FFFF:Snoozin'

This is my first time to participate in Family Foto Fun Friday, but I couldn't pass up this week's topic--Snoozin'. The topics each week are provided by Lissa at Loving Lydia, and you can see other related posts at her site (or add your own).

Anyway, we have lots of pictures of our sweet sleeping girls. Most of these have made an appearance elsewhere, as they are "oldies but goodies," but it is fun to look back, too. For the record, I tried to sneak in and get one of Mary Joyce asleep this morning, but she was already awake. I still got a cute picture, but I'll save it for another post.

And since this post is about sleep, I just have to point out that Mary Joyce and Katherine are both napping at the SAME TIME!!! Wow! I'm writing this down because the chances of it happening again soon are slim. :-)

On with the pictures:


Sleeping in Guangzhou (Sept. 2006)


Napping at the Park (November 2006)


Car Seat Snoozin' (May 2007)


Mother/Daughter Nap (August 2007)


Out Like a Light (September 2007)

One Year Later...

Good Morning, Sunshine!


Mary Joyce and her Favorite Pooh Bear Snuggly


Happy Girl!


Sisters :-)


Enjoying a Fortune Cookie


Mary Joyce and Mama

Here are some pictures from today. What a difference a year makes!

First Gotcha Day Anniversary!

One year ago today, on September 13, 2006, our lives, and the life of a little girl named Tong Min Hao were changed forever. Chet and I, and six other couples were far away from home in Nanchang, China. I remember like it was yesterday—we were supposed to leave around 11:00 a.m. for the Civil Affairs office. I was in the hotel room bathroom brushing my teeth when Bruce, our guide, came by and said, “Let’s Go! We go early!” We rushed to grab the diaper bag, camera, and other necessities, and rushed downstairs. The sense of nervous anticipation and excitement that had been present in our travel group all day was getting even more intense. We boarded the Lake View Hotel bus and headed out.

We arrived at the Civil Affairs office before the babies did. We all sat on one side of the room, and after a little while, the SWI workers brought in 7 precious baby girls, all dressed in matching pastel Minnie Mouse sweat suits. Jaiden was the most easily recognized with her head full of hair, and Aidyn was pretty easy to pick out because she was so tiny. Soon, we were pretty certain that we had located our Mary Joyce. She was wearing yellow and sleeping in the arms of her caretaker. Everyone started snapping pictures, until Bruce and Li Ping came in to let us know it was time to receive our daughters. One by one, Bruce called out the babies’ Chinese names. We anxiously listened for “Tong Min Hao.” When her name was called, our daughter was placed in our arms. Thankfully, she woke up to look at us. What a precious, emotional moment! Wow! We, who had never been parents, were being handed this precious gift, and she was ours. God had blessed us beyond measure!

While Chet was videoing for Marsha and Jeremy, I took Mary Joyce to one side of the room and began to play with her with a little stuffed lamb. She smiled and giggled for us for the first time in that very room at the Civil Affairs office. We had a few more official items to take care of, like making family photos and the babies’ passport photos, then we loaded back onto our bus. While on the bus, Mary Joyce stood up in my lap while holding onto me and bounced happily up and down. (No car seats in China) We knew already that we had a special little girl.

There were many more things we had to do that day—our adoption was actually completed the same day, instead of having to wait until the next day as is done often. If you would like to see our whole travel journal, including the Gotcha Day video, you can do that here:

Mary Joyce’s Adoption Voyages Site

We are so blessed to be parents to such an active, happy little girl. Mary Joyce will be 21 months old on Sunday. It is amazing how much she has grown in the past year. We will be celebrating our one year anniversary tonight with Chinese food and friends who have three daughters from China

Things have changed a lot for members of Group 117b—4 of our families have made moves to new states (including one moving with the military from Germany back to the U.S.). Two of our girls have new younger siblings—a sister for Mary Joyce and a brother for Aidyn. Three more of our girls will soon have younger siblings from Vietnam. What a difference a year makes!

Happy 1st Gotcha Day Anniversary, everyone in Group 117b! We love and miss you all!

One Year Ago Today: Travel Time!

One year ago today, Chet and I, along with our friends/travel mates Marsha and Jeremy, boarded a plane in Atlanta to start the trip of a lifetime. We flew to Chicago, and then to Beijing to start the journey to bring our little girls home. The flight was seemingly endless. Chet and I were on the very back row of the plane to China in the middle 2 seats--a miserable place to be for a long flight, but we made it. It was exhausting, but the trip was so worth it.

Be prepared for a lot of these flashback posts the next couple of weeks. :-)

One Month Old!

"First you give me a bath, and then you make a picture?!?"
(Bath time is not Katherine's favorite part of the day.)


Ready for church on Sunday morning.


Our sweet little girl. She almost always sleeps with her arms out to the side like this.


Sleepyhead


Another daddy's girl in the making?

It is hard to believe, but Katherine is already one month old. Going through the newborn stage is a challenge, especially when we started at almost 9 months old with our first child. It is a different, yet very neat experience. It is amazing to see how much she grows and changes every day.

Katherine is a good baby. She usually only cries if she is hungry or needs to be changed. She sleeps well, usually waking once during the night to be changed and fed. She is still wearing newborn clothes right now, but now they fit her. When she came home, they just kind of hung on her--now she's filling them out. It looks like she'll be in 0-3 months before too long. She has huge blue eyes. We are curious to see what color they will end up. They will be beautiful, whatever the color. When she is awake, she is very alert. We can tell by watching her that her eyesight is getting better. She is starting to zero in on us when we are holding or talking to her.

We are even more into a routine now, and that should get even better as I can do more when I reach the 6 week mark. Then, I won't be so dependent on Chet to do all of the lifting, etc., which will make household tasks much simpler.

Life is good at our house. We are enjoying the task that God has put before us to raise these two precious little girls.

She Cracks Me Up!

Our Mary Joyce is forever doing things that just make me laugh. She has been that way from the day we met her for the first time, as she bounced up and down in my lap on the bus from the Civil Affairs office in Nanchang back to our hotel. Then, there was our group's infamous red couch picture where she snitched Aidyn's shoe, wrestled with one of the other babies, and then almost fell off of the red couch. Anyway, she continues to keep us in stitches. One of our favorite ones of late is that she always asks for ketchup, dips her french fry in it, and then either puts the fry back down again, or even better, turns it around and takes a bite off of the end without ketchup. She really doesn't like ketchup--she just wants it because Mama and Daddy have it. (Sorry...no pictures of the ketchup thing.)

Here are a few more of her recent funnies in pictures:

Mary Joyce has always loved shoes, and she likes to get into her closet and try on her different pairs of shoes. How do you like this look--black patent Sunday shoes and cow pajamas?



Mary Joyce has not been to obviously jealous of Katherine lately, but every once in awhile, we have a little hit of it come out. Last night, she brought me the Boppy pillow I use when Katherine is nursing, put it in my lap, crawled into my lap, and laid down on it. I hold Katherine this way sometimes, and Mary Joyce wanted her turn.


Lately, Mary Joyce has taken to putting her legs between the couch cushions and standing like that. It is pretty funny-looking.

Hope you got a chuckle out of these!