Happy Halloween From Our Munchkins!

Impossible to get them all together in a picture!




"Nathan Potter"



"Count Joshula"

"Riley The Fairy Princess"

We Skyped With Addie!!!

Wow we just spent and hour skyping with Addison and her foster family! She is so lovely and sweet and wiggly and small 6mos size clothes fit!!! She has two bottom teeth, she was very sleepy as it was 9PM her time but she chatted a couple times and drank her bottle and wiggled and wiggled and wiggled :) She will see the orthopedic surgeon from Chicago, Dr Miller, November 4th! From what Keith (her foster Dad) said she has only had one femur fracture that they can see! Nathan had over 100 at birth! So Addie is looking like she is a very mild case of Osteogenesis Imperfecta (brittle bone disease) Keith asked us when we were coming out to visit!!! Jokingly of course! But gosh it would be awesome! It's just not in the budget. We are so very blessed that we got to chat live with our sweet baby girl! Her finding ad is in the paper right now so Keith said soon they be receiving a call to bring her in for her adoption physical! It's so nice to know that things are heading in the right direction! Poor Addie has been in the orphanage since birth and the ayi's (nannies) were too scared to hold her, so the first couple days she was in foster care she was uncomfortable with being held, however now she loves it! And is attaching to this family! She is not sitting up yet and they said they are looking for a boppy chair to help her gain strength in those muscles. I'm hoping to find someone heading to Beijing that would be willing to carry a boppy chair! As they can't get one in China. If anyone who follows this blog knows someone heading that way that has room to carry one (they are very light , just awkward in size) Please leave a comment we'll get in contact :)

On another note our Nate boy is doing well he is still very sick but he is a little improved today, Hurray! So far none of the rest of us are showing symptoms of getting sick!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

FLU!!!!! Yet God is Good!

He loved us so much he died for us!


Well our sweet boy Nathan woke up this morning with high fever, chills, headache, severe cough, and no energy. So he is home. As he has brittle bone disease he is at risk for lung complications, so I phoned our doctors office and it took 2hrs to get through!!!! Poor staff, they're swamped! Anyways apparently in our community they have stopped testing for H1N1 as it is the dominate strain they are seeing when people are being tested with flu symptoms, and if you have the flu symptoms you are being treated like you have it!!! Our Doctor advised that Nathan start Tamiflu immediately and that we stay away from the public, he didn't even want us to come in to asses him! I don't blame him! Fine with me we spend enough time in hospitals and doctors offices! So now we are just praying the other two kids don't develop symptoms and that Nathan's symptoms won't worsen. Poor guy! I'm trying to keep the other two away from him and he's lonely! I was also told to advise the school of his symptoms! So of course they are in panic mode. I hope they don't scare all the parents! It's obviously too late anyways! I was just amazed at how quickly our sweet boy got sick! He was fine last night and now he looks like "death warmed over"







On another note our scheduled Skype with Addison didn't go well, I guess they had a power outage in Beijing and we were not able to get through. So we have rescheduled for Saturday morning our time! We are all still very excited!







We had something very interesting happen last night. While we were trying to get through on Skype I decided to check my emails and we had 3 from our adoption agency, apparently a little girl with brittle bone disease "showed up"on the shared list!!!! (this is the agency that said they have never seen this disease on the list before!) They wanted to know if we wanted to look at her file! Well we knew for sure this wasn't Addison, and we truly didn't know what to do! In our hearts Addie is ours, however in our minds we still know that its not guaranteed until we have an official referral. Our agency says it looks promising for Addison referral but no guarantees! So what was this? Why was there a little girl on the list now? Howard and I decided to take a few minutes and pray together and after praying we decided not to make a decision until morning. Well not 20 minutes later we got another email saying that we should forget it as the child on the list was much older than the age range we were approved for. In our own selfish way we were relieved! And so thankful that God hadn't made us make that decision! You know I am still in awe of how much God loves us! He saw how hard it was going to be to make that decision and he chose to help us! Its kind of surreal! What an amazing sovereign God we serve! He knows all, and sees all and if we just ask for help He will show us the right path! So I challenge you to add a comment on how you have seen God reveal His love for you! I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Skyping with Addison!!!!!

Oh my is Skype the best thing ever invented? In my books.....right now it is! Keith the gentleman that runs the Foster home that Addie is in suggested that I sign up for a skype account and then we can chat with her once a week!!! What a blessing! She'll actually know our faces and voices a little bit before we take her out of the only loving home she has ever been in. I have been struggling with that lately, they (the foster family) truly do love her and want whats best for her....but is us bringing her across the world the "best"thing for her? I am preparing myself for a heartbroken little girl for the first few weeks we have her in our arms. My heart wants to break just thinking about it :( Apparently Addison learned a new trick yesterday... she was playing on the floor and rolled over!!! I guess it scared her quite a bit, and they all got a good chuckle out of that! Also she is soooo wanting to sit up on her own but doesn't quite have the strength yet. I'm sure we will have a report that she is sitting in the next few weeks! I'll post when we actually see her and chat with her on Skype! I think I am floating on cloud 9 we can't wait! Riley is planning on singing "the wheels on the bus"for her when we chat!lol! Well I must go and feed the troops!

Wow!

Check out what this young man is doing! Its a great video! We will definetly be supporting him! http://www.vimeo.com/6674672

Hurray! They've Made Contact!

Oh me oh my I am so relieved! We got news tonight that our agency got ahold of the orphanage! God is good! Addison's profile is being prepared and we should have her official referral "shortly" Okay! so what does shortly mean!?! 1 week? 1 month? Next year? Hopefully they can give us a guesstimate! Apparently Addison is receiving the same medicine our Nathan is on! And it will allow her bones to become stronger and more dense! We were not expecting that so the fact she is on this medication is HUGE! And will drastically change the quality of her life.

I'm not sure what happens next with the adoption referral, I pray things will go smoothly with us receiving the official referral of Addison. To be quite honest I was beginning to doubt that things would work out and my heart was getting weary! It's such an odd thing to fall in love with a picture of a little person whom you don't know, but you know you want wonderful blessings for them! We have had several mix up with phone numbers of the orphanage and we were starting to wonder what was going on!

We're surprised to find out Addie is from the Henan Province, as our dear friends new daughter is from the same province! She was sooo excited, as she was thinking that when the girls get older we could do a heritage trip together! These friends are such encouragers for us and we are so blessed to have them in our lives!

Well I should head off to bed! Friends if we can ask you to please pray that the paperwork will make it's way to our agency (FOI) private list as quickly as possible, for Addison's health, that the Lord will prepare her heart for us, that He will place a hedge of protection around her, that we will have prepared our children at home for Addison, and that they will adjust to having a new sister smoothly! We feel so blessed to know that many of you are praying for us! We are honored to have you all following our journey to our sweet baby girl, and we pray that our journey will truly show how amazing our Father in Heaven IS!

The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I am helped; therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song I will praise Him. ~Psalm 28:7~

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm thankful for Nathan. Because he has taught me about strength!

I'm thankful for Riley, because she taught me about sensitivity.

I'm thankful for my husband, because he taught me about love.

I'm thankful for my parents, because among a million other things they taught me about positive attitude. I'm thankful for my sister, because she taught me about everlasting friendship.

I'm thankful for my children's father, because he makes up for what I lack and then some! My kids are so blessed to have him as their Dad! And I'm blessed that he is my partner.

I'm thankful for Josh, because he taught me how to be fun!

I'm also thankful for Addison and she has already taught me about patience. ( although Istill have much to learn about that :)) We can't wait to meet you!
I hope those of you in Canada have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with the people you are thankful for! And those of you elsewhere cherish the ones your lives have been blessed with, and give thanks for those blessings! I know I will be giving thanks for those that are near and far!Happy Thanksgiving!

They've Attempted Contact!

Well our adoption agency attempted contact with the orphanage director. I guess the phone # I gave them did not work! But they did send an email! So I am checking with the foster family to see if the number I gave the agency is right. We are heading into Thanksgiving weekend so I think that we will hear nothing until after Monday. Please pray that the email our agency sent is received by the right person, and that Addison's referral will miraculously show up on our agencies list! I know it probably won't happen that quickly but even if the steps towards that happening are started I would be ecstatic! On another note..... SNOW ...... alot of it again this morning! I can hardly see the grass peeking through! Sigh, well I better go put extra socks in Josh's backpack as I still need to go buy him winter boots. I probably should have done that last night after Kids club! Whoops! I am adding another picture of Addison as her cute little face is slipping further down the page on the blog! Please Lord bring her home to us!

First Snow!

Well this morning we woke up to a frosting of fresh snow! Yes I said snow. It was absolutely beautiful! The kids woke up and were sooooo excited! It snowed all morning the big fluffy kind of snow flakes, and then melted this afternoon. What all the white stuff made me realize is that I need 3 new pairs of winter boots for my kids and only one needs a new snowsuit. Also I need to organize our "mitten"drawers. So today is the day I go to this wonderful women's book study at another church I love going however this year Riley has decided she doesn't like going to the preschool class that they provide while the Mom's are busy visiting and sharing how they liked/disliked the chapter they read. Well I thought maybe I'd bring Riley with me to see how boring for her it would be to stay with me! The fellowship part she was great colored had a snack and was very well behaved. Then for the small group part she was getting bored. I checked with the class to make sure they were okay with me bringing her in and they "all said yes of course we have all been there. " So I hesitantly brought her along. Well she started to tap a lip gloss on the table and I whispered to her to please stop. She wouldn't of course! :) And then the lady next me took it from her and said "She is really annoying me!" Well I was stunned! I sat there for a minute or two and then decided I should probably leave before the situation escalated and this lady made anymore comments.(And I said something I would later be ashamed of) So I packed up and left. As I was leaving a sweet lady came out after me and said "she just want to say sorry for what that lady said she was so rude, please come back." I thanked her but declined. I was very touched by the women who came out it was so kind of her! And I probably will not go back until Riley is ready to go to class. As for the other women I was a little mad. I started thinking what if I had been new to that church and had no friends or family and my child was really clingy and that was my only adult interaciton I had all week? How would that have affected my attitude towards that church? Its sad. I know we are all humans and we all make mistakes, but please someone when my kids are all teenagers and I have forgotten what its like to have toddlers please remind me to show those young mom's some grace! Sorry about the rant. I just was a little shocked by the whole episode! On another note I am so thankful for my kids I love,love,love them! Even if Riley is going through a clingy stage ;) Thanks for listening to my belly aching :) Here's couple pictures of my munchkins.


How could this little one annoy anyone? She is more precious than gold to me :)

Fun With Friends

We had such a wonderful weekend! Saturday was spent having play dates (for Riley) and baking treats for the Mid Autumn Moon Festival. We made our version of moon cakes (thumb print cookies with jam in them) and the kids loved helping out, I think this will be a tradition I would like to carry on with them, the cookies were easy to make and tasty! We also made some pumpkin pie as Nathan hates jam :) And then we packed those up and headed over to our dear friends house. I had put some stuff together to make traditional kung pao chicken and asian style green beans, our friends had made a marinaded chicken dish, appetizers and rice. It was DELICIOUS!!!!! What a treat! Our friends have been home for almost a year now with their beautiful daughter who was born in the Henan province of China. They also have 3 other children close in age to my 3 so it was a full house, but a blast. We finished our evening off with a fire outdoors and dessert admiring the huge beautifully lit moon thinking of our family and friends that couldn't be with us. I wish I had pictures it was such a fun evening full of laughs. Since my camera broke this summer I have been a bit of a slacker with the photos sorry. Hopefully Santa will be bringing me the one I have been hoping for! (wink, wink) We have all been loving the Fall. The weather has certainly changed and it is now cool and crisp! Howard has 4 more 13 hr days and then he will have 4 days off. Hurray! I think the 10 13hr days in a row are really starting to get to him. I know they are getting to me and the kids we miss him and hate only having an hour or two a night with him, however I know we shouldn't complain as there are many people without work. So we feel blessed. I have been very busy with two ladies groups that I attend as well as the families helping families ministry that I facilitate. And soon we will be starting a 5 week small group study on Max Lucado's new book Fearless. I quite looking forward to this study to see how many lives this book will change. On the adoption front we are in waiting mode Waiting for our agency to get ahold of the orphanage director,to secure a referral for little Addison. I have my moments of weakness where I feel that this will never happen or I am crazy to let myself get so excited for this little girl, as so many things could go wrong. However I do trust my heavenly Father and I do know his plans for me are good..... so I wait trying to be patient, trusting that there is a plan and if this is our child everything will fall into place in its right time. And if she is not our child then there is another little one that is meant to be with us. So this week will be a busy one and then Thanksgiving weekend. We are not sure what are plans are yet as we don't have family close to us, but I hope this will be our last Thanksgiving as a family of 5 and next Thanksgiving we will be celebrating as a family of 6!

Quick Update

I got ahold of our agency they phoned because they had'nt received my email with the orphanage contact info. Bummer now for sure we won't hear anything until Oct 8th. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend.

A Missed Phone Call From Our Agency :(

Uggh! We missed a call from our adoption agency, they left a message saying they needed to talk to us about a couple things, and will be in meetings most of the afternoon, so try back in 3 hrs or so. So now I am kicking myself for having a dead cell phone! Lol! What could it mean they have been trying to contact Addison's orphanage director and secure a referral of her on their private list that would then be referred to us. However China is celebrating 60 years of communist rule and the Mid Autumn Moon Festival so I didn't expect to hear anything until well after Oct 8th as all government agencies are closed for a week. Maybe its bad news :( Maybe its no news. Maybe just maybe things are working out ;) Well I need to get Riley to preschool and finish my grocery shopping. Please keep praying for us, I know I'll be in constant prayer all afternoon! Until I can get through to our agency! I will post once I know whats going on even if I'm disappointed. I hope you all have a wonderful Friday afternoon. I'll leave you with some scripture.

"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you." ~Matthew 7:7~