Jailyn's Three!!!!

I can't believe that my baby is already three years old!
She has grown so much! She is a joy to the entire family!
The older kids said I couldn't do anything special with her today until they got home from school! Sorry, y'all!
Jailyn choose Spaghetti oh's for breakfast!
Then we went to the park to feed the ducks. This was a first for Jailyn! She loved it! Of course, I was very nervous around these ducks! It's amazing - I had to hide the bread bag in my shirt so they would go away! Jailyn loved them! Next time we will bring Dad, so someone can guard Jailyn and the other can take photos!

One of Jailyn's favorite things is to get her picture taken. So we went to another park and put on this beautiful dress that Bryan's Aunt Danny and Uncle Tom sent her. She had so much fun hamming it up for the camera!




We then went to a park that had swings and slides!! She loved it! And I just love hanging out with my sweet girl!!!

She is now napping, or re-energizing for an evening of fun with the rest of the family!

Guangzhou and Typhoon Hagupit

I found this photo of the streets of Guangzhou. From what I have been able to find - Guangzhou is approximately 5 hours from the Zhanjiang area, which is the hardest area hit by typhoon Hagupit. Jorja's SWI is just inland from Zhanjiang. I must admit I am a very nervous mother!!!

Here's a map of Guangdong:

Little Susannah is home!

I posted a while ago about Susannah. Her adoptive parents arrived in China to find her in the hospital! God moved mountains and they all have made it home. Susannah is still a sick little girl. Along with her cleft lip and palate she has a heart disorder. She may be having open heart surgery next week.

On top of that she is having a hard time bonding with her new momma. This is common for adoptive kids who loved their caregivers. It is good that Susannah knows how to love but it is very hard on Mom!

Praying for Susannah and her family!

Wonderful lady!

There is only one wonderful women in this world (so far) who taught our three older, crazy kids.

Yes, Brady had Mrs. Steiner in 5th grade. Kenzie had her two years later, also in 5th grade and now Conner has been blessed with her as his long term sub from the first day of 4th grade until tomorrow. He was so excited to finally get a teacher that both of his older siblings had!
Mrs. Steiner is a wonderful teacher, an incredible person and a cherished friend!
Mrs. Steiner, Thank you for being such a help to all of us!!!
Thank you for letting God use you in each of my children's lives!
You are incredibly special to all of us!!
Now that you aren't subbing full time - let's do lunch! :)

Okay, and because Jailyn felt left out and wanted her picture taken -
here's are silly little girl!

Typhoon Hagupit

This Typhoon has hit Jorja's providence!
I have no idea how this is affecting our sweet girl! Thousands have been evacuated but I have no idea if her orphanage is in danger. Please pray with us as we trust God will take care of our girl and all of her friends!
I have not seen her city listed on any reports so, I guess that is good news.

I hate being away from my kids! I let our kids sleep with me when it is raining - a typhoon??? Are you kidding me?
I need to hold my beautiful girl!!!

Jailyn's glasses

I realized that I hadn't posted any photos of Jailyn with her new glasses! She loves them! The first week, they kept falling down her nose, so we went back to have them tightened. They are perfect now! Jailyn loves them! It is the first thing she wants to put on in the morning and the last thing she takes off at night! They are her newest accessory! :)
Not to mention the best attention getter! :)

Update on Jorja:
We are hoping no news is good news. We haven't heard anything and are desperately praying for some word! I'm not very good at "winging" it. And to think we may be in China for Thanksgiving or even worse Christmas - I have a lot of preparations to make.
Jailyn is ready for us to go. She told me last night. "You and Daddy need to go to China to get Jorja!" I said, "I know, we really need to go!" She continued, "And I need to stay at my home with Mimi and Papa Paul!"
Well, I guess she is ready for us to go - and will have no problem with us leaving!
She has grown up so much!!!



Jailyn has been doing some homeschooling! She loves adding to her calendar every day and going over the days of the week. She loves singing her letters and singing her ABC's song. She is such an easy student! She loves to spell her name with her magnetic letters! She's so proud of herself!

Though I love having her home and schooling her myself. She will begin a special speech therapy preschool. Conner was in this preschool also. It's a great program through our school district.
Jailyn had her first meeting with her teacher. She of course has her wrapped around her little pinky already! We met all the office staff and some other teachers. Jailyn is pretty comfortable with all of them already and thinks she is the princess of the school!
Here is a photo of her outside the school, after our first meeting. My baby is all grown up!!!

How Time flies!!!

Okay, so I had a dream last night! Kenzie, Conner and I dropped Brady off at the United States Naval Academy for his college career. He looked so handsome in his service blues!
He was among all the other Plebe's who were scared to death! In my dream they hadn't shaved his head yet. I'm sure I wouldn't of stayed for that!!!
GO NAVY!!!!

Though the Naval Academy would not be a bad place for him - I'm not quiet ready to send him off! He's just a High School Fish!!!!

"I always want to eat!"

Yes, this is a quote directly from Jailyn!
Since she has been home she has been known to everyone at the older kids schools, karate, church, soccer... anywhere we frequent, as the girl who is always eating! So, I thought it was hilarious today when she admitted it herself!
She has her Mamma's appetite, but thankfully she has her Daddy's metabolism!!!

Prayers needed for this little girl!

This is always a fear of every adoptive parent that I know - for one family it is a reality. This family has traveled half way around the world to finally hold their precious little girl, with excitement in their hearts they watched many other families unite with their children. But, their child was not there. They were finally told that she was very sick and in the hospital. Please pray for this beautiful family!
They want to get their baby girl healthy enough to bring her home to the states to get her better care!

She is sooo smart!

Jailyn is just amazing! She is so smart! She loves to help everyone!
Here she is learning to tie shoes! She is crazy amazing! She is so close to actually accomplishing this!
We have begun "home schooling". Well, a little bit. Jailyn loves talking about what day it is, so we do our calendar every day and the days of the week. She also knows her ABC's and loves to sing "her" ABC song.
She will begin a 2 day preschool next month. This is really speech therapy but it is in a classroom setting! She is going to love it1

Three generations!

We were so lucky to have Mimi and Papa Paul come visit us a few weekends ago! They stayed home with Jailyn while the rest of us went to a fun soccer tournament! We missed Jailyn so much - but it would have been a long weekend with a 2 year old, at 7 games, 2 nights in a hotel, and two soccer teams to fend for! Thank you Mimi and Papa Paul!!! Jailyn had soooo much fun with y'all!!! She can't wait for y'all to come back!

Outdoor soccer season has begun!

Yeah! We are off to spending the weekends at the soccer fields again! I love this time of year! I have an excuse to not clean the house on the weekends! It's great!
Brady is still fighting his pneumonia, so he played very little during his game, and didn't ref at all. His team lost to a very good team - 2-1. It was a very exciting game! The boys played great! GO MSC 94B's!
Kenzie ref'd her first game! She had a good time, one of her teammates was ref'ing also. This made her feel a little bit comfortable! Her team won 3-0! This is the highest score they have ever put up - yeah MSC 96G!
Conner had two games - Saturday his team tied 2-2! Very exciting game!
His Sunday game MSC 99B's won 6-1!!! Yeah!!! It was a great game! The boys were passing the ball beautifully!
Jailyn watched all the games and did a great job!! Thankfully there are different friends at each game that she loves to play with!

What a fun weekend!!!

Changing day to day!

Jailyn is growing up soooo fast! I can't believe it's been 19months since we first held her! She was such a helpless baby!! Now she is in charge of everyone in the household! She knows where everyone is, or should be, at any given time of the day! Jailyn loves to learn! She knows her ABC's and can count to 15, she knows colors and shapes too!

I feel like I have re-arranged her room a dozen times! She came home a little baby - needing an infant car seat, crib, changing table, walker and baby toys. Now she is in her "big" girl bed! Some dear friends gave us this awesome toddler bed! She loves it! There is more space in her room now. No crib, no changing table... but soon we will be adding another toddler bed for Jorja! And again I will need to re-arrange everything again! :)
Today Jailyn is trying to kick a fever and runny nose. Here she is taking her medicine before nap time! She loves medicine!

Simplifying my life!

HA! HA!! Simplifying my life!!!
This summer was so crazy with everyone home and wanting to go different directions! Now that everyone is back to school life is still crazy! Right now Brady, Kenzie, and Conner are in three different schools! Jailyn will begin speech pre-school at the end of this month. And when Jorja gets home she will either take ESL classes or I will be home schooling her. Not to mention all the extra curricular activities we are involved in! So, I really need to simplify and de-clutter my life.

This is why I have begun this new blog! The first blog I had was to share with our family and friends about the our adoption of Jailyn Hope. The blog has now become a family blog, where I can brag about my kids and all! Our second blog was begun to share with others how our adoption of Jorja is coming along. I thought it was a good idea to give Jorja her own blog, but now I feel like the extra blog is not a good idea. She is already part of our family - even though she is not home to share every day with us. We know she will be home soon!

So, here we are simplifying and minimizing any extra clutter! This is our new family/adoption blog!
Enjoy!