Miriam's first ballet lesson

For her birthday this year, Grandpa Mike and Grandma Lee Anne bought her a ballet tutu and a pair of ballet shoes since she has recently decided that she wants to be a ballet dancer when she grows up.  And very fortunately for us, we found a place nearby that offers lessons for a little over $5 per lesson!

At the moment, the ballet class she is in is mostly girls between 6-9 years of age who have all been taking ballet classes for at least a couple of years.  Supposedly they are soon going to be starting a class for 3-4 year olds who are just beginning that Miriam can switch to.  But this class she attended is also the only one with other English-speaking kids, so we'll see how well she likes her new class.

I was actually quite impressed by how well she did all considering.  The teacher didn't really explain what the exercises were or how to do them since all the other kids were obviously very familiar with them.  So Miriam just sort of joined in as best as she could.  I was proud of her for having a good attitude and trying to hard!

She will now proudly tell anyone who will listen that she is now a real ballet dancer.  Yes you are my sweet little girl!

First week home!

Yesterday marked one week home with David.  Actually, it seems hard to believe that it has only been one week.  It is starting to just feel normal to have him with us, and that makes it feel like he's been here for a long time.

When we arrived home last Thursday, it was a rough homecoming.  David was great through the travel, but got really tired and sleepy in the taxi on the way home from the airport.  By the time we got to our neighborhood and stopped by to pick up the two other kids, I think he was overly tired.  And Elijah was happy to see us, but I think overwhelmed by us being home and a new person in his house.  He cried the whole walk back to our place.

When we walked in the door, our dog Sidney enthusiastically greeted us, and David started screaming and threw himself on the floor.  He likes dogs from a distance, but if she so much as looked at him he would start shrieking in terror.  We tried to put the kids down for overdue naps, and Miriam and Elijah went down fine, but David started sobbing and screaming when we tried to lay him down.  I held him on my lap on our bed for about 20 minutes while he cried until he feel asleep.  We then sent the dog to a neighbor's house for a few days, figuring we didn't need that added trauma right away.

After naps everyone was more stable and we had a fun afternoon and evening.  David has been quick to get comfortable enough in our home to explore and I think start to feel some ownership and sense of home here.  He is definitely much more relaxed and "himself" when he is home.  He is continuing to warm up to his siblings more every day, and they are starting to get used to him as well.  The transition has definitely been the hardest on Elijah.  He has been more cranky and more prone to bouts of disobedience and frustration than usual.  The poor guy has also had diarrhea since we came home, though the medicine we took him to the doctor for does seem to help.  Miriam has done really well and has been a sweet big sister.

Here are some of the highlights from our first week:

Places we have gone:

1.  Church!  David enjoyed the music and was happy and content until he saw the bread at communion.  He wasn't happy he couldn't have any, and Jeff took him down to the nursery for a distraction.  Jeff stayed and David and Elijah happily played together.  Jeff even took all 3 to lunch by himself afterwards since I was speaking at a women's brunch and they did great!

2.  An indoor kid's playplace.  They had a ball pit, trampoline, play kitchen, mini merry-go-round, etc.  At first David just wanted to be held and watch, but after a while he was right there in the thick of it with the others climbing and running around.  Miriam was sweet helping him figure out how to climb through the play structure.

3.  A kid's climbing wall/ropes course at a local mall to celebrate a friend's birthday.  Miriam and Elijah got harnessed up and did a lot of climbing.  Elijah insisted on wearing a pink climbing helmet as that is his current favorite color. :)  David was again content to watch for a while, but eventually wanted his turn trying to go through the ropes course.  They all had a blast!

4.  Doctors office visit mostly because Elijah kept having diarrhea, but also to get a general physical for David.  Everything looks great and everything they checked came out normal!

Things I am learning about David:

1.  He is a neat freak.  He doesn't like his hands dirty and is meticulous in keeping his fingers wiped while eating and the table free of any crumbs.  He LOVES to help tidy up and put things away.  Jeff is in heaven :)

2.  He is super smiley and playful.  He almost always has a smile on his face, and loves to make silly faces at you to get you to laugh.  He likes to be held and a little rough housing/tickling, but not nearly as much as Elijah does.

3.  He is not nearly so daring as his little brother.  He doesn't jump off of things move so quickly.  I think maybe part personality and part lack of muscle mass to do it all.  He is a full 6 centimeters shorter than Elijah and ways much less than he does.  Elijah is just way more solid than he is.  But, he did finally make it onto the growth chart at his physical!  He is now up to the 3rd precentile for height and weight!

4.  Whenever he gets upset at all, he immediately throws himself backward onto the floor and starts either wailing or moaning, depending on the severity of his distress.  He did it a lot the first few days, but we started sitting near him and playing with something without paying direct attention to him.  The first few times he'd stay upset for a little while, but now he rarely actually falls to the floor, and if he does it doesn't usually last longer than a minute.  I think he's learned that it doesn't get him what he wants and isn't nearly as fun as just moving on and doing something else.

5.  He is potty-trained, but has recently started telling us every 5 minutes that he has to go.  I'm guessing it's a ploy to control our attention.  We've learned to distinguish a little between when he says he has to go but it doesn't seem truly urgent and when he acts more like it's a real need.  But still an area to try and figure out more of what to do.

6.  He eats pretty much anything except broccoli and spinach.  He, however, is the slowest eater I have ever seen.  I thought Miriam was slow, but nope, she is practically a speed eater in comparison.  I think it is because he has to pause so often to clean his hands and the table.  And he is never really "done".  If I kept giving him food, he would just keep eating it.

7.  He continues to be a great sleeper.  The first couple nights home he woke up a couple of times crying and wanting to be held for a minute, but since then he hasn't woken up at night.  Which is much more than I can say for my other two kiddos who pretty much always wake up every night.  But fortunately none of them ever wake up each other.  David does have a tendency to wake up earlier than the other 2, but has done an ok job of being willing to stay in bed until at least reasonably close to the 7:30 wake up time the other kids have.

8.  David is loud.  He doesn't really talk, he yells.  This is not an endearing trait to me.  With three kids now, I often get overwhelmed at the volume of my house as all three kids are usually wanting to tell me something at the same time.  David sounds like he is from Brooklyn when he talks to me because he calls me "MA!!!" (think stereotypical New York accent to that and you've got him nailed).  One of the toughest things for me this week has been trying to not be overwhelmed by the chaos going on around me.  It is really hard to channel them all into anything resembling an organized activity, and the morning time seems to be especially chaotic.

9.  David is extremely generous for a 2 year old.  He loves to find things to give to the other kids, and if one of them asks him for something he has, he is almost always willing to hand it over with a smile.  I was really surprised by this, as I assumed that life in an orphanage would not be a good environment for learning to share.  But he genuinely seems to enjoy watching the other kids smile when he can find something to give them.

10.  He loves baths, but only if there are no bubbles.  And preferrably no siblings either.

11.  He is fascinated by things he can either stack or sort, and is impressively talented at doing both.

12.  His favorite activity is running around naked with his siblings.  Seriously, why is it that small children are 10 times happier when they are naked?  Almost all of our pictures of the 3 kids together all laughing and playing are naked pictures.  They have a game they now play every night, where they go into a room, close the door, and then throw it open and run out screaming "chu lai! (come out)".  They do this over and over again, naked of course.  I tried to convince Miriam they could play it clothed as well, but she said, "Mama, if we had clothes on it would take all the joy right out of it.  How could we be crazy with pants on?!"  So there you have it.

13.  We adopted the sweetest and most amazing little boy in all of China.  Every one who meets him comments on how happy and content he seems.  The other day I was holding him and he threw his arms around my neck, gave me a big hug, and then pressed his face into my cheek.  Being Elijah's mom, my immediate thought was "he's going to bite me!" and I tried to jerk my face away.  But he was actually giving me my first kiss. :)  I love that precious little boy of mine!

Sorry I only have pictures from the first couple of days since the rest are still on the camera.  Hopefully some more will be coming soon!

One of my favorite pictures! 

Miriam trying for a kiss when she is first meeting David.  He's not so enthused.

Chilling together watching a video after nap the first day.

We woke up our first morning home to a snow day!

Decorating the Christmas tree

Yep, Miriam is decorating in her ballet outfit, since she is now a real ballet dancer

Boys having fun playing together

Our last day

It’s our last day in Zhengzhou, and we are very ready to get home to Miriam and Elijah and real life.  David continues to astound us and show us more of his little personality each day.  The first couple of days you would have thought we have a relatively quiet and reserved little boy.  But last night after his bath, more of his true nature started to shine through!

He was laughing, mimicking our speech, and roughhousing with Baba.  He got a very mischievous gleam in his eye and started testing his boundaries right and left.  In particular, he decided to start trying to hit and pinch at us.  Not very hard, and not at all in anger, but I think just as a release of pent-up energy and as a way to get a response.  We tried to consistently and firmly tell him no while re-directing him.  It worked for the most part, but I can tell we will have a ways to go in helping him slowly give up some bad habits in that department.

We found a small kid’s playroom in our hotel with some rocking horses and a ball pit.  David entertained himself for over an hour by stacking some buckets we had brought and putting balls in and out of the buckets.  He’s such a thorough and focused little guy, with amazing problem solving skills.  I was amazed at how advanced his ability was to figure out how to put the buckets together and organize things.

I’d say overall he is developmentally at about where an average 18-20 month old would be even though he’s almost 28 months old.  His gross motor skills, physical size, and speech are all at about that level.  His fine motor skills are more advanced, as well as his reasoning ability.  I haven’t yet observed anything that causes me any long-term concern in terms of his development.

Our guide took Jeff back to the notary office this afternoon to pick up David’s passport and other translated documents.  Everything is in order and we have everything we need to fly home tomorrow morning!  We are planning to leave the hotel at 7am, and should be back home in time for lunch with our other kiddos! 

I finally got some pictures of our little man coming out of his shell.  Enjoy!

Happily and intently playing with his buckets!

We call this the "bulldog" look.  It's one of his many smiles!

Aloof

Happy!!

Mischievous

Silly

He loves his bath!

Adoption Day

We feel like the blessings have only continued to flow for our family!  After nap yesterday, David woke up happy and we played in our room some more until we decided to try out the swimming pool.  We got to the pool and refused to allow us to even change him into a swimming suit.  After 5 minutes of sitting near the pool to see if he'd warm up to the idea, we gave up when he kept getting more agitated.  As soon as we left, he was happy as a clam again.  Splurged on the Italian restaurant in our hotel and David had pizza and pasta carbonara.  He ate both but preferred the pasta.  Much to our surprise, he picked up a fork and had a blast using it to both eat his food and transfer it from one plate to another.  We are learning that he is VERY neat in his eating habits.  He doesn't like to have anything on his face or hands.  When he was eating the saucy pasta, he would hold up his and every time he put a bite in his mouth for me to wipe off.  He also doesn't like food to be spilled on the table and will clean up any little crumbs before continuing to eat.  We're hoping he can teach some of these traits to his little brother!

Despite not liking to pool, he LOVED his bath.  Played quite happily in there with a spoon and plastic bowl, though he would only squat and not actually sit.  After jammies and some snuggles, we put him down a little after 8 and he went right to sleep with no fussing.  I had to wake him up at 7:45 this morning!

He ate a good breakfast of some eggs, porridge, fruit and milk.  He didn't seem nearly as hungry as yesterday, but was again very entertained by transferring his food from one bowl to another.  After breakfast we met up with our guide to return to the office where we picked him up yesterday to finalize the adoption.  We were there only about 10 minutes when they came out with our official adoption decree and made a little speech thanking us and the other family that was there for adopting our children and wishing us the best.  David was definitely calmer this time around, but as soon as we walked in he was clearly more nervous and withdrawn.  He only wanted to sit on Jeff's lap and was very suspicious of the two other children there.

From there we travelled to the notary's office, where we dropped off our paperwork to be translated and to request David's passport.  Oh, one funny story about the paperwork.  Our guide came to our room yesterday afternoon to fill out most of the paperwork, including having us put our thumbprints over several of our signatures and taking a handprint from David.  Just as she was getting ready to finish it all up, I pulled a box of juice from the fridge that spilled all over the floor and even on some of the papers.  We all freaked out for a minute until our guide assured us that nothing of great importance got wet and they could still all be used. We are grateful nothing was ruined, and we are all done with paperwork now!  All we have to do is go back tomorrow afternoon to pick it all up before we leave Thursday morning to head back to Beijing.

We took a taxi to the Walmart to pick up a few snack supplies and then went to the KFC for lunch.  That was a somewhat cold and wet experience as it was starting to rain much harder and the wind was blowing, and of course we had no umbrella.  David did not like the cold and wind, so we kept dashing from one cover to another trying to get to where we could catch a taxi home.  Jeff finally got one after standing out on the street corner getting soaked while we waited in a nearby store.

We were all happy to get back to the room and David fell right asleep when I laid him down.  Jeff and I appreciated a little nap too!  When David wakes up, we just found out that there is a kid's play area in the hotel that I think we're going to go check out.  We bought some ramen noodles for David, and some peanut butter and bread for us so we can just make dinner in our room to avoid the need to go back out into the yucky weather.

We just can't believe how smooth the last two days have been for everyone!  I'm positive there will be plenty of bumps in the future, but we are going to continue to enjoy the blessings of our son having such a wonderful start to being a part of our family.

Oh, before I post the pictures, I need to ask a question of those who have a potty trained boy.  How do you keep them from peeing all over their clothes when you have to hold them over the toilet?  It goes great when I can just plop him on the toilet seat, but when we are out and about and need to use the squatty we are having some troubles. :)  The poor kiddo works hard to keep himself dry, and then we go and hold him the wrong way so he soaks his pants anyway. :)

Ok, so here are the photos we have.  Again, sorry that the number and quality aren't great at this point.

                                                   Jeff and David at the registration office

Italian restaurant last night

Enjoying his fork!

Happy at KFC for lunch!

Our Sweet Little Man!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes indeed, we have our little boy!  We went to the lobby at 9:30am this morning to meet our guide and go to the civil affairs office to meet David.  She called at 9:20 and explained that because of the huge rain storm there weren't any taxis so she was walking to our hotel and would be 20 minutes late.  When she arrived, she called the orphanage officer who was bringing David and made plans to bring him to our hotel instead.  After waiting another 20 minutes in the lobby, the orphanage officer called back and said we had to go to the Civil Affairs office after all.  Fortunately, we were able to find a taxi rather quickly.

About 10 minutes after we arrived, so did David.  The minute he walked in the door, he started wailing.  The orphanage official handed him to me and walked away into a back office.  David spent the next 30 minutes crying inconsolably while I held him and tried to ask a few questions to the officer who clearly knew very little about David.  But it doesn't really much matter at this point, we'll learn what we need to as we go.  Just before we left, I was able to interest David in a small book with pictures of animals.  He wasn't exactly happy, but he was willing to be distracted by it until we got in a taxi to head home.

On the ride home he started pointing out the window and talking.  He also devoured a couple of crackers, though he still wasn't interested in drinking anything.  When we got up to the room, I sat him on the bed and opened a package of small cookies.  That was definitely the right choice of activities as he started stuffing them into his mouth and smiling.

After a few minutes, we started playing a game where we would hand the crackers back and forth to each other and laugh about it.  He has such a cute and mischevious little smile!  He liked to pass the book back and forth as well.  Jeff came in with some fried rice and noodles and he ate about 3/4 of the rice and some noodles.  Yep, we have one more kid who can EAT.  After lunch was playing on the floor with some blocks.  He LOVED playing with Abba on the floor and was quite happy there for about an hour as we played and also filled out a bunch of paperwork with our guide.  About 2:15 I decided it was time to try a nap, so we kissed him and laid him in his crib.  I put a blanket over the side facing us so he would have a little less stimulation.  He talked to himself for maybe 5 minutes and then fell fast asleep.  He is currently sound asleep holding his book in one hand and his juice in the other.

Oh, and he peed and pooped in the toilet!!  Unfortunately I didn't realize his pants were overalls when I took him pee until it was too late, so they got a little wet. :)

The only two things that have been hard from the day were learning that he was returned from his foster family to his orphanage before we came to get him, and seeing his face all scratched up from another little boy in the orphanage who attacked him. :(  But his face will heal and from this point on he will never have to experience being separated from his family!

We are all so thankful and happy to have David here with us!  He is doing such a great job and we are loving watching little bits of his personality slowly emerge.  The orphange officer said he could say "baba" "mama" and maybe a couple of other words, but he has been talking away to us.  He even started counting with me!  We have the cutest and most amazing little boy in all of China!  I'm sorry for the poor quality of the pictures, we can only post iphone pictures at the moment.  I'll make a whole collage of good ones when I get home.

                                                   
                                                     Right when he was first handed to me

                                                               Our first family photo

                                                             Our official family photo

                                                Doesn't this sad little face break your heart?!

                                                      Reading the animal book with mama

                                              Starting to come out of his shell a little in the car

                                                                Devouring his rice!

                                                            There's my happy little man!!

Day 1 - arrive in Zhengzhou

We left our apartment at 8:30 this morning, and arrived in Zhengzhou at 11:45am.  Don't hate me all of you who travel from the States! :)

It was actually a really refreshing and relaxing day.  No small kids to be in charge of.  We could nap, read, take a walk, whatever our hearts desired with no need to worry about whether the kids would like it or not.

We meet our guide in the hotel lobby at 9:30 tomorrow morning to go to the office to get David!  We thought it would be in the afternoon, but we'll get him I'd guess sometime between 10-12.  Jeff forgot to bring the cord that attaches the camera to the computer for downloading pictures, but we've got an iphone.  Sorry the picture quality won't be all that great, but at least there will be some pictures!

Can't wait to update you all tomorrow when we have David in our arms!

On our way!!!!!

Cannot believe the day is finally here, but we are leaving in a little over an hour for the airport to go get our son!!  Miriam asked yesterday if I was SURE all the paperwork was really done - guess it's not any easier for her to believe it is finally time either.

We spend today in Zhengzhou and then tomorrow the orphanage officer will bring David to us!  Tuesday we finalize the adoption with lots of paperwork, and we're not sure yet what we will do on Wednesday besides pick up David's passport at some point.  We are of course hoping for a way to see Guang Ming, but will just have to wait until we meet the orphanage officer to talk about what that might look like.  My plan is to try to update the blog with pictures and info each day, so hope you all enjoy the journey with us!

Our New Son!!

Ok, we officially received our Pre approval today from the Chinese government for our adoption of Guang Ming! This means they have accepted our request to process our adoption for him. At the end of it all, they will give us a second final approval, but Guang Ming is officially going to be our son and we can let the world know!

A couple of weeks ago, we discovered that David's foster home was being sponsored by Bethany Christian Services. We were invited by them to begin to sponsor his foster home ourselves through their program. We of course said yes! As we began our sponsorship, we were able to view all of the bi-annual reports that the foster family wrote since they began their work as foster parents in 2009. Through those reports, we learned that David had been living with this same family since he was 7 months old! And in addition to that, he had been living there nearly all of that time with Guang Ming as his foster brother. We knew Guang Ming had been a foster brother to him when he was younger from our early orphanage report, but we assumed they had been split up over a year ago. When we learned that they had remained together and that Guang Ming was a loving and caring big brother to David, it created in our hearts a desire to see Guang Ming find a loving home of his own.

At first we thought our role could be as an advocate for him to help him find a family. We sent out emails and contacted some friends who we thought might be interested in adopting him. What I was NOT expecting was for Jeff to come home last Thursday night and talk about how God had been working in his heart to change his understanding of what it means to adopt and in that process cause him to seriously consider adopting Guang Ming ourselves! At the end of the evening, Jeff said, "I think God is offering us an invitation to make Guang Ming our son. It's not a command, but it's an invitation to step into the adventure of redeeming this little boy's life". Well, I for one have learned that when God is the one doing the inviting, the only sane answer to give is yes. :) So that's what we did, and as of today we are officially starting our journey to bring Guang Ming home.

We are fortunately able to re-use most of the paperwork that we had to gather for David's adoption. We are hoping that in a couple of months all of the updates we need will be complete and everything will be submitted to China. From that point, it is about a 4-5 month wait for China to go through their process. In other words, we are likely going to be able to bring Guang Ming home sometime this summer! We don't know yet if we will be able to meet him while we are on our trip to adopt David, but we sure hope so!

Here are some more pictures of our handsome little man! He is 3 years old (born August of 2008), and he was born with his left eye shut. Don't really know much more than that about his medical background, but he is a smart and loving little man who is really curious about the world around him and loves playing with other children. His foster family says he asks "what is that?" about nearly everything. :)

I'll leave you with the conversation I had with Miriam when we asked her about adopting Guang Ming.

Me: Miriam, how would you feel if we brought David's foster brother Guang Ming home and made him a new brother as well? How would you feel about having two new brothers?

Miriam: Good! I like that! (then a considerable pause) It also makes me feel a little confused.

Me: I can understand that! What makes you feel confused?

Miriam: Well, I just don't think most people do things like this!

Me: (with a great deal of laughter) You are absolutely right baby girl! Most people do not do things like this. Aren't we SO BLESSED that we get to love TWO brothers when most families don't even get to love one??

Miriam: Yes! (I can't even tell you how much I love that kid!)

More pictures of our boys together! These pictures are from this past spring

This is Elijah's favorite picture. He is always asking to see "chick gege (big brother)"

Guang Ming in September

Look at this handsome little man!!!

New Pictures!!!

Courtesy of our boy's foster home, we have new pictures!! We are not yet officially allowed to "announce" and post pictures of our newest family member, but for those of you in the know, I bet you'll be able to spot him. :)

This is the last time you'll ever have to wear pink, I promise :)

Halloween

Ok, so I know I'm a little late on the Halloween post, but I've been a little distracted lately. We bought our plane tickets and are headed to get our little boy on the 27th!! A little sad to not have him for Thanksgiving, but happy to know everything is falling in place and he will be home SOON!!

So this year we were riding in the car, and I asked Miriam what she wanted to be for Halloween (secretly chanting under my breath, "say princess, say princess" because I figured that costume would be easy). Without a minutes hesitation she says "a crow!". So I stammer out something about how maybe she could wear black tights and a black shirt and I could try to find her some feathers, but she just said, "I just want to be a crow!".

Upon arrival at home, I was looking around our living room and spied some decorative scarecrows lying around, and intuition from on high hit me. I turned to Miriam, pointed to the scarecrow, and asked, "is that what you want to be!" "Yes!" she says, "like I said, a crow!" Well I was more than a little relieved that I wasn't going to have to pay for therapy 10 years from now to uncover why my 3 year old wanted to be a large black bird for Halloween. So we happily went shopping for the right accessories to turn my baby girl into the world's cutest scarecrow.

And Elijah, you ask? Well....ummm...ok see the thing is that he's barely two so he doesn't really care and it took a lot longer to figure out Miriam's costume so....well....ok so he wore a pair of batman pajamas and Jeff safety pinned some black material to the back to make a cape. But he's the cutest little batman-pj-wearing little boy I've ever seen! There might be a therapy bill in the future for him.

Our neighborhood friends invited us over for a little Halloween party, and they did an AMAZING job decorating their home, making themed treats, and generally letting the kids have a great time. Then we went trick-or-treating to the 4 apartments of our friends in the neighborhood.

Here are my sweet kiddos looking absolutely adorable!

Please ignore Elijah's demon eyes, I forgot to format it first

Ok, seriously, cutest scarecrow ever!

Jeff showing off his awesome carving skills with a June pumpkin

Miriam with the spider cupcake she made. I would have taken a picture of Elijah's, but well he wasn't interested in decorating once he got handed something covered in frosting.

Loving On Some Kiddos

Every week on our way to church, we pass by what we refer to as the "car wash street". Alongside the edge of a canal, there are a strip of makeshift homes and stores that are all in the car wash business. There is a factory across the canal that employs some of the men, but many of the families try to make enough to eat through their car wash business.

Behind the car wash store fronts, there is a maze of one-room cement homes. Trash is literally everywhere, as the government doesn't provide trash services to them. I have yet to see a bathroom, but I can't imagine that it actually has true plumbing. In fact, I haven't seen running water in any of the "homes" that I have been in. They are comprised of a bed, a small dresser, and a table for the most part. Some of the roofs are sheets of tin held down with bricks around the edges.

So as I mentioned, we drive by this place every week, and it has been growing in our hearts for a while now that we would love to be able to do something to help the families and children we see as we go by. So last Saturday we made our first trip to visit. We stopped to get our car washed, and as we did, Elijah and Miriam ran back to the area where people live and started making friends. Especially Elijah. We call him our goodwill ambassador, because he loves everyone and everyone loves him. We spent maybe 45 minutes there, just talking with some people and letting our kids make some new friends. One little boy in particular, his name is Niuniu, became good buds with Elijah. They followed each other around everywhere.

At the end of our time, some of the families asked if we would help teach some English to their kids, so we made arrangements to come back yesterday. We showed up with some simple English teaching props and a pan of chocolate chip cookie bars. Much to our surprise, not one of the probably 15 kids would even touch the bars, much less eat them. Lesson learned: next time bring fruit. :) It was pretty chaotic and I'm not sure many of the kids learned anything, but we enjoyed continuing to build relationships. Miriam finally got an "in" with some of the other little girls and was running up and down the alleys yelling happily with them. Little Niuniu was our most diligent student and liked telling Miriam and Elijah the Chinese names for things.

Our plan is to go back again next week. We have no idea where things are going to go from here. Maybe nowhere. Or maybe there will be a door opened for us that we don't see yet. All we know is that we have a burden to serve and love this little community, and are praying that God would open up a way for that to happen if that's His plan. I'll let you know.

The kids with Niuniu (not the most flattering look for either of mine, but Niuniu is a doll :))

Some views of the area

To my little man

Hello my sweet little boy! I've been sitting here all night thinking about you (a very common occurence), and I decided I should just go ahead and write to you. Mostly I'm just thinking about all the things I love about you.

I love that you are such a strong fighter to have survived being so sick when you were just a newborn baby. Did you know that even half the grownups that get sick like you don't get better? But you were just a tiny baby and you not only got well, but now you are such a grown up two year old and are doing amazing!

I love your sweet sweet smile! It shows me your gentle loving little heart. And a bit of a strong spirit too! I bet you're going to be a snuggler! At least, if you don't want your mama to drive you crazy by always trying to scoop you up I sure hope you learn to like it. I've got a lot of missed hugs and cuddles to make up for!

I was holding your little brother tonight (I know you've seen the pictures, but boy are you in for a treat when you truly realize you've got an awesome little brother just 7 weeks younger than you!), and I got a little teary-eyed wishing I could be holding you too. I was rocking him when he woke up feeling scared, and I prayed for you that your foster mama would be able to hold you and rock you the same way when you get scared. She does rock you, doesn't she?

You also have the best big sister in the whole world. Do you know that at least once a day she reminds me that she wants YOU for her birthday present!? That's right, her birthday is in a month, right when we are expecting to be able to bring you home, and she couldn't be more excited! Every time she draws a picture or picks a flower or sees something she likes, she always asks if she can send it to you.

Whenever I go out anywhere with the family, I always imagine what it will be like one day soon when you are with us. Every trip to the park, or to our favorite restaurant, or to visit a friend, I am always thinking of you. Wondering if you will like the monkeys or the zebras best at the zoo. If you will be a crazy daredevil like your brother on the playground, or if you will be happy to sit for hours playing in the sand box like your sister. Wondering if you will like my enchiladas or only want Chinese food (it's ok if you only want Chinese, Miriam and Elijah could happily live off of only that too). Wondering....wondering so many things and sometimes being so heartbroken I don't know the answers and other times being so EXCITED to find them out.

Only about one more month to go my sweet little boy. Then you will finally be home. The home God chose from before the beginning of time for you to have. Do you still have the stuffed dog we sent you in the first care package? I bought him the day we knew you were meant to be a part of our family. We named him Hope, and sent him to you as soon as we could so that whenever you held him he would remind you of the hope you have to be our son. Even though you aren't physically with us now, you are already our son. I love you with all that fierce, deep, tender, longing mama love.

You are my little boy, and you always will be. Sleep well tonight my precious one. Mama is praying over you and counting down the days. Soon little one. Not soon enough, but soon.

All my love,

Mama

Apple Tortured

In an attempt to distract myself from the maddening fact that it has already been 6 days and the NVC has still not emailed me the letter they promised I would receive "shortly", I have decided to recap some of my favorite kid quotes from the last 3-4 months before I forget them. The first is the most recent, from this past week. BTW, for those who don't know, Miriam is 3 1/2.

On our way to pick apples at an orchard, Miriam says, "Mama, I'm so excited we get to go see an apple tortured!"

After being told she could not have the snack she wanted,
Miriam (complete with feet stomping and arm flapping): I am both ANGRY and FRUSTRATED at the same time!!!

Me: Why?

Miriam: Because I want what I want and I can't have it!!

Me: That's the same problem every person has

Me: Miriam, are you American or Chinese? (asked because she was born in China and we live there although she is white as white can be :))

Miriam: No

Me: I mean, do you think you are American or Chinese?

Miriam: No. My name is Miriam. I am a third culture kid, and I'm special!!

Me: You are absolutely right! :)

Jeff: Miriam, Paper Tiger (her favorite book store) doesn't have the Dora books you like anymore.

Miriam: That's tragical!

Miriam: Mama, can you tell me what I will be when I grow up?

Me: No I can't. That's something you get to choose for yourself

Miriam: I think maybe I want to be a lifeguard.

Me: You could be a lifeguard.

Miriam: Or do you think I can be a mama?

Me: Yes, you can be a Mama if you want to.

Miriam: No....I don't want to choose those things. They aren't good enough. I want to choose something really good!

Me: Like what?

Miriam: Something really so so good! I know!! I can be a bunny!

Oh good! I thought of one for Elijah! (he just turned two, so not so many quotable quotes :)). Our good friend Leah just had a baby a couple of weeks ago, and one day while she was still pregnant Elijah came up and patted her belly and said, "Ball!" Leah explained it was a baby, so he patted her again and said, "Baby!" About a week later, He's sitting next to me on the couch,

Elijah (while poking my stomach): Ball!

Me: No, that's just mommy's tummy

Elijah: Biiiiiiiiggggggg ball!!

Me: Not a ball Elijah, mama's tummy

Elijah: No ball. Baby!!

Me: No, not a baby either

Elijah: Baby baby baby!!! (then he proceeds to kiss my stomach over and over)

Me: You are not good for my ego :)

Ok, that's all that's coming to mind at the moment. Hope it made you smile :)

Blogging guilt

Yes indeed, I just looked back and realized I haven't even written a blog since I could mention my son's name and picture. *sigh* This is why I avoid blogging. Once you start, there is an expectation that you would continue to write on a more than bi-annual basis.

Well, I doubt any amount of guilt I am feeling right now will be strong enough to keep me blogging as often as my family wishes, but it is enough to get me to post an adoption update. I'm sure everyone who is reading this already knows, but we are eagerly expecting sometime this November to bring home our son, David Gordon TianXiang Staege!! I will post the timeline of events below, but just today we received our I-800 provisional approval, which puts our wait time at about a month and a half until we get to pick up our little man! Miriam keeps saying she hopes he comes home by her birthday (Nov 23rd) because it would make a really good birthday present. I agree!

Without further ado, here are some pictures of our handsome boy!

Here is David at 7 months old - fat and healthy after recovering from serious illness!

David at 16 months old

David and his foster brother right after returning to the orphanage

David this past June just before his 2nd birthday

Here is our adoption timeline up to this point:

2/3/11 - agency approves our application

3/5/11 - LOI

3/12/11 - PA

4/1/11 - HS complete

6/7/11 - I-797

7/15/11 - DTC

7/21/11 - LID

9/5/11 - LOA

9/28/11 - I-800 approval