Someone Pick Me

This beautiful video was created by my friend Beth. She is a motivational speaker with a passion for increasing awareness of orphans around the world. She wrote the song and she and her daughter Kaley perform the song you will hear. I know the moms of many of these precious children in the video and I am so glad that each of these children were chosen by their families.

IT'S REFERRAL DAY!!!!

Congratulations to my dear friend ________________!!!!!! She received her referral today for her daughter from ______________!!!!! I can't say anything more but I wanted her to know that we are THRILLED TO PIECES for her and her growing family.

I have always referred to her daughter as her _(insert country here)_ Princess. In her referral photo she said she is wearing a shirt that says "Princess"! :) How cool is that??????

CONGRATULATIONS ___________________ & _______________!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finding Day

To the mommy whose baby girl was left under the Banyan Tree of the Aishantang Village, Jiashan County, Guilin City, Guangxi China on April 26, 2004. She is safe and happy. She is healthy and she is loved. Thank you so much for your precious gift.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SHAY SHAY LU!

Today is our baby's 4th birthday. We had her party Saturday and she absolutely LOVED every minute of it! Her very first birthday party! The theme? CUPCAKES, of course!

A very special THANK YOU to Ms. Kim for letting us borrow her cake pan to make the giant cupcake! We're so glad that our friends the Bryants were able to come and join our celebration!

Sarah, we are so happy you came and spent the night with us! We hope you'll be able to come and stay with us a lot this summer! WE LOVE YOU!!!!

Happy Birthday to our sweet Shay Shay! Mommy and Daddy love you sooooooo much!!!!! What a blessing you are to our family!

I can't help thinking about your China mommy on the other side of the world today. She must have loved you very much to have kept you and loved your for 4 days before taking you to a safe place to be found. I know her heart must have been broken to know that she could not care for you. I hope that someday she will know that you are doing fine and that you are loved.....to the moon and back.

P.S. More photos to come when we get them from big brother Josh. He was our official birthday photographer so these are just a few that Marty and I took during the party.

The New James Bond???

Aaaaah.....to be 21 again! ;)

Say a prayer for Lan

Lan is the daughter of Stephen and Stefani Ellison. Stefani is the SN China Coordinator for Children's House Intl. We adopted Brinley through CHI. Today Lan is having a symes amputation of her foot. This is something her family has known was coming for years and today is Lan's big day. She looks much braver than I would have! Please take a moment and say a prayer for Lan Lan and her mama. Stefani is so very special to so many in the adoption community. She will be posting updates on Lan to the CHI Yahoo group and to her blog. http://www.ammonsadventures.blogspot.com

Thank you Jan & Kim!

Last week I attended a Casting Crowns concert with my friends Jan and Kim. We had a wonderful time. If you get a chance to attend a Casting Crowns concert you really should. I have seen them several times and I always leave feeling revived! :)

Here is a photo of the 3 of us that I stole from Jan's blog. :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DADDY!

Happy Birthday to the absolute very best daddy in the whole wide world! :)

WE LOVE YOU!
Josh, Kristen, Keith, Brice, Brinley and Bailey


Happy Birthday to my sweetie. You are my best friend and the answer to my prayers. I love you more than you will ever know! Thank you for all that you do for all of us, Sweetie! We all hope that you will have a wonderful day!

XOXO
Sharon

Friday!

FINALLY! :)

Tantrum At The Checkout

Yesterday we went to WalMart. The girls were behaving pretty well and I was so proud of them. Bailey kept asking me if she could walk. I told her that when we got to the checkout I would let her get down. So, we got to the checkout and I took her out of the seat and you would have thought I had turned a wild animal lose! She was into EVERYTHING! I kept telling her to stop but she wouldn't listen. I picked her up and told her again that if she didn't stop she would have to get back in the seat. She went right back to what she'd been doing before. I picked her up and put her in the seat and that was when the full tilt screaming, stomping, hitting Bailey came back to life! SHE WAS MAD.....no....not just mad.........F U R I O U S!!

This temper tantrum went on and on. I loaded all of our bags into the van and had both of them in their seats and she was still having her fit. I haven't seen this side of Bailey in several months. She was screaming and thrashing around.......but not a single tear. Since her bday is very soon I wondered if maybe this was one of those days around birthdays when adopted children tend to get out of sorts. I calmly asked her, "Bailey, do you miss Hu Yan?". Hu Yan was her ayi. She stopped screaming immediately and looked at me with a single tear rolling down her little red cheek and whimpered, "No! I want my daddy!!!!!" LOL

Oh well, so much for my psychoanalyzing. She is definitely Daddy's Girl.

You're Invited!!!

You're invited to take a peek at my new website! I've still got a lot more to add! If you have any suggestions I'd love to hear from you! Bailey has been home eight months and has finally settled in. Time to get back to work! :)

More Surgery For Bin-Bin

Brinley and Bailey both went to the see a speech pathologist today. They gave Brinley some Valium and scoped through her nose to see how her palate is doing. She did great this time and was very cooperative and did everything the doctor asked her to do. She's going to have to have another surgery to fix it so that she doesn't lose so much air through her nose when she talks. She said it will be much like having her tonsils removed as far as pain goes and she will be in the hospital overnight. We have to go see Dr. G. to find out exactly when he will do the surgery.

Bailey did really well but since she's only been home for 8 months she wants her to have some more speech therapy before she does a full eval on her. She also recommended speech twice a week instead of just once a week for both of them. I'm glad about that! Our speech therapist had already said she wants to start seeing both of them twice a week. This is a photo of B&B with their speech therapist "Miss Bek-duh" on Bailey's first day of speech class a couple of weeks ago.

Today we have been home with Bailey for 8 months. Wow but she has changed from a scared and very defensive little girl into a lovey little chatter box. Not being able to communicate with us must have been so very frustrating for her. She loves to talk, talk, talk. Her other favorite thing is being tickled. She'll climb up on my lap and pull her shirt up over her tummy and giggle and say, "Tick-dle Me!" Isn't it amazing how God puts our families together and all of the pieces fit so perfectly? :)