Adoption Wait Ticker

Lilypie Waiting to Adopt tickers

Thursday, December 31, 2009

Christmas Morning


Hannah was feeling a little under the weather Christmas morning, so we decided to forego early mass at our church. Instead, as soon as Hannah woke up, we dove headfirst into her presents.


I must admit, my first thought when I saw this picture "Oh, that's cute." My second thought, "Thankfully her nightgown is just long enough".



Thank you Aunt Jackie for the beautiful sweater. And thank you Audrey for the really cool outfit.


After presents, we braved the cold, wet weather and headed to Aunt Jean's for Christmas dinner. Hannah wanted to bring her new talking viewfinder. Thank you Santa.
:-)

Saturday, December 26, 2009

And now for something completely different...


"Hey, hey! What's this I see? I thought this was a party. LET'S DANCE!"

Truer words have never been spoken Mr. Bacon. Let's get back to the cute, shall we?

:-)

Thursday, December 24, 2009

That's right. The ticker does not lie.

We have now been waiting two years for our second child from China. Last year I chose to poke fun of the wait, but this year I'm going bring the room down a little bit. I figured I can share with you guys, right? That ticker totally BUMS ME OUT. I find myself looking at it every time I go to our blog - and on one hand it gives me a strange sense of accomplishment and on the other, it represents the time that we have missed with our second child.

Now don't get me wrong. See this little girl?


Yes, the little girl on Santa's lap. She is our WORLD. She makes it all go round. She gives us purpose and fills our lives with so much laughter and joy - more than we feel we deserve. She makes this wait bearable. My heart goes out to adoptive parents who are waiting for their first child. However, Hannah also makes it harder. You see, I can block the wait out of my mind - I can fill it with work and my husband and my daughter and friends... but Hannah brings it back. She wants her little sister or brother. She does not understand how so many of her little friends at school have little sisters and brothers and we have to wait, and wait and wait. She saves pictures she's drawn and clothes she's grown out of and toys she's stopped playing with - just for her sister. At least once a week she tells me she is going to dream of her baby sister, and I tell her I will too. She says she misses her, even though they have never met. I try to tell her that we have to wait a very long time and we need to be patient. Yeah right, a patient four year old. I grew up as an only child and I do not want that for my child. My childhood was not bad at all, it was just lonely. I want my daughter to be able to confide and teach her sibling in ways that I only long for. And realizing the challenges she will face being a minority, I wanted her to have someone that she can directly relate to.

In the end, we do not know how much longer the wait will be. Technically the wait is not yet at four years, but it will reach four years soon enough and then what? We do not know. China is not saying and frankly I do not want to do anything to make them angry and shut the whole program down. China is a communist country and therefore they keep the information to themselves. We have heard a bundle of excuses for the delay - the Olympics, swine flu, more domestic adoptions, etc. and at this point we are just not sure what to believe. So we will keep on keeping on and hope that one day we will see a light at the end of this very long tunnel. We are in it for the long haul.


Okay that's enough belly-aching. As my friend Denise says, "Buck up buttercup." And we will do just that.
:-)

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Christmas Pageant 2009



These pictures were taken at the rehearsal for this year's Christmas pageant. Doesn't Cole look handsome?


Hannah wanted to wear her halo and angel wings (from last year's pageant) and I figured "Why fight it, an angel is seasonally appropriate". Cole followed the pageant director's request by wearing red and green and a Santa hat.


Each child was assigned a letter to spell the word "CHRISTMAS". The younger kids were assigned a "buddy" who read the little saying for them. Hannah's buddy was not able to attend, so we worked with her all week to memorize her saying. Hannah got the letter "C" and yes, that meant that she had to go first. Cole was the letter "M". (He kept saying "M is for Money", smart boy.) Greyson got the letter "R".


Hannah's saying was "C is for the Christ Child, our Savior and our King." She said it perfect! And no worries, we got it on video... now if we can ever figure out how to get on the blog...




See? It spells CHRISTMAS!





After the pageant, we conducted a mini-photo shoot with all of the kids: Hannah, Cole, Greyson and Ayden. Don't they all look so cute?
:-)

Nooooo!




I just got a postcard in the mail yesterday telling me that Cookie Magazine will no longer be published and my subscription is being replaced by Allure magazine. I LOVED Cookie Magazine, it showed cool moms with cool kids in cool rooms doing cool things. It made me want to strive to BE cool. Now what? I guess I will have to go back to being lame. Darn.
:-(

Monday, December 21, 2009

Happy Birthday Elijah!


Elijah had his fourth birthday at the Salisbury Train museum. We have never had the chance to go and since Elijah's Daddy works at the museum, we figured it was the perfect opportunity to visit. Despite the chilly weather, it was a great party.



Even Santa Claus made it to the party (in a really cool vintage fire truck)!




The kids even got the chance to climb on the fire truck.



Then we headed over to the train ride.




Hannah and Cole got to ride on the caboose with Elijah.



Elijah's Mom was nice enough to take a picture of Chris and I on the train. A very rare photo op. Thank you!



A great party indeed. Chugga Chugga Choo Choo!
:-)

They love a parade!


I bundled the kids up tight and we braved the cold to enjoy this year's Christmas parade. Chris had to work so I had to go it alone. No problem, I said, I can do this. Uh yeah. Things were going well until they started throwing the candy. And throwing more candy and more candy. And for fun, some the kids on the floats starting throwing candy AT us... well at ME. Harumph!




So, I apologize for the lack of pictures, I was busy trying to pick up the candy, keep the kids out of the street and dodge oncoming parade traffic at the same time. Whew! Who knew "parading" could be so challenging?
:-)

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Pug-O-War



Aren't they cute? Chico seems to be doing really well integrating into our family. While he is blind and hard-of-hearing, he gets around very well and has even taught Jack Jack how to play with toys. Yes, before Chico, Jack Jack had no interest in any kind of squeekie toy, ball, stuffed animal, etc. They have started to play with each other and "pug-o-war" seems to be the game of choice.
:-)

Monday, December 14, 2009

Gobble Gobble


Sorry that I have been MIA. My camera has finally bit the dust. I have a backup camera that I have been putting to good use and I will post some more pictures very soon. In the meantime, here is a delightful drawing of Hannah's first turkey. Keep in mind that she may have drawn a turkey prior to this, but this is the first one that I can... well, recognize.
:-)

Saturday, November 28, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Scenes from this year's Thanksgiving.





Isn't this cute? I got the idea from a magazine and the kids happily munched on their "turkeys" while we sat down to our Thanksgiving dinner.



:-)

Hannah's first Panthers game

Last week Hannah got to go to her first Panthers game. Her favorite part of the game was a toss-up between the brownies and the cheerleaders.






We put Hannah in her jammies for the ride home and we took her picture from the top of the parking deck. I tried to get part of the Charlotte skyline in the picture and if you look REALLY closely you can see the BOA building.
:-)

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Look what I made!


I had a couple of goals for 2009 - nothing crazy big, just some little things to work on. One of them was to create something to sell at our church's Christmas Bazaar. And here it is - Ta Da! I made 27 magnet tins that each contain four magnets. I would have made 30, but I ran out of magnets. :-(

I use old Christmas cards, Valentines, magazine covers, etc for the pictures on the magnets. I wish my camera was better so I could take better pictures... that is a goal for next year.
:-)

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Happy 4th Birthday Katie!


Katie's birthday party happened to be the same day as Jadyn's. I mention this so you don't think I dress Hannah in the same pink dress for every birthday party. Heh.


Katie's birthday party was a pottery painting party, so I made sure we came prepared with a smock. Have smock, will travel. Have princess smock, will travel IN STYLE.



Hannah chose a rainbow to paint, Katie picked a flower, Sam picked a tow truck and Stephen picked a puppy dog. As an aside, every color required two coats of paint. A word of caution: do not let your child pick a rainbow. Since each color takes two coats and there are I-don't-know-how-many colors in a rainbow... you do the math. Needless to say, we were the last ones done.




Hannah had a really good time being silly with her friends. Cole's Daddy was in town that weekend, so Cole was not with us. It is just as well, two birthday parties in one day really wore Mommy and Daddy out.
:-)