From Lollipops to Lipgloss

Happy Fourth of July!

2009-07-04T16:58:00.000-07:00

Pictures from the past few days...

We are having a blast with Nanna here. Bjorn came to spend the holiday weekend with us. We've been swimming and having water balloon fights. We also had fun going to lunch with our good friends, Kristi and Adyson.

Time is going by too fast, but we are living life to the fullest and loving every minute of it. We are so thankful to have this time with Nanna.

No time to caption these pictures much, but they're pretty self-explanatory.

Enjoy!

Happy Independence Day!

Kelly's whiney face... she's getting really good at whining... uuugh!

SWEET HUGS!!!

Nanna got Caleb an early birthday present...

A very nice watch that looks great on him!

Water balloon fights...

A game they made up with the water balloons...

you can see the balloon hit Bjorn in the third picture.

Nanna and Boo

Nanna Comes to Town!

2009-06-29T21:25:00.000-07:00

I can't believe how long we've waited for this day... it's been a little over a year since Kelly came home, and Nanna couldn't wait for the day to come where she could come to California and smother her sweet little Baby Boo with hugs and kisses...

Well, I'm happy to share that that day has finally come!

Nanna made it here to California from Texas via Amtrak- adventurous gal that she is- and we are so happy to have her. She is such a blessing to us. Kelly didn't take long to warm up to her, as these pictures below show. She was very good at giving Kelly the space she needed, but she engaged her at the same time. She brought Kelly a precious little baby doll that Kelly has been toting around and mothering ever since Nanna placed her in Kelly's arms.

Nanna has been a prayer warrior and an encourager to us from the moment we told her we were going to adopt Kelly, so it has been a very heartwarming time for us all to have her here, but I think it's been especially emotional for Nancy to finally meet this precious little gift God has placed in our lives- her granddaughter, Kelly Elise. Many tears of joy have been shed by one very tender-hearted Nanna.

Nanna brought a whole extra suitcase stuffed full of goodies for all three of her love bugs! I couldn't believe all the gifts she had for everyone... (Awww, she's always doing stuff like that!)

Just a side note: Nanna's train got in a few hours earlier than expected, so in our scramble to get to the train station to pick her up, I completely forgot to grab my camera! I wanted to capture pictures of the first moment Kelly met Nanna...but no such luck. Uurgh! At least I grabbed the camera as soon as we got into the house...

hOt weatheR + kidS = OtteR pOpS!

Kelly decided to climb in this empty bin to eat her otter pop,

which made clean-up pretty easy... (Thanks, Kelly!)

Now Kelly is letting Nanna help her with her otter pop...

Do you want a bite, Nanna?

Nanna was in tears just watching Kelly swim with her daddy and brother...

she was so amazed at how strong and fearless Kelly is in the pool, and how much love she shares with her brother and her daddy.

Clint stays cool in the water while we visit...

WATERMELON- YUM!

This morning when Nanna got up and saw Kelly watching Mickey Mouse,

she had to join in the fun. The two of them dancing and laughing was quite a sweet sight.

Later on, Kelly had to climb up in Nanna's lap to "help" her on the computer.

Princess Kelly props herself up on her new ladybug pillow Nanna brought her from Texas.

Kelly shares her goldfish with Nanna.

Kelly's not the only one who loves Nanna. So does Kaya!

The feeling is mutual... Nanna has two Westies at home she's missing, so Kaya is providing her with her much-needed "dog fix!"

There is no doubt...

After 24 wonderful, fun-filled hours of Nanna being here,

all the grandchildren agree:

(More pictures with Caleb and Camryn to come!)

More from Kelly's One Year Gotcha-versary!

2009-06-22T21:29:00.000-07:00

Kelly's Jie Jie, Camryn, decorated for her Mei Mei's special day.

Camryn curled pink ribbon and hung it from the chandelier.

She cut pink roses from the garden and chose the perfect vase in which to display them.

She arranged the roses beautifully in the little glass vase and placed her arrangement on the center of the table with love.

We got some gifts for Kelly and wrapped them in wonderful gift bags for Kelly to open. (Most of which were recycled from other gifts we received-- so if you see a gift bag you recognize, thank you! We got more than one use out of it!)

Here we are- everyone is helping Kelly open her gifts!

Kelly got some new sunglasses- oh, she has a face for sunglasses, doesn't she? And she got some gum- one of her new favorite things.

Nonnie got Kelly a camera! She can actually take real digital pictures with it. Now Kelly can be just like her mommy!

We got Kelly the pretty dress you see on the table there, with a matching headband and sandals. Kelly actually picked the dress out... last time we were in Gymboree, she brought it over to me and said, "Pretty!"

I didn't buy it at the time. I went back later and got it for her to surprise her.

This was Kelly's favorite gift. We got her a Chinese musical doll.

She plays the song "Jasmine," so appropriately, we named her Jasmine.

Kelly loved Jasmine and did not want to put her down!

Camryn made the bow you see in Kelly's hair for her!

Doesn't Jasmine have a sweet little face?

Can you tell Kelly loves her?

Camryn loves her little China doll, Kelly, so much!

Here we are, on our way to dinner. Isn't Kelly looking so super stylish? We went out to eat at The Canton for wonderful Chinese food.

Daddy helps Kelly get ready to eat.

It was extra special to have Nonnie with us.

Kelly was hungry and ready to dig in!

Oops! Don't forget to pray first!

(Kelly loves to remind us to pray before we eat these days. It has become her job at meal times. Every time we sit down to eat, she puts her hands up to her face like this and looks at each of us as if to remind us to pray first. It's the cutest thing ever!)

"Thank you, God, for my family and my food. Bless us all. Amen!"

"Hot Dog! Let's eat!"

YUMMMM!

One thing Kelly loves to do is celebrate with a song and a dance!

Her favorite right now happens to be Mickey Mouse's "Hot Dog" song.

Oh Kelly, can you get any cuter?

"I don't think so!" says big sister adoringly.

"Hot Dog! Hot Dog! Hot Diggity Dog!"

And finally, we received our fortune cookies. This is always very special to Camryn, who saves all our fortunes in her treasure box. She always makes sure we each take a turn sharing what our fortunes say before we leave. Each one of us had a different one, and of all the fortunes, this was Kelly's. It actually made me cry.

We got a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake to finish the celebration.

Not only did we celebrate Kelly's Gotcha Day, but the next day was my mom's birthday, so we got to do a double celebration!

Here are the special girls getting ready to blow out their candles. We sang "Happy Birthday" and "Happy Gotcha Day" to them, and for the rest of the evening, Kelly kept singing, "Happy! Happy! Happy!" She's something else, I tell ya.

Blowing out the candles together... such a good team!

What a wonderful day.

What a wonderful girl.

What a wonderful world.

How good it is...

2009-06-10T23:49:00.000-07:00

to remember what was, and look ahead to what will be.

Today we celebrate the one year anniversary of Kelly's "Gotcha Day!"

These first pictures are from China. Most of these I don't think ever made it on the blog. Anyone who's been to Shamain Island will recognize these spots with fond familiarity. (Lucy's especially!) Some of these shots are not of the greatest quality and I apologize, but still, I liked them so I thought I would share. (Even though I hate myself in pictures and I am in almost every single one! EEK.)

Kelly one year ago

Kelly today

Today marked one year since the day Kelly was placed in our arms... screaming, crying, terrified... but ours.

Gotcha Day seems like it was a lifetime away. These pictures show how much Kelly really has changed.

We decided to go and take some pictures at Starbucks today since that is where we spent a lot of time taking pictures when we were in China! We didn't pose exactly the same, but I added a few in from Guangzhou Starbucks so you can see the difference in Kelly. I have so many more to share from our Gotcha-versary celebration so those are coming next. I captured some really great ones of Kelly- who was definitely the life of the party!

What I'm about to say has been said so often that I hope the power of these words isn't lost in the familiar, but...

I cannot imagine our lives without her.

She has brightened our world so much when we never even knew it needed brightening.

Kelly is like color TV...

Before color TV, no one ever knew what they were missing- black and white TV seemed fine. But once TV came out in color, black and white just didn't cut it anymore. No one wanted to watch TV unless it was in color.

Our lives are like that... since Kelly came home, we don't ever want to go back to what used to be. Everything is more bright and vibrant with Kelly around. I can't believe we never realized how much was missing before.

Starbucks Guangzhou

Starbucks Visalia

Starbucks Guangzhou

Starbucks Visalia

Starbucks Guangzhou

Starbucks Visalia

Starbucks Guangzhou

Starbucks Visalia

We love you our little Starbucks princess!

Bound for Hong Kong this Time Last Year

2009-06-06T13:28:00.000-07:00

Oh, what a wonder it was...

stepping onto that big jet plane bound for China one year ago today... flying half way across the world, all because God had one very special little girl waiting for one very fortunate mommy and daddy to take her home to America to be our daughter forever and ever, amen.

I am so thankful God in His great mercy saw fit for us to adopt Kelly. This journey has been full of great struggle, but greater blessing. God knew it all before it ever came to be, and as hard as it's been... as inadequate as I've felt at times... there is a real sense of honor and privilege that God chose us for Kelly and Kelly for us.

I'm filled with wonder and awe at all God has done, and I'm humbled that we have been able to be a part of it all. But our story isn't over... it's just begun. I'm just amazed that this story is our story at all.

You can click here to go back to June '08 posts if you want to read about our story of our trip to China, or simply click on the June '08 link on the sidebar. Thanks for being a part of it. Thanks for all your love and prayers. We are blessed by each and every one of you.

Kelly the Piano Prodigy

2009-06-01T17:32:00.000-07:00

Click collages to enlarge

Okay, so she hasn't exactly proven to be a child prodigy, yet,

but she has been enjoying my mom's piano since she gave it to us about a month ago.

Camryn dressed Kelly up and took most of these pictures a couple of weeks ago. She asked me to post them on the blog, and since I'm still working on several other posts that I haven't finished yet, I decided I'd better put "Camryn's Piano Photo Shoot of Kelly" up before Camryn gets on my blog and does it herself!

I am so behind on blogging, I don't know if I'll ever catch up, but such is life with two teens and a two-year old!

Disneyland

2009-05-26T16:19:00.000-07:00

Here is the second installment of pictures from Disneyland- FINALLY.

Sorry it took so long for me to follow up with these- my mom came to see us for Memorial Day weekend, which was so nice, so we've been busy with her.

It was so hard for me to decide which pictures to post and which ones to leave out, as they all tell a story, even when they aren't the greatest photographs, so I apologize there are still so many. Believe me, as many as there are, I really did cut a lot out! I also didn't do any creative collages to make it fun to look at them, so you'll surely be sick of Disneyland pictures by the end of this post, if you even make it through to the end!

These were taken at the actual Disneyland Park when we visited it last Saturday.

I thought I should add that we really weren't sure how well Kelly would handle a big trip to Disneyland. Because of her attachment issues, we feared it might be too overstimulating for her. Most attachment therapists recommend no more than two hours of highly stimulating atmospheres such as these; obviously, two days is much more than that! So we were taking a chance of having some real challenging behaviors in deciding to do two days at Disneyland, but we felt Kelly's made so much progress that she would probably do alright and even really enjoy it.

Well, Minnie girl that she is, she exceeded our expectations and did so well with everything! Not only did she just go with the flow, but her behavior was phenomenal. She never threw a fit- she never even got cranky when she was tired. She just seemed happy to do whatever everyone else was doing. As long as she was with us, she was fine. The only concern was that she got scared at times- more on that as the pictures below will tell the story.

Since we've been home from Disneyland, Kelly has had more bad days than good days, so the trip wasn't completely without consequence. I think I am finally realizing that whenever our routine changes, her pattern is to go with the flow at the time, but then a few days later, the challenging behaviors surface.

On top of everything with going to Disneyland, the evening we got home, her daddy had to go out of town for training for two weeks. I think that has actually been the hardest thing for her to deal with, poor little thing. He came home for the weekend and she seemed really mad at him- like she felt abandoned and was mad at him for leaving her. She adores her daddy so she does not like it when he leaves, and she doesn't know not to take it personally. Thankfully- he comes home for good this Friday. The next time he has training, the big kids will be on summer break, so we will be able to go with him!

Okay, enough of my rambling... finally, the pictures!

Right when we entered the park, we saw Mickey Mouse come out,

so we bee-lined over to meet him.

Kelly wasn't looking so thrilled at the thought of meeting the oversized mouse, so I was reassuring her that he was nice... pointing out that the other children liked him, "See, they're giving him hugs and high fives."

Can you tell she's not buying it?

She points at Mickey and then whines and whimpers...

So our turn comes to meet him, and we begin to walk up to greet him, but she screams and cries before he even gets a chance to shake her hand. There is no cajoling her. She's completely flipping out, so I quickly step away...

So much for getting a picture with Mickey.

The big girls left us, so they weren't there when we got this picture in front of the famous Disneyland castle.

We rode the Jungle Cruise ride... very relaxing and entertaining. Kelly liked the elephants. Can you believe this guy isn't real?

Kelly can't.

This guy was a little scary, but we just laughed at him!

Next, we rode Pirates of the Caribbean. Here are a few of the newer scenes with the characters from the movies.

We could not believe how dead-on Captain Jack Sparrow was! He looked and even moved just like Johnny Depp did in the movie.

The girls had rejoined us to ride Pirates, so we got a picture of them with Kelly after the ride. This "finger in the mouth" thing was getting pretty funny. Kelly did it every time she wasn't sure about something... the girls couldn't get her to take it out of her mouth for the picture, so they figured they'd join her!

The big people decided to ride some big rides, so I thought I'd take Kelly on the "Winnie the Pooh" ride. I mean, "Winnie the Pooh" is so sweet, surely she wouldn't be scared of it, right?

Wrong! It was scary! At least to Kelly. It kind of had an "Alice in Wonderland" feeling, where it was just weird... the end of the ride was happy, but by then, Kelly didn't care... she just wanted off.

Here she is after the ride. Can you tell she's still feeling a bit scared? She doesn't have her finger in her mouth, but it looks like she's thinking about it.

As much as Kelly loves music and dancing, when I heard the live music as we walked by this band playing, I knew it would help Kelly forget all about that scary old Pooh ride.

She's dancing. Yay! That's a sure sign she's feeling better.

These little fences were everywhere. They provide great climbing fun for two year-olds who get tired of waiting in line.

I had to include a few pictures of some flowers, because half of Disneyland's beauty is in all of her flowers!

These festive arrangements were on every light pole along Main Street USA.

Look who conked out!

We took in all the pretty window scenes along Main Street while Kelly napped.

We stopped in at City Hall and got Kelly this button that marked her very first visit to the happiest place on earth.

Still sleeping, so we did some shopping in the cool (as in air-conditioned) stores.

After Kelly woke up, we met back up with the big girls and went to ride some rides together. Here they are in front of King Arthur's Carousel in Fantasyland.

Kelly liked "It's a Small World" but wasn't sure how those dolls moved and sang.

"Can I have one of those talking dollies, daddy? Pleeease???"

Next, we headed to Toon Town.

We stopped in at Minnie's house since we saw her out front, taking pictures. We asked Kelly if she wanted to go and meet Minnie...

"No, no, no." says Kelly.

"Please don't make me meet her, daddy. She's scary!"

So we went next door to check out Mickey's house, since he wasn't home at the time.

But look who wanted Camryn to go back to Minnie's house?

Oh, we were cracking up... she pushed Camyrn all the way back over there!

She definitely wanted to keep her distance, but she was very curious about Minnie and wanted stay at her house and watch her as long as we would let her.

Next, we rode the teacups. Here we are, doing what you do when you go to Disneyland on a Saturday: standing in line!

Pretty girls smile for the camera.

I just love to look at the teacup ride... it's all so colorful and pretty.

I wish I could hang lanterns like these with vines growing along them all over my backyard.

Kelly really liked the tea cup ride!

Oh no! The girls are about to get eaten by a giant whale!

It came time to save seats for the parade. We were thankful for the opportunity to sit and relax for a while. These pretty balloons were being sold before the parade started.

The "Celebrate With Us" parade begins!

Kelly loves it!

Silly girl!

Oh, I love this cute, scrunchy nose grin!

Goofy came dancing along!

It happened so fast that I didn't get a chance to widen my focus, but you can see in this shot that Goofy decided to come up and say hello to Kelly...

Uh-oh! Bad choice, Goofy! Kelly was traumatized!

But thankfully, after a few mommy-snuggles, she was fine and continued to enjoy the parade.

She's doing the moves with the dancers now.

And clapping too!

She really got into it by the end...

...and waved goodbye to everyone as if they were her best friends.

(Just don't get too close, friends!)

Splash Mountain

2009-05-20T23:16:00.000-07:00

Isn't it funny how some people can not go anywhere or do anything without their cell phones attached to their ears?

Okay, so if I'm honest, I have to admit- I usually don't leave the house without my cell phone either! BUT- that's because I have children who are not always in my care, and I want to be reachable to them at all times, so I am justified.

What's your justification?

I digress... so Camryn and I are looking at our pictures the other night from Disneyland, and we are zooming in on the one of her, Shayli and Clint riding Splash Mountain. Caleb actually took the picture- it's taken during the big drop of the coaster, where you get really wet at the bottom.

So we wanted to see the expressions on their faces because Camryn was really scared to ride it... so we are zooming in, checking out her expression, laughing and carrying on... and then we notice...

Do you see what I see?

It can't be!

Yes, it is!

Look at that guy who is next to last, in the red shirt.

Go ahead and look... I'll wait.....

Do you see what I see?

YEP!

He's talking on his cell phone!

I mean, what in the world?

Is he a stock broker?

What other good reason would there be to be talking on your cell phone while you are riding Splash Mountain!?!

Was it an emergency? Maybe that's it. But his body posture certainly doesn't incline me to believe it was. He looks so nonchalant, like, "Yeah, whatever... I'm just riding Splash Mountain, so what are you doing?"

So- this is to the "Cell-Phone-Talking-Splash-Mountain-Riding-Dude":

PUT DOWN YOUR CELL PHONE AND BE IN THE MOMENT- YOU ARE ON SPLASH MOUNTAIN- ENJOY THE RIDE!

I should note that despite Camryn's facial expression here, she did get off the ride with a big smile and said she loved it!

Disneyland's California Adventure Park

2009-05-19T13:35:00.000-07:00

I have good news, and I have bad news...

The good news is that we had a blast at Disneyland.

The bad news is that we are home from Disneyland.

Oh, don't mind me... I do love my home- but all play and no work- now that's the life for me!

We did have a wonderful time and, boy, do I have the pictures to prove it.

We are still learning how to use our new camera though, so we didn't use it to it's fullest potential, but we still managed to get some great shots. I really want to take a class so I can learn and understand how to best utilize all the settings on my magnificent machine, but there was no time for that before Disneyland, so I played around with the settings and did the best I could with what little I've learned so far.

We visited California Adventure on Friday, and Disneyland on Saturday.

Today I will post the pictures from our visit to Disneyland's California Adventure Park. Then I will do a follow-up post with pictures from our visit to the actual Disneyland Park on Saturday.

Kelly seemed to thrive on our excitement as we anticipated going to Disneyland. She didn't even really know what was going on, or what to expect, but she was still so excited- I think just because we were.

This is something that has changed so much about her. It used to be that it didn't matter how happy or sad you were, she would be completely unaffected... disconnected... detached. But now, does she ever connect with our emotions and feel them too. It's so wonderful to see her so full of life!

Here she is, smiling big as we waited for our shuttle to arrive at our hotel to take us to Disneyland. Her expression tells it all. We all felt like this!

Unfortunately, this is a rare thing: a picture of Clint and I together! Usually, one of us is always the one taking the picture (which is actually the side of the camera that I prefer to be on!) but Caleb did a pretty good job taking this one of the two of us, don't you think?

We were all very happy that Camryn's best friend, Shayli, got to come with us. She is one of the sweetest girls on the planet. Here the girls are, occupying Kelly while we load the stroller onto the shuttle bus.

(Notice Kelly's pink Minnie outfit? Yes, silly me... I got her one in pink too!)

On the bus, ready to go!

Look who greeted us at California Adventure Park! I guess this is "California Goofy!"

Hi Sully!

We got into the park just in time to save seats for the Disney Pixar Parade. Here we are, eating yummy ice cream treats while we wait...

Kelly loved her ice cream sandwich.

(I just have to note- can you believe I actually made that bow to match her outfit? Just don't look too closely... lol ;)

Being silly before the parade starts...

The crowd gathers...

Keeping Kelly seated is always a challenge... Caleb's always a big help when my arms tire.

Lightening McQueen started off the parade- Vroom! Vroom!

"What's her name" (?) from Monsters Inc...

Kelly's taking it all in... such a pretty girl...

(Notice how dark the shot is? I lightened it with my photo editing program, but this is the best I could get without it getting too grainy. Clint took several great ones of Kelly watching the parade, but he forgot to look at his monitor to see that they were all coming out extremely dark!)

Crush sprayed water on the crowd...

Kelly's getting into it now!

A Bug's Life

Toy Story green army men- aren't these guys great?

Mr. Potato Head

Woody

(How we didn't manage to get Buzz, I don't know..?)

Finally, some light bounced and Clint got the gift

of this one well-lit shot.

The big girls rode a couple of rides during the parade, so they found their way to us afterwards. Kelly was thrilled to have them share their pretzels with her, of course!

Let's see... ice cream, pretzels... what else can we eat?

How about a Churro?

Oh, these wonderfully bad foods are all a part of the fun of going to Disneyland, aren't they?

Another thing I love about Disneyland are the flowers! There are so many beautiful flowers everywhere. Look at the beauties behind Kelly here.

I took Kelly on her first little ride while the others rode some big rides. Here we are, standing in line, watching it go. We were in "Bug's Land" where they have most of their little people rides in California Adventure Park.

A better look at the ride. Kelly wasn't so sure about it...

"You mean we're going to get into those flying boxes, Mommy?"

Belted in and ready to go.

She's still not so sure about it... in fact, she's pretty darned scared, poor little bug.

"What's going on here?"

"Why is everything moving? Why are we up in the sky? I don't like this feeling, Mommy..."

"Get me outta here!"

Poor baby girl... she did not like that big scary ride! Not to worry, it was about over when she began to cry, so it was only a moment until I was able to hold her and comfort her, and she recovered quickly. We met back up with Dad and "Bubba" as she now calls Caleb.

She soon found herself feeling safe up on Caleb's shoulders and forgot all about that scary old ride.

There's nothing like a ride on Bubba's shoulders to bring a swift smile back to Kelly's sweet face!

Some pictures of the park as dusk set in and it took on a magical glow.

We met back up with the big girls, who were having so much fun together.

Everywhere we went, they walked arm in arm like this. So sweet.

We really wanted to go on "Soarin' Over California" but the line was too long and they weren't offering fast passes anymore. We decided to take this picture for Shayli's mom, since it's her favorite ride.

We ventured back over to "Bug's Land" to see if Kelly would ride any more rides with us. We stood in line for this ladybug ride, but at the last minute, we decided not to have her ride it as it seemed pretty fast-moving and she was getting tired. Caleb and I stayed back with Kelly while Clint and the girls took a ladybug spin.

Kelly wanted her daddy...

Smiling at Kelly...

She gives them a smile back...

After the ride, we could tell Kelly was about out of gas... from the looks of this picture, I think Daddy was too.

Look Who's Going To Dinseyland!

2009-05-15T06:06:00.001-07:00

I just couldn't resist this darling little Minnie outfit I found on ebay for Kelly's first trip to Disneyland. You gotta love ebay!

We are packed up and ready to go- can't wait to see all three of my kids light up when we walk through the gates of the happiest place on earth.

Get ready for what's sure to be an overload of pictures when we get back. I did get my new Nikon (DID I FORGET TO MENTION THAT HERE???) so I will be putting it to good use!

My little Minnie says, "Have a magical weekend!"

Catching Up!

2009-05-11T16:17:00.000-07:00

I am so excited... we are getting ready to go see Mickey Mouse at Disneyland this weekend! We're going to celebrate Camryn's graduation from 6th grade, Caleb's graduation from 8th grade, plus we're celebrating Kelly's birthday and our one-year anniversary since she's been ours- so Disneyland seemed the perfect place to do a triple header celebration. I really should be packing right now, but I'm desperate to catch up and have so many photos to post, so I'm going to do my best to work a post or two in before we leave!

The next few posts will be dedicated to updating you on everything I can remember from the past month or so that I haven't blogged about...

Things I will cover in the days (weeks) to follow:

1) 1) Our trip to Colorado- I'm so behind! It's been over a month since we were there- that will be what I talk about in this post.

2) 2) Kelly's progress with attachment & development

3) 3) More on Kelly’s Birthday

4) 4) Little Gym

COLORADO

Wow! Was it ever wonderful to get to spend some time with my sister and all our extended family in Colorado. These are some of the people that I love the most in the whole entire world, so anytime I get to go to Colorado, I am one very happy girl!

Joel took some pictures of the girls and I played around with them. Can you guess whose eyes those are in the one above?

This one was my favorite of Hannah.

This was Joel (my B-I-L) and Rinnie’s (my step-mom’s) first time to meet Kelly, so that made it extra special. Joel was so sweet with Kelly, and Rinnie, well- let’s just say she did all she could to spoil Kelly rotten in a week’s time... which I loved, by the way, and wouldn’t have wanted it any other way!

Rinnie let Kelly pretend she was drinking straight from that big old juice bottle. Of course, there was no juice in it, but Kelly sure had fun with it, as you can see!

She thought Rinnie and her juice bottle game was the bomb!

Look at Rinnie's big smile, and look how Kelly gave one right back to her! LOVE IT!

Of course, later that evening, Rinnie sealed her new bond with Kelly with a yummy lollipop! Oh boy, does she ever know the way to her grandbabygirl's heart!

Although going to Colorado to see my sister is usually one of my most “favoritest” things to do in the whole world, I must confess; it wasn’t the best visit I’ve ever had...

It had nothing to do with my sister or anything like that- it was just that Kelly had a hard time with the adjustment of being out of her familiar surroundings, so it took it’s toll on my ability to enjoy myself like I normally would. I think both Kelly and I were in a bit of a funk, and I hated it. I knew I had limited time with everyone and I wanted to make every second matter, but dealing with Kelly was exhausting, so despite my best efforts to snap myself out of it, I knew I just wasn’t fully myself.

With Kelly's struggles with everything, she acted out by hitting the dogs or the kids. She was hitting so much that we thought we might need a straightjacket for her... so here's Caleb's version!

The kids were hoping for a big snow while we were there. We never got one, but they did enjoy getting to see it fall a little here and there...

Another thing was that I couldn’t really leave Kelly, so my sister and I didn’t get to go do anything - just the two of us- like we usually do, so that was disappointing as I LOVE to spend girl time with my sissy all to myself… I often refer to her as “my happy place.” LOL

Here's my sister feeding Kelly frosting from the tube... I think my sister is now Kelly's happy place too!

If you saw my post about Camryn's birthday from Colorado, you know my sister baked and decorated a beautiful butterfly cake for her. I will never forget what a sweet gesture of love that was- it took a LO-O-O-O-NG time for her to do it- and for a mother of four, that's quite a feat!

Look at how Kelly's smiling up at my sister... so sweet!

Here's the finished product. See- I told you it was beautiful. Don't Emma and Camryn look adorable?

My nieces and nephews are so precious and I loved spending time with them also, but again, with Kelly’s issues, I didn’t get nearly enough time to fully enjoy them as much as I’d have liked. They’re growing and changing so fast, so I treasure any time I am able to spend with them, and we did have some sweet moments together as you’ll see in the pictures below. They are all the loveliest, most precious children and I really wanted to pack them all up in my suitcases and take them home with me!

Eli is so sweet- he enjoys pampering the mommies. One night, he agreed to style our hair for us...

He had some interesting styling ideas...

Did I mention that getting my hair styled is probably the most relaxing thing on earth for me? More so than a massage or a pedicure... as you can see by the ridiculous look on my face in the picture below.

Here we are, all dolled up by Eli! It was so much fun.

The girls got in on the fun too. Emma and Hannah loved playing with Camryn's hair.

I think Camryn loved it too.

Caleb and Camryn enjoyed their time with everyone. They always love to spend time with their Grammie (aka Rinnie) and uncle Joel. Grammie had to work most of the time we were there, but they stole every moment they could get together. She also made us a beautiful breakfast the day before we left which was such a treat. You could taste the love she sprinkled all over every biscuit, every bite of fruit, every egg and every slice of bacon…. mmmm, good!

Uncle Joel took the big boys out star gazing one night, which was so cool for Caleb. Colorado Springs has so many beautiful places to go to appreciate the great outdoors, and Joel is always so good about getting the kids out to enjoy those places.

Caleb and Camryn have such a close relationship with my sister and their cousins since they spent so much time together last summer when we went to China, so it was really special to see them all reconnect and to watch how close they’ve all become. I am envious of their bond, actually… I haven’t had a chance to spend that much time with my sister’s kids alone since they were much younger (before Eli and Hannah came home) and I realize how it is through those extended times together that you really get close. Caleb, Camryn and my sister share such a special bond that they have several “inside jokes” that I’m not even on the inside of! HEY! No, it truly brings my heart such incredible joy to see the ones I love most loving and knowing each other the way that they do.

I’m so blessed to have such a beautiful, loving sister who did so much to spoil us while we were there. The hardest part is waiting until we can be together again. Thank God for phones, Facebook, and e-mail!

Kelly's Birthday Party Slideshow

2009-05-07T17:42:00.000-07:00

Sorry the slideshow is so long. I had three times as many pictures as are in the slideshow, so it's actually been cut down a lot. LOL

Remembering

2009-05-01T20:24:00.000-07:00

On this day last year (May 1, 2008), we got our LOA (Letter Of Acceptance).

Oh, what a happy day it was!

Our LOA was an important document (the biggie!) we had been waiting for since January 18, 2008, when we got our referral, so the lo-o-o-o-ong wait (101 days to be exact) had become excruciating, especially when Kelly's birthday came and went and we still had not heard any word on it.

Little did we know, two days later we'd get it and would be traveling to China five weeks later! It must have been all those red balloons everyone in our family sent up on Kelly's birthday! (Click to see my post on it.)

Over the past few weeks, I have been finding myself reminiscing a lot... remembering the feelings I had this time last year, and the whirlwind that quickly ensued after we received our LOA. It was such a time of agony, anticipation, wonder, mystery, excitement, and oh, did I mention anticipation..?

I have been missing China too. It rained today and it was a warm, humid rain-- it totally brought back memories of China!

For those of you in the adoption process, yet to bring your little one home, feeling the agony of the wait... try to embrace every moment of it. Before you know it, your baby will be in your arms and it will all be history. It really is an amazing journey and such a special part of your child's story... cherish every moment.

So, back to present day--

Kelly's birthday was WONDERFUL, and I will share more pictures soon! (I still need to download them off Connie's camera she let me borrow...I don't have the right cord!)

I enjoyed Kelly so much on her special day. I just felt overwhelmed with an abundance of love and thankfulness for her- there were hearts floating all around her, I'm sure!

And did we ever have fun at the zoo! We always enjoy spending time with our friends, Kristi and Adyson, who went with us, so that made it all the more special to share the day with them. The girls had a ball and were so sweet together.

Kristi got some great pictures with her camera and I will share some of her shots also, but I only have a couple on my computer right now, so I'll give you a teaser until I get more to share... soon.

Watching the flamingos

Climbing over the seat at McDonald's...

that's my girl in true form!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1... Happy Birthday Kelly!

2009-04-29T06:22:00.000-07:00

I still have much to share about our precious daughter,

and many photos to go along,

but it'll have to wait because

today is Kelly's special day!

We decorated the house last night

and Kelly woke up this morning

to balloons and streamers,

and

Mickey, Minnie, Goofy,

and Donald (decorations)

all wishing her a happy birthday.

She was all gasps when I brought her

out and she saw everything- so cute!

She's having a ball on her new riding toy

that also greeted her this morning for her birthday.

This thing is amazing-

I think it's the best toy ever invented!

You will have to see pictures later...

I still am without camera =( WAAAAAAHHH! )=

although my sweet friend, Connie,

has let me borrow her point and shoot.

She needed her big daddy camera back,

but she didn't want to leave me completely empty handed,

so I do have some shots from that camera

that I can upload later.

(Thanks so much my faithful friend =)

Oh, this camera drama has got me all in a tizzy...

I tried to order the D60 kit from Ritz Camera

last week and they, too, had it backordered!

AARGH!

The good thing is,

it looks like I am going to get that D90 after all,

because we can't find the D60 kit anywhere

(for the price we want to pay),

but we have been able to find some great deals on D90 kits,

so yay for that!

But as wonderful as that is, I don't have it yet,

so all this rambling about the camera is to say

I am so upset that

I do not have my nice camera

for Kelly's special day!

But what am I going to do?

Whine about it all day long and

miss the blessing of enjoying my little girl?

No way.

I will enjoy Kelly on this, her second birthday,

her first birthday with us-

nice camera or not,

and I will thank God for this precious gift

of a daughter He has given us.

We are going to the zoo with our friends,

Kristi and Adyson today!

Yay!!!

Speaking of the zoo, a certain little monkey

keeps climbing on me, so I better go...

More pictures and Kelly stuff to come!

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 6

2009-04-28T14:30:00.000-07:00

EEK- I'm running out of days to highlight all of the things about Kelly that I want to!

How about a "Two For Tuesday"?!

These collages make it so nice to show a lot of pictures in one post... so, this first collage captures our little Kelly quite accurately.

You see, Kelly is a CLIMBER.

If it's climbable, Kelly WILL climb it. She's a fearless and adventurous soul.

Some days, I admit... okay, most days, I admit... it drives me crazy!

But I know deep in my heart that Kelly's adventurous nature is a gift, and I'm willing to bet that one day, it will be the source of much pride and joy. I just don't like it that much right now, while she's still so little. She's still learning her boundaries and is so accident prone, so it can be a bit exhausting.

If you look at Kelly's face in some of these pictures, you can tell that normally, I would never let her climb all the way up on the desk while taking pictures of her in the act, so naturally, she was confused. But you can also see that she was delighted!

I should add (to any toddlers looking at these pictures)- do not try this at home!

CLICK TO ENLARGE

This second collage is special to me because it shows how much

Kelly loves lotion.

Why is that special, you might ask?

Well, when we learned of Kelly's attachment issues, one of the things I began doing is giving her massages with lotion. It's a really wonderful bonding exercise that fosters almost every element of bonding: skin-on-skin touch, eye contact, movement, and lots of smiling.

At first, Kelly wasn't so sure about the massages, but as time went by, she grew to love them. She also grew to love lotion, and now she loves to put lotion on every day, at least once a day! I usually let her do her hands and I do the rest of her body, but for these pictures, I let her put it on her legs too, which she really enjoyed!

CLICK TO ENLARGE

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 5

2009-04-27T21:18:00.001-07:00

Only two days until Kelly turns two, and this countdown about her wouldn't be complete if I didn't mention how much our little Boo loves to dance.

It's so fun to watch her- she can light up a room with the joy dancing brings her.

I hope she always enjoys life to the fullest like this, and never stops dancing like no one is watching.

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 4

2009-04-26T17:38:00.000-07:00

(click to enlarge)

I'm pretty sure I am not alone

when I say that my little Kelly

loves the outdoors.

I don't know if there is a child who doesn't!

I am learning how important it is for this

little flower

to get out and get some

fresh air

and sunshine

each and every day.

She loves to help me

if I'm working in the yard.

I get a kick out of watching her

face light up with

delight

in herself when she feels

she can do what I am doing

and is helping me.

I'm so thankful for the

beautiful Spring weather

because lately,

we're spending most of our time outside,

which means Kelly is a happy girl.

And if Kelly is a happy girl,

then I am a

happy mommy!

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 3

2009-04-25T13:40:00.001-07:00

As I have watched Kelly blossom over the past eleven months, one thing I've observed is that the girl loves shoes!

All day long, from the time she wakes up until it's time for bed, she is bringing me a new pair of shoes to help her put on. Sometimes she gets frustrated because she wants to wear two pairs of shoes at the same time, one on top of the other! She probably changes shoes 10 times a day, but her favorites to wear when we're out and about are definitely the red cherry flip flops.

As you can tell, they've seen better days, as have many of them, including my favorites, the Lelli Kelly's. They're such cute shoes, but I love them simply because they bear her name!

Kelly has not always loved shoes, however. There was a time when she absolutely hated having shoes on her feet. When we were in China and bought her some of the ever-popular squeaky shoes, we thought she'd be delighted. Nothing could be further from the truth! She screamed bloody murder when we put them on her feet. We thought it might be the squeakies, so we took them out... nope, she still hated them! Oh well, good thing it was summer and it was really too hot for shoes anyway.

It was a good couple of months after Kelly got home before she finally decided she liked shoes, and there's been no looking back since!

Camryn was the one who helped her to change her mind about them, and if you haven't seen this post about how it happened, you have to check it out. It's one of my favorites!

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 2

2009-04-24T18:22:00.000-07:00

The next thing you should know

is that

Kelly

loves

the

POOL!

Countdown to Kelly's Birthday - Part 1

2009-04-23T12:04:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking about Kelly's birthday coming up- it's Wednesday, April 29th. I can't believe my baby's going to be TWO!

One of the things I decided to do for the blog is to highlight some things about Kelly- some of the things about her that make her "Kelly", as well as some of her favorite things...

I want to do one a day until her big day. I haven't planned it all out... I may do a few a day as it gets closer.

So this first post is about the fact that Kelly LOVES to brush her teeth. She probably brushes her teeth 5 times a day! Sometimes she carries her toothbrush around with her and wants to brush her teeth while she watches a show or while we run errands. She's so silly! But hey, I bet you won't find any tartar build up on those teeth!

Isn't she adorable?

I love her so!

A Puppy and a Popsicle

2009-04-22T11:26:00.000-07:00

Oh Happy Day!

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

2009-04-21T21:59:00.000-07:00

Finally, here is the collage of pictures from the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo!
What an awesome zoo, and what a beautiful day it was. To top it all off, we had an absolute blast with our new friends- Natalie, Isabella, and Elliana.
As many of you well know, we are all so spread out in blogland that it's a rare treat to actually get to meet one another in person. Since we were visiting my sister in Colorado, and Natalie lives about an hour from her, we had the privilege of meeting them in person at the zoo! It was so exciting for me to get together with one of my wonderful blog friends. Natalie's blog is adorable- it's called Ladybugs and Daffodils. She always has great pictures and cute stories to share.

I met Natalie after we connected through our blogs, and I quickly grew to adore her as she is just one of those people who will do anything for a friend- or probably a stranger too, for that matter! She is one of the most positive people I know, and she has the biggest heart. She is open, generous, kind, and always so super helpful. She gives me tips she's learned to help me on my blog (like this collage- thanks N!); she shares insights with me to help me with bonding with Kelly; she encourages me all the time in every endeavor or struggle I have; she tells me when there's a good sale or even a blog makeover giveaway; and she's just an overall sweetheart in every way. I could go on and on, but I know I'm probably already in trouble (with her) for gushing over her this much, so I'll stop by saying it was soo fun to get to meet Natalie and her darling girls. They are absolutely beautiful and both girls have such sweet personalities too. Camryn adored them and really enjoyed getting to hold little Elliana. It was obvious that Elliana is very attached to her mommy, so Camryn felt very privileged when Elliana decided she could let Camryn hold her!

Back when I met Natalie in cyberspace, we became fast friends as we had so many things in common, and especially because both of our youngest daughters share a bit of history in that they both spent the first several months of their lives at Yangxi SWI. It's so cool to me that we can connect our girls here in the States, so they can share that very special bond. I think it will be especially good for them as they get older and begin to realize their feelings about it all. To have one another and to know they will understand in ways that we, as parents, never can, makes me feel so thankful to know them, and especially grateful for this Internet world! We'd probably never have connected otherwise.

Natalie did a great post about how wonderful this blog community is, and how much she enjoys checking in on everyone and all their little cutie pies on their blogs... I couldn't agree with her more. I love watching all our little ones grow and hearing all about what and how everyone is doing, so keep it up, bloggers! And for those of you who don't have blogs yet, PLEASE, start one! (You know who you are!)
Okay, enjoy the pictures! I think they're pretty self-explanatory, although I would love to caption them. I'm a little disappointed that the pictures are so small when you look at the collage. I probably should have used a smaller amount of pictures, or I should have done three or four collages, but I'll keep working at it and remember for next time!

If you click on the collage, it should enlarge.

Kelly, Kelly, Quite Contrary...

2009-04-21T17:30:00.000-07:00

How does your garden grow?

(Okay, I know that didn't rhyme, but it's what came to mind when I saw these pictures ;)

Our first yellow squash

These pictures show the progress of our little garden! I can't even tell you how much joy it brings me to watch our vegetables grow. It's almost ridiculous how much pleasure I get out of it. I must go out and check on my garden half a dozen times a day, just checking in on everybody (it's so bad I've personalized my vegetables!), pulling new weeds that have popped up, and making sure they all look good and nobody is wilted. But most of all, I am looking for something that's changed since I was out there the time before. This morning, I was so excited when I saw these big, yellow blooms on our squash! All this sunshine we're getting is really giving our garden a boost!

Our first baby zucchini

Kelly in the garden on St. Patrick's Day

Kelly in the garden today

Oh, how I love having a garden!

A big thanks to my sweet neighbor, Connie, for letting me borrow her camera while I'm without one. That's how I got these awesome shots, and many more that I will share soon!

Out With the Old- In With the New!

2009-04-20T12:24:00.000-07:00

So it has been a little crazy here lately! There is so much I want to share, but can't seem to catch my breath long enough to sit down and write much of anything worth reading. After a virus attack on our already old computer, we decided to take the plunge and get the iMac we've been wanting for years. This is my first post from it, and while I have MUCH to learn, I must say: I LOVE IT!!!!!

As if the computer crashing wasn't enough, my cell phone battery kept dying, like ten minutes after it would be fully charged. So I went in to get a new battery and ended up walking out with this new phone, a new blue tooth, and a new car charger... eek! Yet another new contraption I need to figure out how to use. I still don't even know how to put it in vibrate mode, or on speakerphone. I did manage to get it on speakerphone the other day, but I don't know how! I've got some serious studying to do...

Then, this weekend, my darling little angel baby (sarcasm definitely intended) got a hold of my camera and broke it! Now it wasn't the nicest camera to begin with (I've actually hated it for the most part,) but it was the only camera I've had. We have been shopping for a digital SLR for several months now, (waaaay over-doing it on the research if you ask me... huh hem, CLINT!) so it's not like it was a huge loss because we were planning on getting a new camera anyway, but the problem is that I do not have my new digital SLR yet, so now I am completely "cameraless." WAAAAH.

The place we planned on ordering it from (with a couple of lenses and other goodies) is currently out of stock, and their price and reputation can't be beat, so I don't know what to do... I know we should wait until they get it back in stock, but I DON'T WANT TO WAIT!

Of course, Kelly looked so cute dressed up for church yesterday, but did I have a camera to snap her picture with? Why no! I didn't! Then she and Camryn swam yesterday afternoon and they were so cute laying out together afterwards (Kelly is really mimicking everything we do lately so she was laying exactly like her big sister right next to her, and it was just so darling), but did I get a picture of that??? Noooooo....

So you see why I hate every day that goes by that I don't have a camera? Ugh, it's torture, I tell you!

Well, here is a picture of my soon-to-be new camera. I really want the D90, but I'm such an amateur that it would probably be more camera than I would know what to do with right now, so this will be a good starting point for me. I intend to learn lots with this baby and it will be a stepping stone to the next best camera in a year or two.

Kelly's First Easter

2009-04-17T08:03:00.000-07:00

I am going out of order on my posts here... I still want to share some great Colorado pictures too, but I'm trying to figure out how to do a collage with those, so it might take a little longer before I get them up here.
This Easter was a little crazy with us getting home from Colorado at 10PM the night before, so I must admit, we did not dye any Easter eggs this year. I felt terrible about it, but decided to let myself off the hook since Kelly's so young, I figured she probably wouldn't remember anyway. The big kids are kind of past it... =(

We were lucky to make it to church on Easter morning, as draggy as we all felt from our full day of travel the day before. I was so glad we did because it was a very powerful service that helped me to get my focus off all the suitcases I still needed to unpack and onto what was really important- praising God for the amazing gift of Jesus and the hope we have because of His resurrection.

We got home from church, had lunch, and then the big kids and I filled plastic Easter eggs with candy and hid them in the backyard for Kelly to hunt. I wondered how she would do, never having hunted Easter eggs before, nor seeing anyone else do it either, but she caught right on and seemed to really enjoy herself.

Here she is - Camryn is giving her

her Easter basket so she can start hunting!

"Oh Boy!"

"This is going to be fun!"

Finding her first egg...

She wanted to open each egg as she found them... so cute!

See that blue one in the background?

Let's see if she finds it...
Yep- she found it!

She had to open it and see what was inside.
"Mmmm, this jelly bean is yummy..."
"Uh-oh, it's stuck to my tooth!"

She just couldn't get enough of those jelly beans!

Camryn comes to see if she can help...

Caleb comes to help too...

We purposely waited to mow until after the Easter egg hunt.

Those eggs really hid well in the tall grass!

Sharing some jelly beans with daddy...

It turned out to be a very simple but especially blessed day with Kelly home for her first Easter. Hope you all had a wonderful Easter as well!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo pictures to come next!

Wordless Wednesday

2009-04-15T16:04:00.000-07:00

Photo courtesy of Natalie =)

Mark Keathley

2009-04-14T11:47:00.000-07:00

I forgot to mention back when the Keathley's were here (because I think most of you already know it), but Mark is an amazing artist.
I completely forget to mention it most of the time, because in my eyes, they are simply our very precious friends... but when I stop and think about the talent God has blessed Mark with, I can't not mention it.
Mark and Bonnie are both amazing people- they have brought so much joy and beauty into our lives- we are blessed to call them friends. But for those who don't know them, I'm happy to at least share the beauty of Mark's artwork with you.

Check out Mark's website, or simply google "Mark Keathley" and you can see some of his incredible work for yourself. These are a few he did several years ago, with Caleb and Camryn as his subjects. Can you tell which one is Caleb, and which one is Camryn?

How Toddlers Entertain Themselves At Airports...

2009-04-14T09:57:00.001-07:00

Kelly played "Peek-A-Boo" with us while we waited to board our plane...Peek-A-Boo! I see you!
Ah-ha! I found you Mommy!
Oh wait, I was the one hiding, wasn't I?

When "Peek-A-Boo" got old, she listened to some tunes with Camryn on her iP0d...

And then she dug through Camryn's bag to see if there was anything interesting in there...

These are just a few of the things a toddler will do for entertainment at an airport...

the cutest thing was that she managed to entertain many more than just herself in the process... oh how everyone loves a baby!

Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back...

2009-04-13T08:58:00.000-07:00

I am learning that this is the nature of attachment work with children who suffer with attachment disorders.

We are home from Colorado. We got home late Saturday night. We had such a wonderful time with my step-mom, my sister, and her family... that will be another post... but Kelly certainly showed signs of distress at the upheaval of her routine, and we all paid the price for it in one way or another.
Now that we're home, things are a little better, but we're still seeing signs of anxiety and aggression, so back we go to keeping her in the pouch the majority of the day, with minimal freedom or control for her.
She has been raging off and on this morning since I put her in the pouch, which I am so glad for... not because I like to see my baby girl upset (no, no, no) but because it confirms my suspicions that she has spiraled out-of-control again, because if being close to me causes her to fly into fits of rage, then close to me is exactly where she needs to be.

While we were in Colorado, the most glaring manifestation of her issues was aggression towards the other children and the animals. It seemed she was constantly hitting or biting someone... sometimes because she was mad, but oftentimes, for no apparent reason at all.
She pulled my sister's lab puppy's tail on several occasions. (Maggie is such a good puppy- never sneered, growled, or even flinched, when she had every right to- Kelly pulls hard!) Since my sister's other two dogs are Aussies and they have no real tails to pull, Kelly simply hit them or pulled at their fur and skin. No wonder Chili got a little snippy with her. (Don't worry, she never made contact with Kelly, but she did her best to let Kelly know she better back off.)
I tried to keep the dogs "off limits" to Kelly, but because I was not as consistent with her as I should have been, there were several occasions where she managed to get to the dogs despite my efforts to keep her from them.
I admit, I was rather lazy with working with her while we were there, so this is the price we all pay for my laziness. I think I had a vacation mentality where parenting was concerned while I was there. I just wanted to hang out with my sister and enjoy her and her family, and not have to be "on" 24/7 with Kelly like I normally would be. I knew this trip might cause some disruption to Kelly's progress, so I figured we'd just get back to our routine when we got home. I think the problem is that when you parent in "vacation mode," while you don't "do" as much as you normally would, your child still does what she does, so you can only overlook or ignore so much... finally, it gets to a point where you get frustrated, so you become reactive instead of proactive. For me, that just is never good. It is much more draining on every level.

I do have to say, Kelly did so well in so many other aspects, especially considering how much she's had to deal with in her short little life, so it's not all bad. We saw lots of smiles, eye contact was good for the most part, and she showed appropriate affection towards me and others (preferred me- wasn't inappropriately affectionate with others), so all progress was not lost. It's mostly the control issues that I am seeing her battle for again, but like I said, I knew this would probably be the case, so I'm not surprised.

What did surprise me was how Kelly initially reacted to coming home... I wasn't sure how she would be with Clint, but she was very happy to see him and has exchanged lots of hugs and kisses with him. And she seemed so happy to come back home to her little nest... almost as if going away and coming back made her realize
this is her home...
this is where we always come back to...
this is where she belongs.

It will most likely be a long week as we work to regain the ground we lost... pray for us if/when you think of it, and I'll update with some pictures and stories from some of our more fun times of our week in Colorado. Oh, and watch for pictures of Kelly's first Easter too!

Blessings~

Camryn turns 12 in Colorado!

2009-04-05T17:46:00.001-07:00

We made it to Colorado just in time for Camryn's 12th birthday! Wow- I don't know how my little peanut got so big on me! One more year and it's the teens! EEK. Seriously, she is growing into such a lovely young lady and I'm so very blessed to be her mom.

The kids have been enjoying every minute of their time with their Grammie, Uncle Joel, Auntie & especially their cousins, as have I.

Auntie made this beautiful butterfly cake for Camryn. She spent so much time on it- Camryn really felt special and so very loved.

Flowers for the birthday girl!

Spending a quiet birthday morning playing chess with her brother.

Camryn loves to play board games.

Grammie gave Camryn the cutest Truthwear hoodie for her birthday.

Josh, Caleb, and Eli watching Avatar.

Pretty girls...

can also be silly girls!

Emma, Camryn and Hannah snuggle together.

The girls playing make-up...

Fun times with family make birthdays the BEST!

Yosemite

2009-04-02T21:23:00.000-07:00

It's hard to beat the glory of God's creation displayed at Yosemite National Park. Add the love and laughter of family and close friends to enjoy it with, and it's like a little slice of heaven on earth.

Love that big smile!!!

And this peaceful one too...

Did I mention my new favorite picture? Sorry, it's just that I can't get enough of it. Kelly, that is!

The kids and I are heading to Colorado for Spring Break to enjoy more of God's beauty, not only in nature, but more importantly, in his people. We get to spend a week with my step-mom, my sister and her family. We'll also get to see some friends while we're there.

I am loving life these days!

More pictures to come soon...

Our Nature Walk with the Keathley's

2009-04-01T11:26:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite things to do when we have friends over is to go for a walk together. It's always so nice to walk and talk and enjoy the simple pleasure of getting some fresh air while taking a relaxing stroll together.
It was doubly nice this time as we not only got to walk and talk together, but we also got to enjoy the beauty of the spring flowers that are in bloom right now.

My friend, Bonnie, absolutely loves flowers, and being from Texas, she has an even greater appreciation for the beauty of all the flowers we are able to grow here in California. She was in love with so many of them, as I am too, so we had fun taking pictures of flowers together. We had to laugh at ourselves because we didn't know the names of some of the flowers... which is especially bad for me, since I live here and see them all the time!

Bonnie taking a picture of me- taking a picture of her.

Camryn and Kaya- can you tell Kaya is ready to go?

This is called Sweet Broom, I believe. It's the big yellow one behind Camryn and Kaya in the previous picture.
Amazing yellow color!
Left to Right: Kaya, Colter, Caleb, Camryn, Bonnie, & Mark. How I love them!

Bridal Veil
Mark & Clint walk and talk with Kelly enjoying herself in the stroller.

Colter ran way up ahead with Kaya,

which made Kaya very happy, naturally!

Here are Bonnie, Camryn, & Caleb slowly catching up.
In awe of the incredible shade of blue of this "something or other..."

Mark's not crazy about it's scent, but he's awed by it's color.

Bonnie taking the beauty of it in...

Our sweet friends:

Colter (being silly!), Mark, & Bonnie.

Their oldest son, Landon, is off at college, so he wasn't with us this time. We all missed him. I've known them since Landon was a baby, so this picture seems incomplete without him.

We had to make our little model, Camryn, pose in front of the beautiful blue "whatever it's called..." We later asked someone at a nursery what it is... she said it's a type of a Lilac. I can't pronounce the rest of it- I only got the Lilac part down! Isn't Camryn beautiful?

Pretty Red Petunias

Red Bud Trees in Bloom

Close up of the Red Bud

They say friends are the flowers in the garden of life.

If that's so, then I'm so very blessed with the

most beautiful flowers growing in mine.

Happy, Happy Times!

2009-03-31T21:44:00.000-07:00

I have so many things I am dying to write about here...
and pictures I'm eager to share...
But time never seems to allow me to do all I'd love to do here.

Maybe tomorrow...?

Sigh.

Well, it's been wonderfully busy around here. We were able to enjoy some precious times with some of our oldest, dearest friends who came to visit us over the weekend. I do hope to be back tomorrow to share more pictures of our times spent with them, but for now, I just had to share these few pictures...

For those of you who have been wondering how we're doing with Kelly as we've been working through her attachment issues (since I am so behind on updating you!)... well, here are some pictures
worth
a thousand words.

That last picture is my favorite.
As much delight as it brings me to see our darling Kelly with such a beautiful, authentic smile on her face
(Yes, it's true! She's finally really smiling!),
this last picture is absolutely amazing to me.

I find myself going back to it,
over and over again,
staring at it in complete awe.
So many words come to mind as I attempt to describe the look on her face...

peaceful, serene, content, secure...

yet none seem big enough
to truly express my amazement
at the miraculous transformation
that's taken place inside our precious little girl.

This picture is proof to me

that after so long,

our baby girl is finally finding that

her safe place
is
in my arms.

I couldn't ask for anything more.

My cup is full to overflowing with joy and thankfulness to God for all He has done.

One happy momma,

Nonnie

2009-03-26T21:11:00.001-07:00

My mom (aka Nonnie) came to visit us this past weekend. What a treat it always is to have her come see us. It was especially wonderful for Camryn this time, because her Nonnie took her out on a pre-birthday shopping spree.

This particular shopping spree meant a lot to me, not just because my mom took Camryn shopping (which is every 12-year old girl's dream), but especially because of the motivation of my mom's heart that prompted the whole thing...

A few weeks back, my mom and I were talking on the phone, and she shared with me that Camryn had been on her mind. She said she sometimes wondered if things were harder for Camryn now, being thrust into the "middle child" position- no longer the baby- but sandwiched between her high-achieving big brother, who's always receiving some sort of academic accolade- and her adorably cute little sister, who gets all of the attention now. My mom wondered if Camryn sometimes felt lost. She said she wanted to do something to let Camryn know how special and loved she is.
Camryn is a pretty self-assured girl, but I do think she has had moments of feeling a bit invisible between her big brother and her little sister, so I really appreciated my mom's thoughtful perception. Just the fact that she was mindful of Camryn and considered how she might feel, and then to put that thought to action by doing something to bless Camryn the way she did- well, it just made my heart full.
What a sweet thing. And Camryn really appreciated it.
At first, Camryn had a hard time accepting her Nonnie's generosity, so she was timid about picking out things that might be considered expensive, or frivolous. But as her Nonnie reassured her that she wanted to get her whatever she wanted, that this day was about her, Camryn finally relaxed and had a really good time.

Here she is with her loot!

She said to me, "Mom, I never knew you really could shop 'til you drop, but today, I think we did!"

Nonnie had fun splurging on Camryn--
She loves her sweet Camryn,

~ not to forget her precious Kelly too!

(Sorry Mom, I guess I didn't get one of you with Caleb,

but we do know how much you love him too!)

Nonnie, we love you.
Thank you for coming to see us-
and thanks for all you do to show us
how much you love us and how much you care.
We are truly blessed!

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun!

2009-03-24T06:28:00.001-07:00

Whenever Camryn has friends over, I am reminded that girls really do just wanna have fun... here are Shayli, Camryn, and Ashlyn, doing just that!

Eating strawberries and whip cream together...

Even this is fun when you're with your girlfriends!
Life is good when you've got friends!

A Beautiful Day at the Park

2009-03-19T22:02:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a beautiful day for many reasons.

For one, the weather was absolutely glorious. You just can't get much better for early Spring.

For another, we got to go play at the park! Kelly was one happy girl...

But the biggest reason it was a beautiful day yesterday was because we got to be with old friends... and new!

Several weeks back, we "bumped into" a family at the mall, and soon realized we had something in common- International adoption! Unfortunately, it's pretty rare in our area, so we were mutually delighted at our chance encounter. I think the friendship was pretty instantaneous, but we made it official with this play date at the park yesterday.
The darling little cutie you see in the polka dot top is Adyson- Kelly's newest friend. Adyson is 2 months younger than Kelly. She came home from Korea to her forever family in May 2008, and we brought Kelly home from China in June 2008, so we have lots in common.

Connie and Emily joined us, which made it even more special, not only because they are dear friends, but also because Emily and Adyson share in their Korean heritage. It was fun to watch our girls play together and enjoy getting to know one another.
They held hands, hugged, and seemed genuinely warm with one another. It was precious. Of course, the little ones had their "toddler moments," especially Miss Kelly, but they were few and far between, thankfully.

Enjoy the pictures! A big thank you to Kristi, Adyson's mommy, for taking them! (Somebody had a blonde moment and completely forgot her camera!)

Such a serious face!

C'mon, Kelly, won't you give us a smile?

I think I see a slight one there...
Oops, spoke too soon...

Emily wanted to go to the other park for bigger kids, but she was a trooper and stuck it out with the littler ones.

Adyson is such a doll!

Oh, won't you give us a smile, pretty little mei mei?

Adyson's a lucky girl- she's got some wave in her hair!
Kelly loved playing with the wood chips- she got them all over herself right after this picture was taken!

Big girls like Emily know how to smile pretty for the camera!

The little ones, not so much! Still, they are undeniably adorable.

Kristi said Adyson has just started looking away whenever she wants to take her picture. Oh, how I know the feeling! It's only because Kristi took these pictures that we got so many of Kelly actually looking at the camera! She rarely does that for me...

Kelly protesting that I took her juice cup away... Emily's doing her best to help, and Adyson looks genuinely concerned...

So cute together... and looky there... I think that's actually a smile on Kelly's face!

Adyson riding the horsey- quite a challenge with her cup in her hand!

Oh, how this picture shows-- the girl has a zest for life!

Playing at the park made us all hungry, so we went to lunch afterwards at one of our favorite spots.

What a fun day we had!

Can't wait 'til next time!

Happy Saint Patrick's Day

2009-03-17T17:16:00.001-07:00

Okay, I just had to include this picture.

True to his German heritage, Clint enjoys a good beer.

This is his way of celebrating Saint Patrick's Day!
This weekend, we planted a garden!

Here's Kelly helping me tend to it today...

Grow little vegetables, grow!
Kelly says "It's too bright out, Mommy!"

I guess I'm going to have to get her to start wearing sunglasses!
Camryn was in the spirit today before school,
besides, who wants to get pinched, right?

She's so cute with her green bow!

Science Olympiad

2009-03-17T16:20:00.000-07:00

This weekend, Caleb competed in the Regional

"Science Olympiad" Competition.

Here he is with his partner, Zack, before their first event. They have been working after school three days a week + some weekends on this... we were rooting for them to do their best!
Discussing their first event, "The Scrambler," right before it began...
Setting it up...

Watching from the sidelines with high hopes that it does what it's supposed to do...
There were a few kinks, but "The Scrambler" did well!

A "thumb's up" from their science teacher, Mr. Carmean.

He's always so positive and encouraging.

There were two other events that we were not allowed to watch, so I don't have pictures of those.

Caleb's main event that was his strength was Astronomy.

Here they are at the Awards Ceremony awaiting their fate... if they place high enough, they go on to State...

Ah, wouldn't you know it?! They got First Place for Astronomy!

Here's Caleb with the rest of the teams from his school.

Caleb and his partner will go on to State competition now!

Good job, Caleb!

We're so proud of you!

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

2009-03-16T11:32:00.000-07:00

If you notice changes to the blog and they don't make sense, it's because it's under construction! Stay tuned as my wonderful blog designer, Ashton, perfects it!

Lovey Update

2009-03-15T19:04:00.000-07:00

Kelly after her nap- sporting the cutest bedhead you ever did see!

I forgot to say in my previous post, but Kelly's been doing wonderfully without Lovey. She has a harder time settling down to sleep without it to suck on, but Thursday night was the first night she slept through the night since we said goodbye, so I was extremely happy and oh-so-grateful!

I felt a little silly about my emotional "Lovey post" and had to laugh at myself a couple of days later, but it really was hard for me to see Kelly have to say goodbye, so even though I feel a little silly about it in hindsight, I think one day Kelly might read this and, because I posted about it, she'll know how much I honored her cherished Lovey.

Thanks for all the sweet comments you all left- they made me feel better about posting about it. =)

Random Pictures

2009-03-15T14:46:00.000-07:00

Whew! What a weekend we've had! That's another post entirely, but I wanted to share some random pictures from the past week.

Caleb giving Kelly horsey rides!

She loves it!

We had some beautiful weather this week. The ice cream man came down our street one warm afternoon, so here are Caleb and Kelly enjoying an ice cream with the neighborhood kids.

It was Kelly's first ice cream from the ice cream man. I wonder if she's going to know to get excited now (like all the other kids) the next time she hears that musical truck strolling down the street?
Now that Kelly's hair is finally long enough to do some fun things with, I ordered some bows for her from Katelyn & Co.

My friend Natalie always has her girls looking so cute with bows in their hair, so naturally, I HAD to have some too!

Here are some pictures of Kelly with her new bows in her hair.

Out lunching at Red Robin- looking as cute as button!

Did I mention Kelly LOVES french fries?

Since the candy store was right by Red Robin,

I had to get lollipops for my lollipop girls!

Some more with Kelly and her new hair bows... you probably can't see them, but they're cute little yellow ones with white polka dots. (That's Clint in the background- he was stretching after a run... and that's Chloe, our cat, napping after a nap... lol)

Lastly, here's Kelly being silly with her bucket on her head! She thought of this all on her own and she cracked herself (and me) up, so I had to get a picture. (Can you tell, Kaya doesn't get what's so funny?)

Get Your Word On...

2009-03-11T13:48:00.000-07:00

Here's a great site I found blog browsing. I've always wished Christian tees would get a vintage update... lol (get it?)
Seriously, these are so well done. This world could use a little more of the word right now... check them out. Oh, and you can enter to win a t-shirt... check their blog page.

A Time for Saying Goodbye...

2009-03-09T22:47:00.000-07:00

A tribute to Kelly's "Lovey."

Today, Kelly was a very brave girl: today, she said goodbye to her Lovey.
Here she is, sleeping for the first time since we've known her, without her Lovey in her mouth.
I'm so proud of my big girl, but it brings tears to my eyes, because I know how much she's adored Lovey.

If you haven't figured it out by now, Lovey is Kelly's "blankie." It's actually a cheesecloth towel. It is the only thing Kelly brought with her from the orphanage besides the clothes on her back.

Little Lovey has slept with Kelly every day & night since Kelly's been home, as I'm sure was the case in the orphanage. Lovey has brought Kelly much comfort over the past 21 months of her life, and I'm so thankful Kelly's had Lovey; but I have known for some time now that we really needed to say goodbye, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it... until now.

This picture was taken the first time we met. Kelly cried so hard until the nanny gave her Lovey, then she calmed right down.

Back when we started learning more about bonding with a child who suffers with an attachment disorder, we learned that "comfort objects" such as Lovey, hinder little ones like Kelly from attaching.

From what I understand, children who struggle with attachment will attribute any comfort they receive to their comfort object, not their parent, so it becomes a barrier between the parent and the child, and hinders the bonding that needs to take place.

Now these comfort objects are a very normal part of childhood, so this is not to say they're "bad" by any means! I'm just saying for a child who suffers from an attachment disorder, they can be a hindrance. But even knowing that, it's taken me almost two months to finally bring myself to the point of willingness to let go of Lovey, so this has been no easy thing.

I had such a hard time with the idea of taking the one thing away from Kelly that's been such a huge source of comfort for her. But I knew that if I wanted to give Kelly every opportunity to make healthy attachments with us, that I needed to remove every hindrance that stood in the way of that goal.

I have really been praying through this. It might seem silly for me to pray about something like this, but I believe God cares about everything, even the little, seemingly insignificant things, like Kelly's attachment to her Lovey.

God's faithfulness has been so evident today. For instance, Kelly has been surprisingly calm. Nap time was miraculously easy, but she did struggle more at bedtime. The hardest part was when I heard her whimper, almost like she was in pain- oh, I just wanted to go grab Lovey out of the box in the garage and give her back to Kelly and forget all about this "no Lovey" business. But I just kept praying for Kelly and rubbing her back, and she finally drifted off to sleep.

I took this picture the first night Kelly was with us. She slept peacefully all night with Lovey in her mouth.

Oh, it's such a bittersweet feeling for me. On one hand, I'm so proud of my big girl for doing so well at saying goodbye to her Lovey; but on the other hand, I feel sooo sad for her that we had to say goodbye at all. I probably sound like a big baby, but I have really been down. I feel like I'm grieving the loss of a loved one or something. But Kelly is so amazing. She's let me comfort her and she even grabbed my hand a couple of times and put it to her cheek, which was so precious. (I often rub her cheeks and forehead with the back of my hand as she falls asleep, so to have her show me she wanted that from me was a real blessing.) It gives me the reassurance that we're doing the right thing.

Goodbye sweet Lovey. Thank you for being such a faithful friend to Kelly. We will miss you, but please know that I will do your job from now on, so you can rest assured that Kelly will be well taken care of. I know she will always hold a special place in her heart for you. Goodbye.

Little Buddies

2009-03-07T15:37:00.000-08:00

Some of you may remember Kelly's little buddy, Liberty, and the fun these two girls have had together in the past. They amaze me how well they get along, especially considering how young they are. Their personalities are very compatible- they're opposites in a lot of ways- but isn't that often what makes for a great combination?
For one, Liberty talks up a storm, whereas her little counterpart won't say a word... so Liberty does the talking and Kelly just listens in amazement... I think Kelly must wonder how in the world little Liberty does that..?! You'd just have to see the look on her face when Liberty's talking to her... you can tell she's just puzzling her puzzler. LOL
Well, maybe it'll encourage Kelly to start trying to form some words on her own here soon.
Enjoy the pictures of this precious little Dynamic Duo!

Kelly introducing her friend,

"This is Liberty, Mommy... you remember her..?"

Hugs!

"I've missed you, my friend."Checking out some of Kelly's toys... always important!

Kelly gives Liberty a ride in her car...

"Vroom-vroom-vroom!"

"Okay, now it's my turn!" says Kelly.

(They really are so good at sharing.)

Liberty has some of the biggest, prettiest blue eyes you ever did see!

"Life is good when you've got a friend."

The Many Faces of Kelly

2009-03-05T20:52:00.000-08:00

More Fun at Boingo's!

2009-03-04T13:03:00.000-08:00

We went to Boingo's with our good friends (& neighbors) yesterday. It was so fun for the kids, as the pictures tell...

Boo looks like she's posing!

At the top of the slide...
And down she goes!

Trying to get the three of them to smile and look at the camera was futile!

Jonathan climbing the rock wall.

Emily can do it too!

And of course, so can Kelly!

Kelly was just about to jump in this picture,

which resulted in a bloody lip!
Don't worry, Mommy, I'm okay!

Emily's having a blast!

So is Jonathan!

Afterwards, we went to Valhalla's for lunch- a great little restaurant in town that has a wonderful "train room" just for kids. Boy does it help make lunch nice for us mommies.

Emily's otter, Chocolate, goes everywhere she goes!

"Mommy, can we do this again tomorrow?"

Thoughts on... Sugar?

2009-03-02T22:22:00.000-08:00

I have mentioned the five keys to bonding in previous posts, as I’ve learned them from Nancy Thomas in her “Taming the Tiger While It’s A Kitten” CD’s.
I talked about Smiling as one, and I want to touch on the other four in the weeks to come. Today, I want to talk about sugar, another one of the five keys to bonding.

Are you like me, asking, “Did you say Sugar?”
Yep- you heard it right- sugar.

Did you know that human breast milk is the sweetest of all mothers’ milks? No other animal's milk is as sweet as human breast milk. There’s a reason for that. Studies have shown that the sugar (in breast milk) stimulates babies’ brains to form connections that help the bonding process to take place.
Isn’t that amazing? It amazes me. It deepens my faith in God, the Creator of all things, who leaves nothing to coincidence. I see that He has a purpose for everything, even sugar.

So, even though we don’t have breast milk available to help us bond with Kelly, we do have sugar! What Nancy recommends is sweetening Kelly’s milk for her bottles, so that is what we’ve been doing.

As I thought about the whole sugar thing (being the analytical thinker I am ;), some things clicked for me…
For one, I thought, no wonder we use terms of endearment like,
“Sugar”, “Sweetie”, ”Cupcake”, “Honey”,
“Sugarplum”, and “Sweetheart” with the ones we love.

Now I know the reason: Sugar = Love!

You know what else I thought?
Poor old sugar!
I mean, sugar has gotten such a bad wrap. It seems almost taboo anymore, what with the way it rots our teeth and causes us to gain weight and all- but sugar is actually a good thing and has a purpose in our brain’s ability to form emotional bonds.
I think we have just gone too extreme with it, where we take way too much of it in, so we end up with the negative results you will often get with anything (that’s good) when used in excess.
But rather than swing from one extreme to another, where we either ban sugar from our diets completely, or eat too much of it to the point of making ourselves sick; what we need to do is recognize that sugar has a place and a purpose, and use it for just that.

Valentine’s Day is the perfect example of how much sugar really is an integral part of expressing love in our culture. I mean, what better way to say “I love you” than to give someone a box of chocolates?
I also love a freshly baked cake, or a batch of cookies- any time of year!

As a mom, that’s such a huge way I love to nurture my kids, and express my love to them, is to bake them something yummy. I do the same for Clint. My mom did it for us growing up, and now that I'm all grown up, she still makes a point to bake something sweet for us every time we go to visit her. My grandma used to do it too- whenever we went to visit her, she always had a freshly baked batch of chocolate chip cookies waiting for us in her cookie jar. I remember, I couldn't wait to her the clink of that cookie jar as I took the lid off to find it full of delicious chocolate chip cookies. Whether it was my mom or my grandma who baked us cookies, I just remember feeling special because they took the time to bake us something yummy.

One thing I hope my kids always know is that the key ingredient in everything I bake them, besides sugar, is love.

I Drank A Diet Vanilla Pepsi...

2009-02-25T22:20:00.000-08:00

with dinner, and now I can't sleep!

I should know better than to have caffeine at night.

I have been updating my facebook profile since I'm up past my bedtime. I was working on my Bible study homework (Bad Girls of the Bible- good stuff!) but I got distracted with facebook. I joined this afternoon after a good friend urged me to join again.

Yes, again... see, I tried several months back to join, but it never sent me the confirmation e-mail, so I tried again that same day, and it still didn't send me a confirmation e-mail, so I gave up. I was starting to get a complex that I wasn't good enough for facebook or something... geez.

This time when I attempted to join, it worked! So now I'm on facebook if anyone wants to look me up and be my friend. ;-)

A few things I forgot to mention when I posted earlier...

Why the changes to the blog? (...if you even noticed...)

Well, my mom has been urging me to put our picture back up on the blog... the one of Clint and I...

but I hate that picture. We took it for our dossier in a hurry and I think I'm just sick of it. (Besides, I really prefer to be behind the camera, not in front of it!) But as I thought about putting a picture of us up on the blog, I decided to follow what I started with the kids, with the short description captioning the pictures of them on my sidebar. I was thinking how, when I visit blogs, I often wonder about the family, if the information isn't clearly posted somewhere.

If there isn't a picture of the author, I often wonder what he or she looks like..? (Am I the only one who does that?) I'm just a visual person, I guess. (I still prefer picture books! LOL)

So that's why I decided to do that on the sidebar. It kind of reminded me of the Brady Bunch when I was writing my caption... I think I need to take new photos of us looking up and down at one another- LOL.

The other thing I forgot to mention in my earlier post is that Kelly has been so happy to have her sister back home. Her demeanor has been much better since Camryn's home, so I guess there really was something to that. Here they are, sharing lollipops that their Nanna sent them for Valentine's Day.

You didn't know how literal I was being when I said "sharing" did you? I admit, my inner germophobe was cringing at their Lollipop Love Fest.

Kelly's trying with all her might to either bite it or get the whole thing in her mouth! Camryn's lips are turning blue from the lolli. LOL

Mmmmm... mommy, tell Nanna- lollipops are my new favorite!

I want to share more as we continue with our attachment work, so more to come on that. I don't want it to become the theme of our blog or anything, but I do want to share candidly where we are with it. Not only is it great to chronicle for me, but I figure, you never know who might glean from your experience. I so appreciate it when I can gain insight or wisdom into my situation because someone else was brave enough to share theirs; struggles, victories and all.

Uneventful...

2009-02-25T07:28:00.000-08:00

Since I have been sick, we just haven't done much lately, so I have no fun pictures to share... but aren't Kelly's feet cute? I just love her little feet!

I finally went to the doctor yesterday and found out I have a sinus infection, which is why I haven't been getting better. I should be seeing improvements in the next day or two, now that I've got antibiotics in my system. I'm sooo ready to feel good again.

Kelly and I have been drinking more fruit smoothies lately, trying to boost our Vitamin C intake, so these are some shots of her enjoying her smoothie... (including the one of her feet!)

Momma, no more pictures, PLEASE!