I am so excited that we are heading home to Texas!  I will write some longer posts once we get home as I will finally be back to my own laptop.  We have spent tons of time exploring Guangzhou, going to the zoo, and finding local food to eat. We had an extra day in Hong Kong because airfare to fly home yesterday (Saturday) was almost twice as expensive as waiting till today (Sunday). We made the most of it, as Hong Kong is a beautiful city. We ride the tram to the Peak, took the ferry across to Kowloon during the day and again at night, rode a double decker electric trolley around town a couple of times, and ate some yummy food.  

The kids are doing ok.  Daniel is testing us every chance he gets. I think it will be much better with him once we get home.  Eden has mastered a few English phrases, including “Daniel, no!”  For the most part, things have been going fine with them.  

I am so ready to get home and have our family all together again soon!!  I can’t wait to get my hands on my little boys! I’ve missed everyone so much!!

Here are the kids at the top of Victoria’s Peak

Here are a few pictures I wanted to post with the last post. The one below is with Eden’s friends and foster brother in her foster home.

This is with Eden’s foster family. They were very sweet and seemed to really care about her. On the left is her wonderful teacher, Liu, a very special woman who cares deeply for the orphans and does so much for them.

We are now officially killing time here in China.  There are parts of this process that seem a little inefficient.  They could make it so much shorter if they changed the way they do a couple of things.  We had to wait 4 days in Changsha for passports.  Once we got them, we flew here to Guangzhou where the children had medical exams, had blood drawn for TB tests (for US approval to travel home), and now we wait for our US consulate appointments to get the kids’ visas to travel home.  I am getting super homesick.  I miss all the other children so much.  We have seen them on FaceTime a few times, and my older children are texting us on WhatsApp, so I don’t feel so out of touch with them, but it is really hard being gone so long.  I’m really feeling it.  If I come back to China, I will skip the touring part to make the trip shorter.  We will have been here over two weeks by the time we arrive home.  We have to stay a couple of extra days because our consulate appointment is a day later and flights were really expensive unless we waited another day to leave.  We will get to spend an extra day exploring Hong Kong, which should be fun, but I would much rather be home with everyone together.  The sad news is that we won’t all be together until about mid-August because to of our teens are traveling.

The kids were really excited to fly on the airplane.  Eden couldn’t wait.  She kept grabbing her backpack and saying “Go!” and I kept having to show her my watch and explain that when the clock said “4:00” we would get ready to leave the hotel.  She had fun on the flight, and enjoyed everything about it.  Daniel was excited too, but on the way down, he cried a lot and it seemed like his ears hurt.  He was OK after we got off the plane.

The medial appointments went ok.  Both of our children were really upset about having to have their blood drawn.  They wouldn’t let us go into the room with the children, which is probably best so they won’t associate us with that experience, but it was hard watching them be so afraid and not being able to do anything while they were in there.  Eden had to have a vaccination done, and she was terrified.  It took 4 people to hold her down for the shot.  Once she got it, she relaxed and saw it wasn’t so bad, but she cried for several minutes afterwards.  She was equally as terrified about getting her blood drawn.  Bethany was trying to show her that it wasn’t so bad, and she showed her that Jayson had had his drawn and he was OK, too, but she was still so scared.  She cried all the way to the room.  She made it through OK, and was fine again once it was all over.  I think her arm is a little sore where they gave her the shot for the vaccine.  She was a little moody last night, and fell asleep quickly, before story time and prayer.  She has been really into listening to the mother-daughter Bible devotional I have been reading to the girls at night, and both kids really love to pray.  Daniel asks for it before every meal and before bed.  I’m so happy about that.

Today we went to a museum that was kind of touristy and full of expensive souvenirs we weren’t going to buy.  The kids were super bored, and wanted to leave the whole time.  They kept asking the guide in Mandarin if we were leaving yet.  We went to a market place afterwards where we bought chop sticks and other gifts at great prices.  They had Legos there that were so inexpensive.  We bought several sets for the children and to bring home to the other kids.  We spent the afternoon making our creations.  Daniel helped a little with his, but he is very easily distracted, so he was happy when the final product emerged.  I didn’t get a good picture of him with it because he promptly took it apart.  I’ll get one tomorrow to post.  I fixed it so he can pose with it later.  Eden didn’t want to open her set at first, but after seeing Daniel’s built and Lillah working on hers, she agreed to open it, and we worked on it together.  She helped me find pieces and was counting very well in English.  She kept saying, “OK!” when we would finish a step.  She was thrilled with the end result.  The last part was making a bunch of little flowers to put in the “yard,” and she did those all by herself.  She was really proud of our work.  It was a good bonding time for us.

Tomorrow we will be going to see a safari.  Everyone is really excited!  I’ll post about that later along with pictures.  I’m sure it will be a fun day!

This is at the entrance of Martyrs Park

Eden with one of her new dolls

They were so excited to ride the rides!

After getting splashed on the flume ride! ?

Continue reading Pictures and Just Killing Time →

The last couple of days have been busy and exhausting, but wonderful for getting to know our kids and bonding with them.  Tuesday we finalized our adoptions.  We spent the morning going over paperwork, getting passport and family photos at the Civil Affairs office, and promising to take care of our newly adopted children.  Our guide then took us to a local store that is kind of like a supercharged Walmart (think “Stuff Mart” a la Madame Blueberry) where we bought a few items of clothing for our kids (we didn’t know their exact sizes before we got here) as well as a few toys and coloring books.  Eden was so excited, it was better than any Christmas morning I’ve seen in my life.  She was so happy to get a set of little dolls she can dress up and brush hair.  She was thrilled with her new clothes and new sandals we bought for her, and she was very thankful.  She kept saying, “Thank you!”  She picked out a really pretty little yellow dress, and she gasped when we said she could get it.  It was relatively inexpensive. It was both heartwarming and heartbreaking to see the  kids’ excitement, especially Eden’s, at the store.

Yesterday, our wonderful guide, Amy, took us to a beautiful park in the middle of ChangSha.  It’s very green and lush here, unlike Beijing. The kids acted as if they had died and gone to heaven.  There were amusement park rides, and we rode several of them.  We fed Koi in the pond and rode a little boat all around the big lake.  Our friends who are traveling with us adopted a little girl who is friends with Eden, which probably makes things easier for her in a lot of ways.  Those two were talking up a storm, holding hands and running ahead of us.  They were thrilled with every single ride we went on, and at the end of our time, they thanked our guide for taking us there.  They are sweet girls.  I love that they are so happy about their adoptions.  I know that there will be lots of different emotions over the next several months, but I’m so happy that they are so happy right now.

Today was a very emotional day as we went to visit Eden’s orphanage and foster family.  I was moved to tears several times by everything we saw there.  There are many, many children at the orphanage who will never be adopted.  It is so, so sad, and it made me just want to pick up as many children as I could carry and take them home with me.  There was another girl Eden’s age who is friends with her who was basically asking us to adopt her, too.  I really want to go back and get her.  She is a beautiful girl who will age out in January 2017, so her chances of being adopted into a family are very, very slim.  It just killed me seeing how much she wants a family.  She seems really sweet and eager to please, just like Eden.  There were several other children who would do well if they could just get a chance to be loved by a family and get out of the institutional setting.  I really wish I could fit them all in my suitcase.  Eden’s foster family was wonderful, and they really seemed happy for her.  They have been fostering kids for 10 years, and have fostered 6 children over those years.  Eden has been with them for 4 years.  The other child in their foster home is a little boy who will be adopted soon.   The foster “grandpa” told us that he will take two more after these two are gone.  They have very big hearts.  It was so wonderful to see how they have opened their home to orphans.  It is a simple home, but has all a child would need, and the foster home setting provides such a great environment for children to thrive outside of the orphanage.  I think that is one of the reasons Eden is so sweet and social.  She does have some signs of institutionalization, but she also has some signs of having been well taken care of and nurtured more than if she had only been in the orphanage.  We are very thankful.  Eden didn’t seem very sad to leave the orphanage and the foster parents.  She is so happy to have a family.  She hardly said goodbye to them.  It made me sad for them.  I think it may hit her once we are back in the States. what she has lost.

The orphanage director invited us all out to lunch at a beautiful nearby restaurant.  The food was delicious, and everything was served on a really cool automatic lazy Susan, The food was delicious.

The kids are now used to our little routine that we have had this week outside of our visits to various places.  We go to the pool at the hotel, we walk around outside and find a place to have dinner.  Then we get ice cream!  Then we come back to the hotel for a bath and bedtime.  Eden has this routine down pat.  She is so cute.  Their personalities are so funny and different.  Eden has been shy and quiet, but with her friend, Bethany, she is outgoing and can be pretty loud.  She learned to count to 6 in English today, and has learned several words, including “towel,” “shower,” and “sleep.”  She loves saying, “Mama!” when she needs my attention, and I love hearing her call me “Mama.”  So sweet.  She also can say “Daniel” really clearly, and repeats it over and over along with “no” as we are constantly correcting her little brother, and she is now starting to try and help us get him in line.  It’s pretty funny, actually.

Daniel is improving, but still testing the limits.  He will try something he knows isn’t allowed, and when we go to correct him, he will smile and wave “hello.”  I think he just wants to please deep inside.  He improves a little bit every day,, and I know he will keep on getting more used to our routine and how he is expected to behave.

I have lots of pictures to share, but our internet isn’t working properly, so I will have to add the photos later.  I will try that tomorrow.  For now, I just wanted to write a new update.

I could hardly sleep last night as I was so excited and nervous about gotcha day!  I couldn’t wait to meet our children, and at the same time I was nervous about how they would respond to us and wondered if I would know what to do.  I was so restless, I even stayed up and watched the entire final round of the British Open, and I’m not really that big of a golf fan (although, it was actually quite interesting)!

This morning we went to the Civil Affairs Office, and we had to wait for the children for a while in a warm, humid room.  The wait seemed interminable, but then the children came from the first orphanage–Eden and the two children the other family with whom we are traveling are adopting from the same orphanage.  The two girls, Eden and her friend Bethany, came running in saying, “Mama!” and she came straight to me and let me hug her.  I could tell she was a bit scared, but she was very excited as well.  It was good to have a few minutes with her before Daniel came a little while later.  We gave her a couple of gifts, and she played with them with Lillah and Bethany for a while.  I sat next to her and showed her how to use the Etch-a-Sketch.  She kept smiling cautiously up at me.  She is a very sweet little girl.  Her teachers kept telling me what a good, obedient and very nice girl she is.

When Daniel came in, he was confused at first because he thought the other mom was his host mom from last summer, and he kept walking over to her and saying “Mama.”  He had his photo album they sent home with him last year, and he showed me the pictures, and told me they were Mama and Baba.  I had to show him that Todd and I were Mama and Baba and that they were his friends.  The translator helped with that, too.  He seemed to understand after that, and he was very happy.  He loves Simeon, and kept holding Simeon’s hand and leading him to play.  Daniel remembered how to count in English from being here last summer.  He can write the numbers as well.  The teacher from Eden’s orphanage came over to talk to me about Daniel.  She remembered him from last summer, and warned me that he was very active and would need us to be really strict.  I assured her that we will be very strict.  With 6 boys at home already, we know how to be strict.  But we are ready to be stretched in new ways by this active little guy.

When the teachers left, Eden sobbed for several minutes.  It broke my heart for her.  I can’t even fathom the loss that these children have already experienced in their short lives.  I comforted her, and hugged her, and she let me do that.  Her friend Bethany came over and showed her a pony game on the iPad, and she quieted down and seemed content.

After we were finished there, we came back to the hotel to rest for a while and get the paperwork ready for tomorrow, which is when we finalize the adoptions.  Daniel was testing the limits quite a bit, running around the room, hitting us, and laughing as he turned off all the lights or tried to escape out the door.  We had to be very firm with him in telling him no to each thing he tried that was unacceptable.  This little boy has lots of energy!  The good news is that I can be just as stubborn as any kid out there, so I think he will have met his match!

We walked down the road and got some lunch, which was really good.  Daniel piled his bowl full of food.  He is so tiny, it makes me wonder how well he was able to eat in his orphanage.  He ate everything, but kept adding more before he was finished.  We had to tell him to finish what he had first.  It is sad to think of all the times he probably didn’t get enough to eat at meals.  Eden’s orphanage and the fact that she was in a foster home at the orphanage made her experience different that way, so she doesn’t seem as desperate for food, but she had lots of snacks in her bag, and she ate a lot of those yesterday.  Food will be something else that we will have to show them will not be an issue anymore in their lives.

After lunch, we were getting a little bored in the hotel room, so we went downstairs where there is a little play area for the kids.  After a bit, Todd went back to the room to get a ball.  That turned out to be a huge hit with everyone!  Daniel was responding well to some boundaries we set, and his silly personality was shining through as he would dance or pose before throwing the ball.  Eden opened up a

lot through playing ball.  She was laughing out loud and clapping.  It was very good for everyone.  I have such a smart husband, thinking to bring the ball into the picture!  It was perfect!

We celebrated with the other family with a beautiful cake we got at a bakery down the street.  Everyone really enjoyed that as well.

Bedtime was smooth as could be.  Both kids took baths, which I was concerned about with Eden, but she seemed to really like it, and she liked her new nightgown we gave her.  Daniel couldn’t wait for a bath–he had been asking for one all afternoon!  We prayed with everyone, and tucked them all in with kisses, and they all went to sleep just fine.   (I included a dark picture of the boys praying because it was so sweet.  I will get a better one tonight).

I have been overwhelmed by the love I already have for these sweet children.  God has filled me with love, just as if they had been born into our family biologically.  It is amazing.  I am excited about the journey ahead.  We are just beginning, and I know God is equipping us with just what these children need. I pray we will listen for His wisdom as we walk through all the challenges.

We are now in Changsha, which is the provincial capitol of Hunan province. Tomorrow morning, we will go to the Civil Affairs Office and meet our children!  I am so excited,  I can’t even sleep!  Today was spent getting up at the crack of dawn to catch an early flight from Beijing, settling in at the hotel, gathering and giving our paperwork to our guide, and changing our dollars into Chinese yuen.  After doing all of this, it was only about noon local time, so we decided to go exploring with the other family with whom we are traveling.  We set out down the street and found what looked like a fast food Chinese restaurant.  We, of course, couldn’t read anything on the menu, and no one spoke English.  This is the second time since we have been here that we ventured out and just walked into a restaurant to eat.  Todd is a seasoned traveler, so he wasn’t worried about ordering.  We simply pointed to various items on the menu, held up a finger to indicate we wanted one of each item, and then we waited to see what would arrive at our table.  A couple of days ago when we did this in Beijing, Simeon and Lillah were pretty sure they wouldn’t be eating anything.  Once the food arrived, however, they were delighted to use their chopsticks to pick up delicious beef and celery and various dumplings with different fillings.  It was all quite tasty.  Today, we ended up with a couple of soups that appeared to be rice-based, one with chicken and the other with some kind of fruit.  We also had a spicy mushroom and beef dish and some spicy noodles.  We finished almost all of it, even the spicy food, and left only a little of the fruity soup.  I have been impressed by the children’s willingness to try new and different foods.  The chopsticks have been a big hit, especially with Simeon.  If there is a fork available, Lillah will use that, but today we had only chopsticks, so we had to make do.  I have been thankful for the chopsticks skills I acquired while living for 7 years in California!

I am going to try and get some sleep.  I can’t believe we will meet our sweet children in the morning and begin the true adventure.  We are ready for the challenge!

It has been an extremely busy few days.  We had so much to do to get ourselves out the door to go to China: Settling certain kids with grandparents, making sure everything was set for the kids who would be staying home and the people helping them, gathering the correct documents, etc.  To complicate matters, I had to fly to Florida to attend to a legal matter regarding my father.  I arrived in Florida on Tuesday evening, the court hearing was Wednesday afternoon, and I was scheduled to fly out to Dallas Wednesday evening so we could get to the airport early Thursday morning.  I was settling in at the gate for my flight Wednesday evening, when all of a sudden the sign that had just said “on time” changed to say “cancelled.”  I thought it must be a mistake, because there were no announcements made over the loudspeaker or anything, but I did notice that there were no airline staff at the gate working to get the plane loaded and ready to go.  I made my way to the airline counter, and was told that there was nothing they could do since the entire regional airport network shut down after 8pm.  We checked every nearby airport with no luck.  Finally, we decided I would need to drive in order for me to make the flight to Detroit which would take us to Beijing. After a miserable, somewhat scary overnight (11-hour) drive, I made it safely to the Dallas/Fort Worth airport, where Todd, Simeon, and Lillah were waiting for me in the security line.  Todd’s Dad and my sister-in-law were amazing, meeting me outside, returning the rental car for me, and helping me find Todd and the kids.  We are very thankful for everyone’s prayers!

No one really slept much on the plane rides, so we were pretty exhausted upon arriving in Beijing yesterday.  We walked around a little bit to stay awake, got some yuen out of the bank, and bought some dinner at a local restaurant.  The food was amazing, and the kids loved it!  They enjoyed trying to eat with chopsticks.  We all crashed around 7pm local time, which isn’t too bad, but Todd had a hard time sleeping past about 11pm.  I was sound asleep for almost 9 hours!  The kids were so excited, they could hardly contain themselves, but they slept for a bit before finally waking up at around 3am.  Yay for jet lag.

This morning, we enjoyed an amazing breakfast at our hotel.  There were tons of selections, including western choices as well as traditional  Chinese foods.  Then we met our guide along with the other families with whom we are traveling, and we toured Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City and the Great Wall.  It was an incredible day.  The Great Wall was the most amazing thing to see in person.  Pictures cannot do it justice.  We climbed hundreds of very steep steps to make it to the top of the section we went to.  The kids were so over-the-top excited.  I was amazed at their energy level.  This was not an easy climb, but they got to the top and down while keeping the spring in their steps!

Tomorrow we will fly out of Beijing and into the city where our “gotcha day” will be on Monday, and we will finalize our adoptions and meet our children!  We are so excited!  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beZ5hF-qZDY

This song has touched my heart ever since the first time I heard it.  I remember sitting at a Steven Curtis Chapman concert, and hearing it for the first time, watching this video.  The words spoke to my heart and I began to cry.  I knew deep in my heart that God would call us to adopt someday.  I had no idea how the story would unfold.

We are just a few days away from our departure date!  I have so much to do, I can’t even think straight half the time, but I am so excited!  I can’t believe it’s already time, but then again it seems like forever since we began this process.

I am filled with different emotions: excitement, joy, apprehension… I can’t wait to get there and bring these two children into our family.  I know that it is going to be a process for them to feel that they belong with us.  I am praying that they will feel loved and accepted and safe.  I’m praying that they will know that they are now forever home with their family who loves them.  I pray that they will come to know our awesome God.

The last couple of weeks have been filled with a lot of things that have challenged and grown our faith.  Two weeks ago, while I was at Nationals with our speech kids, Todd found out that his position at Intel had been eliminated.  I felt awful that I wasn’t home when he found out.  We were in a bit of shock, wondering what God was doing.  We were just about to leave for China to adopt two special needs children, which we are doing out of faithfulness to the call we have felt from God Himself.  What is up with the timing of this?

After a difficult couple of weeks, full of interviews and prayer, Todd was offered two different jobs yesterday morning!  He actually gets to choose between two good positions (still at Intel)!  What a blessing.  God has grown our faith and renewed our certainty that God is calling us to all of this, and that HE will take care of us.  What a blessing!

We felt blessed and at peace yesterday as we booked our airplane tickets, and we finalized our decision to bring two of our children (who are closest in age to Eden and Daniel) along with us for this incredible journey!  Simeon, our 9-year-old, was so happy he leapt into his daddy’s arms and kept saying, “Thank you!  Thank you!” over and over.  What an adventure awaits us all!

Right before we leave for China, I have a family matter regarding my father happening in Florida. I will be flying to Destin Tuesday evening, then flying to Dallas Wednesday evening.  I will meet Todd there, where our youngest 3 boys will get to spend a couple of weeks with their Mammy and Graddaddy.  Please pray that my flight to Dallas Wednesday is on time.  The older kids have various things going on, and different people will be helping out with them.  Pray for us all as we will be apart for a couple of weeks.  This is the part of the journey about which I am not very excited.  I will miss everyone so much.  My little 2-year-old is such a Mama’s boy!  This is going to be hard on him.

We are so excited about our journey, and we know it is going to be exciting and hard.  I will be posting updates as things go along, and I’m hoping to be able to add posts while we are in China.  Please pray for us as we embark on this journey and adjust to life with our new children.

“A Father of the fatherless…God makes a home for the lonely.”
Psalm 68:5-6