Camping, Chinese Heritage camp and waterpark fun

July is only half way over and already we have had enough fun and excitement to last the entire summer. 4th of July weekend we did what we love to do the most...We loaded up the camper and headed out of town. We absolutely love to go camping. We spent much of our time in the sun swimming. On the last day spent the day at the waterslide park. It was Annabel's first time down the slides. She had a great time. Those swimming lessons really paid off. She has no fear of the water at all. We were home from camping for a few days and then headed out again. This time we went to a weekend Heritage Camp. We joined the organization called Families with Children from China. We had a blast. We got to meet some wonderful families and children and learned a lot about Chinese cultural dance. Mostly we just had fun. It was very well organized but also allowed for much needed down time. We were able to go swimming, play at the beach and fly kites. We stayed in what are now retired Army barracks. That was fun because we got to spend a lot of time with other families in the common areas of the barracks and the food was absolutely delicious. Mark especially enjoyed the Salmon BBQ!!!! Amber decided to go and stay in the open bay with all the teen girls. She was the only one not adopted from China in the group. She had a great time. I am so glad she made so many great friends. It will be fun to come back year after year and watch the kids grow up. There are many events throughout the year that this organization hosts as well. We plan on attending as many of them as we can. All in all we have had a fantastic summer so far. Annabel is making so much progress at adjusting and trusting us more and more each day. So much so that Annabel is now in her own room and doing beautifully. Praise God!!! We are all getting a lot more sleep these days. haha We are on day 52 of our wait for our Letter Of Acceptance for Jacob. The summer is flying by so quick. It will be no time at all before we are packing our bags to head back to China. We cannot wait to hug and kiss our little guy.

June Update

It's been far too long since I last updated, so I will try to catch you all up on the ever growing and fast changing Annabel. She just celebrated her 2nd birthday and we had a cute little party for her with some of her friends. She wore the Snow White outfit that Amber wore on her first birthday 14 years ago. Wow!!! That made me feel old. She is fast learning how to be in control of the dog and is not afraid to drag him around everywhere with her. He doesn't seem to mind. She loves Mexican food and just today experienced her first freeze pop. I will add that when Joey brought her in the house she seemed to have more melted freeze pop on her then in her. haha Wherever the older kids are Annabel is not far behind. She adores them. I have to add that they are amazing with her as well. She is becoming a pro on the trampoline. She is actually jumping now which is so funny to watch. We have had her photos taken professionally twice now and she really gets into it as you can see from the photos. She is a huge ham infront of the camera. Her lip is healing up nicely and she is just amazing. She is beginning to say Jacob in preparation for meeting him and hugs and kisses his photos all the time. I can't wait to see the two of them together soon. Praise God for matching us with Annabel who is by far the perfect fit for our family.

She can finally use a straw!!!!

Today was a very exciting day for Annabel. She finally figured out how to keep liquid coming up through the straw. She can finally suck through a straw. Yea!!!!! Here she is showing off for daddy. She put on quite the show tonight with water, milk and apple juice. Her diaper will be pretty water logged come morning.

Did my hair grow while I was sleeping?

Wow!! Hard to believe she was nearly bald 8 months ago.

What a bargain!!!!

Sometimes you get lucky and find a bargain. Sometimes you search and search and don't find one. Today was definetly bargain Saturday for us. I have been searching garage sale after garage sale for a kitchen for Annabel. I even had one saved in a shopping cart on the Walmart website. But I just wasn't going to spend hundreds of dollars for a play kitchen. Especially when we live in a town that has major garage sales this time of year. Well today I just happened to stop by the thrift store. I have not been there in months. As I walked up to the door my eyes about bugged out of my head. The EXACT kitchen I had saved on my shopping cart was there. And guess how much they wanted for it???? $14.99 Yes I said only $14.99 Oh my goodness. They might as well have been giving it away at that price. It is brand new, in excellent condition and even came with two big bags of accessories. I didn't even stop to check it all out as there was a woman coming up behind me from the parking lot and I could see she had her eye on it as well. I went straight up to the counter and said "I will take the kitchen" and pulled out my debit card. Don't worry, I wasn't rude or anything. I didn't run or knock anyone down or anything like that. That wouldn't be very nice. Annabel is having the time of her life playing with it. Last week I found a play baby doll station with bed, swing, carseat, bath and highchair all in one for just $10 at a garage sale. Annabels play area is now complete. I guess in a few months we will have to look at some more masculine toys. Otherwise Jacob will become a very domesticated young man. haha I prayed God would find me a kitchen and He did. Thank you Lord for answering even the most smallest of our prayers.

Prayers for the Chapman family

Please keep Steven Curtis Chapman and his family in your prayers during this terribly painful time. They lost their 5 year old daughter Maria tonight. She was struck by a car in her driveway while playing outside. Such a tragic accident. I pray Gods peace fills their home. I must have looked at Maria's photo a thousand times while waiting for our referral for Annabel. I can't tell you how many Sundays I carried a photo with her and her two sisters, also from China to Church with me. During praise and worship I kept looking at their faces and trying to imagine what our daughter would look like. For those of you who may not know who he is, he is a Christian artist who advocates for adoption and has been used by God to influence thousands of families to open their homes to orphans. It was at his 2005 Christmas concert that God spoke to both Mark and I about adoption. My heart aches for their loss. I pray their family strength and complete faith in God will carry them through. Below are the words to a song he previously recorded. I am sure they never thought it would be about their youngest daughter. A website has been set up where you can view a sweet video clip of Maria and her dad as well as leave your prayers and blessings for the family. http://chapmanchannel.typepad.com/inmemoryofmaria/

With Hope

By Steven Curtis Chapman
1 Thess. 4:13-14 / Heb. 6:9, 10:23

This is not at all how
We thought it was supposed to be
We had so many plans for you
We had so many dreams
And now you've gone away
And left us with the memories of your smile
And nothing we can say
And nothing we can do
Can take away the pain
The pain of losing you, but ...

We can cry with hope
We can say goodbye with hope
'Cause we know our goodbye is not the end, oh no
And we can grieve with hope
'Cause we believe with hope
(There's a place by God's grace)
There's a place where we'll see your face again
We'll see your face again

And never have I known
Anything so hard to understand
And never have I questioned more
The wisdom of God's plan
But through the cloud of tears
I see the Father's smile and say well done
And I imagine you
Where you wanted most to be
Seeing all your dreams come true
'Cause now you're home
And now you're free, and ...

We have this hope as an anchor
'Cause we believe that everything
God promised us is true, so ...

We wait with hope
And we ache with hope
We hold on with hope
We let go with hope

Jacob's own website

I finally made Jacob his own website. You can follow along at www.journeytoourjacob.blogspot.com There is a short video clip on there of him in China. He is so sweet.