Ni Hao everyone

It has been a while since I've updated the blog so figured I'd pop in and write something. Another crazy week is coming to a close, only to be followed by a fun and crazy weekend ahead. The kids have their final basketball games tomorrow and then we have the season ending awards ceremony - all conveniently spread across the day 9AM, 1PM and 4PM. LOL! The kids really seemed to enjoy basketball and the people at Upwards do a great job. Even with some of a refs being a bit zealous they had fun and that is what is important.
Sunday Julie has PSR, time to dash home pick the rest of us up and go back for mass since we'll miss it on our usual Saturday night. After mass we'll head over to my mom's house for a birthday lunch with the family, so that will be fun. We'll come home in time to start getting ready for the work week ahead. Oh yeah - don't forget to set the clocks forward! The F1 racing season starts this weekend so that is cool, too!
I completed (finally) my contributions to a technology book I have been working on for the last year or so. I know I told Julie the last time I did this that it'd never happen again, but the offer was too good to resist. I can't thank her or the kids enough for their patience and understanding while I worked nights and weekends (as well as days!) to wrap this up. What an endeavor, but we're done - until the 2nd edition! Hehehehehehe
I fly out Monday to take an all day exam on Tuesday. This will be my 2nd attempt so hopefully I fare better than the last time. The only comfort is that there are less than 30 people world-wide who have passed it and a few hundred who have tried, including many of the smartest people I know or have worked with. Be nice to get that behind me, too.
Finally, Chinese is HARD! I have been taking time during the day to hit the Rosetta Stone and try to get conversational Chinese, but man, it is TOUGH. So many sounds we don't use in English that can be real tongue twisters. At least it feels like I'm doing something to keep preparing for Lil Bubba. Anyways, time to go get caught up on "24". Have a great weekend!

and we wait...

Good is the Lord to one who waits for him,
to the soul that seeks him

Lamentations 3:25

We know good will come from this waiting; but, boy is it hard! All in His time...

What should we ask?

Hi Everyone,
As we wait and pray and wait and pray (you get the idea), questions keep forming in our minds about our youngest son. We are trying to come up with a list of questions to ask the orphanage. This being our first adoption, we are unsure as to what we should ask; but, we certainly do not want to miss out on the opportunity to find out as much as we possibly can about him and his two years there. What did/would you ask? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

On a funny note, our 3 year old has been running around the house in her underwear pretty much all day as only 3 year olds can get away with. I came inside to find her with her pink snow boots on (boots and underwear only). She told me that she put her boots on because her feet were cold. Too funny!

Do not forget to hop on over to Drew's site and enter their raffle! Let's bring him home to his family. Thanks!!!!
http://bringingdrewhome.blogspot.com/

We have a log in date!

Just a quick note, our dossier has been logged in to CCAA with a date of 2/25/10! That's a lot faster than we thought since the dossier just arrived on 2/22. Whoo-hoo! Making incremental progress. :)

Please help if you can!

http://bringingdrewhome.blogspot.com/

We want to make everyone aware of a family who needs our help and prayers right now. They are sooooooo close to being able to go get their son, Drew, from China. However, they do not have all the money that they will need to travel. They are holding a fundraiser to try to earn what they will need to bring him home. Adoption is not easy on the wallet, so to speak. There are a lot of people involved in the process and all those people want paid, shocking, huh? :) On top of all that, families need to figure in funds for the travel part of it. It adds up.

I have been following this family through their blog. They, too, have been married for 13 years (God-willing that will be us in April), have three biological children, and are in the process of adopting their second child (ok...they are one ahead of us on that one). Things are tough right now for them. It is not my place to give the details. Just know that they need our help.

Please take a look at their site. Even a small donation will help. Ten dollars would get you an entry into their fundraiser and twenty-five dollars will get you three entries. There is a "Chip In" button on the right hand side of their blog. Just click on it and it will take you to a secure site to donate. They even have PayPal if that is easiest for you. Please help Drew come home to his forever family. Prayers for them would be greatly appreciated too. On their behalf...thanks!!!!

http://bringingdrewhome.blogspot.com/

Out of the mouths of babes...

These stories are probably those type that you have to be there to really get a kick out of them; but, I just had to share them anyways as they made me laugh. Hopefully, you will get a little chuckle out of them too.

The girls and I were on our way to pick up Max from school. They started playing with some of the little figures that they had around them in the car. Sydney started talking about how the little figures could get married, typical Sydney. So, my mind drifts off and I start thinking about how blessed I am to be married to Ron. He is a wonderful husband, great daddy, hard worker, etc. I am thinking about how, God-willing, we will be celebrating our 13th wedding anniversary in April. Here I am thinking all those wonderful thoughts when I hear from the back "Let's pretend she gets unmarried and then marries him." What...unmarried? What happened to "Happily Ever After" and "Dreams do come true." and all that other stuff that our little princess used to believe? Of course, I spoke up. I certainly do not want our children thinking that is something that they will ever need to think about. I do not want our children to get "unmarried" or worry about us getting "unmarried". When I questioned Sydney about it, she said " You know...divor (imagine stumbling over sounds here)" Luckily, at least, she did not know how to pronounce the word divorce. It certainly is not a word we use frequently around our house!!!! I have to admit that I am saddened that she even is aware that people get unmarried; but, I guess that is a part of our life these days. The only times that I can recall talking about it is when referring to people we know who have been through the "d" word or in this case the "un m" word. :) So, anyways, my speech continued about how God does not want people to get unmarried and that we are suppose to stay with the one we marry forever. Sydney, bless her heart, came back with "But, Mom, it is just a chipmunk and a doll." Oh, out of the mouths of babes...



My next funny, at least to me, story comes from our youngest daughter, Veronica. After picking up Max, the kids all started talking about what they want to buy at Toys-R-Us. They have all been saving up their money and gift cards. Max is talking about more Transformers. Sydney wants some little doll set where you can change bodies around, not just the clothes, to give them different looks. To me that is just creepy and that is probably the exact reason that she wants it so badly now....it creeps Mom out. Veronica was giving the whole shopping some thought. She finally said "Me buy hanitizer to put in me red bug for me kids." (or something along those lines) Translation: "I will buy hand sanitizer to put in my red Volkswagen bug for my kids." I am hoping that she will find something at the store that she will be able to use now versus 25 years from now. :) Again, out of the mouths of babes... Now, I am off to use some "hanitizer"...

Dossier is in the air!

Another incremental milestone has been reached as we received word from our agency to send our dossier to them for processing. They'll send it for translation and then on to China to the CCAA to be logged in! We're sure all of you are wondering just what this dossier looks like so we took a picture before we dropped it in the FedEx Pak this morning.

Keep in mind that each stack of papers has at least 3 papers and many have more as we have the original document, a county and state certification (those are all of the ones with the gold circle on them) and then each stack has a

sticker of authentication from the Chinese consulate. Some documents went to the US State Department while others went to the California Secretary of State. We also had to include a copy of our passport photos, extra pictures, pictures of our house, family and of us doing stuff together, etc. Finally, a copy of each of these documents was mailed to our agency as well. We were surprised that the FedEx envelope was only 1lb 11.2oz. It felt a lot heaver for 9+ months of documentation collection.

The kids all received their first H1N1 and Hep A shots yesterday and apparently put on a very dramatic scene. Poor Julie and the nurse - people must have thought they were being skinned alive I hear. The best I could do was bring Indian home for dinner. Is it a coincidence that we had Indian and then get the good news about our dossier? I think not. :)

We're really rolling now and have a lot more to do but now the goal seems so much closer! Have a good weekend. We are supposed to be getting a lot of snow, so that should be exciting.