LINK TO OUR JOURNEY TO JILLIANA

LINK TO OUR JOURNEY TO JILLIANA
CLICK ON JILLIANA'S PHOTO TO FOLLOW OUR JOURNEY TO CHINA

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Jilliana's Forever In Our Arms Video

Thank You Kami!

Thank you Kami for helping us make our shirts!
 We Love Them!
Meilynn, Jilliana, Emma and Lily

Monday, April 18, 2011

Filling Easter Eggs (and eating them too!)

A Little Of This And A Little Of That



This is just some glimpses of things from the last two weeks.  I always come up with these wonderful posts in my mind that are really deep, but then when I find time to post I usually end up with a lot of pictures of just things that are a little of this and a little of that.  


 Last Saturday I woke up and made the gils Mickey Mouse waffles.  Mike was at the Men' Prayer Breakfast.  There are not many days when the girls get to just come down to breakfast and eat in their jammies, but this was one such day.
 This is what happens when one distracted mother pours syrup into the waffle iron instead of waffle mix!  I can tell you it was a mess.  I did just wipe it out and went on cooking, since only one waffle can be made at at time and I still had two more to make.
 Kami came over one day to tie dye with the girls.  The girls know that when Kami comes over that fun happens.
 Jilliana was playing at the water table in her underwear.  She was just excited as the other girls to select which colors for Kami to put on her shirt.  Kami was using gloves but the dye leaked through to her fingers.  Her fingers were blue!  Now, normally this would not be a big deal, except that she had a black tie affair that night!  We looked up on the internet how to get dye off of your hands and most of the suggestions (all involving bleach with no guarantee that it would work) were brutal.  I finally found where someone suggested using the Mr. Clean eraser (we use that a lot) and it took most of it off without taking off her skin.
 We met Grandma at the Church and she gave Jilliana her own "Bitty Baby".  She has been carrying Emma's baby Ming Jing around and so Grandma bought her one.  This is the 5th Bitty Baby that Grandma has bought.  (Lily has another doll and has never been very interested in dolls)
 Jilliana at swimming lessons.  We are taking the Mommy and Me classes to get her used to the water.  She is not too crazy about getting water in her face, but we have a pool and she needs to be pool safe.
 Haven't we had crazy weather.  One minute we have summer like days and the next we have snow ten minutes away!
 The girls are loving it!
 Meilynn getting snow to take home in the ice chest.
 Lily with her contribution
 Jilliana comes from a province with snow, so we know it is not her first time seeing it.  In fact it was snowing one of the days we were there.
 The girls filled the ice chest and then the next day we had a snow ball fight in our backyard.


 You may remember that Mike broke his scapula in December riding his dirt bike.  He belongs to a motorcycle club that gives this "trophy" when someone gets hurt.  It has the names and what happened on it.  You keep it until you can pass it on to the next person that gets hurt.  He was happy to get it off of his hands and pass it on.  (Not happy that someone else got hurt, but happy he did not have to have it anymore)
 My new laundry solution.  Laundry is out of hand around here.  So I decide that I would get four buckets, one for each of the girls.  They stack into each other (bought them at Target) so they don't take of too much room.  When I do laundry I pull them out.  As I take the things out of the dryer, the girls ,if they are here sort them and then we fold the clothes together and then they put them away.  It is much easier to have a bucket already sorted than to fold their clothes and separate them as I fold them.  I am thinking of just making one big sock drawer for the three little ones since they wear the same size.  This would cut down on me sorting the socks which takes the longest.  I am open to suggestions, since we are a new big family and I am trying to figure out what works.
 Jilliana at the girls school open house making a marshmallow sculpture


Friday, April 15, 2011

Fitting In

As many of you know this is our fourth adoption from China.  I have often heard people say that when they adopted it felt like the new child had always been there,  That the adjustment was just that easy.  I have never felt that way.  When we adopted Emma it was such a long time since I had a baby in the house and she needed me so much.  I could not leave the room without her crying.  My life changed so much.  I loved her instantly, but it was hard.  

Then when we adopted Meilynn the change from one to two the same age was significant.  Those two could get into more messes together.  We had an adjustment period. I loved having two, two year olds but it was hard.

Then when God called us to adopt Lily we again went through a lot of changes.  It really is like having three the same age in so many ways.  It was hard and at times still is.

Then Miss Jilliana came to our attention.  I worried about what I might be doing to our family.  There were so many unknowns due to the information we were given about her disruption.  I knew it was what God wanted us to do, but it was scary.  I constantly thought about what we might expect.  It has been 6 weeks since we have been home and this has been the easiest of all adjustments.  Even with Jilliana waking up two or three times a night.  I can say that she has just walked into our family and stolen our hearts.  She is the funniest, sweetest, smartest little thing.  It truly feels like she has been here forever.  Yes, it is hard, but she just fits in so perfectly.


Meilynn and Jilliana,  they have formed a special bond

Popcorn and a movie


A friend of mine told me about this exchange student that we could have come over and speak to the girls in Chinese.  She was so sweet and the girls just loved her.  We have been so busy I have not had the chance to have her come over again.  She will be leaving to go back to China in June.  I wish I had found out about her earlier.


The girls having ice cream with Mike.  Emma dislikes chocolate so much that she cannot even stand to sit next to anyone eating chocolate.  That is Emma way over to the left.


Too cute!



Meilynn, Jilliana, and Emma

Playing in the water table


Swimming with Daddy
We love this little thing!

Tuesday, April 05, 2011

Spring Break at the Beach


We spent part of Spring Break at the beach in Carlsbad.  I went down alone with the girls and then Kami met us there.  Mike came down for a few days at the end of our trip.
 We got up and went for a walk on the beach.  At the little store at the campground we let the girls choose a candy.
 Already for our walk
 When we got down to the beach there was no beach!  Only rocks!  Tons and tons of rocks!  This was Jilliana's first trip to the beach.  She was not too happy about it.  The beach we go to changes all of the time.  Sometimes there is a lot of beach, sometimes beach and rocks, but this was the first time that we could not find any beach.

 It did make for some great shell and rock hunting.  Meilynn with a shell.
 Looking for that special rock
 Emma and Kami

 While we were at the beach, Kami promised the girls a girly, girl day.  She curled their hair,



 And painted their nails.  Kami is always thinking up fun things for the girls to do.

 Kami and Jihong

 After the girls got all prettied up Kami decided the girls needed another adventure.  This time a bus ride to dinner.  Here they are waiting at the bus stop.
 Me at the bus stop with the girls
 Jilliana being cute

 Emma's pretty hair
 Then, a crisis!  Emma dropped her lip gloss
 Way down here
 With Kami's help she was able to get it back
 Just in time for the bus!
 Happy bus riders!  We made it to dinner. We ate at our favorite Thai restaurant at the beach.  And we successfully took the bus back with only one blip, when Lily pulled the rope when it was not our stop.

 Playing at the playground
 I would say that is a happy face
 She is so awesome
 Daddy on the scooter
 And then a rainy day.  Kami, Meilynn, and Lily, were the only ones willing to check out the beach in the rain.
 We found a fun indoor playground for the rainy day

And then we had ducks on our driveway!