In Pursuit Of Him

Long Time, No Post

2011-09-29T12:22:00.002-06:00

I am the lamest blogger out there. I really did a good job blogging when we were working to adopt Max. I felt like I had so much to share with all the people who were praying us through the process, so I blogged often to keep everyone updated. Then we adopt him, and my blogging slows down. We get pregnant and it pretty much stops completely. It has been almost a year and a half since I have written a post. I am lame!!!

I have more time on my hands now that school has started, so blogging once more has been on my list of things to accomplish. I am going to work really hard to blog often. Perhaps I should add it on to my list of weekly chores! But it truly isn't a chore. It is a blessing to have this avenue to share our life with people all over the place. So be ready-the comeback tour has been scheduled and is on it's way!!!

Movement

2010-05-07T10:24:00.000-06:00

All three kids got to feel the baby kicking last night. Analiese is a very active baby and I feel her often, but so far the kids hadn't been able to get there in time to feel her kicking.

Last night she began her dancing and the kids were all sitting around me, so I told them to quickly get their hands on my tummy. Lo and behold, it actually worked this time! Abby got the first big kick and she was absolutely thrilled to feel her sister for the first time. It was so sweet to see the look of amazement on her face as she felt Analiese moving around. Both Max and Madeline got to feel her too and loved it.

It was a tender moment and one I am truly looking forward to repeating over the next few months.

Random Pictures

2010-05-05T11:58:00.028-06:00

I am going to post some pictures from the past 6 months just to give you a glimpse into our crazy family!!

Fall Fun

notice Madeline's face!

Daddy took a turn, Mommy didn't!!!

Halloween

Max Skywalker and Raggedy Ann

Dorothy (from the Wizard of Oz)

Christmas

Picking out a Christmas tree from tree farm

A Christmas Program at Max and Madeline's preschool

Madeline made this face every time she saw us
watching her during the program

Christmas Eve sweetness

Fun with cousins (notice that Abby and Madeline
are the only girls)

Late Winter

Abby's first baby tooth to fall out

Jason took Abby to a Daddy/Daughter Dance. It was
a magical evening for them both

Freak Snow Storm

Freaky snowman (arms compliments of Jason)

Update

2010-05-05T10:51:00.007-06:00

It has been far too long since I have posted anything on here. So sad to admit that, since so much has been going on. I will do a long post to catch everyone up and then make the fruitless promise to blog more often..It is a well-intentioned promise, but life so easily gets in the way. I truly do want to blog more. It is a wonderful way to share the happenings of our family, as well as document them for ourselves.

The biggest update is that we are expecting another baby! I am almost 5 and 1/2 months pregnant and thrilled to be so. We were so devastated by the turn of events last summer. I was so afraid I would not be able to get pregnant again, and if I did, that the pregnancy would end in the same way. So I am so hopeful for this one-I am 25 weeks along which is a good place to be.

It has been an interesting pregnancy, to say the least. Bleeding and cramping sent us to the E.R. at 15 weeks where we discovered that I had placenta previa. My placenta is low-lying and there was a piece that had broken away, which all led to the bleeding. I was put on bed-rest for an entire month to get the bleeding to stop. My parents graciously came down to help out. Thank goodness, because it was chaos here!!! I am off of bed-rest and have had no more bleeding since being released. I am so hopeful that the placenta is moving up and that the situation will resolve itself. We will know more in 2 weeks after another sonogram to check the progress.

Because of the placenta previa we had a sonogram at 18 weeks to check if it had moved at all. During that time, we were able to determine the sex of the baby......Drum Roll Please..................

A Girl!! Another Girl!!! We were laughing so hard. Apparently we can only produce little girls. Max is going to be so tired of girly things by the time he grows up. He is excited, nonetheless. So are we! Little Analiese is due August 21...It is going to be a long, hot summer.... I will try to post some pregnancy pictures soon.

Patience

2009-10-05T13:41:00.002-06:00

Most of you already know, but considering the previous post, I realize I should make sure that all are aware....We had a miscarriage a week after announcing the pregnancy.

As miscarriages go, it was merciful. Not an event I would like to repeat, but it could have been much worse. I have received many encouraging words from people regarding having babies after miscarriages, so we know that our desire to have one more child is not over...just delayed.

News.....

2009-08-20T10:43:00.004-06:00

The next Paredes' baby will join us around April 24th, 2010...The kids are all thrilled (as are Jason and me!!!). When we told them that I was pregnant, Abby looked at me and said, "Are you telling me the truth? Are you kidding????" It was adorable. She comes up to me all day, rubbing my tummy and kissing it for extended amounts of time. So sweet. We are so happy and can't wait for next year!

Madeline is 3!!!

2009-06-30T12:54:00.019-06:00

Happy Birthday Madeline!! I cannot believe that my little baby turned 3 today. It blows my mind that she is so big! When I woke her up this morning and told her happy birthday, the first thing she said was, "Where is my birthday cake?" She is such a hoot.

Here are some pictures, giving a glimpse of Madeline over the past 3 years.

Her first laugh-and she still looks like that when she laughs!

She was such a chubby baby!

The ever present thumb-sucking.....

Turning 1.

Such a typical Madeline face!

Turning 2.

Happy Birthday Baby!!!!!!!

Playing Catchup

2009-06-17T12:56:00.022-06:00

I never anticipated that it would be June before I sat down to blog again, but that is life. I will attempt to share some of the most important highlights from the past 6 months. Lots has happened!

We had a fantastic Christmas. Max absolutely loved everything about it! We finally got all of our decorations up and made it to a Christmas Tree Farm as well. We try to go every other year to pick and cut down our tree. Max got his first hayride and loved being outdoors again after being cooped up in our sick house for such a long time. He loved helping Daddy to cut down the tree. We then got to drag it back to the tractor to be carried to the barn where we paid for it. It is a wonderful experience and I highly recommend everyone try it at some point in their life!

All 3 kids loved being there, and I imagine it will be a continued tradition in our family.

Christmas was extremely special, being that it was Max's first with our family. He loved the Christmas lights on our house, the extreme Christmas movie watching our family does, hot cider, hot cocoa, adding ornaments to our Advent calendar each day, seeing Santa Claus, and of course, Christmas morning! He LOVED opening presents. It was so fun to see the joy in his face when he realized that it was his turn to open a gift. His smile and laugh were contagious! We spent the day here, with Jason's parents, his brother Adrian, sister-in-law Jessica, and our new nephew Alex. We had a fun filled day with just a few cooking mishaps! It was a memorable day.

A few weeks after Christmas, Max had his surgery on his right leg. It was done in order to better stabilize his leg in his prosthesis. Two bones were shaved and fused together. He did well in the hospital, actually being released the day after his surgery because he was doing so well. He had a hard time after he came out of surgery, crying hysterically. It was heartbreaking to see him like that. He kept crying for the cast to be taken off-finally I asked if I could hold him. He eventually calmed down, after getting into my arms. It made me cry that he trusted me enough to calm down in my arms. It was a moment I think I will never forget. I even carried him up to his room because neither of us wanted to be parted when it was time for him to be moved from post-op. Jason and I alternated spending the night with him at the hospital. The girls were able to come up and visit the afternoon that he was released. They enjoyed pulling him through the hallway in his special wagon. They both really loved the wheelchair that we were able to borrow during his recovery time! It was the best toy in the house for them!

He was in a cast for the next 10 weeks. After it was removed, it was another 6-8 weeks before he had his prosthesis. He finally has it full time now and is quickly readjusting to be back on his feet. I am so relived to have him walking again. I am sure that he was tired of being so dependent on me for so many things. It did give us a good opportunity to baby him, which in turn, encouraged more bonding.

As for the bonding, we are so pleased with how well Max is doing now. About a month ago, we sat down as a family and watched our home videos from the adoption trip to China. It was remarkable to see the differences between then and now. It was as if Max was just this little boy, hanging out with our family for the day, whereas now, he is our son, our brother, our family. He has really responded well to the boundaries we set early on. We have absolutely no doubt that Max knows without a doubt that we are his family. He recognizes the differences between our immediate and our extended family. He understands that we care for our friends, but we love our family. He has vastly improved in keeping personal space between himself and others. He still loves to perform and is still a ham-but we have come to understand that is part of his personality...

In February, Max celebrated his fourth birthday. As he was still in his cast, and unable to do much, we decided to do a small family party, just the five of us plus Jason's parents. Being brilliant parents, we decided we would have his birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese on a Saturday afternoon. Let me just forewarn you, NEVER enter a Chuck E. Cheese on a Saturday afternoon unless you want to be surrounded by hordes of screaming children, frustrated parents, all shoved together in a hot environment. These elements don't bode well. We had a great time, nonetheless! Max picked Elmo for party theme, so I made him an Elmo birthday cake. I had some issues with the frosting-so Elmo looks like he has a sunburn-but Max loved him despite that! I am seriously loving makes for the kids, and am getting a little bit better with each one-but I have a ways to go.

Max opening his gift from Abby.

He got some great presents-once again he loved opening them. He would open one, toss it aside and reach for the next one. It was funny to watch. He really enjoyed the party and didn't stop talking about it for weeks. Abby did the cutest thing the day before the party. She picked a toy from the toy box and wrapped it up with spare wrapping paper that was leftover from me wrapping up his presents. They both got such a kick out of him opening it. Just another example of the cuteness I live with!!!

Abby's birthday was one week later. Two February birthdays, a week apart!!! Overwhelming!
She wanted to go bowling for her birthday, so Jason's parents went with us to bowl. She was inspired to do this because she is such a talented bowler on the Wii. She quickly found out that bowling in real life is much harder. Her score wasn't quite as high. We then headed back to the house to have homemade personal pizzas for dinner, followed by an ice cream cake. She loved her presents, especially her Hannah Montana dress up stuff from Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw.

She fell asleep on the way to the bowling alley, unbeknownst to us! At first, I didn't even know she was asleep, we thought she was playing a trick on us. But when her head fell forward, we knew she was seriously asleep. It was confirmed seconds later by the snoring we heard coming from the backseat.

She loved watching her ball go! Even if it took minutes to make it to the pin.

Abby Montana!!!

Yummy cake!!!

Life quieted down after February was over. We slowly got into a routine, working around Max's cast, but continuing to do as much as possible. We went to the zoo, went to playgroup at our church, and went to fun programs at Abby's preschool. Max and Madeline will both be in preschool in the fall, they are thrilled about that! So is Mommy!!!!!!!

We are excited about the summer and have already been blessed by going on vacation for a week. I will post about that next time with pictures from our trip. It was a fantastic week and we couldn't have had a better time.

Our Story

2008-12-04T22:09:00.004-06:00

Jason had the honor of preaching at our church 2 weeks ago. He shared about how God began this journey of adoption for our family. Below is a link to watch the sermon-not only will you get to see Jason preach, but you will receive the added pleasure of seeing the biggest ham in the world, wooing the audience! (P.S. I am talking about Max, not Jason!)

Jason's sermon

Click on November 23, the one on the right, so that you can watch his sermon.

Enjoy!

Sweet Emotions

2008-12-04T20:34:00.003-06:00

I cannot begin to describe the emotions I am feeling right now. We have been through the ringer the past few weeks with too many illnesses to count. We had not even begun to put up our Christmas decorations, which is very unusual for Jason and me. So tonight, we decided we were going to do it, no matter what. We pulled out all of our many boxes of Christmas stuff and suddenly everyone seemed happier. Abby, who has been fighting tremendous pain in her ears and a fever all day, smiled for the first time. Max, who has been feeling neglected because his sisters have been so sick, donned a Santa Claus hat and started shouting "Merry Christmas!!" Madeline hugged each and every Christmas stuffed animal that we unpacked, with such gusto that I thought their seams might pop. The mood lightened, and all seemed right.

I actually began to cry. It was but a year ago that we anxiously awaited the news of whether China would allow us to seek the adoption of Max. We found out on January 2, 2008, that we were pre-approved to adopt Max, pending our dossier. The entire Christmas season of 2007, we constantly pondered the fact that our next Christmas would be as a family of 5, with our sweet son Max.

But I digress.....I experienced an overwhelming sense love for Max tonight. Just seeing his excitement at unwrapping our decorations, listening to Christmas music, putting up our stockings on the fireplace....I just couldn't help but think about where we were a year ago and where we are now. I am still amazed at how much our life has changed because of the joy that he brings to our home. I was in our bedroom as Jason was getting more boxes of Christmas decorations out of the garage. All of a sudden I heard him say "Hey, what are you doing out here??" And then there was hysterical laughing, because Max had followed his daddy out to the garage in his sock feet, because he was so excited to see more Christmas decorations. I don't know why it was at that moment that I felt such a wave of love wash over me, purely for Max, but I did. And I am grateful for it, because those moments are happening more and more frequently. What an answer to a heartfelt prayer.

I'm Back.......

2008-11-22T13:39:00.013-06:00

Well, I know I promised in my last post that I would be updating our blog at least a few times a week. I am such a liar. I was so naive to think that I would have time every other day to sit down at the computer and write updates. All that to say, please, please forgive me for taking so long to do this!! The only reason I can right now is because all 3 kids are sleeping. Madeline is the only one who naps daily, but Abby and Max are both sick so we decided they needed naps as well. So I have an entire hour to myself. So I am finally getting the chance to update on our life. I am desperately wanting to do this more often-but I realize that until things calm down a little bit, I need to be patient with my expectations. I simply cannot keep up with everything like I would like to. But I do promise to do the best that I can to update on how things are going.

So life at the Paredes' house has been crazy lately! I know that it will not always be like this-eventually things will slow down, we'll get into a routine, and I will feel like I have some control over life. At this point, I don't feel that at all. It has been a huge adjustment going from 2 kids to 3-especially since the newest one is not a newborn, but a highly active 3 year old who is learning English and learning to trust his new family. Slowly but surely, I am conquering things that have been oppressing me. The laundry is a neverending battle, but I am fighting it each day. I am back on top of my meal planning and cooking. The kitchen will eventually be completely cleaned. The kids rooms are staying a bit neater. The same cannot be said for their bathroom however. Jason and I are finding time to spend together in the evenings. And the bonding with Max has been showing great signs of progress. I am sure everyone is wondering how he is doing (and the girls) so I will quit talking about me and get straight to the kiddos.

Max is doing really, really well. He is learning English so fast, it is astounding. He shocks us sometimes by the things that come out of his mouth. The other day he was looking at something (I can't remember what it was for the life of me!) and he said "Oh my gosh." It was hysterical. He is a little mimic. So I am having to be even more careful about what I say. No more calling the kids doofballs, spazoid, etc. I don't want Max to call anyone else those names! His comprehension is really high. I am so impressed by him.

He is loving his sisters. Abby is a wonderful playmate and actually, 2 times a week when she is at school, Madeline and Max have a great time together. It's cute to see the two of them playing, because they are almost exactly the same size. They are a hoot together. The kids are really enjoying each other. I wonder sometimes if Madeline truly comprehends that Max is here to stay. We did our best to prepare her-but you never know. If I could only get in her little brain-the wonders that I would encounter!

We have seen great signs of bonding with Max. He is more timid around others and doesn't pay them much attention anymore. We are finding that the less attention they pay to him, the less he gives back, which is a start. He has grown into quite a little cuddler. He loves to be held and while he's been sick, has wanted to be rocked more at night. He is also giving out hugs and kisses more freely-without even being asked. He is getting tons of modeling and examples from the girls. What a blessing they are. He is seeing every day that we a family. Even if he doesn't quite understand the concept, he knows that the 4 of us are his everyday life now. He understands that Jason goes to work each day, but that he always comes homes. He knows that when I leave, I always return. He is seeing consistency. It will still be quite some time before we leave him anywhere without us (like at church or with a sitter), but we'll get to that point before we even know it.

There have been some tough times in the past few weeks. All 3 kids got sick about 2 weeks ago, then I caught it. It was crazy! Poor Jason was trying to take care of all of us and catch up on all of his work that had been piling up from our trip to China. I bet no one was more relieved than he was when I was finally well again! He did a great job taking over for me.

We are looking forward to the holiday next week. Jason will have several days off, so we'll be able to relax for a bit. I am curious what Max will think of the upcoming holiday season. We go all out for Christmas, it's our very favorite time of year. He will probably begin to think that is just another example of how crazy Mommy and Daddy are. What's incredible to us, is that a year ago is when we first received his paperwork and officially began the "paperchase" to bring him home. At Christmas, we would say over and over again, "Next year Max will be home!" Incredible that it's next year. Incredible that he's home!!!

I will leave you with pictures that have been taken over the past month or so. I also leave you with a promise that I will update the blog as much as I can. I am not going to promise a specific number of times per week, because I don't want to be made into a liar again! But don't give up on me! Don't give up on the blog. We will meet again!!!

Max pretending to take my picture!

Playing is even more fun inside the toy box.

All dressed up for trick-or-treating!

Elmo, Stinkerbell, and Sleeping Beauty..(Did I say
Stinkerbell, I meant Tinkerbell).

No, actually, I meant Stinkerbell.

Max loves being a cheeseball!

Abby, after her preschool circus parade.

Abby White Cloud

She is so adorable!!!!

"Mommy, please STOP taking my picture!!!"

Better Day Today

2008-10-29T19:43:00.002-06:00

Things went better today. I felt better when I woke up-it's amazing what a quiet time can do! I had energy and actually wanted to get things accomplished. Since I was feeling so adventurous, I decided to take the kids (all 3 of them!) to Wal-Mart. I have been needing to go for several days, but when we ran out of diapers for Madeline this morning, I knew it was time to go. It went really well. Max was so funny! Every time I put something in the shopping cart, which he was sitting in, he would yell "Yay Mommy! You did it! Good job!" He is such a hoot! The volume intensified when it was something that he really liked, like cereal or yogurt. Overall, it went really well. I definitely will not be taking all of them when I have tons of shopping to do, but today was a smaller one. Although, as usual, I walked out of there with much more than I had planned on buying. Don't tell Jason!

I feel like I am getting the hang of things. Jason is at a late meeting tonight, so I was on my own with the kiddos. It went fine. I even bathed all 3 of them-which is interesting. I got them all to bed by 8:30 (MIRACLE!!) so I actually have time to sit down and blog. :-)

I have received emails from several people who are also adoptive parents. All of them have been so encouraging. What a blessing. They shared their struggles-some of them identical to ours. It's amazing how much guilt you can put onto yourself because you think that your feelings are so wrong. What a refreshing reminder that other people out there have gone through exactly the same thing as us and have made it through it. Thank you to all of you who took the time to email me today, or left a comment on the blog. I am so grateful that you did so. It really truly encouraged me.

One last thing before I sign off. We got Max's appointments for Scottish Rite Hospital. This is the children's hospital where we will be taking Max to have evaluations/corrections made on his hands and legs. Our first appointment is November 20, in which his hands will be evaluated by a team of doctors. Unfortunately, his appointment for his prosthetic leg isn't until December 8. I had really been hoping for an earlier appointment for that. His prosthetic leg is at least 1 inch shorter than his other leg because he is growing out of it. So I am concerned for him to continue to walk around on it for another couple of months. Hopefully once we have the evaluation, the doctors will be able to move quickly. Pray for that please..

Next time I post, I promise to include pictures!!!!

At Long Last...

2008-10-28T20:12:00.002-06:00

Please accept my apologies for how long it has taken me to sit down to write an update. It has been crazy here since we returned! We got back to Arlington on Saturday, October 18. We felt a mix of emotions as we arrived-relief, excitement, joy, anxiousness...Our journey to adopt Max was coming to an end, but an entirely new journey was about to begin. It took us some time to realize that. We are now in the process of becoming a family. We have been praying for Max for so long, and have yearned to be with him so strongly-it was so exciting to finally be united with him. But our bonding as a family will take time.

It was a hard week last week, between being exhausted from the jet lag, the kids being exhausted from the jet lag, Abby being sick and then Madeline having some issues...but we are finally getting into a good routine here. The house is not staying quite as neat as I would like, but I am realizing that I am putting really high expectations on myself. I simply cannot keep up with everything right now. The most important thing is to teach Max how much we love him and for him to learn to trust us and love us.

We have seen some really positive and encouraging signs over the past week that he is bonding to us. We visited Jason's office last week and he didn't try to get down out of my arms the entire time. He was more quiet and reserved than normal. This is good! This means that he felt uncertain, yet felt safe in my arms. He asks for Jason a lot when he is at work. He also whined for me one day when I had left to go run an errand. Very exciting! This is the only time we are happy to report that one of our kids is whining!!! We have had lots and lots of play time as a family. Lots of wrestling (big surprise!), reading together, cuddling like a baby and tons of play time outside. He loves to be held and cuddled and is really learning to let us do it for longer periods of time. Sometimes it is a struggle for us when we are trying to cuddle him and he is pushing us away, but we know that he is not used to it, and needs to be taught that is is fun and special.

Now for the hard part- I have been struggling a bit. I have felt overwhelmed with the transition from 2 to 3 kids. Especially with the change of a boy. I have felt down for the past couple of days for various reasons. I have not been getting enough sleep, I haven't been doing my quiet time, and there are certain things that I am dealing with emotionally. This has been unexpected and has been difficult. Please pray for me. Pray that I would not be hard on myself or expect perfection right now. Pray that I would be patient with the kiddos as they adjust to each other. Pray for our bonding with Max. We have loved Max from afar for nearly 2 years. We would do anything for him, just as we would the girls. But the emotions are different right now, which kills me. But as I finally spent some time with God this morning, I realized something. Just as Max needs time to learn to trust us and love us and attach to us, we need the same thing. He is our son, but it will take some time to develop depth to that relationship. Please pray for us. We know we'll get there-but we are finally realizing that our true, deep love will not develop overnight.

I will say that he is doing exceptionally well. He is adjusting so well. He is having a lot of fun here-he loves playing with all of his toys, with his sisters, with us, with the dogs, and outside as well. He has responded well to our discipline. He is eating well, sleeping well and really learning English quickly. We could not have hoped for his adjustment to have been any better! I am so proud of him, for how resilient he is proving to be. Overall,we are very pleased with how he is doing. We are anxious to begin introducing him to the outside world, but we continue to be very careful about his exposure to others. I do feel that he is beginning to grasp that this is his home and that we are his family. But we are still going to be cautious. Better to be over-cautious now then realize later on that we jumped the gun to soon.

I promise to begin blogging again on a consistent basis. It may not happen every single day, but it will be multiple times a week. The blog will be about the whole family, not just about Max anymore. I am thrilled to finally be at that place!!

Last Post from China- U.S.A. Here We Come!!!!

2008-10-16T08:30:00.002-06:00

We are up late as usual, having waited until the last minute to start packing. Although, I guess last minute would truly constitute waiting until tomorrow morning. So perhaps we are ahead of the game!

We had an interesting experience at the U.S. Consulate today for the oath ceremony (this is also where we got Max's passport with his U.S. visa and all of the documents necessary for him to enter the U.S.). We had a harrowing taxi ride that believe it or not, was actually worse than the last bad one. At one point, I truly thought we were going to collide with another taxi. I squeezed the kids so tight I thought they might pop. I will be so glad to have them back in carseats! Our driver apparently thought he was Tom Cruise from Top Gun and that he had the need for speed. He took one corner so fast that we all shifted so hard that it seemed that all 5 of us were sitting on top of each other. I actually started begging God to get us there safely. We were sending up major flare prayers in the backseat, begging that Mr. Tom Cruise in the front would get us there without bodily injury. We made it, praise God!

And that's where things got interesting. We waited for several minutes in the lobby of the building for our guide. After about 3-5 minutes of waiting, we started to get a little worried. Then a Chinese woman approached us saying, "Consulate?" We said yes, that we were going to the consulate. She then proceeded to tell us in very broken english that it was closed. For a second, I actually felt my heart drop to the bottom of my stomach. Had we misheard our guide? She was late, which was very unusual, then this woman was telling us that the consulate was closed. We didn't see any other Westerners, so we started to get worried. Jason went to ask someone else, then decided that we would head up to the consulate ourselves, to see what the situation was. We were pretty confident that we were there at the right time-even without our guide being there. As we rode 4 different escalators to the 5th floor, I decided that I wasn't leaving without a fight. We are leaving the country tomorrow afternoon, and we can't leave without his passport.

Long story short-everything was okay! I don't know what the woman on the first floor was thinking. As we were waiting to enter the consulate, we saw another family from our adoption agency. We immediately felt better. They helped us get our papers (with the help of their former guide from a previous adoption). Leila, our guide finally showed up. She had had to run back to the hotel to get another family at the last minute because their appointment time had been changed. We had the oath ceremony, where we promised never to abandon or hurt Max and then it was done. It was pretty cool. I wish we could have had cameras in there, because I would have loved to take pictures. There were tons of families there, adopting children from all over China. It was a beautiful picture of sacrificial love and determination. I am sure that all of those families shed just as many tears as we did (if not more) and spent countless hours doing paperwork, praying, preparing everything and waiting. Very special.

We did some last minute shopping and then headed back to the apartment for our last dinner here in Guangzhou. I can't believe our 17 day trip is almost at a close. I simply cannot wait to get home! We will be spending the night in L.A. with my brother Friday night, then we fly into DFW on Saturday at 5:15 on American Airlines flight # 2444. We'd love to see you guys at the airport, if you live in the DFW area. We want to include all of you in the celebration of welcoming Max to Texas. He is sure to put on a show.

One last thing before I close my last post from China. Please pray for Abby as she seems to have picked up whatever it is that I have. Pray for her as we endure the 12 hour flight to L.A. We are hoping that her ears will not be affected. Please also pray for safe travel all the way home, and for Max as well, that he would handle the coming changes well.

Love to all of you from Guangzhou, China!!!

The promised long entry....

2008-10-15T07:11:00.009-06:00

We had planned yesterday to spend the day at a safari that is about 45 minutes away from here. That changed when I woke up. The night before I had been feeling kind of crummy. But crummy was not nearly strong enough a word for how I felt when I woke up. I've had a sore throat for almost the entire time we've been in country, but on Monday night, whatever had been brewing erupted. I have never had a cold come on this fast or this hard. Thank goodness we didn't have adoption stuff to do that day, because all I did was rest. At one point, I was on the couch, with my hand on my head, and Max came over and struck the exact same pose! He even had the same forlorn look on his face!

Jason was such a trooper, handling the kiddos all by himself so that I could sleep. He even took them to the playground by himself so that it would be quieter for me to sleep. Another adoptive parent here, who I had been emailing with before our trips, happened to have some antibiotics with her, that she had no need for. So I spent last night calling the doctor to find out if I could take them. I am not the kind of person who runs to the doctor to get prescriptions when I feel bad. I only went to the doctor once this past year-but I did not want to chance that this illness develop. We head out in 48 hours, and I do not want to be stuck on a plane for 12 hours feeling like my ears are about to pop. All that to say, Jason got the antibiotics from my friend today (thanks Kristi!!!!) and I started them this evening. I pray that whatever I have will improve before we leave China on Friday. Even more important, I pray that the kids don't get sick!!! I have been very careful about trying not to give them germs.

So enough about me and onto the ones that really matter-the kiddos. But before I share some fun stories, I just want to take a second and say thank you to all of you who took the time to email me or post comments on our blog after we posted about Max and our concerns about his bonding with us. We felt so much love from all of you and so much support and encouragement. We are so grateful to all of you and know that our family is being bathed in prayer right now. We thank God for you. We know how fortunate we are to have friends like all of you. We know too, that God will give us the wisdom and the patience that we need in order to guide Max through this transition into our family. He has already blessed us by opening our eyes so quickly. I have heard from others that they have seen families that allowed their children to give their love away to anyone and everyone, and because of it, are still dealing with the ramifications of no parent attachment. So we thank God that we realized so quickly that things weren't as rosy as they seemed. Thank you to all of you for your advice and kind words about our skills as parents. It means the world to us!!

So this time I will truly share about the kids. Because we didn't go to the safari yesterday, we had lots of fun play time around the apartment. Man we are thankful that we are staying here. I don't know how we would have managed yesterday or today if we had been in a hotel room. Jason and I had some special time with Max while the girls were still sleeping. We woke him up a little early so that he wouldn't nap quite as long-he's been stalling at night when it's bedtime, so we thought we would try a little experiment. Anyway, we brought him into our bedroom to have some one on one play time. Now let me just preface this with the cold hard truth. Jason is 31 years old-on the outside. In his heart, lingers the spirit of a 13 year old boy (and I have the pictures to prove it!). Sometimes this is fun (like yesterday), not so much when it's time to put the kids down and he's still throwing them around on the couch. But yesterday was precious! There is a window right behind our bed that just happens to have a deep enough ledge that a 3 and 1/2 year old boy and a 31 year old man could stand up on it and jump off onto the bed. How fortuitous for our family because we just happen to have a 3 and 1/2 year old boy and a 31 year old man who love jumping off of things onto the bed. Jason and Max had an absolute blast. I served as recorder of the jumping session-also to have documentation of what exactly happened to give to the doctors at the emergency room-which is where I was sure we would end up later. (We didn't)

I loved seeing Max's face light up! It was so sweet to see such sheer joy on his face. Jason is such an absolutely wonderful father and our kids are lucky to have him. The girls love to wrestle and that is completely due to Jason. Max loves it too and has fit into our wrestling matches quite perfectly.

We also had fun with arts and craft time. The best part was playing with some foam playdough that I bought right before we left. It began innocently enough at the table, with all of us molding our craft into different shapes and sharing nicely. It ended with each craft being shaped into perfect balls in order to peg someone else with precise aim. Unfortunately I have no pictures of the incident as I was one of the participants in the throwing. The kids loved it! Most of our family members know that Jason and I have an insane affinity for throwing things, both to each other, and at each other. It's inexplicable how two people with the same weird passion met up and actually married. We have spent many a night laughing hysterically after having spent that previous hour dodging objects that were hurled with great speed at our bodies. In the past, we have used bean bags, rolled up paper, socks, wash rags, baby dolls, stuffed animals, dirty diapers, etc.. Notice how the list changed-after we had kids the objects that we found in reach were quite different. Please don't judge us.

At dinner that night, Max did something adorable. We have been holding hands and praying at all of our meals (just like we've always done at home). It has taken some time, but finally Max knows that we will do that before we eat. He has even started whining when we all sit down, if we don't pray fast enough. Well last night, he upped his involvement. As Jason prayed, we suddenly heard Max talking as well. It was not understandable, but he was trying to mimic Jason. It was so sweet. He even said amen at the end. He is so smart!!!!

Today we spent the whole day in our apartment. It was another day for me to rest and try to sleep and fight off whatever it is that I have. We had some great play time with the kids and Jason and Max ran down to the grocery store to get some things for dinner. We have been cooking many of our meals here, since we have the kitchen. When we decided to stay here, at the apartment, one justification was that we could save money on food by cooking. Some of the meals have turned out really well, and one has gone straight into the trash can (that would be the smoked sausage we made last night). Jason said he had a bad feeling about it as soon as he smelled it when it came out of the package. We raided the fridge for leftovers and were relieved that we had not served the sausage to some guests the other night. We have had pan-grilled chicken and potatoes, beef stir-fry (the beef had to be diced into miniscule pieces so that we could chew it-it must have been a cut more suited for stew!), spaghetti, chicken nuggets, ramen noodles, peanut butter sandwiches and fish fillets (actually came pretty well!). We have enjoyed the challenges of cooking and feel that it has been a mostly positive experience (except for the sausage). Abby has also decided that there are certain things she likes better here, because they are chinese. For instance, she informed us last week that would she eat the broccoli because "Chinese broccoli is much better than Texas broccoli." She has also said this about rice, pineapple, fried eggs and some types of bread. However, the infamous smoked sausage did not make the cut. Texas sausage is still better. Yee-haw.

Tomorrow we do the very last step of the adoption work, we go to the U.S. Consulate for Max's oath ceremony. His visa was approved today, so we'll pick it up tomorrow and then he will be sworn in as an American citizen. What a momentous occassion. He will actually become a U.S. citizen when we land at LAX. I cannot believe that our trip is almost done. I am so excited to be returning home-to introduce Max to all of you, who played such a big part in getting us to him.

Sorry!

2008-10-14T08:44:00.002-06:00

Sorry for the non-blog tonight. I spent a lot time on the phone with a doctor back home about antibiotics. I'm not feeling well, so I am being proactive before we fly home in 3 short days. Praise God that an "internet friend" here has antibiotics and will be passing them off to me tomorrow. Pray for a speedy recovery on my part.

We will post an extra long blog tomorrow with great pics from today!

One of those Days....

2008-10-13T06:36:00.002-06:00

Today was not the best day we've had here. It started off by me (Virginia) taking Max to a required medical check up. There was a huge group of people in front of us, so I stood in line for 45 minutes, holding Max the entire time. My arms wanted to fall off when it was over. That wasn't the worst part. Seeing the doctor was. I will share more details when we return home, but suffice it to say, my mama bear instincts were kicking in high gear today.

Jason and I have also come to the full realization that we have a long road ahead of us when it comes to full bonding and attachment with Max. He is so sweet and so extroverted-we love that about him. But we are also finally realizing that it is making it harder for him to bond specifically to us. He loves attention from other people-and when he gets it, he is not interested in us. Today, as I was walking with some other families to the medical check up, he reached for another mom's hand and she took it. After a minute he tried to shake free of my hand. I know that he isn't trying to hurt me, but it does hurt a bit. We have been working so hard with him, and felt that we were making progress, but we are definitely seeing signs that he is not as far along as we had hoped. That is why I held him for the entire wait in line. Any time I put him down to rest my back, he was trying to run into our guide's arms or was wrapping his arms around someone else's leg. He gives his love freely to anyone.

We spoke with someone from our agency before we left about this very thing. Children being adopted respond in one of 2 ways: Complete rejection of the parents or total acceptance of the parents and everybody else as well. Max seems able to indiscrimanately bond with anyone. We have come to the conclusion that because of his great personality, it will actually prove harder for him to bond/attach with us. It is vital that he do so because it will affect everything about his relationships for the rest of his life. We are disappointed but hopeful. We know we will need to seriously consider everything that we do when we return to the U.S., evaluating carefully the ramifications for him. He is the life of the group when we are around anyone-and so loveable. We don't want to feel like the bad guy when we tell people- "Please don't pick him up, don't hold his hand, etc." I hate the thought of that. But it seems we will have to be dilligent about it for some time.

Please pray for us, that God would grant us wisdom to know how to deal with this. I promise you that I prefer this to the alternative-complete rejection of us. But it is hard for us to hear him call other people Mama and Baba. He loves being with us, I have no doubt about that. But he loves being with lots of other people as well. We need for him to learn that we are the most important people in his life and that we are a family.

Please also be understanding and patient with us when we return, know that we will be dealing with this for some time. I don't know what exactly it will look like, but things will not be like we had originally imagined (nothing has yet!!).

Fun With Friends

2008-10-12T07:04:00.004-06:00

The church we visited today.

Our first family picture!

Max and Maddy! Max is holding a picture of the two of them,

taken earlier in the year.

We went to church today with several other families who are also adopting. One family happened to be the family who is adopting Max's best buddy from Harmony House, Maddy. Her family arrived one day after we got Max, to pick up Maddy. We had really wanted to see them and spend some time with them . The funny thing is, last week when we were registering the adoption paperwork, we looked over and saw Maddy. Her parents told us today that Dan, the father, was videotaping the room where all the adoptive parents were waiting with their children, and he thought he had spotted Max through his camcorder (he had seen numerous pictures of Max and Maddy together, just as we had). He told his wife, she said, "No way." But as they looked again, they realized it was indeed Max. So we got to meet earlier than expected. It was sweet to see Max and Maddy see each other again.

So today we met up with them to go to a church that has a bilingual service. We didn't make it through the entire service, the kids were just too restless. We walked outside to let the kids run around a bit, then decided to walk back to the hotel where we had all met. I walked back in to tell Dan and his wife that we were leaving. Lo and behold, they had decided to leave early as well. So we spent time together at their hotel, just talking and watching the kids play together. We had lunch together, then made plans to get together that evening at our apartment. They arrived safely and we had a wonderful evening together.

Max and Maddy have a special affection for each other. They both came from the same orphanage in Shantou City, where they were both chosen to go to Harmony House for more specialized care. They were in the first group of children to go to Harmony House when it opened. So it was very special that they were united with their families within a day of each other. We plan to keep in touch with Maddy's family so that Max can keep that connection alive.
Dan and Jennifer (Maddy's parents) showed us the funniest thing. The hotel where they are staying gives one to each family who is adopting. It is a Barbie doll who is holding a little chinese baby. It is a hoot!

Special Barbie, adopting a chinese baby. Too bad for Max

that his mommy doesn't look like that!

I have also included some pictures of Max and Maddy playing together. They are so incredibly cute. Maddy's parents and I have decided that we will set up an arranged marriage between Max and Maddy. They are perfect for each other! They are so cute together, and man would they have beautiful kids!

By the way, please excuse the randomness of the pictures. I have been having a lot of problems moving pictures to the spot I actually want them since I have been blogging here. There is no way to cut and paste them the way I would prefer to, so that is why they are all together at the top, with one below. Blog Spot is beating me at this game!

Energy

2008-10-11T07:33:00.004-06:00

Hi all!

This is going to be a shorter post tonight. We are tired and going to try to get to bed before 11pm tonight. I'll let you know tomorrow if we actually accomplished it tonight.

Had an uneventful day. No teeth broke, no dishwashers spilled bubbles out the front (long story from last week!), no death rides, I mean crazy taxi rides. Abby and I met up with our guide to fill out all the paperwork for Max's visa. I took her so that Jason would have an easier time with younger 2. We are still a little overwhelmed when one of us is on our own with all 3. I have told Jason repeatedly that he can never go back to work and leave me by myself with all 3 of them!! :-) Just kidding. We are getting used to the change. They are really adjusting well, and we are so glad we brought the girls. Max wouldn't be having nearly as much fun if they weren't here (the following video is proof of that!).

Heard some funny things today. I will share them and close with that. We are going to go to church tomorrow. I'm excited/curious about that experience!

*Abby has been calling Max macaroni since about the second day that we got him. Today she was calling him that and suddenly he said "Maca-jei-jei." Jei-Jei means big sister and that is what Max calls Abby. It was so funny!

*At dinner this evening, Madeline spilled something on the table and said "Oh Fudge!" She has learned that from me. I say it often when I drop something or stub my toe or something. But it was the first time she had ever said it. It was precious.

*While we were eating dinner, Abby said she didn't want to eat her broccoli. She then informed us that she thought she would eat it because it was chinese broccoli, which meant it was better. We'll have to use that trick at home, tell her that all her veggies are chinese, so that she will eat them.

*We were all dancing together in the living room to our favorite family song (Life is a Highway by Rascal Flats). At the end we told the kids to say bye-bye to the camera. One of the girls must have said chau-chau (Argentinean good-bye) because suddenly Max started saying chau-chau as well. He repeats so much!

Jason's Perspective

2008-10-10T07:27:00.004-06:00

I'm sure most of you have been drinking deep of the sweet waters of Virginia's perspective throughout our entire journey here in the Far East, but today I wanted to pull back the curtains to give you a glimpse through the window of my experience. Our entire journey has been a tapestry of harsh experiences woven seemless with breath-taking joy in a once-in-a-lifetime voyage through China. Today is a case in point.

The day began innocently enough with Maddy waking up first, a few moments after dawn's first light. Soon after, Abby and Max joined her in casting off their slumber. Somehow today they woke up with a steroid-induced type of energy and were all but literally bouncing off the walls. After a superb (and more importantly free) breakfast buffet, we returned to the room to begin the day in earnest. My first task was to go to the bank to get some more RMB from the ATM machine. The task seemed simple enough, and all to harmless, yet somehow I returned from this menial task with a broken tooth and no money (that's the harsh experience part of the tapestry I was talking about).

Oh how I desire to have an incredible story of throwing down with a Chinese guy on the street to save some old lady from getting mugged. Oh how I wish I could say, "You should have seen the other guy," but alas, my faith does not allow me to express such dishonesty. The sad truth is that it was just a finicky ATM machine and a tooth that apparently decided it was time to jump out with the flavorless gum I had just spit into the garbage. Sad, eh?

Our entire trip has been like this. The things that should be insurmountable obstacles are traversed as if they were fluffy pillows on the bed, and things that should be as easy to overcome as walking over a cheerio on the ground become Mount Everest. Maybe this is just the Father's way of reminding us that He alone gives and takes away.

Just when my simple mind concluded that today would just be "one of those days," I was reminded of how good I have it. I couldn't help but sneak away periodically from the inexhaustible thirst of the kids for playtime just to marvel at God's creation of my three kids. Sure there were times when there was kicking, screaming, and I heard shouts of "Abby did it," or "Max hit me," or !%$%!$!@! (that's my version of whatever Max was screaming), yet at the same time I witnessed an incomprehensible tenderness that only the Father could create. Abby seemed so mature today. She would run up to Max in moments of deep emotion and embrace him with all the might her precious little arms could muster. She would even steal away from movie time and play time to go dedicate herself to her higher learning of ECC homework. I'm totally serious! She has a desk in her room, and she begs us to go do homework. I've attached a video to prove it.

Well, I know I've been longwinded enough, so I'll call it a night for me. I hope to go jogging around Guangzhou tomorrow morning, so pray for me. I can't soldify the veracity of this claim, but I believe that the Chinese have some sort of point total for hitting pedestrians, and I think there is a triple point score for hitting Americans. I'm probably an easy target.

Fun in Guangzhou

2008-10-09T06:48:00.010-06:00

We met our guide today to do some shopping. We hadn't really had the chance to get around Guangzhou, so we were excited to see some more of it today. We took a taxi over to a hotel to meet Leila (our guide). It was an interesting taxi ride, to say the least. Honestly, I don't think I will ever be able to describe it in full detail. However, I will share some of the highlights (notice I didn't say favorite parts).

*The driver swerving repeatedly around stationary vehicles, narrowly missing pedestrians each time
*The driver hocking up the biggest loogie in history, rolling down the window, and spitting it out (I was praying the whole time that it would in fact make it out the window and not fly to the back of the car into Abby's face)
*Max seriously vomiting because of the aforementioned swerving
*Madeline hitting her head on the bars separating us from the driver because of the aformentioned swerving

When we arrived at the hotel I felt like the little girl from the movie The Pacifier, who kissed the pavement, saying "Land, land." after surviving a drive by her teenage sister. I truly considered doing it. However, I was still trying to help Max puke into the barf bag (one of many we "borrowed" from our last plane trip. All in all, we were happy to have arrived!!!
We loved getting to go to some shops. They are created just for tourists like us, who are ready to blow some serious dough. We got some beautiful clothes. We'll post pictures when we get have a chance to put them on. We also had a really great experience with some Chinese women. Jason went into a shop by himself while I kept the kiddos outside. There was a little park area that had benches and sidewalks. We walked over there to wait. A very nice, friendly woman was there with her adorable little dog. Madeline absolutely adores animals of all kinds so she was in heaven. We had a lot of fun playing with the little dog and communicating a bit through our guide. The women were very taken with the kids and the kids were very taken with the dog. I was so sad we had not brought our camera because I would have loved to have been able to record some of our precious time with the women. At one point, little miss independent Madeline started walking off into the distance, with her new doggy friend obediently following her. The dog's owner and I were chasing after them, yelling in our different languages, neither of us getting any results. It was a hoot!! About that time, Jason had shown up, so he was able to help.

Jason and I got some down time today (YAY!!!!!!!) because we put all 3 kids down for a nap. We have had almost no time together because of all the craziness, so it was really nice. We seem to be settling into a good routine here. It has made things easier. Tonight Max will sleep in a bed by himself, rather than with us. We thought we would try it out. He slept in his bed for his nap and did great, so we're hopeful!

We went to the playground this afternoon. The kids absolutely love it and are always bummed when it is time to leave. We are so grateful for such a great place for the kids to play. There were a ton of families there today, it was neat.

I have included some pictures and videos of various things. Enjoy!

Newspaper Announcement

2008-10-08T08:04:00.003-06:00

I received a copy of the announcement that was put into the newspapers for Max's parents, at some point after he had been abandoned. The local authorities advertise information about abandoned babies in the newspaper to give the families one more chance to reclaim their children.

For some reason, reading it really broke my heart. I was aware of some of the details of Max's beginning, but reading the announcement really struck a chord. I had given some thought to Max's parents at various times. I have wondered what they were feeling as his mother went into labor, probably not expecting him to be born the way that he was. I wonder how she felt when she saw him. There are many different things that she could have been thinking. I cannot assume that he was abandoned because he wasn't wanted (because of this physical deformities). I wonder if perhaps his parents hoped that he would have a better chance at survival by letting him go, hoping that he would be adopted. I know that for some parents, that is the most merciful thing that they can do.

Here is the announcement:

Fu Gu, male, was born on February 22, 2005, was found abandoned on the field of Qiamenzai, Hengshan, Raogu County, Chaoyang district, Shantou City. He has deformend right foot and hands. He was a new-born baby at that time. He was found with thirty yuan RMB and a bottle. He is placed in Shantou City Welfare Institute.

I cried as I read that. His parents, left him with a bottle and the equivalent of a little more than $4. It broke my heart for so many different reasons. I will never truly understand his parents situation or all that they were experiencing. But in God's greatness, He had a plan for Max.

We were out tonight and saw a beggar on the street with severely disfigured limbs. As I looked at him, I thought to myself, "That could have been Max." Maybe some view his abandonment as an act of cruelty, but for the first time, I can view it as an act of compassion. His life is forever changed because he is now part of our family. I thank God for teaching me that. Max was fearfully and wonderfully made-and I believe he was created especially for us. I also believe that God has something extraordinary for him, because He has moved major mountains to get him to us.

Max is Officially Ours!!!

2008-10-07T08:12:00.005-06:00

We officially adopted Max today!!!! We went to the registration building here in Guangzhou, and had a family picture taken, turned in our documents, paid our fees, and had 2 interviews to establish that we understood Max's special needs, would never hurt or abandon him. We also had to explain why we wanted to adopt him. I could have talked all morning about that!! There are so many reasons why we want him, but the most basic reason is that God led us to this-which of course we didn't get into. Would have been a hard conversation to translate. I still find myself amazed at all that God has done. I remember when we first began talking about him, whether we should try to adopt him, not knowing how hard it was to actually adopt a specific child. But here we are, a testimony of the power of the Almighty.

The time at the registration building was a little crazy. There were TONS of families there with their little children to be adopted. Madeline was a bit tired and overwhelmed by all the people. She had a little meltdown. I was hoping that the officials wouldn't change their minds about us adopting Max! We got to see Max's sweet friend from Harmony House, Maddie. She and Max came from the same orphanage 2 years ago and were some of the first orphans to come to Harmony House. She is precious and we were so happy for them to see each other again. I think that they are very special to each other. We got to meet her parents and hope to maintain contact for Max and Maddie's sake.

We had a slow afternoon. We just stayed here at the apartment, so that the kids could rest. Every moment spent together is just more bonding as a family. I am so thankful that we don't have appointments every day. We just sit around and play, interact, talk and try to teach Max as many words as possible. He amazes us with what he is picking up already. Here are some of the words he has already learned:
Abby, Maddy, no, NO!!!, don't touch, potty (sometimes he says polly), wait wait wait (one of my biggest phrases), I love you, and the most important one of all- Diggums. He has learned the name of Madeline's special bunny. It was so precious today when he said it. He was looking at his picture of us that we sent to him this summer. Madeline was pointing to all of us, telling him our names and she always included Diggums. Then he stared saying it. For those of you who have heard Madeline say Diggums, she doesn't really say it, she kind of rolls her tongue around her mouth and pushes it in and out, making noise. Max did it, and it was hysterical. We laughed like crazy, so of course he did it again and again. We'll try to get it on video tomorrow.

We will be spending time with some friends tomorrow. They have 3 children, so we plan to go to the pool and the playground. They are Americans, living here in China. We are looking forward to that! I imagine that it will be Max's first time to swim.

Enjoy the videos! You can tell that Max loves to be on camera!! Hollywood, here we come!

Great Day

2008-10-06T07:23:00.008-06:00

We had a great day today! That is saying a lot because we had a little scare with Abby last night. She woke up crying uncontrollably, incoherent, and unable to communicate with us numerous times last night. Her body temperature was also lower than normal. We finally called a doctor at about 1:30 am because we were so disturbed by what was happening. We weren't sure if what was happening was connected somehow to her vomiting all day Friday. The doctor assured us that everything was probably fine and we finally got to bed around 2 am. She slept better, but we are anticipating that it may continue. We believe she is having night terrors-brought on by the time change, tiredness, and the stress of all the changes.

All that to say, we were a little worried about today, but it was a fantastic day! We didn't have anything to do today, adoption-wise, so we just rested and played. There is a great playground here on the premises, the kids loved it. We will take our camera next time we go over there so that we can share in the fun. Max absolutely loved the slides. We are amazed at what he can do. He crawled up the slide-I was sure that he wouldn't be able to, but he proved me wrong. I expect that to happen often. :-) We also got to walk around a bit, not too far from where we are staying. It is very pretty here. Very tropical looking.

Tomorrow we go to begin the adoption proceedings for the Chinese authorities. Soon, Max will be legally ours. It is so exciting to be at this step. It still takes me aback that we are finally here, doing this. It has been such a long wait, it is almost surreal.

I have included some pictures of the kids playing. They have such a blast together. It is incredible how quickly they have all taken to each other, especially Abby and Max. She is so loving and motherly toward him (we knew that she would be) and he eats it up most of the time. Tonight after dinner, all 3 of them chased them each other around the apartment, screaming at the top of their lungs. It was so precious. They were laughing hysterically the entire time. So cute!

Madeline really enjoyed her chocolate milk! The kids love the glass top table. We hope it is all in one piece when we leave.

Abby giving Max some serious love.

Family Time

2008-10-04T23:17:00.009-06:00

We are in Guangzhou and we are so happy to be here! We finally have our Internet connection so I have time to sit down and really write and share about the past few days.

What a whirlwind! So much has happened over the past few days. Our "gotcha day" was not what we had ever imagined in our minds or hearts, but it was still special. I am quickly learning that we cannot plan in our head how things should work out. I had already decided in my heart, before coming, that I would remain flexible about everything. It has made it easier for me to deal with the unexpected because of that. When Abby became ill, it changed everything. Our focus could no longer be just about Max. Our concern for Abby was just as strong as our desire to be with our son. But isn't that the balance we have to find as parents of multiple children? Jason and I were so proud of Abby. She was such a trooper. Despite feeling terrible, she still wanted to go. It was so difficult to see her so sick and know that I couldn't do anything to help her. Even more, the despair of being in a foreign country with my little girl so sick.

Meeting Max for the first time was incredible. We pulled up to Harmony House and he was outside waiting for us. Jason graciously allowed me to go to him first. He came running toward me yelling Mama...sweet words to my ears. I picked him up and just marveled that I was finally holding him. He quickly looked at his baba (daddy), his jei-jei (big sister) and mei-mei (little sister). He called to them as well and there were hugs all around. He was so adorable.
Once inside, we had a few minutes to just sit with him. Lily, who is the administrator of H.H. had set out fruit and drinks for us. We just sat for about 25 minutes, eating, staring and marveling at him. He was a little quiet, but asked for help often with his food. We then spent some time talking with Lily about things. She brought down his things, including a suitcase we had sent to him earlier in the year. When he saw his suitcase, he immediately grabbed it and headed for the front door to leave. It was the funniest thing! He knew that he was leaving! We had to slow him down because we weren't ready to leave yet. It did warm my heart that he was eager to leave with us, and that he wasn't scared of us. We brought gifts for him to give to all of his friends, so he passed those out. All of the kids enjoyed the little presents. The girls were playing alongside some of the other children. Madeline made herself right at home with the toys. It was very funny. She probably would have been happy to stay all day and play with the toys.

We didn't stay very long because of Abby. We had planned to stay until the afternoon, but instead we were eager to return to the hotel to make Abby more comfortable. We packed everything up and headed outside, with Max in the lead. While outside, he and his very special friend Maggie (who was picked up by her family the next day) sang multiple songs as the children and nannies waved goodbye. It reminded me of the scene from the Sound of Music when the von Trapp children serenaded the party guests before they went to bed. It was very funny.

We headed back to Beijing with two barf bags ready to be used-one for Abby and one for little Max who we had just learned got carsick. Lucky thing we had the bags because there was a point when both of them were vomiting at the same time. What a Kodak moment!! We made it back to our hotel and got settled in with our 3 children. Suddenly the room seemed much smaller!! I had to go to a grocery store soon after in order to look for some items to help Abby. It seemed so anti-climatic to leave soon after returning with Max, but I am quickly learning that this trip is not going to be normal (more on that later).

We left Beijing the next day (on Saturday) with 3 healthy children. By the end of the day Friday, Abby was eating and holding down everything. That was such a relief for us. There were times that Jason and I just laid down and prayed over Abby. It was so scary to see her so pale and lethargic. I deal pretty well with the girls when they get sick, I am not a freak-out kind of parent, but this was different. We praised God when she started to improve. Now she is completely back to normal and we are so thankful!

We arrived in Guangzhou on Saturday evening. We were so anxious to get down here, because of the fantastic living arrangements we have here. We are staying in a 3 bedroom apartment with a kitchen, dining room, living room, washer/dryer, and much more. It even has 2 bathrooms which is huge for us! It has so much space!!!! It is going to be a great place for us. It will make this trip so much easier and SO much more enjoyable. I get cabin fever quite easily, so having the extra space, and being able to unpack everything makes a big difference for me. There is a beautiful swimming pool, a huge playground and other things to do right here in the community where we are staying. It has been raining all day , so we haven't been able to enjoy any of the outdoor activities yet.

Our adjustment with Max will take time. We have been used to 2 little girls. We have always known that little boys are very different from little girls, but for the first time, we are truly experiencing that. Max has a lot of energy. He is quite stubborn, but so are Jason and I. The nannies at Harmony House really spoil the children, so Max is not used to hearing the word no. However, as I thought about that, I think I prefer that (being spoiled) to the alternative (being treated with such a stiff hand that his spirit was defeated). It has been a big change for him to have us. We are trying to let him explore, but at the same time, trying to create boundaries for him. It will take time for him to get used to us, and time for us to get used to the best way to deal with him. His personality is great-he is very, very happy and has a very contagious laugh. He already loves being with his sisters, it is so obvious. He is so smart! He is already understanding when we ask him to do things. He loves to help do things around the apartment. He likes to clean up (which I love) and he likes to help us do whatever we are doing. He is extremely independent which is great. He is so adept at using his hands just the way that they are, which is amazing. You will really see what I mean when you meet him and spend time with him. He has really learned how to do just about anything that we could do, even though he is missing his thumbs and his hands are bent in. I love that he is independent in doing stuff for himself, because I have no doubt that it will help him in the future. Both Jason and I feel a bit overwhelmed right now-but every parent does with a new baby. We are praying for wisdom and an uncanny understanding of Chinese.

I need to wrap this up, but before I do, I want to share some funny moments that have taken place.
*When we were in the car, driving from the airport to our apartment, Max, Abby and Jason were singing all kinds of songs. Max would sing some in English and some in Chinese. Sometimes we could figure out what he was saying, sometimes not. At one point he looked out the window, pointed to something and started talking. We asked our guide Leila what he had said and she said "He is not speaking Chinese." It was so funny. We cracked up for quite some time. Abby is still bringing it up.

*We went shopping at a grocery store this afternoon. Everything that could go wrong did. It was pouring rain, we couldn't get a taxi to the store, the kids were fussy at the store, all of China's 1.6 billion people were at the store at the same time as us, and we couldn't get a taxi to pick us up after our huge shopping trip (so we stood in the pouring rain with multiple shopping bags, 3 soaked kids, and a very patient guide).

*Max was trying to take off his shoe last night when it was time to get into jammies. He insisted that he do it by himself. He pulled so hard on his shoe that his entire prosthetic leg popped off. Jason, Max, Abby and I started laughing uncontrollably, while Madeline started screaming "Oh no! What happened Max leg???" She was so concerned! It was so funny and made us start laughing even harder. Jason then took Max's leg to another room and Madeline really freaked out. She started looking everywhere for it and was so upset that she couldn't find it. She kept telling him, "Max, where your leg go?"

*Max was talking to Abby and she said to him, "Max, I don't understand you because you speak Chinese and we speak Texas."

I have attached some picture and video. Enjoy! We will continue to post daily. Sorry for the 2 day wait. We lost our Internet connection on Friday night and didn't get set up until today with one. We are so appreciative of all of your prayers for us, especially with Abby. We thank God for you.

Fun with stickers!

Daddy time!

Abby resting gracefully on the plane, like Sleeping Beauty

At Last!!!

2008-10-03T03:56:00.004-06:00

We are now officially a family of five! We made it to Harmony House this morning...I will do my best to describe the scene...I will give more detail later when I have more time to sit down and really share.

Max was coming out of the house as we were getting out of our car. When he saw me, he said Mama-and came running toward me. I could not believe it! You hear so many stories of rejection and in my heart, I was prepared for that. But it was not the case. He came running into my arms. Unbelievable. We will post video of that when we return home. We aren't able to post from the camcorder yet.

When Max's suitcase was brought downstairs he grabbed it ran straight to the front door. He was ready to leave! We still had things to do there with the staff, but he was ready to rock and roll! It was adorable to see him dragging his suitcase.

I will post more tomorrow when we get to Guangzhou. We are about to lose our internet connection so I wanted to get pics up..

Abby is feeling better. We are hopeful that whatever she had has worked its way through her system. She has some color in her face and is smiling. Good sign!!

I promise to post more detail when we arrive in Guangzhou tomorrow. Thank you all for your prayers for us, especially Abby. This day was nothing like we expected, but it was a family reunion for sure. Max is doing spectacular. He is responding so well to us. He is calling us Mama and Baba (mommy and daddy) and has learned his sisters' names as well. He is very strong-willed and VERY funny. It is so easy to make him laugh. His personality is amazing.

Love you guys!

We made it!

2008-10-02T06:06:00.007-06:00

We are here in Beijing, China. We are so happy to have arrived safely. The girls were so exceptionally good on the plane. I was not sure what to expect with them, but they were such troopers! We experienced a couple of meltdowns due to fatigue, but we were able to quiet them down fairly quickly.

We arrived at 4:30 am Beijing time. All of our bags made it! Praise the Lord! I don't know how I would have replaced all the gifts we bought for everyone here. Everything is Texas related. We had a nice long nap in the morning, then met our guide after lunch (in which Abby looked around and announced loudly that she had just seen a Chinese girl) and went to the Forbidden City. It was amazing to see it in person. We were happy the girls had rested well and were up for going. I would have been sad to miss it. The funniest part was that little miss Madeline was a mini-celebrity. The Forbidden City was extremely crowded because it is a national holiday today, but most of the Chinese that were there were taking pictures of the girls, especially Madeline because of her blonde hair and blue eyes. It was so funny! The Chinese nationals wanted to take pictures with her-they were so sweet. Some of them allowed us to take pictures of them as well, I have included some of the pics here. I remember this reaction with my sister when we lived in South Korea. She had blue eyes and very light hair and was given much attention for it. By the time we left the Forbidden City, Madeline had passed out on Jason's shoulder...as you can see below.

Tomorrow we head to to Harmony House to get Max. I am a mix of emotions right now. I am so excited, but for the first time I am nervous. I have been so prepared for each step of this journey, knowing what paperwork had to be turned in when and what step would follow, but tomorrow we take a giant step of faith off of the cliff of the unknown. But as I work to be calm, I remind myself that God Almighty has brought us here and will carry us as we step off....I have no idea what to expect tomorrow (except that I will be crying!) but I am hopefuly that Max will respond well to us. We feel that he has received a lot of preparation for tomorrow. It almost feels surreal to be here. We have waited so long for this-and now it's actually happening. Wow! Pray for us as we go from a family of four to a family of five tomorrow!

I will post again tomorrow with pictures of our sweet boy!

I'm Leaving on a Jet Plane......

2008-09-30T08:24:00.002-06:00

12 hours till we are on our way to China!

Our suitcases are packed, carry-ons will soon be bursting at their seams, and our hearts are anxious.

Pray for God's protection for us as we travel. Please also pray for strength as today is going to be an extremely LONG day. We don't even leave LAX until 3:30 am our time. Please pray that the girls will be able to rest in the airport and on the plane. Pray for Max, that his heart would be prepared for the big changes that are about to take place.

We fly back in to DFW on October, 18 (Saturday) at 5:15 pm. We will be on flight 2444 from LAX. Please feel free to join in the celebration of welcoming Max to his new home! We would love to share his first experiences in Texas with all of you who have shared so much of yourselves over the past 2 years. We love you guys and thank God every day for your support, your prayers, your encouragement, your friendship.

48 Hours to Go!

2008-09-28T20:27:00.002-06:00

In exactly 48 hours we will by flying high over the land, headed to the beautiful country of China. There are so many things I would like to write about, but one train of thought in particular really stands out.

As Jason and I have worked these past two years to adopt Max, I have been continually amazed by our Heavenly Father. He has made all things possible in our adoption of Max. It has been almost 2 years since Jason first met Max. When he returned home from China with stories, pictures, and videos of the countless orphans he had encountered, God immediately began working in my heart to bring about His plans. This whole process has been example after example of God intervening to realize His plans.

I remember telling a friend in August of 2007 that our chances of actually being matched up with Max were about a million to one...But God is bigger than the odds of a million to one. He probably chuckled when Jason first met Max, knowing what was to come. I love that! He has been so faithful to us and I seriously mean it when I say that I have been completely in awe of Him this entire time- in a way I never had been before. I had never needed God to do so much before, to make things happen at the exact right time, to encourage me when Satan was trying to cast doubt in my heart about adopting a child with such physical needs.

I have grown so much over the past 2 years, and for that I am thankful. Jason and I knew from the beginning, that God had a plan. We didn't have each step laid out for us, we had to trust in faith that God would lead us. But trust we did, and step out we did. And as a result, we have seen incredible miracles take place that otherwise, we would have missed out on had we not stepped out in faith.

As I reflect over the past 2 years, the most important thing for me is to remember that ultimately, God loves us and desires for us to grow. He desires for us to come to Him, to seek Him, to ask of Him, and to trust Him. Very early on God gave me a verse that I would come to claim throughout our journey.
Proverbs 16:3 Commit to the Lord whatever you do and He will make your plans succeed.
We committed to follow Him, no matter what, and He was faithful to the promise. We leave in 2 days to go to China to adopt a little boy, that was fearfully and wonderfully made, just for us. I thank God that Max was created just for us, because my faith has been refreshed, renewed, and revitalized through our experiences. The glory and honor belong to the Lord.

Max Live CHINA!

2008-09-19T07:39:00.004-06:00

(Pause the music on the side before you listen to the video)

Madeline loves to yell this out to us, although lately she's been whispering it. We love hearing her response when we ask her where Max lives.

Packing List

2008-09-16T14:39:00.002-06:00

We leave 2 weeks from today. I have begun making list after, after list, after list of things we need to do before we leave, while we're gone, after we get back, things to pack, etc...My brain is fried!

So help me out. If you could only take one thing on a 17 day trip to China (for you or your children) what would it be? Leave me a comment and help me make another list.

The Countdown Begins!

2008-09-11T10:27:00.004-06:00

Sorry it has taken me a few days to update with the most current information, but Madeline got sick so I was overwhelmed by taking care of her as well as a bunch of travel details.

So here is the skinny- We are leaving for China in the late evening of September 30!!!!!! We will be with Max on October 3. We finally have our due date!

We got our consulate appointment for October 15. This is a huge praise to God! If we hadn't gotten it, we would have had to wait either another week, or possibly push the trip back to November. There is a huge trade fair in Guangzhou that begins October 14. Hotels would have been unaffordable for us. We will overlap by 3 days, but the manager of the fabulous place we'll be staying has graciously offered us the same rate for our entire trip. This is huge! God continues to move. I will give details on the hotel later....

Thank you so much for your continued prayers. God has moved time and time again in the last 2 years-and I know that He has heard your prayers for us.

We are over the moon that we will soon be with our sweet Max. We cannot believe that we're finally at this step-it has been a long time coming. But we are here. As we prepare to leave in less than 3 weeks, we will contemplate often the might and wonder of our God. We will also fondly contemplate the overwhelming support we have received from all of you. We love you!

Pray for a Miracle!

2008-09-06T16:53:00.002-06:00

We are still waiting to hear whether we got the consulate date we are hoping to receive. Because of a national holiday in China, the next consulate date we requested is October 15. If we get it, we'll leave around the 2 or 3 of October. If we don't get it, we will be pushed back another entire week. Yuck! This would then push us into a major trade fair that takes place in China, in the exact place that we'll be staying for almost our ENTIRE trip. Hotel rooms are not only extremely difficult to secure during that time, the prices shoot through the roof.

Please pray that God would once again intercede. Pray that we would receive our anticipated consulate date so that we can be out of China before the trade fair begins. Pray that we would trust God's perfect timing.

Not quite yet....

2008-09-03T10:48:00.002-06:00

I just spoke with our caseworker from our adoption agency. Sad news - we will not get a consulate appointment for September 29. This means that we will have to wait 2 extra weeks to travel. I am a little disappointed because I was so pumped about getting to Max earlier than expected, but I truly trust God's perfect timing. We weren't expecting to travel this early anyhow.

If it works out with a new consulate appointment, we would be leaving on October 2 or 3. It gives us much needed extra time to get prepared. The fact is, 2 extra weeks is a drop in the bucket in this 2 year journey. The most important thing is that we are getting closer and closer to being united with our son.

We're Going to CHINA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-09-02T12:56:00.005-06:00

We got our Travel Approval today!! It was completely unexpected! I had put aside my hopes that we would be with our son in September and was focusing on October, but I don't think that will be the case!

Our adoption agency has requested a consulate appointment (the U.S. consulate) for September 29. We have to do this to get Max's U.S. Visa. If we are approved for that appointment, then we will be leaving as early as September 18th or 19th to go pick him up in Beijing at Harmony House. We are beyond thrilled. I have a million things racing around in my head that we need to do. I really thought that we wouldn't be going until the beginning of October, so I need to get my rear in gear!

I want to take a second and praise God for this. He has been so generous to us this entire
journey, and He continues to bless and amaze us. Since I first laid eyes on Max's picture, he has
been in my heart. Our Heavenly Father has known from the beginning the desires of my heart to mother this precious child. He has worked miracle after miracle for us, and today He has moved again. We will be reunited with Max WEEKS before we expected to. What a gift.

(One of the first pictures I ever saw of Max. This was taken almost 2 years ago, in October of 2006)

Thank you Daddy for getting to me my son. I am so appreciative that You have answered my prayers. Thank You for Your perfect timing. Thank You that You already know the exact second that I will hold Max for the first time. Thank You for showing Yourself time and time again as we have followed You in faith. Thank You for choosing us to adopt Your sweet child. Thank You for creating him exactly the way that he is. Thank You for calling us to this. Thank You for sustaining us when we didn't know where things were headed. Thank You.

MAX-HERE WE COME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ABC's.......

2008-08-27T10:29:00.002-06:00

I have been hearing some very sweet stories about Max from various people, so I decided I needed to sit down and share them.

Someone else who is adopting from Harmony House, where Max lives, received a video of some of the orphans from there. Our little Max is on the video and in it, he is singing his ABC's in English! Someone has been working with him. Now only if they'd help him to be fluent before we get there!! We have got to get better with our Mandarin!

We heard another story from the woman who is the administrator at Harmony House. She said that all the nannies were so happy to hear that we had received our Final Approval to adopt Max. They are so happy to know that he will soon have his family. She also shared that when Max sees our picture he always says "Mom and Dad come to pick me up." He's been asking when we are coming to get him, and when he sees an airplane he says that he will go to America to find his mom and dad, and that he'll fly there. So sweet!!!! Lily (the administrator) said that Max was so happy to hear that we would be there soon.

Lastly, a friend who knows Max (and played an integral role in us being matched up with him) shared a story that Lisa Bentley (wife of John) told her. In my friend Gretchen's words:

When I had driven Lisa to her hotel, I asked how Max was doing and she shared this story.

Shortly after Max got his prosthetic foot, Lisa had stopped by to visit the kids. Max was so excited to show Lisa his new foot, that he was dancing and kicking so show her how he could 'move' and 'groove'. He did one last kick with his new foot, and it came off and went flying through the air. Max thought it was so funny, he dropped to the floor and laughed and laughed.

As soon as I read that, it confirmed for me how perfectly Max will fit in to our family. I would have laughed hysterically had I seen it and I loved knowing that laughing was his first response. I know in my heart that God created him perfectly for us...he is our son. I'm so thankful that God has beautifully ordained us to be together.

I've been smiling like this since I heard.......

2008-08-20T19:16:00.006-06:00

We got our Letter of Approval today!!!!!!!!!

We received it after only 10 weeks of waiting. The average wait time used to be 12-17 weeks, so China is getting faster. Jason and I feared that it might take much longer to get it because of the Olympics, but our fears were unfounded! God is so good!

Our Letter of Approval comes from the Chinese government agency, giving the us formal approval to adopt Max. We will receive the letter in the mail tomorrow, sign it, confirming that we still want to adopt Max, then overnight it back to our agency. They will in turn send it to China. We will then wait for our Travel Approval. This is China's permission for us to enter the country. Our time frame for traveling to get him is anywhere from 5-8 weeks from now. But we FINALLY have a time frame to shoot for!

We are beyond thrilled! We have so much to do before we leave. We have been working on his room, so as soon as it is finished, I'll post pictures.

Please continue to pray for us. The faster we get our TA, the faster we can go. Please continue to pray that God would prepare Max's heart for the coming changes. Pray that we would receive our TA in record time! Pray that I would be patient as we wait for it. Pray that we would have safe travel to and from China. PRAISE God for all that He has done in this adoption journey thus far.

Our Latest Care Package

2008-08-17T07:13:00.008-06:00

We received some pictures of Max opening up our latest care package. We are praying that it is the last one we will send. Our desire is that his next gift will be us! I am so hopeful that my next blog entry will be sharing the joyful news that we have received our Letter Of Approval. Above all though, I pray for God's will to be done. I want Max to be home with us so very much, but truly desire for everything to happen in God's timing. He has been so good to us thus far, I trust Him
(and continue to pray for a miracle!).

Look at that smile!!!

More pictures to add to his photo album of us.

He is looking at a picture of us-Jason is holding

a picture of him.

My very favorite picture-him kissing us!!!

We'll be there soon baby!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Madeline and Max

2008-08-05T13:20:00.002-06:00

From the beginning of our adoption process, we have talked to the girls about everything that was going on. Abby always understood what was going on, but we knew that Madeline really didn't. 3 weeks ago we moved Madeline into Abby's room so that we could start working on Max's room (Madeline's old room). We started calling it Max's room so that Madeline would understand the change. We also show the girls pictures of Max all the time and talk about him. Madeline usually just sucks her thumb and nods....I was never sure what she was thinking.

Yesterday Madeline and I were in my bedroom. The computer was on with the wallpaper showing. Our wallpaper is a big picture of Max. Madeline looked at it and said, "Mac, Mac!" It took me a second, but I realized that she recognized the picture and was saying "Max." My heart jumped with joy as Madeline was calling out her brother's name, over and over. She was excited to see the picture of him. Then today as I was rocking her before her naptime, she said, "Abby play in Max's room." She totally gets it! I was so pumped to hear her say that. She is really beginning to understand that there is someone else in our family. I simply cannot wait for the girls to meet their brother.

Log In Date

2008-08-05T13:15:00.002-06:00

We finally got our log in date for our dossier last week. Our dossier was hand delivered to the CCAA on June 11-but up until last week, we didn't have an official log in date. I breathed a sigh of relief to receive our LID because then we knew for sure that our dossier was being processed, not just sitting on a desk or something.

We are on week 8 of our wait. We are REALLY HOPING to get our letter of approval in the next few weeks. If that happens, it is feasible that we could travel in September. Please pray for us! Pray that God would work another miracle and that we would get our LOA before we even expect it. We want to be with our son so much! We have been working on his room-which makes me even more anxious to have him home. I do take comfort in the fact that our Father knows exactly when I will be holding my sweet son......

I'll post pictures of Max's room as soon as we get it finished.

Tender Heart

2008-07-21T10:07:00.002-06:00

From the beginning of our adoption process, we have talked with the girls to explain everything that we were doing. We wanted them to understand what was happening. Abby obviously understands better than Madeline (although Maddy seems to be catching on a bit now). Abby has been excited since the beginning about having a little brother. She talks about Max all the time, she understood all the "paperwork" I was doing. She even understood about the money we were raising to pay for the adoption-although she said we had to get money from the bank to "buy" Max. We quickly explained that we weren't buying Max, but saving money to pay to go to China to get him.

Through it all, Abby has displayed such a tender heart. When she talks about our family, she always includes Max-without any prompting from us. A perfect example happened yesterday. The girls and I were eating lunch after church. We were talking about what they had learned in Sunday School that day. Abby said she wanted to share a song that they had sung (one they sing every week). She sang, "Jesus loves Abby, Abby, Abby, Jesus loves Abby, He loves everyone." She then sang it over and over again, substituting all of our names. She sang it for Madeline, Mommy, Daddy, then she sang it for Max. I could hardly keep the tears from spilling down my cheeks. She truly has the most tender spirit I've ever encountered in a child. She is going to be absolutely the most amazing big sister to Max.

Sweet Gift

2008-07-15T12:44:00.002-06:00

While we were waiting to speak at the church in San Antonio, I had a few moments to visit with John Bentley's daughter, Emily. She is around 16 years old I think. She was such a blessing to me, more than she'll ever know, because she shared little stories about Max.

She said that all of the nannies love him, because while most of the children wake up crying, that Max always wakes up happy and laughing.

She said that one time he was visiting at their house and asked if they (the Bentley family) would adopt him. Emily explained to him that her family couldn't, but that another family would. The next time he visited there, he told Emily that he was going to have a family soon and that he would have a house to live in with his family, and that she could visit him there.

Now that story warmed my heart. Jason and I will never know what exactly Max thinks and understands about adoption and about all that will transpire soon. But he does understand that he will have a family....YEAH!

She also told me that after he received his first care package from us, he was showing her what he had gotten. He told her, "My daddy sent me a backpack, it's mine, and you didn't get one!" He said this with a smile and a laugh. That little boy certainly has a sense of humor.

I could have sat and talked with Emily all night, but then I would have missed out on incredible worship time and hearing John speak. But what a sweet, precious gift it was to hear a little bit about our son. I have carried the stories with me since that evening and often find myself reliving them in my head. I can't wait to meet this little gift.

Special Meeting

2008-07-08T13:18:00.010-06:00

Jason, the girls and I had an incredible opportunity last week. We were invited to share a short testimony of our adoption at Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas. This is the church the Max Lucado is a part of. Many of you know that he is special to us because our son is named after him. Max Lucado and his wife visited China several years ago and met little Fu Gu. He was then named in honor of Max. We were thrilled not only to share our story, but for the chance to meet Max and tell him that we were adopting his namesake. He didn't know that we were coming, or even who we were. John Bentley is currently in the United States (he is the director of Harmony House), so he and the executive pastor of Oak Hills set it up to surprise Max.

John shared for a bit about the amazing way that God works and about His call to China. The Bentley's story is fascinating. I loved hearing more about their work and their call to China. Then he invited Jason and I up to share a brief testimony of the miracle of Max. We shared how we came to know him back in 2006 (well, how Jason came to know him). We mainly shared about the miracles that have happened since we took our first step of faith into this adoption. God has been so faithful through the whole thing. I still sit in awe as I reflect on all the incredible things that have happened.....I thought I would share a brief timeline for those of you who are new readers and for those of you who may have forgotten.

10/2006 -Jason visits China and meets Max.
11/2006 -I feel compelled to ask Jason if he thinks we should adopt Max. He says no. :-)
-We commit to pray about it. I bug Jason incessantly during this time...
1/2007 -We move forward in faith and apply with an adoption agency.
3/2007 -We are officially approved to move forward with our agency to adopt from China.
8/2007 -Max's file is sent to the CCAA (this is the Chinese government agency that is in charge of adoptions).
-Our adoption agency in the U.S. makes a request to the CCAA for Max's file to be
placed with them.
10/2007 -Unbeknown to us, Max's file is placed with a different adoption agency in the U.S.
Through God's miraculous intervention, we find out within days and are able to switch
adoption agencies. Max is placed on hold for us, under the terms that we return our
paperwork in one week. We also have to pay our agency fees of $8,000. At the time,
we only had $4000 raised. God once again intervenes and in 3 days, people donate over $4000.
-We receive Max's referral. This is such a miracle. China strictly prohibits pre-matching with a particular child, but because of God's grace and intervention, we have been matched with Max.
11/2007 -We send our Letter of Intent (LOI) to adopt Max to the CCAA
1/2008 -We receive Pre-Approval (PA) from the CCAA to adopt Max. This means that based
on our preliminary paperwork, we are approved to adopt him. The final approval will be granted once they receive our dossier.
6/2008 -Our dossier is finally finished and sent to China. Due to numerous complications, it takes months to complete. However, we see God's hand in this as well. Plane tickets to China have skyrocketed because of the Olympics. As we are taking the girls, this would have been problematic.
7/2008 -We are waiting for our final approval. We are in week 4 of our wait. The average lately has been 10-12 weeks, so we are praying for that to be true for us. It it is, we will travel sometime in September or early October to bring Max home.

After the service was over, we had the opportunity to meet Max Lucado. What a blessing. He is one of the nicest people I think I have ever met. He was so interested to hear about Max, and about our story.

Sad News from Harmony House

2008-06-16T15:50:00.003-06:00

I received word today that one of the newest orphans to arrive at Harmony House died. Below is the email that I received from the director of Harmony House. The first one is taken from a newsletter that I receive, telling about the little boy. The second one contains the sad news. Please take some time to pray for the staff there as they grieve this little boy's death. Praise the Lord that he was with them for a short time-I know 100% that he was loved on while he was at Harmony House. In all the pictures that I see of the kiddos from Harmony House, I always notice how happy they look. That shows you the level of care they are receiving there. Please pray for this ministry and for the lives that are changed through it. I know our lives certainly have been changed.

Two New Orphans Find Refuge at Harmony House

Harmony House has two new peanuts – little Ken and tiny Corrie. Both came from the Shangrao orphanage in Jiangxi province.

Ken has a very severe heart defect called Pulmonary Atresia and urgently needs surgery. In the short time he has been in our care he has had three heart incidents and turned purple. Doctors have advised us that his condition cannot be treated in China but can be treated in the US or Australia. If any e-newsletter reader knows of a hospital or doctor who would be willing to donate services to save Ken’s life, please send an email to John@HarmonyOutreach.org.

Corrie was found abandoned shortly after her birth possibly because she is female or because she was born with anal atresia. She is named after famous Dutch evangelist and holocaust survivor Corrie ten Boom. If you would like to be our partner in changing the life of Corrie by helping with the cost of her surgery or by sponsoring Corrie or Ken, please send an email to John@HarmonyOutreach.org.

Special Update from Harmony Outreach

At approximately 2:00 p.m. China time Harmony House manager Lily Huang called to advise me that little Ken--the new orphan we recently took in and featured in oureNewsletter--died in the hospital of massive heart failure. Lily could barely choke out the words to tell me the news. Ironically, just two hours earlier Lily had called me to introduce me to the new adoptive parents of Harmony child Jeffrey, who had just flown in from Florida. On the very same day, mere hours apart, one child graduated from ourThree Steps to Hope program and another went home to be with the Lord. I couldn't help but recall the motto of one of our sister ministries who also works with special needs orphans.

- Comfort Always, RelieveOften, Save Sometimes -

Lisa and I are deeply grateful to all of you who emailed in response to that eNewsletter appeal for help with Ken. The response we received was overwhelming and full of love and prayers for him.

--John Bentley

Our Dossier is at the CCAA!!

2008-06-16T15:46:00.002-06:00

Just got a call from our case worker at our adoption agency. Our dossier made it to the CCAA on June 11-this past Wednesday. We'll receive a log in date in the next few weeks hopefully. But we are still hoping for a trip to China in September... YEAH!!

The Countdown Begins!

2008-06-04T12:59:00.005-06:00

Our case worker from our agency called yesterday to let us know that our dossier is on its way to China. It should arrive on Friday. Early next week, it will be hand delivered to the Chinese government agency that processes all applications. The usual processing time is 12-17 weeks, but lately the CCAA has been processing them as fast as 10 weeks. We were told to hopefully expect 10-12 weeks. Then we will receive our LOC (Letter of Confirmation). We sign it, overnight it back to China, then wait for our TA (Travel Approval) to go get Max!!!!!!!!! If everything goes smoothly, then we could be traveling as early as mid-September. We were so excited to get the phone call yesterday. I have seriously been working not to think about when everything was going to get moving...I was just trying to be patient. So I was not expecting to hear from our case worker yesterday. What a joy it was when she told me, though.

Here are some pictures of Max from Children's Day. It was just celebrated in China. Just think, in 4 short months, he may be home with us!!!! We'll be celebrating EVERY DAY!

Still Waiting.....

2008-05-30T13:04:00.002-06:00

Just giving you a quick update that there is nothing to update. :-)

Actually, God continues to confirm for me that His timing is perfect. Our dossier (as far as I know) is still being authenticated in Houston. It was mailed off several weeks ago. Once it's done it will be mailed off to China and we'll wait for a log-in-date. If I had hand-carried it in as planned, our dossier would already be in the reviewing room in China by now.

I was brooding about this to a friend yesterday, telling her that I am confident in God's timing, just still a little sad that it's taking so long. A few hours later, I received an email from our agency with some time frames for how long China is taking to process dossiers. They are happening as quickly as 10 weeks now. The average time is anywhere from 12-17 weeks, so China is really moving fast. This being said, if our dossier had been submitted to China when I wanted it to, we probably would have been traveling in August to pick up Max. Plane tickets to China at that time are UNREAL! They are so expensive. God has already provided for our finances in miraculous ways. I believe with all my heart that we would not have been able to afford to take the girls with us to pick Max up if we had received approval to travel in August. We feel very strongly that the girls should go with us, so in my humble heart, I believe this is why everything is being held up....that way we will be traveling well after the Olympics, and airline tickets will go back down.

Even when in our heads we know that God is in control, it sometimes takes longer for our hearts to catch up.

Please Pray

2008-05-22T16:52:00.005-06:00

Please, please pray for Steven Curtis Chapman and his family. Steven is a Christian recording artist who has advocated heavily for international adoption. He and his wife have 6 children, 3 of whom were adopted from China. Yesterday afternoon, their youngest child (a little 5 year old girl adopted from China) was tragically killed in their driveway, when she was accidentally hit by an SUV. I cannot even imagine how their family is feeling. I implore you to pray for them. Steven and his wife are solid believers-but that doesn't mean they're not hurting right now. Their daughter's name is Maria. Steven's wife's name is Mary Beth. To learn more about the Chapman family, visit their website.

www.stevencurtischapman.com/

Change of Plans

2008-05-08T15:30:00.003-06:00

I drove down to Austin last Monday, with the intention of getting our dossier state certified, then heading to Houston early the next morning. But things didn't exactly work out like I had planned. This is not always easy for me to handle, especially when it comes to my children.

I found the Secretary of State office with no problems. I walked in and found myself to be the only person in the office, so I didn't even have to wait in line. The state certification process started and I was feeling pretty good about the whole thing....until the woman doing the work mentioned, "Did you know that you are missing a notary stamp on your husband's physical?" My jaw dropped. NO! Of COURSE I did not know that the stamp was missing. I would never have driven all the way down there knowing that something as vital as the notary stamp was missing off of a document. I wanted to cry (I won't lie, I did shed a few tears). But the woman was so nice. Because my physical from our doctor had been notarized correctly she went ahead and state certified the other one, after extracting from me a promise that as soon as I returned home I would get the stamp.

Yeah!! But then I asked the question that began the shift in my plans. "Do you think the Chinese consulate will authenticate the document without the notary stamp?"

Silence.........

I could tell by the look on her face that the answer was not going to be one that I liked.

"Technically, I wasn't even supposed to state certify it, but you never know, they might."

Well, not the most comforting answer, but at least it was a truthful answer. We finished up, I thanked her for her help and headed down to the lobby to figure out what to do. I had two choices. Go home and get the missing notary stamp, or go to Houston and hope for the best. I finally decided I was going to go for it. I would plead my case with the consulate and hope that they would mercifully authenticate our dossier so that we could get it sent to China.

I headed to my friend's house. We talked, I vented my frustration and then I went to make copies of our dossier in anticipation of leaving early in the morning for Houston. While making copies, I came across a mistake that the secretary of state had made while certifying our home study. She had certified that wrong notary, a notary whose commission had expired. That meant that China would reject that document when it arrived there.

"Houston, we have a problem." I would have to go back to the Secretary of State the next morning to get the document fixed before I could go to the Chinese consulate in Houston. However, I had to be there by 11 am to get our dossier authenticated that same day. Wasn't going to happen. The Secretary of State didn't even open until 8 am, there was no way I could then make it to Houston in time.

I spent the night there in Austin with Stephanie, got our document done correctly the next morning, then headed back to Arlington. I was heartbroken. It had become QUITE apparent that God did not want me going to Houston to get the dossier authenticated, but I struggled. I had worked out a whole plan of getting our dossier to China as fast as humanly possible, but God was saying, "Slow down." I didn't understand why. We so badly want to get Max as soon as possible, why had so many things gone wrong with our dossier. It took 90 days to get our Homeland Security Approval rather than the normal 60. Our dossier was missing an important stamp. Our home study had been certified incorrectly. Why?

I don't claim to understand why God makes things, or allows things to happen. But a week later I can look back at this and trust that He is in control. Perhaps we needed to get our dossier in later so that we didn't get approval to travel in the summer when plane tickets would have doubled in price. Perhaps..I honestly don't know. But I do know that at least He knows what He's doing. Thank goodness for that. I take comfort in His timing.

Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Road Trip

2008-05-02T09:45:00.002-06:00

I am heading down to Austin on Monday to get all of our dossier documents state certified. I will then spend the night with one of my favorite people, my best friend from college, Stephanie Groutas. GO OBU!!!! The next morning I will get up much earlier than I would actually like to (all for Max!) and go to Houston to the Chinese consulate. They will authenticate all of the dossier and it will be ready to be mailed to our adoption agency. From there, it will be translated into Chinese, then hand carried into the CCAA. Then we wait for our log in date and start the countdown. The average time for a dossier to be processed and approved is 12-17 weeks. Then we will receive a letter asking if we still intend to go through with the adoption (hello, would we be doing all this if we weren't????). We then send back our letter of confirmation, that yes indeedy, we want our son. We then receive our travel approval to go to China to bring Max home. We are speculating that we will be traveling to China sometime in October, but even as early as late September if everything moves quickly. We are so ready to be there!

It's About Time

2008-05-01T08:24:00.002-06:00

After my last post, I decided that I needed to start making phone calls to make something happen with our U.S. approval that we had been waiting for. I emailed the office in charge of processing our application, with no response once again. I then called the woman who did our home study. She contacted the Oklahoma office (who emailed her back within hours) to ask them to look into it. They did-they emailed the Dallas office who in turned emailed my home study provider, asking, "What can we do to help?" Well she told them exactly what they could do to help and I received an email that very afternoon saying that our application had been approved and our approval letter would arrive shortly. We began making plans for the next step, thinking that the letter would arrive sometime this week. In fact, no, it arrived 2 days after I received the email telling us we were approved. SO-we scrambled to get everything together to get our paperwork ready for state certification and authentication.....more on that in the next post. But Hallelujah!!!!! Our approval is in and we can get the finishing touches on our dossier and get it to China. For me, that will be a huge burden off of my shoulders. I have been working on our dossier since January-so to finally know that China has it and it is out of my hands will be a big relief.

Please Forgive Me!

2008-04-21T09:40:00.007-06:00

It has been almost 2 months since I have updated our blog. It has been a crazy two months at the Paredes' house. I apologize for not keeping up very well. Jason was gone for two weeks. I found out the day after he left that Abby had the flu. She was better by the time he came home, but by then, Madeline had the stomach flu. Then Abby got sick again with some type of terrible cough (which of course Madeline then caught). Several days later my grandma passed away, so we were gone for about 4 days in Arkansas for the funeral. We just got home last night and I realized I really, really, really needed to take some time to update what's been going on and where we are with the adoption.
Truth be told, there hasn't been much going on with it. We are just waiting, waiting, waiting....We are waiting for our approval from the U.S. Government. It is several weeks overdue. I am about to begin hounding them. I know they are busy, but the longer it takes them, the more our process gets pushed back. I have been hearing chatter online that there might not be any travel for adoptions in China during the summer because of the Olympics. This would really push picking up Max back, possibly even into 2009. I am praying with every bit of me that doesn't happen. I am trying to be patient-I know that God knows when we'll be going to pick Max up, but it kills me to think that our own government is making the situation worse because they are taking SOOOOO long to give us the one form that we need in order to send our dossier in. Once the dossier is in, we can start the countdown to picking up our son. But until then......
On a happier note, JASON GOT TO SEE MAX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He took a suitcase packed full of goodies for him. :-) What a blessing it is that because Max is at Harmony House, Jason got to visit with him. He said it was an amazing feeling to be able to hold him and play with him. He also mentioned that it was really hard to say goodbye to him and leave him-he hadn't anticipated that it would be. Jason took a video camera with him and got some fantastic video that we had planned to post to share with all of you. Unfortunately, somehow the video was erased. We think it happened at a security scanner at an airport. We don't know for sure. We were able to get a few pictures from some other people that were there with Jason.
Lastly, I wanted to give an update on our fundraising. God has continued to amaze us with His goodness and His provision. We have been stunned numerous times when checks just showed up out of nowhere from people who felt led to donate. It is such a humbling experience for me to see the generosity of our friends and family, and even complete strangers. The money aspect of the adoption was the single most frightening aspect for Jason and me. We have been working hard to get in a better place financially, to get out of debt completely. So the thought of having to come up with a huge sum of money was scary. We knew from the beginning that if indeed God was calling us to do this, that He was not calling us to go back into debt to finance it. We knew that refinancing our house, taking a second mortgage on it, or getting a huge loan to pay for everything simply wasn't an option for us. Sinking deeper into debt was not being good stewards of the money God provides for us. So how would we come up with the money? We have been scrimping and saving, making changes in our budget and spending habits to eek out every last cent to put aside as much as possible.
More importantly though, early on, God promised us that He would provide for all of our needs during this journey, whether that be money, patience, the strength to make it through the process, whatever. He has been with us every step of the way. Sometimes I am completely surprised that God chose us for this, other times I am so grateful because we have seen God move. We have seen Him work miracles on our behalf. If we had not been obedient to begin the adoption process and go for it, we would have missed out on all of it. What a loss that would have been for us.
We did a total on all of the expenses related to adopting Max. The final number is quite a bit higher than what we had originally anticipated, but we switched agencies last year to get matched up with Max (which cost more), and we have decided to take the girls with us (which really costs more). We feel very confident about the decision to take the girls with us so the increased cost is worth it. The final total is around $31,ooo. We were stunned when we saw that number on the calculator.
But can I just blow your minds for a minute? Let me now tell you how much we lack. With some anticipated money coming in (tax rebate, a check for leasing the mineral rights under our property, some pledged donations, and money we anticipate being able to put aside) we only need $3695 more to pay for everything outright. Unbelievable!!!!!!!! I simply cannot believe that we are almost there in reaching our fundraising goal. God truly is a miracle worker. To be honest with you, money stresses me out. It always has. I am responsible for our budget and am always looking at the numbers to make sure we are on track. But money has always been a sensitive issue for me. I have really come a long way in my spending habits. But God's promise to provide for this adoption has carried me through this whole time. I was never worried that it wouldn't come through or that things would fall apart in that specific area. We have been very proactive in working to raise the necessary funds, but it has never been an area where Satan was able to attack by placing doubts that maybe it wouldn't work out. That is a miracle-all God. But it is the truth. So to do the calculations on our finances and find out we had less than $4000 to raise was incredible. I know that God will continue to work to provide it.
Jason and I want to sincerely thank all of you who have been a part of the fundraising and the "prayer-raising". We have been overwhelmed with the support we've received. We are enormously blessed by all of you and feel honored to have you in our lives. I guarantee you that Max will be told about all of you! Thank you for making such a difference in his life, and in ours.
We pray that someday we can somehow be as big of a blessing to you as you have to us.

New Feature

2008-04-07T08:04:00.002-06:00

After much discussion, Jason and I have decided to add the Donate feature to our website. We have been told by multiple people that they wanted to support our financial need, but didn't know how to go about doing it. So hopefully this will help to make it easier.

Seeing the support of our friends and family through this journey has been overwhelming. When God called us to this adoption, He promised us that He would provide all that we would need in order to make it happen, whether it be patience, the strength to get everything done, or the finances. We have seen His faithfulness time after time. Thank you for being a part of God's perfect plan.

Happy Birthday Max!!!!

2008-02-21T17:54:00.005-06:00

Today (Friday, February 22) is Max's Birthday! He is turning 3 years old. We wish we could spend this special day with him, but we know that if he couldn't be with us, he's in the next best place. As you can see, he is having a very happy birthday! What a blessing that we get pictures of him so often, so that we can share just a bit, what he is enjoying. I am so excited about all those special days that we will celebrate with him once we get to bring him home. He will be receiving tons of presents in about a week-a little late, but they will be hand delivered by someone special!!!

Please take some time to pray for Max today, on the day that we celebrate the fact that God created him.
*Please pray for his little heart as others try to prepare him for us, his forever family.
*Pray for him to understand what is taking place, and the changes that will occur.
*Please pray for his health.
*Please pray for all of the paperwork that is in process right now-we are very close to being ready to send our dossier to China.
*Please pray for the extra finances that we will have to have. We have decided to take the girls with us to China for numerous reasons....This will add quite a bit of cost to our trip, but we decided that it is the right decision, and well worth it.

Thank you everyone!!!

Late Christmas

2008-02-06T13:59:00.001-06:00

With our pre-approval, we received the right to send packages to Max. Our first one finally arrived 3 weeks after we sent it. We were relieved that it got there since I had neglected to put the address in Chinese-thank goodness! We woke up Monday morning to see the following pictures of Max opening up the package we sent him. Looking at the pictures was like watching the girls opening their Christmas presents. What a gift it was to us to see him holding things that we had sent him, that we had touched, that we had put together to express our love for him. It was so special. We are so privileged to have received the pictures-it's not common to get that much information and contact. We know what an extra blessing it is.

So enjoy a few pictures of our son. Isn't his smile amazing?

As you can see, we are already getting him ready to enter a house that LOVES chocolate. He is going to fit right in! That's how I look when I eat a Kit-Kat.

If you look carefully, you can see that there are pictures of us sitting on his lap. Of course he's laughing as he looks at pictures of his silly mommy and his crazy daddy. :-)

We're Pre-Approved!

2008-01-02T20:36:00.000-06:00

We just received word that China has officially approved us to seek adoption of Max! (Isn't he beautiful!!!!) This means that the Chinese government has approved the match between Max and our family. We can now tell him that we are adopting him and will be his forever family. We can also send him packages, gifts, pictures of our family, and letters. We are so joyful to be at this point. All that we have left to do is send in our dossier and wait to receive final confirmation (which will take anywhere from 12-17 weeks) and then we'll travel to pick him up about a month later. Our hope and prayer is that this will all take place before the Summer Olympics happen in Beijing in the late summer. Please continue to pray for us-but tonight, take time to thank the One that made this happen.

Happy (?) Holidays

2007-12-14T15:06:00.000-06:00

Jason and I "attempted" to take Christmas pictures of the girls last night...The following is a brief montage of the experience...............Enjoy!

Notice the head and foot sticking out from the bear-reminiscent of a scene from the Wizard of Oz.

Mommy is so mean to make me sit here!We actually considered this one of our best shots.

Enough sitting, I'm outta here.

I have better things to do than sit here looking pretty.

I can stand tall just like my big sister.......

Maybe not.

Darn Paparazzi!!!

Abby has decided that she has had enough of her little sister not sitting still for the pictures. She is just going to slowly squeeze the life out of Madeline.

Pre-Approval

2007-12-13T16:33:00.000-06:00

Well it's been almost a month since I've posted anything. I was hoping to have exciting news before I added anything on here, but we're still waiting. On November 23, we sent our Letter of Intent to China. Basically, this is a few documents that state that we want to adopt Max and a plan for how we will care for his special needs. We included information about us such as health status, financial status, info on our girls, etc. Based on this we will either be granted pre-approval, or we will be denied. There is nothing in our file that should disqualify us, even so, we are spending lots of time in prayer that our Heavenly Father would work again in this situation. After we get pre-approval, we can send packages to Max (including pictures of us!!!!) My heart's desire was for the pre-approval to come before Christmas so we could send him a Christmas package, there's still time, but I'm not going to get my hopes up too high.

After pre-approval we send in dossier (which is a LOT of work) and wait for our final acceptance. So....please continue to pray alongside us that we would hear news soon, and that it would be good.

We Made It

2007-11-18T17:33:00.000-06:00

It was a long day, but we made it! The 5k, Run For A Son, that our small group organized and put on for our adoption was a success! The weather was perfect and everything went really well. We will never be able to thank our small group enough for doing this for us. We raised over $2500 through this race....and we discovered that Teresa has the gift to be a race coordinator. So a big shout-out to Aaron & Teresa, Steve & Nadia, Hector & Claudia, Omar & Julie, Steve & Janice, and Dave, Kimi, & Haylee! You guys are awesome!!!

Pictures of Race Day will follow as soon as I get some. I am so smart that I brought my camera to the race to chronicle everything, but didn't put the newly charged battery back into the camera.
That's what happens on 6 hours of sleep.

1 task down, a BUNCH to go

2007-11-15T17:28:00.000-06:00

We had our final home study visit today-this means that the house will go back to its normal state of disarray. Just kidding! We've actually been doing a really good job lately keeping up with things, so it has stayed much cleaner. I am truly trying to make a life change in keeping on top of the house, because when Max comes home, things are just going to get crazier.

But tonight is a time to celebrate and relax. We are finished with one small part of our adoption process-there is MUCH that follows, but at least I can mark one thing off my list. Now I will be focusing on our Dossier. The dossier is a huge file of information about all areas of our life. We will include background checks, medical exams (no fudging on my weight), financial statements, DNA samples (just kidding). Basically, it is to prove that we are who we say we are, and that we are fit to adopt. So if you call get a call asking for a reference, lie! Make us look good (again, kidding).

3 Days and Counting......

2007-11-14T11:29:00.000-06:00

Only 3 days until Run For A Son! I cannot believe it's almost here. We have been busily preparing all the last minute details. The funny thing is, we have absolutely no idea how many people will be there. We had almost 50 people pre-register, but we feel that there will be more people who register on the day of. So it's kind of like when you have a party and only some people RSVP. You have no idea what to expect. But the great thing about all of this is that God knows how many people will be there. He already has a plan for this event and it will be a success whether we have 50 runners, or 500 (Lord help us if we have 500 cause we will be short lots of porta-potties!).

Anyway-if you live in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area, and you feel like being outdoors on Saturday, please join us at River Legacy park in Arlington. Registration starts at 7, the race starts at 8. It's going to be a beautiful morning! Come help us Run For A Son!

The Miracle of Max

2007-11-07T15:42:00.000-06:00

It has been quite a roller coaster the past 2 weeks. Just when you think things are mundane, God shakes them up!

We have been waiting for some time for news regarding a request that was made on our behalf to have the file of a particular little boy placed with our adoption agency. We were into week 4 of waiting for any news when God placed in motion a chain of events that may prove to be life-changing.

We had already been experiencing a hard week, due to the unexpected death of Jason's grandmother. On the morning that we should have doing our first home study visit with our social worker, I was bathing the baby to get her ready to stay with a friend of mine while I attended the funeral of Jason's grandmother. While Madeline was in the bathtub, I received a phone call from Jason on my cell phone while the home phone began ringing off the hook. Jason had received an email from a friend of ours in China (as did many of you!) that concerned the little boy we had been praying to adopt. His file had been sent to a completely different adoption agency while we had been waiting to hear if it would be sent to ours. The email went on to explain that we needed to act fast to switch agencies and get matched. Our emotions were frantic. Not only had his file not been matched with our agency, but it had been matched with a completely different agency altogether. Would this prove to be the miracle that we had been waiting for, or would it close the door shut on our pursuit of the little boy we wanted to adopt?

With a naked baby splashing water all over me, I proceeded to call the new agency to find out any information on our little guy. When I finally got through, I was in tears as I explained our situation. I had no idea what to expect from the agency being that they knew nothing of us and we knew even less about them. But almost immediately, I could see God's hand on the situation. I quickly asked the most important question-whether our little boy was even still available. Our fear was that another family had seen his picture and his information and fallen in love with him like we had and moved to match with him, all before we even knew he had been listed there. I held my breath after I had given his information and waited for their response...... He was available. He had not been matched up to a family. UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!! I told them everything as quickly as I could and spoke with several people over the course of the conversation. They agreed to put him on hold and take us on as clients. We realize what a miracle it was that he was put with an agency in the United States. If it had been in another country, then we would not have been able to proceed. Plus, our new agency is unashamedly Christian. AMAZING! Everyone that I spoke to on the phone recognized and verbalized that God's hand was all over this.

So in less than 30 minutes I was able to switch adoption agencies and get this heart-stealing little boy put on hold with us. The stipulation was that I had one week to return all the contracts and necessary paperwork and..............send in a check for $8,000. As my heart skipped a beat (or 3) and I tried not to pass out, I heard myself answer that we could send in that much money in a week. I knew that if God had gotten us to this point, that somehow, He would miraculously make that money come in as well. We had $4000 in our account that we set up for our adoption expenses, so we were short the other half. I started sending out emails (which many of you got!), sharing the situation and the praises we had regarding the miracle that had just taken place. And God moved. In 3 short days, we received the $4,000 that we needed. Incredible. People started emailing and calling and sending cards, including donations to get us to our goal. We were astounded. I could not believe the way people responded. People opened their hearts and their checkbooks to support us. It was amazing to see that happen. God totally used people all over the country to help us out.....

So-we are proudly announcing that we have accepted the referral of Max from China, the little boy that God put on our hearts, one year ago, to adopt as our son. Please continue to pray for us as we wait for approval of the match from China . I believe with all of my heart that if God wants Max to be ours, than we will get him. God has already shown His power in this whole process. We have been moved to tears at the miracles that have been taking place. I am honored that He chose our family for this journey. We are also honored that so many of you have joined us on this journey as well. Thank you.

Run For A Son

2007-10-23T11:24:00.001-06:00

www.runforason.com

We have a terrific fundraiser next month that I'd love to share with you. Our small group from our church is organizing a 5K run/walk to help us with our adoption expenses. Jason and I are so overwhelmed and touched that our group is doing this for us. They are organizing the entire event, taking care of all the details, and basically working like crazy to make this happen. I will never be able to truly express our gratitude to them.

The 5K is designed to be a family event. There will be food, bounce houses, a live band, and of course, the race itself. Please take a look at the website to see if you are interested in participating. It will be a fun morning!

God is really blessing this event already. Details are falling into place in a way that no human could ever hope to control. For instance, we just found out that we will have the band. However, the city of Arlington requires a permit for music at events like this. You have to apply for the permits 45 days in advance. The race is less than a month away and as of last night, we didn't have the permit. This morning, one of the ladies from our group called the city about it and was told that we had missed the 45 day period. But then she hesitated, telling my friend that somehow the permit had been approved at the last board meeting, even though we hadn't even confirmed the request. God is so amazing! He is taking care of the details-even when we can't!

4 and 1/2 months later...........................

2007-10-17T16:03:00.000-06:00

It has been months since I've sat down to write an update. I am a terrible blogger. I have so many things going on, that I have not kept up with this blog. But I promise to try harder! I truly want to keep everyone updated on our adoption process....and I know this is a great way.

We are about to begin the homestudy phase of the adoption process. A social worker will come to our home, making 4 visits, in order to determine if we would be good candidates for adoption. So it's time to get busy on cleaning this house. I have much to do and only about a week to get it accomplished. Pray for me!

Introduction To Our Family

2007-05-31T12:42:00.001-06:00

I wanted to give some background on our family in order to keep everyone up to date.

Jason and I met while working as missionaries to Buenos Aires, Argentina. We were married in the summer of 2001. He began his master's degree at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary that fall, and I began teaching a second grade class in Grand Prairie. We had our first baby in February of 2004, Abigail. What a joy she has brought to our lives since joining us! Jason graduated with his Master of Divinity in May of 2005 and I quit my teaching position to stay home with Abby. God led us to a position at a local church in August of 2005. Jason is the Missions and Hispanic Pastor at the church. It's an amazing body of believers. Our second daughter, Madeline, joined us in June of 2006. I can't believe how much fun she is! What a blessing to be a mother of two beautiful little girls! We are so fortunate......

Welcome

2007-05-30T15:46:00.000-06:00

On the advice of experts in the area of adoption, I have decided to set up this blog in order to keep friends and family updated on where we are in our journey. I'll start from the beginning........

Jason visited China last October and brought home precious memories, pictures and videos of places he had visited and people he had met. Over the course of several weeks of looking at pictures of different things, God began to stir my heart for the countless children in China who were living their lives in orphanages. At first I believed it was just my motherly instinct kicking in, hurting for these children who were starting their lives without the love and security of their own family. But as the weeks passed, I realized it was something more. I began to pray about the idea that perhaps God was indeed stirring my heart to do something. I finally brought up the idea to Jason. We committed to pray about it-which we did, and did, and did, and did. It seemed like God wasn't speaking to us about it.
Then one day Jason and I had the conversation that brought us to the point we're at today. He said that perhaps God had already moved and we needed to move to. He compared it to the days when the Israelites were wandering in the desert. The last chapter of Exodus described the completion of the tabernacle by Moses and the profound events that followed. Exodus 40:33-38 says, "And so Moses finished the work. Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out; but if the cloud did not lift, they did not set out-until the day it lifted. So the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their travels." Simple faith. When the cloud stayed, the people stayed. When the cloud moved, God moved-and so did the Israelites. So maybe God had already started on this journey-it was now time for us to pack up our tabernacle (our baggage and our fears) and get going. In order to hear Him, we needed to follow Him. So we did. We took a step of faith and the results have been amazing. To see how God has already worked through this has been incredible! We are so excited about the rest of the journey that is yet to come..........
So here we are. We are in the process of adopting a child with special needs from China. Currently we are filling out paperwork to get our homestudy started. It is overwhelming and I imagine my fingers will never be the same from all the writing and typing I'm doing to complete everything, but it will all be worth it when we bring our sweet child home. I know that God has a perfect plan for our family in this, and we are so honored that He chose us to do this.