02:47:00.000-05:00

It's amazing how fast time flies when you are paperchasing and trying to keep up with a 2 and 4 year old ! That may be why I'm finally posting at almost 3am lol. I just wanted to catch up briefly and share the events of the past couple days. First of all, we are in the final stages of our paperchase now and it's getting hairy to say the least. Yesterday I was sitting in the County Clerks office in downtown Chattanooga waiting to have all our dossier docs certified and all of the sudden I hear the song "It'll be a Blue Christmas without You". Wow, I was like, hmmmmm, this song couldn't have come at a worse time ;-). I thought I was going to burst into tears right there ! Now that we are almost DTC, suddenly I have this overwhelming need to have our son home. It has been so very different having a little face in our minds to think about constantly. Up until the past week though, I personally have just tried not to think too much about him and hyperfocus on the paperchase. But now that we are almost done, all I can seem to think about is him and what it will be like when he is with us. Well, while I was thinking about Lei yesterday, I decided that since our homestudy had gone to USCIS on November 16th and our social worker had not put a cover letter on our homestudy stating that we were adopting a "Waiting Child", that I would just email them (Memphis USCIS) to make sure they knew that Lei was waiting on them so that he could come home. So I emailed Memphis yesterday morning and when I returned from getting our docs authenticated in Chattanooga, I come home to an email that says they can't find our homestudy !!!! I was like NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Of course then I was just so thankful that I had emailed them only two weeks after they received it instead of waiting weeks only to find out they never had it. Long story short is that we are fed-exing another homestudy to them tomorrow and I am hoping that since they LOST our first one, that they will expedite the processing of our I-171H.

Ok, I must sleep now !!! There is so much more to post and catch up on which I promise to very soon.

Gotcha Day Rachel in China and Home

2007-12-06T02:36:00.001-05:00

I recently remade Rachel's Gotcha Day video and added some pics since she's been home. Hope you enjoy.

Audrey's Horseback riding Adventure

2007-10-07T22:31:00.000-05:00

Ok, am I crazy putting Audrey on a horse at 4.5 yrs old? This was actually just one of those fateful things that happens. I really had thought she was too young, but I had talked to several different people recently who had experience with horses and all informed me that it's not uncommon at all for kids to start riding after age 3.5-4. We just happen to have a riding/boarding stable literally within walking distance of our house so I have been inundated with requests from Audrey to ride over the past year.

Long story short, she is a natural and she had the time of her life. I myself love horses as well so seeing her learn to ride was wonderful. She takes another lesson this Wednesday and we are really looking forward to it.

We have our PA for LEI !!!!!

2007-10-07T22:19:00.000-05:00

Although the PA (preapproval from China) is only one small step in our adoption process, it offically makes Lei ours as long as our dossier supports the information in our Letter of Intent (LOI), which it will. We finished up our homestudy last week and our SW is working on writing it up now. We just received our fingerprinting appointment Saturday and it is for October 26 so just a couple weeks away. If all goes as planned, we should be DTC early December. I still cringe when I think about Memphis USCIS though. They can take anywhere from 5-8 weeks to process our I-600A once they have the homestudy and prints. It only took 5 weeks with Rachel so I will be happy if it is the same for Lei.

Happy Birthday Rachel !!!

2007-10-07T22:05:00.000-05:00

Rachel's Birthday was actually the last week of September but I'm finally getting around to posting. We celebrated with a small birthday party at home and it was perfect. I didn't realize how in touch Rachel would be that it was her birthday but she totally got it and she wanted us to sing Happy Birthday to her all day long. The only word she can say from the song is "Happy" so she just went around singing "Happy" all day lol. We picked her up a special little birthday cake and a Princess Balloon that sings "happy birthday" and she was thrilled. Throw in last years "carebear" birthday decorations and you have a great party ;-) The most memorable thing about Rachel's birthday party was the fact that she blew out her candle without any help whatsoever. This should not have suprised me though since she is very often full of hot air !

About Our Boy !!!!! Our hearts already ache for him

2007-09-15T21:51:00.000-05:00

Since I last posted about Lei, I have learned so much new information about his orphanage and caregivers thanks to several families who have visited the orphanage contacting me after I posted on the Zhejiang orphanages yahoo group. We now know that Lei is at Jiaojiang SWI which is on the China Sea where it meets the Shujiang river. There are only 14 children at his orphanage and one was just adopted in the past week by a Dutch family who actually have contacted me while in China. They visited the orphanage just a few days ago so they are sure they met Lei. I sent them his referral pictures and they are going to look through all their pictures to see how many he is in and send them to me. As you can imagine we are so excited that we might see recent pictures !!! One family did send me a picture of her daughter with him in the background in July 2006. He just looks like an angel from heaven, and I'm not kidding :-) We also now know the director of the orphange's name and we have a direct contact in China thanks to a gentleman who's son is adopted from Jiaojiang SWI. The recurring theme from all the families I've been in contact with is that this is a very good orphanage with loving nannies and a director who really cares about the children. The families who have told me this have all been to the orphanage and have met the director and caregivers.

Our LOI should be on it's way to CCAA by now because it was being translated last week. I also filed our I-600A today and our homestudy is moving at warp speed. All this said, I still know realistically that we probably won't travel until next May. Knowing who our son is and having to wait so long is just going to be heartwrenching ............ It already is. I will post any new pictures and information I receive. Hopefully I will have new pictures soon !

Soccer Girl !!! WAY TO GO #14

2007-09-15T21:26:00.001-05:00

Ok, well today was only Audreys 2nd Soccer practice and game but we all sure had a good time and we can already see her improving. ( She now knows to kick the ball when possible and which goal to kick it towards ;)) Of course there is this phenomena that is quite humorous to watch in which the opposing team member will stop with the ball and then Audrey and her teammates aren't sure what to do. They stand there and wait for their opponent to move. I guess you can't play soccer if your opponent doesn't move lol. Anyway, our first soccer game with Audrey we weren't sure what to think but today it was great. Sunshine, fresh air, exercise for the girls, and oh, the junk food at the concession stand wasn't bad either ;-) Rachel really enjoys soccer now too and she is going to be a natural when she's old enough to play. She can already kick the ball great !

It's All About Audrey and Rachel

2007-09-02T15:54:00.000-05:00

Actually Audrey has a fleece blankie from her "Rae" (grandma) that says "It's all about me, Deal with it". Audrey asked me what it said last night and I told her and she seemed quite pleased and kept repeating this phrase sigh lol. Thanks Rae !!! Haha

What is new with us? Well everything is always new, sometimes fun, sometimes exhausting and most of the time both !. Rachel is still as headstrong as ever and tests us daily. She doesn't have great speech skills yet, but she has no problem getting her point across. She is our little "spitfire" putting it politely ;-) Her main words these days are "one mo" and she puts up one finger. She learned this quickly because no matter how much you give her she isn't satisfied so it's always "ONE MO PEAS". She can also say "GUM" quite plainly. (a whole other story there). She also says "BAD" perfectly lol. Guess maybe her mama has said that one more than once. Whenever any of us do anything that displeases Rachel, she is the first to raise her finger and scold us with "BAD". Rachel feels inclined to do exactly what Audrey is doing at all times which is a great challenge. I let Rachel play with Play Dough the other day and you would have thought she had gold. She sat there mesmerized for at least 45 minutes using the little plastic scissor that came with it. I think she felt like she had arrived because I let her use what appeared to be real scissors ;-) Rachel has been doing some crafts at her new preschool and the teacher says she is really really into it. I told them that I believe it is because she is "craft deprived" at home. I am about the least crafty person you will ever meet lol. Rachel is finally starting to pay attention to security items, ie, baby dolls, stuffed animals, etc, although she still doesn't act like she has to have them. Rachel twists the hair on the back of her head at night to self soothe which is great except that when she wakes up the back of her head resembles a brillo pad ;-) needless to say I am still trying to push stuffed animals off on her. We are making progress slowly but surely.

I could write a book on what Audrey says on a weekly basis. Actually what she says begins from the moment her feet hit the floor (unfortunately this is usually quite early) until after her feet are back in the bed at approximately 9pm. Audrey is in the "Sassy", I have conquered the world and know it all" phase now. I'll start first with the talking. Audrey currently reminds me so much of that VolVo commercial where the man picks up the daughter and puts her in the back of the SUV and she never stops talking the entire time and he just has this numb smile on his face ;-). This scene would be our daily life now lol. Audrey doesn't have to have anything to say to talk now and if nobody will listen to her then she will sit and talk to herself, it is too funny ! Audrey can write her name now and a few other choice words like "MOMMY" *grin* ;-) She can count to 40 and I think if I would take a little time and sit down with her she could count to 100 in no time. Audrey is a stuffed animal junkie and we are seriously considering intervention soon !

Audrey is still taking gymnastics and she starts playing soccer next saturday so I will be sure to post pictures of that. I will be starting Rachel in gymnastics next fall when she turns 3. They have mommy & me programs for under 3 but I am just too old and tired for that one lol ;-)

A little about Lei

2007-09-01T22:03:00.000-05:00

Lei is his first name and Liu is his surname. Alex is taking his sweet time choosing a name so until he decides we shall use his Chinese name. Who knows, Lei may tell us he wants to continue to use his Chinese name vs. a new American name so we better be prepared for either ;-) His Chinese name will definitely be included in his american name regardless. Lei is from Zhejiang province which is just south of Shanghai and north of Fujian province on China's eastern coast. He is from a place called Taizhou City. From what I can tell so far, this is a fairly rural region and not close to any large cities.

Lei is described as restless, energetic, likes to imitate, and play with toys. He sounds exactly like his sisters ! His update from the SWI also mentions more than once that he gets along well with other children and especially likes to help the younger ones. It states that he likes to help feed and take care of the them. Hearing this is one of the things that just really stole my heart for him.

I will post more as I know it and of course more about the girls !

Latest Pics of Girls

2007-09-01T16:05:00.001-05:00

I just got these back the other day and thought I'd share them. I am going to try to post more about our goings on tonight when the girls are to bed ..........

The Latest .............and then some !

2007-08-31T22:05:00.001-05:00

Ok, first of all, if you haven't seen the video I just posted, please watch it. I copied it from anothers blog who copied it also who probably copied it haha. It is great and so expresses how most parents feel quite frequently ;-) Secondly, I have some big, big, very big news ! I never post so no telling when anyone will read our news but I'll post it anyway because I'm soooooooooooooooooo excited.

WE ARE GOING BACK TO CHINA A THIRD TIME :-)

WE HAVE FOUND A BEAUTIFUL 4 YR OlD BOY ON A WC LIST AND HAVE ACCEPTED HIS REFERRAL !

IF ALL GOES WELL WHICH IT SHOULD, WE WILL TRAVEL TO BRING HIM HOME LATE SPRING 2008 !

HE WILL BE 5 1/2 WHEN WE TRAVEL AND MOST LIKELY SPEAK LITTLE TO NO ENGLISH SO IT'S GOING TO BE VERY INTERESTING AND CHALLENGING WE ARE SURE.

OK, I'LL POST PICS NOW BECAUSE THAT IS REALLY WHAT YOU WANT TO SEE I'M SURE ;-) I THINK THESE PICS ARE PROBABLY FROM AGE 2 UNTIL PRESENT.

Must See !

2007-08-31T22:04:00.001-05:00

New Slideshow on Myspace

2007-07-16T22:11:00.000-05:00

Just wanted to let you know that I posted some updated pics of the girls on our Myspace page. The link to our page is listed at the top of the links on this page. I tried posting the slideshow here but it wasn't formatting properly. I will post more about life here as soon as I can !

Audrey's May 2007 Mother's Day Out Program

2007-06-22T08:28:00.000-05:00

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Audrey Just turned 4 !

2007-06-21T20:57:00.000-05:00

Audrey's Birthday was last weekend but we haven't celebrated it yet because she is having a party this Sunday. I thought I'd post her Gotcha Day Video in honor of her Birthday. I'm going to try to post a short clip also taken from her Spring program from her Mothers Day Out group. It is so cute ! Can you tell I'm a little biased lol?

Audrey's Gotcha Day Video

2007-06-21T20:47:00.001-05:00

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Catching up !

2007-06-02T07:25:00.000-05:00

My posts are few and far between, but thought I'd try to share what little I can retrieve from my tired brain ;-) We have all been very healthy since April and just enjoying life. Audrey is growing up so fast and will be turning 4 this month. Yikes ! Rachel isn't even 2 yet and wants desperately to be 4 lol. She is in constant competition with big sister and she is now obsessed with sitting on the potty whenever I mention changing her diaper. I will be buying some pullups very soon to seize this opportunity ! Rachel is also transitioning into the "No" phase. I really think I liked the "yes" phase alot better haha. If you ask Rachel most things now, you will get the reply "no, no, na, no, no". It's usually a series of no's for emphasis I'm guessing. She is really starting to try to talk and say quite a few words. Among them are bird, duck, cat, dog, star, hi, bye bye and quite a few others that escape me. Rachel is our grumpy child too which is actually humorous sometimes. She is already imitating Audrey everytime Audrey pouts or gets mad. Rachel will cross her arms and pucker her lips to show her displeasure anytime things don't go her way. It is so funny to watch but of course we try not to smile ;-)

Audrey is currently working on writing her name and she is starting to know most of her lower case letters too. She can finally count to 20 now. The reason I say finally is that we have been working on this off and on over the past year and she seemed to have a mental block about it but now is a counting fool !

I'm still bouncing around the idea of "homeschooling" but haven't made a final decision yet. Next week I am going to contact some homeschoolers and see what kind of networking there is in our area. The only way I will consider homeschooling is if we do it as part of a network of families so that the girls aren't isolated. Homeschooling is extremely popular in TN so it may be a totally feasible idea. Alex's sister homeschools 2 of their boys in KY and is somewhat of an inspiration to me. I'll post more when I know more.

The pictures that I posted below are from our trip over Memorial Day weekend when we visited both our families. As you can see the Kiddie Pool was quite the rage ! The girls really love visiting their Rae and Grandpa and Nai Nai and Papa and all their Aunts, Uncles and cousins. The memories we create each visit are really priceless. The pictures towards the end were taken yesterday at a local park which I just love. It was a bit hot and sticky outside but there were lots of shady spots and the ducks were very happy to see us :)

Oh, and last but not least, I seriously have adoption fever again ............... I know I am completely insane lol, but I also know we will adopt again, hopefully starting the process next year. I'm hoping that we will be able to find a child on one of the special needs list because I really feel next year will be the right time for us to adopt a SN child. In fact, I fell in love with a little girl on the AHH list that is currently out, but It is just too soon to be bringing a one year old into our family. This little ones birthday is the day after Rachel's so I would end up with a 1 year old, 2 year old and 4 year old. This could result in me completely losing my mind lol, so I vowed we will pursue a SN adoption next year. Now I just have to get Alex on board ;-)

Check out my Slide Show!

2007-06-01T19:04:00.001-05:00

Check out my Slide Show!

2007-05-04T23:01:00.001-05:00

2007-05-02T14:04:00.000-05:00

Sick and then some .................

Right before Easter Rachel came down with a somewhat nasty cold, a few days later daddy came down with it and a few more Audrey and about the time everyone else was on the mend, mommy came down with it and it didn't go away but turned into bronchitis. Why did mine go into bronchitis ? Well, my guess is that my total lack of sleep while everyone else was sick and while I was sick due to Rachel teething, being sick and staying up at least 1.5-3 hours every night might have had something to do with it :( After 1.5 weeks on antibiotics though I am happy to announce I am human again and the girls and daddy too. Unfortunately though, yesterday Audrey caught another sneaky bug and ran a 102.3 fever last night and into today. Fortunately she seems like she's rebounding well today and her fever has broke.

Due to all the illness, our Easter was definitely not the most memorable but the girls did have a great Easter at home after Audrey and I returned home from Church. Audrey was able to go on an easter egg hunt at church but Alex and Rachel stayed home since they were both pretty sick.

Saturday, my sister and her husband and his parents and brother and nephews all came for a visit to celebrate our nephews birthday. We all went to Chuck E Cheese and it was crazy lol. After about 2.5-3 hours of complete chaos and very loud noise, I found myself standing in a long line with Audrey holding our receipt for 117 points towards some unknown prize. After nearly a 20 minute wait, Audrey announced she would obtain 2 tootsie roll pops and a small round container of sparkling lip gloss. I told you it was competely insane, but Audrey thought the whole ordeal was quite worthwhile ;-)

Lastly, Right after Audrey Rachel and I were almost completely well, we made a very long treck to Etowah TN to have outdoor professional pictures made (late Easter Pictures). The trip was an hour and 15 minutes each way which I didn't realize when I scheduled the session. Long story short, it was not a good decision on my part and by the time we got there the girls had a major attitude problem. The woman who took the pictures thought that they were so bad she gave me a CD with them on it for free lol. That is how bad they were !

I'll post a few of those pictures and some others as soon as I can.

2007-04-07T20:52:00.000-05:00

Things I love about being a family of four now ............................

Last night after we ate dinner, there wasn't anything left and we were all full but were asking if there was anything left. I can remember when there were always leftovers ............ I love empty pans and happy chubby faces with rosy cheeks.

I can remember my Grandma (mom's mom) always loved to cook for us when we came to visit and she would make an obscene amount of food and feed us until we could hardly move. I also remember wondering what in the world made her so happy about us all "pigging out" until we were miserable .......... Well last night I think I finally Got it ! She was alot wiser than I gave her credit for :-)

I love looking in the rear view mirror and seeing the two girls laughing and giggling knowing that they will always be each others "Best Friend".

I love that I am never caught up on the laundry and that I have become an expert in organic stain removal ;-)

I love it when I'm rocking Rachel in the glider chair in her nursery and Audrey comes in hugs her sister tight, says "I love you", and tells Rachel that she will be in the next room if she needs her.

I love it when we all load up in the Van to go to visit family and stop at Mcdonalds half way, Exit 70 Nashville. Our Mcdonalds visit is usually fast, furious and a lesson in surviving toddler eating habits but it sure makes for great memories lol.

I love that Audrey's Clothes can now become hand-me downs.

I love that I can't remember the last time I was ever bored or wondered what my purpose in life was !

There are many more things I am loving about being a family of four now, but I'm too pooped to think of them now.

2007-03-27T22:30:00.001-05:00

Trip to KY visiting Nai Nai & Papa and Rae & Grandpa

We just arrived home yesterday evening from a wonderful visit with both our families. We are fairly exhausted but thankful for how well everything went ! I am very happy to report that this trip went much much better than our trip home at Christmastime. Rachel actually slept in her crib and slept through the night until 6am. 6am was a bit early, but such an improvement that we didn't mind at all. Also, Rachel played with Audrey outside most of the time we were home and had so much fun. Her legs look like she has been in a war because she's still is developing coordination and falls alot but she really didn't seem to mind. She will take some hard falls and just get up and act like nothing happened. She really is our "little tank" ;-) Audrey was a great Big Sis as always and helped take care of her Lil Sis during the trip. She is growing up on us way too fast ! The pictures in our slideshow are of two Bubblefests we had with my parents and Alex's parents. At Alex's house, the Breeding Clan came for a visit and a great time was had by all. We are really looking forward to our next visit home; the difference a few months can make is amazing.

2007-03-21T20:46:00.000-05:00

About the Past 6 months, Attachment & Bonding , other Adoption issues .......

While the past 6 months is still fresh in my mind, I just wanted to mention some of our experiences, trials and tribulations we had after Rachel's adoption. There is a reason that I rarely updated our blog after October of last year.

When we received Rachel in Chongqing in July of last year she automatically smiled her best smile and went to both Alex, I and Alex's parents without the slightest anxiety or fear and this was just fine with us after experiencing Audreys screaming fits on "Gotcha Day" in 2004. Because Rachel was just turning 10 months old, we just assumed we had been blessed with an "easy" baby. When we received Rachel in China she was literally the perfect child, she slept through every night; she never fussed unless she was hungry; and I hardly remember her ever crying. Once home this behavior continued for about two months and I remember thinking that I didn't know what all the fuss was about handling two. This was no more difficult than having just Audrey.

In late September the "easy baby" was no more. Suddenly, as if a tornado had hit, our little Rachel became this very emotional, very demanding, and constantly upset child who seemed unpleasable (She cried most of her waking hours and her feet rarely hit the floor). To make matters worse she went through about 4 months where she would reach out to just about anyone (strangers or friends), especially if she wasn't getting what she wanted from mom or dad. I don't think I have ever been so humbled in my life. Rachel would act like she was the happiest child in the world when we were out in public, but the second we were in the car or at home, she would come unglued and scream and cry unless she was held continuously. I finally came to the realization that we had some serious issues that needed to be addressed. I started reading as much as I could about bonding and attachment as well as other adoption issues. I just focused 150% on Rachel and her needs and tried not to let my emotions come into play as much as possible. Initially, when Rachel started "pleaing for help", I wasn't there for her like I should have been. I just couldn't believe that our "perfect child" was now completely out of control and I felt helpless for quite some time. Even after I realized what some of Rachels problems were and had found ways to help her, I still wondered if she would ever bond the way that Audrey had and if she would ever trust and love me the same way......

I am here to tell you now that she has and the transformation in Rachel is nothing short of miraculous. She will now hug me tight whenever she can and calls for me whenever she is feeling insecure or just needs affection. Until the past couple of months, Rachel didn't wan't any affection unless it was on her terms and usually she just wanted to be carried around but not hugged or kissed. She will now play independently or with her sister rather than needing to be held constantly and she just appears to be so much more secure. She has also developed "stranger anxiety" over the past two months and I have never been so happy about anything. After almost 7 months home Rachel finally realizes how loved she is and that she can let her guard down. She also gets along wonderfully with her big sis now and they are pretty much inseperable. We are truly blessed.

2007-03-20T08:49:00.001-05:00

March 2007 Photos above...... I will post more about whats going on with us asap !

2007-03-16T12:37:00.001-05:00

February News

February wasn't a bad month at all except that both the girls had colds which is never fun. Rachel had a yucky cold when we visited the TN aquarium which is why you don't see her or Alex in any of the pics. Alex volunteered to stay home with her while Audrey and I went with my sister, her husband, son and his mother, father, brother and two nephews (adopted from Russia). We had a wonderful time and we were definitely all wore out by the end of the day. On Presidents day, I took Audrey and Rachel to a playdate with several FCC families and the girls had a blast. At this point Rachel still wasn't walking very well so I ended up holding her alot but she still seemed to really enjoy herself. neither of our girls have a shy bone in their body. Their motto truly is "the more the merrier" ! Audrey started writing some letters in February and was very proud to show them off; hence the picture of her holding the piece of paper with several As and an H. Needless to say, I was sooo excited to see her letters since in the past when I've tried to show her how to write some letters she showed no interest at all.

2007-03-11T21:43:00.000-05:00

Still Catching Up January 2007

Ok, brief synopsis is that in January we were still recovering from December ;-) Audrey took the stunning picture of Alex and I and I had to post it because we never get our pictures taken together except for post placement visits ! See myspace for that rare family pic. Audrey went on a playdate with quite a few girls from our local FCC chapter and had cupcakes, see above photo for demo of how much she enjoyed them or at least the frosting. Despite the semi frigid temps, we did manage to get outside a bit and let the girls play. We played with sidewalk chalk which I don't think is exactly a great winter activity but there were no complaints from Rachel or Audrey ! Lastly, Rachel is climbing all over everything even if she isn't walking very well. The girl really knows how to get where she wants to go. Oh, and in case I forgot to mention it, at 15 months she is already throwing temper tantrums, getting noodle legs, and mimicking epileptic seizures at the first sign she isn't going to get here way ;-) We are sure in for one wild ride lol.

2007-03-06T08:10:00.000-05:00

Christmas 2006 was ...... well maybe a little challenging (understatement). Since it was a couple months ago, I think the memories are already fading. In a nutshell, it was not too fun. Rachel showed us that she truly does not adapt well to change and needs her routine desperately. While we were in KY for the holidays, she screamed bloody murder every night until we put her in the bed with us and then she still didn't sleep great. She also wanted to be held every waking moment and would melt down if her feet hit the floor. She had just started walking before Christmas (at 15 months) so she wasn't walking great anyway but at almost 25 lbs, she was quite a load to carry all day. And this post wouldn't be complete if I didn't mention that her digestive tract was totally out of whack our entire trip . . . . lets just say "it wasn't pretty". We did have wonderful visits with both our families though despite the challenges so I will post a few pictures here. Audrey and Rachel are 2yrs 3 mo apart in age, so it was nice that many of their Christmas gifts are ones they both could play with. The most popular Christmas gift and possibly most annoying one (constantly plays loud music) ;-) was what I now pleasantly refer to as the "Mermobile". See posted Pics.

2007-03-06T08:02:00.000-05:00

Experience with Myspace.com

Well after finally finding a little time to update our blog, a friend told me about myspace.com because she had started using it at the recommendation of one of her friends. The main appeal to me was that I can upload video files and a nice little family slide show to music FREE. There are some major downsides to the site though which I'll go ahead and mention. While it is nice to have millions of people on the network, it can also be annoying because many weirdos will want to be added to your friends list or solicitors for get-rich schemes. I also did not find their blogging interface to be very appealing. Thus, I am going to continue to update our blog here because it's a much better blogging system and I already have our blog here. When I am able to update myspace.com with any new pictures or videos, I will make sure to post it here.

2006-12-28T22:40:00.000-05:00

Audrey at Gymnastics Center

Audrey started taking gymnastics in late August of this year and she has made amazing progress for such a short time. Audrey is in the light pink leotard in case it's hard to tell. There are a few pics from her class in late November above and there are a couple more pictures on the pictures page of our home website http://audreyandrachel.com .

2006-11-28T11:49:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving and Latest News

We recently visited KY (left Wednesday afternoon and returned Sunday evening). The girls did amazingly well during the trip. It took 7 hrs just to get there (normally takes 5). We had a wonderful visit with both our families. Rachel was held by someone practically the whole time we were home so we are having fun getting her used to sitting on the floor since returning home hehe ;-) She also cried and screamed each night we were in KY when we put her in her crib at Nai Nai's house. Rachel definitely knows the difference between our house and theirs. Once she would get to sleep she slept fairly well but she sure had a hard time going night night. When we came home, it was so cute to see how pleased Rachel was to be here. She went to sleep Sunday night without the slightest wimper and did last night as well. We are still having some issues with her sleeping later than 6am so we have started cutting back on her naptime during the day which is helping. We've all had a nasty cold/sinus infection over the past month so it has been a little rough but we are finally all rebounding I believe. Santa Claus is finished with shopping so now all there is to do is decorate and look forward to his visit ! I will post a few pictures from our thanksgiving visit and more on our family website.

PS. Rachel took 3 steps with daddy yesterday so we are getting close to walking but not quite there. She turned 14 months on Nov 21st so we've got to be close to her walking, don't we ?? ;-)

2006-11-28T11:03:00.000-05:00

About Halloween and a very late post

Audrey and Rachel celebrated Halloween at our local MOPS (mothers of preschoolers) fall festival, at their mother's day out program and Halloween evening with Mommy, Ms. Faith and Mr. Mike (Alex was in Chicago on business). At just under 13 months, Rachel was amused by the whole thing but clearly not as excited as big sister Audrey. I will post a few prized pictures here as well as more on our family website http://audreyandrachel.com .

2006-10-09T10:59:00.000-05:00

Latest news

Rachel has finally tapered off on the teething and pooping all the time. I know, TMI, but that has been our life the past 3 weeks. We are again, finally, sleeping through the night and not going through 3 outfits a day so life is good ;-) Rachel and Audrey are getting along great now and we couldn't have hoped for a better relationship between the two. Rachel is still pulling up on everything and gaining more balance everyday so it won't suprise us if she's walking in the next month. I uploaded a photo slideshow today with alot of recent photos of the girls. It's on our website http://audreyandrachel.com . The slideshow is on the video page. Hope you enjoy !

ps. Audrey is currently working on her first science project. She is growing seeds that we've placed between two wet pieces of papertowel in a ziplock bag. She is really obsessed with them sprouting and always is making sure they are still wet and in the sun. Today they have actually started sprouting so she is quite pleased!

2006-09-22T07:51:00.000-05:00

Rachel's First Birthday

Rachel's first birthday has come and gone. It's hard to believe that she is a year old already ! We just wish she could have enjoyed her birthday more. She is currently in the middle of a nasty bout of teething and cranky would be an understatement for her temperament the past couple days. I went ahead and made her a batch of White cupcakes with strawberry frosting (big sisters suggestion ;-)) . Rachel liked seeing the cupcake and the burning candle but wouldn't even try a bite of her cupcake. Needless to say the rest of us didn't have a problem with the eating them ! Rachel is doing great other than her teething. She is waving bye bye and trying to say it. She is saying mama and dada. She is pulling up on everything and trying to walk so it won't be long until she is. Here is a picture of Rachel with her Birthday cupcake. I'll post more as soon as I can.

2006-09-10T22:18:00.000-05:00

What's New ? and Yes I'm ashamed I haven't posted in a month !

I am quite happy to report that we have settled in amazingly well and we actually have somewhat of a routine. Audrey and Rachel are truly sisters and have that wonderful love/hate relationship already. Audrey definitely has her moments when she is not very nice to baby sister but for the most part we are really proud of her and she seems to be enjoying having a sister more than not. Rachel has been a really easy baby and we just can't believe it ! Or, maybe Audrey was just such a difficult baby that any other baby seems easy hehe. Regardless, we love both of them for who they are and not how much trouble they are ;-)

Developmentally Rachel is doing wonderfully and she is now pulling up on all our furniture and standing. It' s so hard to believe that a month and a half ago, she wasn't even that steady sitting up.

Audrey is doing awesome too. Although she is killing us on a daily basis with her pleas for independence and her temperamental moodiness, she is the light of our lives. She just started gymnastics and has her 2nd lesson tomorrow so we are excited about that. So far Audrey just loves it and she can't wait to go back.

We are also doing MOPS again and it has been a Godsend for me. Audrey and Rachel have wonderful caregivers while we meet and the moms there are the best. I can't say enough good things about the program!

Our house is messy and I can't keep up with the stickiness or the laundry but we are happy anyway ;-)

Last, but not least, and Becky if your out there, don't post about this lol ! I reactivated our family website again so I could post videos/slideshows etc on a larger scale and post more pictures without worrying about space. So, once again, you can click on the link on the right to go to http://audreyandrachel.com . I no longer have dropshots.com since that was just for video and pics. I promise I'm going to quit playing musical websites haha ;-)

Please do go to http://audreyandrachel.com though and go to the videos tab and you can view the slideshow I made the other day with some of the pictures since we've been home with Rachel. The ones taken at the playground were just taken a few days ago.

I'll try to post more frequently as I'm able and hopefully I'll be able to make some videos or slideshows with our pictures and footage from our China trip.

2006-08-14T11:42:00.000-05:00

Our Cutie Pie - Looking back ....

When I look at Rachel now and see her on a daily basis, two things really strike me from her update from China that we received with her referral information. First, it said she had a ready smile that would bring us much joy and happiness. I can certainly vouch for that; she smiles constantly and grins showing us her 4 beautiful teeth. Alex has affectionately started referring to her as "Beaver" ;-) Secondly, it described Rachel as having many facial expressions. I have never seen a child make so many adorable faces and show such expression. It really makes us feel good to know that Rachel's caregivers really noticed Rachel and what was special about her.

2006-08-14T11:07:00.000-05:00

Sisterly Love and Sunglasses

I came downstairs the other day and found Audrey had put her heart shaped sunglasses on Rachel and Audrey had on her Dora glasses. I of course immediately ran and grabbed the camera and took these priceless pics !

2006-08-14T10:12:00.000-05:00

Swim Trip with the Girls Last Week

Last Tuesday I ventured down to our neighborhood pool with the girls. I think it took us longer to get ready than the time we actually spent at the pool. What is humorous is that Rachel decided it was nap time so she took a bottle and passed out when we got there. Audrey and I let Rachel sleep in her stroller while we went swimming for about 1.5 hours. Eventually we will get Rachel in the pool ! ;-)

2006-08-07T21:40:00.000-05:00

Pictures of Rachel at Xiushan orphanage between Referral and Travel

The pictures above were taken by the staff at Xiushan SWI with the disposable camera we sent with Rachel's carepackage after we received her referral. There were quite a few photos but I will just post a couple here now. I will post more on dropshots.com (see link on right for Audrey and Rachel Pics) tomorrow or I may post one or two more here.

2006-08-05T22:12:00.000-05:00

Picture of Alex, Audrey and Rachel and cousin Matthew our 2nd day home from China

I love this picture so I'm ashamed that I had not posted it before now.

2006-08-03T22:17:00.000-05:00

This is going to be one of those posts where I have to post just because I want to remember things.

Today was the first day I took Audrey and Rachel to the grocery together and it was a hoot. At our Bi-Lo they have Racecar shopping carts that seat two so I put Rachel and Audrey in one. I was a little concerned that Rachel might be a bit young for it but it had a strap to hold her in so I said why not ;-)? Anyway, Rachel absolutely loved it and kept grinning the whole time we were there. Audrey was wonderful and even kept putting her arm around Rachel and acting protective. They must have looked cute because the ladies from the deli came out and brought them cookies lol !

Also, Audrey has turned into a mother hen and a mommy's helper. She helped me make Spaghetti and cookies this week and tonight she helped me give Rachel a bath. She also is always eager to help me gather supplies for messy diaper changings etc. One time this week we had a very stinky, messy diaper and Audrey started gagging. I kept telling her to leave if it was making her sick but she insisted I needed her help lol.

Today a woman from Tennessee dept. of Education came by to talk to me about Rachels developmental progress. My pediatrician recommended I let her give them a referral so they could check out Rachel for us and see if she needed any help catching up. I am happy to report that the woman that evaluated her was very pleased with her progress and she didn't think we needed a referral because Rachel is exhibiting all the signs that she is progressing and should progress normally even though she is still a little behind. It is absolutely amazing the progress she has made just in the past two weeks we've been home. She has went from eating no solids to now eating just about any baby food we give her, oatmeal, rice cereal and cheerios. She has went from not even being able to sit up by herself to sitting up by herself well, pulling herself all over the place with her upper body and she is now bringing her back legs up trying to crawl. She is also starting to transition so that she can go from a lying down position to sitting which is neat to watch.

I don't want to neglect to mention that over the past week Rachel has started saying Mama when she needs me and needless to say I come running whenever she says it. I am amazed that she is already saying it !

Rachel is also really becoming vocal and making all kinds of entertaining baby talk.

Audrey and Rachel are still sleeping in the same room and so far it has worked out really well. I put them to bed at the same time and I let Rachel sit in my lap while I read Audrey her bedtime story and Rachel loves it. Actually I think Rachel just likes getting to sit on the "dreamcastle" bed the most ;-) After storytime I put Rachel in her crib and she goes to sleep no problem as does Audrey. I keep wondering how long this will last. I will say that Rachel did cry some for the first week when we put her in her crib but the 2nd week I made her sleep in the crib and didn't take her out if she cried the first few minutes and now she doesn't even bother to cry when she knows it is bedtime, she goes right to sleep. We are truly blessed .....

2006-07-29T16:00:00.000-05:00

Pictures from our first week home with Rachel

2006-07-28T23:11:00.000-05:00

Regarding AudreyandRachel.com website

Due to the fact that I'm mainly using our blog now to post pictures and info updates, I've decided to cancel our family website (audreyandrachel.com). It costs me 12.00/mo and I just feel it's a waste of money no more than I post to it recently. Please bookmark this blog because I'll continue to update it and I'm going to put videos/slide shows on my multiply site which is at http://sahmto2fromchina.multiply.com . I already have some videos on that site but I'm going to add the rest this coming week. I will also post new pictures there occassionally. I will post a link to the multiply site on this blog in the links column as well.

2006-07-28T22:45:00.000-05:00

The Details ..................

Ok, Ok, Ok, so you want details ;-) We left Louisville KY on July 7th (Friday) at 9:58 am. nothing exciting there. We left Chicago Ohare at 12:10pm right on time and the interesting point I will share here is that Audrey and I had to sit by ourselves in the center aisle between two men (one Chinese American and one Caucasian American), while Alex sat across the aisle in between two men that he did not know. My In-laws, Patsy and Scott sat in front of Alex. All I have to say is nice job "Delight Travel" sigh lol. Anyway, Audrey was high maintenance the first 6 hours of the trip but the gentlemen sitting next to us on both sides were super nice and extremely understanding so it wasn't too bad. After about 7.5 hours of wiggling squirming complaining and pushing her limits Audrey finally melted down and said quite loudly and in tears " I don't want to go to Beijing ! I want to go home, I want my blankie" (yes, we left the almighty blankie in the van *cringe*). Eventually Audrey passed out on me and slept the remainder of the trip. Needless to say I slept very little the entire flight except maybe a couple of 15-20 min catnaps where I passed out from exhaustion. We finally arrived in Beijing at approximately 2:10 pm their time and even a little ahead of schedule. We arrived at the Qian Men Jian Guo hotel and checked in and we weren't far from Tianamen Square so we took a taxi down there to walk around at approximately 5:30pm. We all slept fairly well except Audrey who vehemently refused to adapt to China time. From about 2:00 am to 5:10 am we would hear her say "Is it 5:30"? We told her she couldn't get up until 5:30am lol. On Sunday, our first full day in China we ate breakfast and headed for "The Great Wall". I didn't believe that the weather there could have been worse than it was when we visited it in 2004 but it was haha (minus the fact that it wasn't as cold). It was very foggy and rained our entire visit but we still enjoyed it and collected a few pictures, some video and souveneirs. We also all had some calf and thigh cramps to show for it as well. After the Great wall, we visited the Friendship store and ate lunch. We then rushed to the Beijing Airport to catch our 4:40pm flight to Chongqing. We stayed at the Chongqing Marriot in Chongqing and it was wonderful just like it was in 2004. The next morning (Gotcha Day), we didn't have to leave for the Civil affairs bureau until 2:00 pm but we double checked paperwork with our guides that morning. Our orphanage donation was actually wired from a Chinese Bank in Chongqing instead of us having to give the money in person so this was a pleasant suprise. Our (Gotcha Day) was about as perfect as it could have been, other than the fact that Audrey slept through the entire thing and then there was the somewhat worrisome fact that Rachel was like holding jello when we first received her and could barely hold her head up by herself. Her tongue seemed completely out of her control for the most part too. I will say though that Rachel gave us some glimpses of her charming personality even from the beginning. She grinned and smiled at us within just a few minutes of us holding her and seemed completely at ease with us. Her caregivers seemed very loving and even posed for some pictures and video with her. We also received back the camera that we sent with her care package so we were thrilled to have that back. I will post some of those pics once I have them back. As far as the rest of our stay together in Chongqing, the overriding memory I will always have of this time is that they don't call it "The furnace" for nothin ;-) Not only did we experience 100+ temps almost everyday we were there, but the humidity was insane. Despite the lovely weather, we still did quite a bit of site seeing and survived to tell about it. We visited the Chongqing Zoo (see picture of Alex, Rachel and Hippo Butt hehe), Eling park that had some breathtaking views, and we visited Chao Tian Men where we viewed the work of local artists. We had Audrey and Rachels names done with Calligraphy and we also purchased several Banyan leave paintings which are beautiful. Banyan trees are the city tree of Chongqing and make a great keepsake. We also visited the Walmart in Chongqing where we were able to purchase Chinese huggies, rice cereal, and a replacement blankie for Audrey until we could get home !. The Wal-mart was wild and was on 3 or 4 floors and they had ramp escalators that took you between floors. Lastly, we were able to experience the Sichuan Hot Pot dinner while in Chongqing and it was pretty tasty minus the fish and a couple other funky items they provided to dip in the tasty broth.
We left for Guangzhou on Friday July 14th and were wondering what the heat there would be like. The bad news is it rained our entire time there, the good news is that it was much cooler than Chongqing so we didn't mind the rain one bit ! This right after the remainder of the typhoon had passed so the high temps were in the low- mid 80s, amazing for Guangzhou in July I'm sure.
Ok, more about Rachel while we were in China. She was an angel and almost too good ! She hardly ever cried or got upset unless she was really hungry or tired so this made things alot easier. Audrey was a sweetheart too and really had very few instances where she was upset about Rachel or us paying attention to her. Audrey had a cold the first week we were in China and I had bronchitis starting 2 days after Gotcha Day. Rachel also had the bronchitis so I went ahead and gave her amoxicillin which knocked it out pretty quick. Rachel also had a rash on her feet which was obviously itchy to her and concerned us . Finally while we were in Chongqing, Allison offered to take me to childrens hospital in Chongqing to have the rash looked at because I was paranoid it could be scabies. The visit to the childrens hospital was one I won't soon forget and really made me appreciate our hospitals and doctors here in the US. The hospital there had no air conditioning except in the rooms where the doctors saw the patient and it was very hot and humid. You really just had to see it to believe it. Long story short is that Rachel ended up seeing some resident doctors and the only thing that wasn't lost in translation was the word "dermatitis" (inflamation of the skin). I was like doh lol, so what is causing it. Allison told me that she thought they said that it wasn't scabies but I still wasn't sure and continued to worry. They gave me a prescription for this funky brown cream that stunk and told me to cream her down from neck to toes which also worried me. Allison and I had taken a taxi to the hospital bu t when we tried to get one to go back to the hotel, it wasn't easy. We actually had one taxi driver make us get out of the taxi once we were in because the ride wasn't worth his time (wasn't far enough). I really couldn't believe that ! Anyway, we just went ahead and treated her with elimite all over, then we put cortisone on her feet and an antifungal and her feet slowly improved. When I saw her pediatrician yesterday she said that it just appeared to be an unusual case of a different type of eczema and told me to continue to apply cortisone to her feet, no scabies at all.
At Rachels medical exam in Guangzhou she was 29.25 inches long and 21.5 pounds so definitely a big girl but not quite as big as our update had led us to believe. Since we've been home with Rachel, we've seen great improvements in her developmentally almost on a daily basis. She can now sit by herself fairly well, has much more control of her tongue and she is taking stage 2 baby foods (she was only taking food from a bottle when we received her and in China). She is also in the beginning stages of crawling and she can pull herself all over the place using her arms and upper body. I'm guessing she will be crawling great in the next 2-3 weeks. She has been babbling and experimenting with sounds alot now like you would expect a 10 month old to do so we are really happy with her progress all around. The only downside to all of this is that she is now alot more high maintenance than she was in China. From the time we hit US soil she decided that she would scream and cry if you sat her down by herself. She also doesn't like to be put in her crib and fall asleep on her own so she usually just passes out downstairs and then we put her in the crib. She's now sleeping through the night about every other night so I think she is just working through the jet lag. She is an awesome sleeper when she sleeps.
As far as Audrey and her relationship, that has been kind of humorous. Initially it was Rachel who seemed jealous of Audrey and didn't like her while we were in China. Everytime Audrey would get too close, Rachel would scream and cry which was not at all what we had expected. Now that we are home, Rachel seems to like Audrey alot more and Audrey is probably the more jealous one. Overall though, I'm amazed at how well they are tolerating each other and adjusting to all the changes in their lives. Although this adoption and adjustment hasn't been easy, I know in my heart that we have done the right thing by adopting again and I am already seeing the blessings from it.

Lastly, I will leave you with one good laugh. On our return trip home from China we had about a 4.5 hour layover in Chicago which was delayed by almost 2 hours. When we finally boarded the plane at 10:30pm est, the pilot came on and informed us that they were experiencing major runway congestion and they didn't know how long it would be before we took off. About this time, Rachel decided to have a nasty blowout and so there we were, 27 hours into our trip home, me with a stinky baby and a wet poopy feeling on my leg. I told Alex and my inlaws, I didn't care what the pilot or flight atttendant said, I was going to the restroom to change this baby so Alex told me he would hold Rachel instead. Needless to say, I had no problem handing her over lol. I was so exhausted that I fell asleep for the short flight to Louisville and Rachel actually didn't smell that bad when we arrived in Louisville ;-)

I will try to post some current pics of Audrey and Rachel tomorrow ...

2006-07-26T18:04:00.000-05:00

Pictures from China

I regret that we haven't had more time to post since we received Rachel but as you can imagine the jet lag was murder and we also stayed 2 extra days in KY with Alex's parents so we could visit both our families before we returned to Chattanooga/Ooltewah. I will try to post some of the better pictures from our trip here now.