Noel....A Christmas Surprise!

Yep -- we got a dog! Noel is the newest addition to our family. She was the last gift given to the kids this morning and I managed to pull off the surprise. Collin was the only one who was REALLY excited. He was so overcome with emotion when I told him that we were keeping her forever that he started sobbing. It was too sweet. Dylan was excited, but not overly so. Alana could have cared less. She wanted to get back to her toys. I think she touched Noel once very briefly and hasn't even glanced at her since. At least Collin was happy! Noel was rescued from a puppy mill and is still pretty scared, but she is extremely tolerant even as she shakes in fear. It will take her a little while to get used to everything, but she is already a little momma's girl. She followed me around the house all morning. She doesn't like it when I get too far out of her sight!

We had a really great Christmas today. It was so wonderful to get together with our family. I tried to prepare as much as possible in advance and that definitely helped to make today less stressful. Great company and yummy food. I hope everyone's day was as blessed as ours!

Busy, Busy!

Life is very busy here. I'm scrambling to get ready for Christmas and to keep up with my three busy children! Plus, we are still trying to sell our other house. We've hired a new team of people, including a stager, general contractor who specializes in preparing homes for sale, and a new realtor. We've pulled it off the market to make changes and will be re-listing this spring. I've got my fingers crossed that it goes well!

The kids are all doing well. Collin is still plugging away at his homeschooling. I'm really proud of him. He is doing an excellent job! He and Dylan also started a gymnastics class recently. I felt it was important this winter to be sure they are getting plenty of activity. It is easy to stay cooped up in our house when they weather is so cold outside. Dylan loves gymnastics, but doesn't cooperate with his teachers. They are earning their pay with him -- that is for sure! Alana is doing great as well. She still loves school and is happy to go every day. She also goes to religious education for an hour and Chinese school for 2 1/2 hours every weekend and loves to tell everyone about all the schools she goes to!

I just ordered my Christmas cards this week, so *maybe* I will get them out before Christmas. Here is a picture I took of the kids that I included on the cards. It was so amazing that they all sat for the picture and were excited to do it. Dylan used to hate to sit still for pictures, but was very cooperative this time. My baby is growing up!!



I can't wait for Christmas. I just love to see my kids faces as they open their presents and to visit with all of our family. The kids are incredibly excited as well and are counting the days anxiously! Luckily we have quite a few fun things planned between now and then to keep them occupied! I'm also thinking about adding a new member to our family this year, but I'm not sure if Victor is on board yet. Collin has been wanting a pet for quite a while and it seems as though everywhere I turn people are talking about their pets. I looked into rabbits, guinea pigs and hamsters, but I keep coming back to a dog. We'll see what happens. We will certainly get a new dog eventually, we may just wait a little longer. I just think it would be so cool to get them one for Christmas. I can already see their faces lit up!!!

Trip to Texas

We went to Texas a while back and I haven't posted pictures yet. It was good to see Victor's nieces as well as a friend of mine and her family. The weather was exceptional -- highs in the mid-70's. We came back to KC to highs in the 30's and 40's and blustery winds. I'm ready to go back to TX!

Joy!

I don't know if I can accurately express my feelings tonight. I keep thinking about how depressed I was after the last two presidential elections. Then I think about how overjoyed I feel tonight and how I've wept off and on all night after learning that Barack Obama will be our next president. I am overjoyed for myself and for my country. I am overjoyed for my children and other people of color who will see this world differently after today. I am truly excited to see the positive changes that are on the horizon for our country. I feel so blessed!

This election was one of many firsts for me. My first time to contribute financially to a political campaign. My first time putting a political bumper sticker on my car. My first time putting a political sign in my yard. My first time volunteering for a campaign and knocking on doors in support of a candidate. I've never felt a part of an election before, but I am extraordinarily proud to have been a part of this one. I received an e-mail from the Obama campaign tonight that said "We have a lot of work to do to get our country back on track, and I'll be in touch soon about what comes next." I can't wait to be a part of changing this country. I want a country that values service over shopping. I want a country that values community over every man for himself. I'm really looking forward to tomorrow!

Here are some pictures I took of the kids today. They were not in the mood to cooperate, but I wanted to take a picture of them on this historic day!

Vote!

I hope everyone gets out to vote today. Victor and I both voted before 7:30 this morning and I've been out knocking on doors on behalf of the Obama campaign. I took the boys to a Biden rally yesterday and they enjoyed themselves (for the first hour anyway). They lost steam after a while, but we made it through. I'm hoping and praying for a good outcome tonight. I've been so crushed after the last two elections, but I feel good about this one!

Halloween and Fall Fun

Here are some pictures of the kids taken today as well as some from the last couple of weeks. It was great that both of my brothers were able to visit in October. The kids LOVE their uncles! We took the kids to a pumpkin patch as well as a fall festival recently. Fall is my very favorite season and this year has been no exception.

Couldn't agree more

I couldn't agree more with this blogger's 10/13 post. I'm so tired of the hate and fear.

http://mumblerrr.blogspot.com/2008/10/hypocritical-much.html

Collin's 9th Birthday

Collin turned 9 this past Tuesday. We had his birthday party yesterday at the Wizards game. We invited just a few of his friends along with a parent to come along. It turned out to be a fun father\son event for everyone. Then we came back to the house where the kids went WILD. They were chasing each other around with nerf dart guns and bouncing in our inflatable bouncer. Then we filled them with pizza, pop, cake and ice cream and sent them home exhausted, but on a sugar high. I'm sure they all slept well last night. I think Collin really enjoyed himself!

Literal

Collin is so extremely literal that there are times I don't know whether to laugh or cry about it. For instance, he was completing a science worksheet the other day that asked why birds migrate. It had a picture of a hamburger and mittens as clues to help him with the answers of food and warm weather. Collin writes hamburger and mittens for the answer. He also does this fun thing where he tries his best to find a reason that something I've said isn't true. Something along the lines of Dylan asking me what color the sky is and I'll answer "blue." Collin will then point out that sometimes the sky is gray or black. He has been doing this for quite a while and it can be unnerving. I wonder if all kids do this? Is it a precursor to the days when he will think I'm a complete idiot? There are times that he is concerned that I've forgotten to do something or haven't done it right. I make sure to point out what a good job I do of taking care of him. That I keep him fed, clothed and such and that I'm quite a responsible person! =) I just wonder if I'm seeing some preteen behavior already. He is only going to be nine next week!! I know it could also be related to insecurities because of being adopted. I think something children realize that one parent left them or couldn't take care of them and what will prevent it from happening again? I hope that I find the right words to calm his fears if this is the case.

In other news, his homeschooling is going quite well. He loves the books provided in the curriculum. He even asks for them to be read at times that aren't scheduled. We are finishing some of the novels way ahead of schedule because he is so interested. I love how excited he is about reading! If he gets nothing else out of this program (which of course he will), I am thrilled that he is developing a true love of reading. He has always been a good reader, but he just didn't like to do it much.

I also have not such good news to report. The sale of our house fell through. We were supposed to close this Friday, but the buyers pulled out after the inspection. There wasn't anything too major on the report, but lots and lots of little things. We are going to work to correct most of them, but the buyer wasn't willing to wait for them to be fixed and didn't want to fix them himself without a drastic price drop that we weren't willing to agree too. So, here we sit with two houses again. Of course the financial mess our country is in is not helping to calm my nerves. Showings have all but stopped, but our realtor said that is happening everywhere. I just pray that things don't get drastically worse than they are now. I'm still pretty confident that things will work out in the end.

Sold?

I'm so relieved that we may have sold our house. We received our first offer and are just waiting on the paperwork right now to get the process started. If all goes well we will close in 3 weeks!

Everything else has been pretty boring around here. Alana is getting into a routine at kindergarten. She still loves it and you would have thought someone had died the first Saturday that she didn't have school. My main struggle has been figuring out what she will eat in her lunch at school. I knew we would have food issues, but she won't even eat grapes and other foods that she loves and requests at home. After numerous e-mails to her teacher I think we are figuring it out though. I've started Collin's new homeschool curriculum and so far so good. We haven't settled into much of a routine yet with it, but that should come soon. Things will start getting busy around here soon enough though. Collin's soccer games start this weekend and Alana has Chinese School. Next week religious education and swim lessons get thrown into the mix.

In other news, we are LOVING our new house! It really is as dreamy as we imagined. This house was designed well and they didn't waste even the smallest space. We are still trying to get organized and even have some boxes yet to unpack. We are hoping to buy some new furniture to fit our new space after we sell our other house. I also have an absurd amount of painting to do, but I'm just going to tackle that as the mood strikes.

Here is a picture of Dylan in his new bed I got him today. (Yes, he is 3 1/2 and I am just now moving him to a toddler bed.) He is really excited about it and probably won't complain too much at bedtime tonight!

Moody

I think full-day kindergarten is catching up to Alana. However, instead of sitting around because she is tired, she is active as ever but VERY moody! Yesterday evening was filled with her shoving me, yelling at Collin, and slamming doors. I do not allow her to act like a diva, so she is either ridiculously tired or she is getting away with acting up at school and wants to try it out at home as well. She went to bed really early last night and seemed to feel better this morning.

Alana is riding the bus to school (per her request\demand). Unfortunately, because she is not attending the local elementary she has to be bussed to one with ESL services that is further away. She is the first one on the bus in the morning and the last one off at night and rides the bus for 45-50 minutes each way. My friend suggested I send an activity for her to do on the bus, but I'm coming up blank. She destroyed her bus tag that is safety pinned to her shirt by the end of the second day. I'm sure whatever I give her will be lost or destroyed by the time she gets home, so I'm trying to figure out what I can send. I think I am going to ask her bus driver tonight if she has any suggestions. Any paper I give Alana will be torn into tiny pieces on the bus and I'm sure the driver won't appreciate that. Alana was wearing tights the other day and ripped several large holes in the them on the way home from Chinese school on Sunday (I need to blog about that later). If anyone has any suggestions, please post in the comments.

First Day of Kindergarten

Here are some pictures from Alana's first day of kindergarten. No tears except from Dylan who wanted to stay and play. I'm anxious to see how worn out she is tonight (I'm hoping VERY). It should be a really fun day for her. She was SO excited to eat lunch at school. I packed her lunch this morning with all sorts of fun things for her. I'm hoping that we can eat lunch with her one day next week and meet some of her classmates.

Feels like Home

Victor made a comment a day or two after we'd been in our new house, that there are toys all over the floor -- it now feels like home! So true!

Recovering

Wow! This move was every bit as long as stressful as I thought it might be (if not more so). I thought we were ahead of the game going into it though. We had most of the house boxed up and we had all the boxes in the dining room and living room, so we wouldn't have to walk up and down so many stairs to load the truck. However, things didn't go according to plan. Victor picked up a truck on Friday morning and the people we hired to help us move showed up around 9:00. We hired them for 4 hours, but it took them 3 1/2 hours to load the truck one time. They did pack it tightly to be sure things didn't move around, but I was surprised at how slowly they moved and was disappointed that several large items were still damaged. When we arrived at our new house 4 hours after starting, we found out that the power still hadn't been turned on. We assumed it would still be turned on that day as scheduled, so we went about our business. We also noticed immediately that there was trash all over the house and that not all of the previous owner's stuff had been moved. We knew they hadn't finished loading the day before, but they were supposed to be back Friday morning to pick up the rest. However, on Friday afternoon the house looked frightful. We did the best we could and made one more trip with just me, Victor and my dad. Thank God for my dad!! The power was still not on Friday afternoon, so Victor called to see what was going on. Apparently there was a mix-up and they wouldn't get to us until Saturday! Soooo, we leaned on my dad again and spent the night at his house. Thank you dad! On Saturday things started to come together. My dad, Marilyn, and my friend Aimee' came over to help clean the place up so we could start unpacking. They were such a huge help! Since then, we've just been slowing trying to get our lives back in order. It has been a struggle to say the least, but even with all the headache, we really love our new house and are happy with our decision.

Alana starts kindergarten tomorrow, so that is my newest project. I've also ordered Collin's new homeschool curriculum that should be arriving this week. Never a dull moment!

I'll post tomorrow with pictures of Alana's first day. I will drive her in the morning and then she'll ride the bus home. Should be interesting!

Here are some progression pictures taken during our move:

CHAOS!

Starting to see a little of the countertop.

We are almost there!

Moving

We are moving tomorrow! Things are getting VERY busy now and the stress is starting to get to me. I'm trying to roll with the punches, but there are so many right now that it seems as soon as I recover from one another one comes (I got in a fender bender in a parking lot today just to name one). I just need to get through this weekend. Luckily my children make me smile. How could you not be happy when see this face?

der

Goodbye

Dylan will have to say goodbye to his special vent tomorrow. He would visit it daily for the longest time and make deposits -- toys, snacks, paper, etc. It got pretty filled up and he quit for a while, but recently Victor cleaned it out and he has become fascinated again. Alana showed him a cool trick the other day -- spitting down the vent. I don't know where she comes up with this stuff. I'm curious as to whether he will find a special vent in the next house. Maybe there will be enough to explore that he will forget about the vents. I can hope anyway. Here is a picture of Dylan laying on the vent. Our dogs used to do that in the summer to stay nice and cool.

Together Again

We got to have dinner with Isabelle and her family last night. It was so wonderful to see her!! She sat across from Dylan at dinner and they played really well for a while. They would roll things back and forth across the table to each other and talked a little bit. Victor and I each held her for a picture after dinner. She is a busy girl (much like Alana) and couldn't sit through the whole meal. Oh is she beautiful though! I just can't thank her family enough for staying in contact with us. It means so much!!

Unexpected

We had friends over tonight from out of town who have never met Alana. They have a little boy who is about 6 1/2 years old. He used to play with Collin when we would get together, but he hit it off immediately with Alana tonight. I could tell right away that they had very similar personalities. They were wrestling, jumping off furniture, chasing each other around the house, throwing things, and generally causing chaos. Our friends talked about how their son had no volume control and I laughed because I say the same thing about Alana all the time. They were both like little wild animals who talk loud, play hard, and have no thoughts of consequences. It seems that they got along a little TOO well as it turned out. At one point I noticed it was quiet and realized they had taken off upstairs. I started up the stairs and noticed that Alana's door was closed. I am picturing them jumping on the bed, throwing toys, or somehow destroying something and making a huge mess, so what happened next was very unexpected. Alana comes out of her room before I can get up the stairs and I ask her what they've been up to. "Kisseees" she tells me. KISSEEES??? I send the little boy downstairs and tell his parents what our kids have been up to. They talk to their son, but he denies kissing Alana. I head back upstairs to talk to Alana. I ask where he had kissed her. She said her cheek, but then I asked her to point to where he kissed her and she pointed to her lips. I can't believe that I have to worry about my daughter kissing boys in her room AT FIVE YEARS OLD!!! Am I going to be in trouble when she is a teenager OR WHAT!! I calming explained that we do not kiss our friends, but I'm now wondering what kind of reports I'm going to start getting back from her kindergarten teacher in a couple of weeks. Life with Alana is interesting to say the least!

English

Alana was officially registered for kindergarten today. They tested her and recommended extra English services for her. So, she will attend full day kindergarten, but she will be with a different class in the morning and afternoon as only the English learning kids are full-day and everyone else is half-day. There are 10 other English learning kids in kindergarten at her school though. So, those 10 kids will eat lunch together in between kindergarten sessions. Alana is SO excited! We've been picking up school supplies here and there. I am going to have her use the same backpack I brought to China last year, but I bought her a really cute lunch bag that looks more like a girly purse.

They said they work mostly on vocabulary and grammar with the English learning kids. So, she will be tested this fall for speech services to help with some of the sounds she struggles with. Who knows, she may not need the extra services after a few months in school anyway. They were impressed that she was sounding out words already and knew her letter sounds better than the letter names. We are more than halfway through the 100 lessons in her "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" book and she is doing great. She loves doing her reading every night before bed and is writing her name now too. It won't be long before she will be reading real books! Collin's favorite after finishing the same reading program was "The Cat in the Hat."

I'm so curious to see who the other English learners are in her class and what their background and languages are. It would be wonderful for her to have other Chinese children in her class, but that may be asking too much! Only 2 1/2 more weeks until school starts, so I won't have to wait long.

I'm so excited to watch Alana's language blossom. Even though her English is functional (I understand most of what she says "Daddy brushed teeth me" for "Daddy brushed my teeth" or "You no go outside?" for "You are not going outside?"), it is basic at best. She really can't express complex thoughts or ideas. She tries to string sentences together, but they tend to get jumbled with lots of filler words and she becomes very difficult to understand. She even still struggles with simple requests "Can I drink?" for "Can I have a drink?". We've worked on that soooo much in the past year, and when she does say it correctly, she says is slowly in almost a robotic voice. I knew language would be one of the more difficult aspects of her adoption, but to be honest, I didn't realize how big it would be. Everyone says that they pick up the language so quickly and it is a non-issue, but after talking to my neighbor who adopted her daughter at 5 years old -- it can take years and years. Even now, her daughter is 12 and home for 7 years, she struggles with language. That doesn't mean that Alana will struggle forever, but it is certainly possible. Time will tell.

Collin is feeling a little frustrated that Alana is starting kindergarten and is getting nervous about the move. I know this will be a big adjustment for everyone, but things will be more difficult for him I think. He has friends here and will be playing on different soccer and baseball teams and attending different religious education classes. Alana really hadn't gotten involved in too much yet, so she'll be starting pretty fresh. I'm planning to try a new homeschool curriculum with Collin this fall that I'm really excited about. I'll plan to post an update next month on how that is going. It is a literature-based curriculum where they use real books instead of textbooks to teach history and language. I think it will be a lot of fun for he and I and Dylan will be able to participate some too if he chooses. More to come!

Remeber this sweetheart?

Does anyone recognize this little girl?

Believe it or not, that is Isabelle! She is the baby that we fostered a few years ago. She just turned three in May! I hadn't seen new pictures of her in almost two years and I could hardly believe this is the same little girl!

Here are some pictures of Isabelle as a newborn and a picture of her the day she left. Oh what memories!! I can still hardly believe they let me take her home at 4 lb 10 oz. She turned into the biggest chub and was such a funny (and fussy) baby! I still miss that pumpkin!

St. Louis

We went to St. Louis last weekend for a short vacation. We attended Alana's adoption agency's annual picnic Saturday morning. Unfortunately, no one from our travel group made the trip nor anyone that we know from Kansas City, so we really didn't know anyone there. It was still fun to see so many families formed through adoption and our kids had a great time with balloon animals, crafts, music, and beach balls! Afterwards we went to the St. Louis Science Center where they had to kick us out at closing. Victor is a museum junkie, so that was to be expected.

On Sunday and Monday we went to Six Flags. Collin and Victor got their roller coaster fix while I hung around with Dylan and Alana in Bugs Bunny Land. There were a few rides we could ride together as a family, but mostly we had to split up. Alana was tall enough to ride three roller coasters, but she really only liked one of them. She is not as adventurous as Collin was at the same age. Dylan is the least adventurous of all of our kids. Poor guy rode a seemingly innocent kiddie teacups ride at Six Flags, but was put in a teacup with a boy of about 4 or 5. When the ride started he loved the spinning, but the little boy starting spinning the teacup really fast and Dylan's neck was flopping all over and he hit his head a couple of times. I had to yell at the lady who was operating the ride (interrupting her conversation with another employee -- she wasn't watching at all) to get her to stop the ride. Dylan clapped when it was over -- he was just so happy to get off. The next day he rode other rides, but refused to step foot on the teacups -- even with Collin and Alana riding with him. I don't blame the poor little guy! That is why we are such Disney fanatics. We can ride almost all of the rides as a family and stuff like this doesn't happen.

We also went to the water park at Six Flags on Monday afternoon. Collin and Victor hit the water slides while I stayed in the kiddie area with Alana and Dylan (sound familiar?). Alana and Dylan were up to their typical park behavior. Alana finds a girl about twice her age and holds her hand and drags her around the park. I think she finds older girls because they humor her. I don't think girls her own age want to be bossed around so much. (Kindergarten is going to be interesting!) Dylan doesn't play with any kids, but walks around the perimeter to see what he can get into. He talks to the adults and older kids and plays with their sunglasses, goggles, strings on their swimsuits, etc. They had a lot of fun though. The drive to and from wasn't bad at all either. The kids are old enough to handle road trips so much more smoothly these days. Between the gameboys, DVD player and constant snacks, we make it to our destination without any crying or screaming. How wonderful!

Moving

Time is ticking away until our move. We are currently set to close on August 8th, but there is a possibility that day could move up a little. We are already lining up movers and starting to pack boxes. I'm also filling bags of trash and taking car loads of items to Goodwill. I'm trying not to move anything we haven't used in the last 5 years. Seems reasonable, right? It is amazing the things you accumulate though. Especially when you have 3 kids!! So, we'll be in our new home in about a month. Yippee!! We still haven't sold our home yet though. We are scheduled to have open houses the next two weekends. I'm praying that we get an offer soon!

Pool Party!!

We had family over for a pool party on Sunday afternoon. It was such a nice day for it and we had a great time! Every time we have one of these I wonder why we don't do it more often. It really is so much fun to have a large group out to the pool. Collin enjoyed pestering my cousins and their children (he loves having "big boys" to play with). Alana loves having people to order around (stand here, sit down, move over there, etc.). Dylan just gets into his usual mischief. I should have taken a picture for black mail later, but he stripped naked in the living room in front of everyone. No modesty at 3 years old!

We certainly missed the family that couldn't make it over. Especially my Uncle Frank. We hope you are feeling better and enjoy your trip to Minnesota next weekend. We are thinking of you!!

Babies

I hope everyone had a great 4th of July. We stayed very busy this past weekend. On Friday, we took the kids to Pump It Up for some bouncing! Then we came back for lunch and went swimming. We visited Victor's dad for dinner that evening and then watched fireworks at my dad's house later that evening. The fireworks were especially impressive this year as we found a great viewing area in a subdivision that is still being developed. Sadly the view we enjoyed may not be available next year as they continue to build homes, but we certainly enjoyed it while we could. We could see two large fireworks displays and the entire horizon was filled with smaller fireworks. It was really beautiful!

On Saturday, the kid's had a birthday party in the morning and we had friends over that evening. Here is a picture of our kids with our friend's new baby! I had taken a toy away from Dylan that I didn't want him swinging around and accidentally hitting the baby with. I thought it was appropriate that the two "babies" are crying in the photo. Dylan is still very much our baby right now. He isn't excited about wearing big boy pants and gets very upset if I give him his milk in a regular glass. He will yell at me "I WANT MY SIPPY CUP!!!" He is such a cute little tyrant!

Cheerleader

I had a revelation today as I was walking through Target with the kids. Alana started cheering about something and waving her arms in the air and stomping her feet. I told her for the 100th time to lower her voice (she shouts -- all the time) when it hit me. She would make a great cheerleader! She is tiny, so they could throw her really high. She is very flexible. She is so loud that she could cheer at the games and not need a megaphone. I need to sign this girl up for cheerleading!! Seriously though, my preference would be for her to play sports instead of cheering for others. However, I may consider signing her up for a cheer class down the road. I'm leaning towards a dance class this fall\winter after we've settled into our new house and Alana is settled into kindergarten. We were going to enroll her in soccer, but we are going to wait because of our move. Collin will play soccer again this fall, but we are going to have Alana wait at least until next spring.

I've been very lazy about taking pictures lately. I'll try to post some new ones soon!

Reading

I'm back on track with Alana's reading program. I started it earlier this year and then we got busy with the house and I slacked off big time. We finished lesson 33 of 100 tonight, so hopefully we will be very close to finishing before school starts in mid-August. That is my goal anyway!

It is funny sometimes because there are certain sounds that are still very difficult for Alana (r's for example). She also can not say the "L" sound in isolation to save her life. She can say words that start with "L" but she can not say just the "L" sound. So, when she is sounding out words, she says something like "eh" for "L". So, reading the word "little" it sounds like "eh" "i" "tt" "eh" and then she says "little" almost perfectly. Fill sounds like "f" "i" "eh" and then she says "fill". It is pretty funny really. I'm guessing this is the sort of stuff they will work with her on in school during her English as a Second Language sessions, but then again maybe not. Maybe they just do vocabulary with her and she will need speech therapy or just a lot more time to perfect some of the more difficult sounds. Time will tell I guess!

Eeeeewwwww!

My kids seemed to be trying their best to gross me out over the weekend and they succeeded!!! Saturday was filled with baseball games. Collin had an afternoon game and then we went to the Royal's game that evening. Alana started out the grossfest by eating gum from under the bleachers at Collin's game. She immediately swallowed the evidence when confronted (typical). Yuck!!!

Collin followed up later that night. I told him to use my bathroom as the downstairs bathroom was occupied. Apparently in Collin's language that means help yourself to anything in my bathroom -- including MY toothbrush!!! It was late and I was really not a happy camper at that point.

Got to love kids!! My life would be so boring (but less messy) without them!

Yikes!

We might really be moving! We agreed on a price today on the home we both fell in love with. We still have to sign the contract and schedule the inspection, but that should all happen in the next couple of weeks. I'm excited, but really freaked out too. I can't believe this is really happening! If it works out, we are planning to move in early August. That ought to be fun!

One Year Anniversary

Today is the one year anniversary of Alana's arrival home! And what a year it has been! In a way it feels like longer, but in many ways it feels like yesterday too. She really has changed so much in the past year. She is learning what it means to be part of a family. She is getting hugs and kisses everyday. She is learning to read and exploring this big world that she had little exposure to previously. We are still adjusting to life with Alana too. She has a larger than life personality and is so full of energy -- I truly wish I could bottle it up.

I'm excited to see what the next year brings for her as well. She will start full-day kindergarten in August and will receive ESL (English as a Second Language services). I'm sure her English will really take off in that environment. She will also have the opportunity to make more friends her age.

Here are some pictures of our trip last year. I can't wait to go back as a family and visit China again. I truly did enjoy my time there and I'm so excited for Victor, Collin and Dylan to experience China too!