Finally, some new photos...

We (ahem, I mean Tom) got the card reader working again! Here are some belated photos of Lilly's completed room, some of the cute clothes my book club surprised me with last week when I hosted book club, some fun ones of Jared and Anna just being cute, and the new vehicle we got last weekend after Anna's big championship swim meet in Pensacola (her last 8 & under championship meet!) It feels good to have a new, reliable car, as we look ahead at traveling for medical appointments and ever further ahead at Tom's deployment early next year.

Finally, some new photos...

Here are some much-belated photos from our recent birthdays and other happenings in our home. No word yet on our TA, but I am happily following blogs of those families that are in CHina right now getting their new children. Feel free to check some of them out if I can figure out how to post them on here!

Here is Anna with some of her Barracuda teammates celebrating after last week's swim meet.

And here is Anna helping me paint Lilly's room...hope to have "after" photos of the finished room soon!

Here we are celebrating my 40th b-day at Osaka Japanese steak house--yum!!

And the rest of these are of Jared and his friends celebrating his 12th birthday. We initially tried to take a group of them paintballing, but when we got there the painball field had to turn us away as all of their guns were checked out. Yikes! What's a mom to do when she has 8-10 boys ready and eager to play paintball? We went home the the same eager boys played "Capture the Flag" in the woods behind our house for HOURS! They had a blast. We proceeded with the pizza, cake, presents, and an impromptu nerf gun war around the cul-de-sac, and rescheduled the actual paint ball outing for a few days later. They had a blast! Tom sported some pretty nasty bruises from all the fun! Jared has such a nice group of friends--he is truly blessed.

And, last, but certainly not least, is the photo of Lilly we received most recently. This photo was probably taken even earlier than the referral photos I posted back in October, but it is new to us and it is a joy to catch another glimpse of her sweet face. And she has hair!!

Getting Lillian's Room All Ready!

Today I will begin painting Lillian's room...I am excited to see the transformation and to get it completely ready.

If only we would get some word on our LOA!!

Today is Jared's 12th birthday--Happy Birthday my big baby boy!! I can't believe he is nearing teenagerhood. He is a delightful kid...I am excited to see him before a big brother to Lilly. I will try to post some photos of his birthday party this weekend...actually it turned into 2 parties. We took about 8 boys to a nearby paintball field to play, but they had run out of paintball guns. So, we had to take 8 forlorn boys back home, where they played capture the flag for about 2-3 hours in the woods! They had a blast, and I kept saying they seemed to be having more fun playing in the woods than they would have had playing paintball. Such fun to see them romping through the woods, all boy, having the whole woods to themselves. We finished off that day with presents, pizza, a nerf war in the front yard, and birthday cake around the fire pit on the pool deck. BUT, since we had been unable to play paintball, the original plan, we decided to try again on Monday. Tom and two other dads--Carl and Kurt--brough the boys back to the paintball field on MLK day and they were successful in getting the equipment they needed this time! They played for most of the day, and came home so excited and buzzing with the fun they had had. TOm also is sporting some REALLY nasty bruises on his legs from where he got hit--wow. I'm so glad Jared has such a great group of good friends. Thank you Lord!

I will post a few photos of Jared's birthday fun soon!

Family Life Rolling Along!

It's been awhile since I've posted the happenings around here...this are going really well! Jared and Anna are in the full swing of things at school and activities at this point. There are days that it feels like the world is spinning and we all want to get off, but this weekend provided a nice chance to step back, rest, and get some thigns done at home (including, for me, updating our blog!).


Jared is LOVING middle school. He has some really long days--running cross-country at 6:45 3 mornings a week, and staying after school on Wednesdays and Thursdays for cross-country meets and football band, respectively--so there are many nights he pretty much falls into bed exhausted by the time it's over. (though, I've realized, part of his exhaustion is due to the fact that after we think he's asleep, he is awake in his bed reading until 10pm!!) But he is enjoying it all... He had his first cross-country meet last week and did really well. Here are some photos...can you spot him in the front left side with his trombone at his first half-time show? And here he is with his friend Zach, after their 2-mail cross-country run.

Anna is enjoying 3rd grade. She has a wonderful teacher! She is still swimming, and has given some suggestions to her coach (me) on how to make practices more *fun*. I'll have to see what I can do!! She is working hard at the piano in the mornings before school--an exercise we are finding helpful as she works hard on mastering some lingering reversals of letters and numbers at school. The visual processing required for piano playing is helpful in the realm of handwriting and visual processing of numbers, columns, and place values in math! She also has been spending a lot of time reading...and playing with friends! Here are some photos of her at the beach recently, when we were part of a surprise 25th wedding anniversary vow renewal for our dear friends, Steve and Denise Schaick. Anna was so enthralled with the whole celebrating, she insisted on dancing with Denise afterwards.

We put up a zip line in the back yard--I'll have to get some video footage and post it here--and last weekend the kids worked hard to build a platform for launching themselves on it. They hit a snag when, after building it, they realized the had built it 3 inches wider than any of the gates in our fence leading to the back yard. So this weekend we removed and then replaced a portion of fence in order to move the platform into its place.


We are hosting a small group Bible study in our home on Sunday afternoons, which is a great sources of encouragement, motivation, and accountability. Great group of folks! And Tom recently started playing his guitar AND his trumpet (!!) for the church praise band. It is so good to see him up there, and to hear that sweet trumpet playing!

We had a really good time celebrating Tom's 40th birthday. Thank you thank you to those of you who sent contributions for his birthday encouragement book--it turned our really well! The surprise party was lots of fun as well! Tom has been super swamped at work…he is acting as squadron commader for the next 4 months as his boss is deployed, so not only is he managing his own clinic, seeing patients, and teaching the residents, he is also running the entire medical operations squadron. Yikes! This week was a huge challenge for him…many times he came home saying “I’m in over my head…” but God has seen him through and he is energized by seeing God at work. You can pray for him that he’ll have extra strength, wisdom, humility, and perseverance through these busy months.


Just as life sometimes seems to be a marathon, I continue to train for the Marine Corps marathon. Last weekend, while away attending a Precepts Bible Study Leadership Training seminar at a nearby coastal city, I got up early before the Saturday session and ran my 20-mile training run. It was an incredible run--started at about 4:30am running along a Gulf shore island in the strong winds from Hurricane Ike. I ended up turning back and crossing the bridge to the mainland as the storm surge was bringing water over the running path on the island. The run went well (especially when the wind was at my back!!) This morning's 10-mile run was even better, as the temperatures are finally starting to fall a little bit! I get excited thinking about how lovely DC will be in late October! If you'd like to sponsor me, it's not too late! http://www.teamlwb.com/ I am over 85% of the way to my fundraising goal of $1500.


Speaking of Bible study, last week I taught the ladies' Bible study at church as we looked at the life of Miriam. What a lot of rich lessons to learn from her life! I used to think of her only as the older sister of Moses who helped to ensure her baby brother's safety as he floated in the basket on the Nile. Now I realized how much more there is to know about her and how relevant her experiences are to our lives!


We now have video footage of Anna's solo at church, which Tom will isolate and show me how to post here soon! I will also (hopefully) post some footage of the kids on their zip line.


God has brought me to a new place of peace in our wait for our little one from China. I know the call will come eventually, and I am content to wait patiently until that day (and then wait until we have travel approval...). We attended an international adoption seminar a few weeks ago at University of Alabama at Birmingham, which was a useful day of information, preparation, and thought-provoking discussion. The trip also gave Tom and me a chance to talk and visit as we drove (the kids stayed with friends), which is always a good thing... believe, me, the moment we have a photo to post of our little one, it will be up on the weblog and you will KNOW! You will probably hear me shout even across the many hundreds of miles!

Until then, I'll continue to try to keep you all posted on the rest of us and what's happening here... Please keep us posted on what's happening with you!

Love,
Amy

Dossier has passed the critical review, undergoing translation!

We received word late last week that our dossier is entirely in order! It has been submitted for translation and will soon be on its way to the Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA), the Chinese government agency that oversees adoptions. Once it is logged in at CCAA, our wait begins for a "match" with a child...the wait could be anywhere from just a month or two, up to nearly a year... I am personally hoping for a short wait for our match!! Once we are matched with a child, we wait another 3-6 months until we are able to travel.

The waiting is still a struggle, but it's a chance to learn to rest on God's sovereignty and trust His timing.

In the meantime, we celebrated Anna's 8th birthday this week!! She had a pool party here at the house for a few friends, and we had a fabulous time. I can't believe she is 8 years old already! We also bought hiking shoes for Jared last night since he leaves next weekend for a week at Boy Scout summer camp. Not only can I not believe that he will be away from us for a whole week at a camp in Georgia learning to shoot a rifle, drive a motorboat, ride a horse, and live in the mountains, but--get this--his shoe size is only a size and a half smaller that Tom's!! Yikes! When did this happen??

Thanks for the comments some of you have left for us...always fun to hear from friends!

Happy Father's Day to any dads who are reading!

Enjoy the photos! There are some from the last day of school, the black and white of Jared is his 5th grade portrait (isn't he handsome?) and some are from Anna's birthday.