With Open Arms

Happy 1st Birthday, Sweet Maia!

2011-08-08T13:51:00.004-04:00

Laurie, a Little House marathon is in our future! :)

April 5, 2011 (Again, I realize it's, um, August), our sweet Maia Grace turned ONE! She is certainly our little firecracker and has a large personality. I wonder all the time what God has in store for her! Mom and Dad came over to wish her Happy Birthday and then we all went out for.... Chinese! We went back to the restaurant where we celebrated her referral in July of 2010. The server remembered us and got to meet Miss Maia for the first time. You'll see her pictured. Here's to year one, a miraculous year! He knows her name. :)

Daddy and Ava

2011-08-05T13:18:00.004-04:00

As Maia's birthday and Easter approached, the grass needed its first mowing and Ava was delighted to wear a bunny dress. This was my dress when I was little. I still love it! Reminds me a little of Little House on the Prarie... which I still love, too!

Maia's 1st birthday pics up next!

"I want to ride with Daddy!"

Ready to Slide!

2011-07-29T13:59:00.006-04:00

April 1st began with a slide! These are of Ava's first adventures on the swing set. She is definitely our adventure girl! She's pretty fearless and is so curious about everything. She's still our little busy bee and is willing to try just about anything except riding a pony! Oh, the monkey bars. Not sure if that was a good idea this early!

Sliding Toward the End of March!

2011-07-29T13:34:00.009-04:00

The end of March brought warmer temperatures and a first big girl swingset for Ava! We set up the slide in the living room for a few days while Daddy busily put the rest together in the basement. She was SO excited! They both loved watching Daddy put it up. Here's to fun outside swinging, sliding, and climbing for our active duo! Maia went straight to the ladder and was up on the third rung before we could catch her.

Next up! The beginning of April and Maia turns 1!!!!!!!!

Ava loves to help with Maia's bathtime. We have a lot of fun with her hair!

Typical mealtime shot!

Cutie Pies

2011-07-27T13:08:00.003-04:00

As I type these next words, "You're a season behind, Emily!" is ringing in my ears! Yes, I am a season behind as I sit here in 99 degree weather and type about crisp spring afternoons. Ahhh.... would be nice to be in the 60s again! Here a few more pics from March to share. We had a wonderful spring!

Happy Birthday Buddies

2011-07-27T12:42:00.005-04:00

Ben and my Aunt Jill are our March birthdays, and we always have a great time celebrating together. This year, we went out to a new seafood restaurant called Marlin Rays. We made it through an entire dinner with Ava and Maia and managed to eat cake!

Happy birthday to my sweet husband and dear aunt!

Playdate with the Halsey Girls!

2011-07-26T15:02:00.006-04:00

Making new friends! Ava, Sophie and Mia

Serendipity is a great word to describe this new friendship for me and for Ava and Maia. We had heard about the Halsey girls and their remarkable stories of adoption long before we met them. Well, finally, Laurie and I managed to get four little girls together ( no small feat) to play! Laurie and I joked that we started no less than 35 conversations that morning and probably didn't finish a single one! We had a ball and hope to get together again at our "applesauce fingerprints on the window house."

Sophie and Mia are Ava and Maia's new friends, and they are just precious and full of energy just like Miss Ava and Maia. Their stories are so similar to ours! I just love it when another sweet friend comes into my life.

We love you, Halseys! Here's to more fun times!

We're Back!

2011-07-26T13:25:00.004-04:00

Hi, everyone!

We are back and uploading pictures daily! After immeasurably more than I could have asked for or imagined at the Pray for Japan, gathering, we are back to daily life. I could go on and on sharing about what God did to prepare for the Japan service, and when I have time, I may write a post about it. In my life, I have never witnessed his hand quite like I did as we made preparations to pray for Japan with the Body of Christ and the Japanese community.. I told everyone I knew that He really orchestrated all that happened. I just moved my hands and feet and mouth, and He did the rest. It was an absolute joy to be a co-laborer with Him for the precious Japanese people who came and attended the service. I'm going to be processing for a long time!

Ava's first taco experience. :) She loved it!

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Fort time!

Where in the World are We?

2011-06-16T15:05:00.003-04:00

In short, Japan!

If you're still following our family blog, you probably wonder where in the world we are!

If you've followed my blog for awhile, you maybe have picked up on the fact that the Lord has broken my heart for Japan. He started preparing me to have a special heart for the Japanese when I was very young, and the passion I have for them has only intensified as I've got older... much older! :)

Shortly after the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami, I felt a familiar stirring in my Spirit that the Lord had something in mind for this daughter, His daughter whose heart He's allowed to be broken for Japan.

Since the last time I posted the zoo pictures from March, I have been spending just about every waking moment preparing for a community-wide Pray for Japan gathering. It has been my joy to do it, and it has taken so much of my time, what little time remains with two little ones! :)

I'm not finished blogging and I'll be back at it very soon. For now, I've been instructed to focus solely on this event, in the hopes that seeds will be planted within the hearts of the Japanese that the Lord will water and cause to grow.

Pray for Japan
July 17, 2011
6:00 p.m.
Fairview United Methodist Church

140 churches and the Japanese community will unite to Pray for Japan. I am expecting great things from the Lord this night! May His will be done in this time for Japan!

See everyone soon. We've got lots and lots of fun pictures to share of Miss Ava and Maia. Neve a dull moment in this house!

We're Going to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo...

2011-05-09T14:41:00.010-04:00

We heard about a Cat in the Hat day at the zoo March 12th, so we loaded up our girls and gear and headed to the zoo! Ava has loved reading the Cat in the Hat dictionary. It's one of her favorites. We had beautiful weather, and seeing as how one little girl was very mobile, you'll see quite a few pictures of her experiencing fun. Maia was not quite walking yet, so she was happy to ride in the stroller and have up close views of the meir cats. I love those!

Ava's reaction to seeing the camels.

March Mayhem :)

2011-05-09T13:03:00.008-04:00

As March rolled around on the calendar, we were all officially well and somewhat rested from a busy January and February. I plan to post as many photos as I can from March in three or four blog posts so I can really catch up!

The highlight of the beginning of March was Maia turning 11 months old on the 5th. How she's grown since China! Here's our little peanut.

Ava celebrates Dr. Seuss Day! She loves hats of all shapes and sizes.

Giving Maia love...

One beautiful sunny afternoon, we met Mimi and Papa for a walk on the Greenbelt. Ava had a ball, like I once did, looking for ducks, playing on the exercise equipment and following the stream.

Our monkey!

Our fun playdate with Caden Jones! Their family is about to bring home long-awaited Kinsey from China. So excited for them!

Happy Retirement Papa! We love you so much and are so proud of you! We took Dad to the Chop House to celebrate.

Returning to Routines

2011-04-26T09:57:00.004-04:00

I'm not sure that there's been anything routine about the beginning of this year! It has been a break-neck pace, non-stop, and I am happy to say that things are calming down now that birthdays and holidays are behind us.

We just returned from a wonderful first-time Easter visit to Maryland to visit Ben's family with the girls! There was never a dull moment and the girls had a ball. Pictures to come just as soon as I post March! I know I'm so behind, but that's the season I'm in right now, and I am content with that on most days. :) It's been difficult for me at times to let go of expectations to get it all accomplished and meet everyone's needs, but I'm learing to let go of that day by day and just rest in what I'm doing raising these two little high-spirited firecrackers! Ava is just over 2 1/2 and Maia is just over 1. I have no idea how old I am. I've forgotten somewhere amidst the chaos. I just know I'm feeling older by the second!

Maia is off to a sick appointment for a chest cold today, Ava's back at preschool sharing Easter cookies, and I'm off to pick up two out of our four pets sometime today.

And just maybe, I'll get to do a little laundry. Nothing like good ole routines! Maybe I'll just sweep. That always makes me feel a little more on top of things.

I hope everyone had a very HAPPY EASTER!

He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!

Hallelujah!

The Blessing Rock

2011-04-15T15:13:00.007-04:00

The clock is always ticking and moments come and they go.

Some are fleeting, and I forget them like a forget what I ate for dinner on my 16th birthday. Others are seared onto my brain and my heart, and I think I'll remember them for eternity. What I am about to describe is one such moment, and I will tell it just as it happenend.

I love and serve a Risen Savior, fully alive and fully in love with this daughter. He is my King, my trusted Friend and He is Who I try my earthly messed-up wayward best to point to as I walk out this journey toward my Heavenly home where my citizenship really is.

If you've followed my blog from the beginning of the wait for a baby, then you probably remember that when Miss Ava was born in Riverdale, Georgia, the clock had been ticking, ticking right past August 20th late into the night and into the wee hours of August 21st at 1:56 a.m. 2008. My grandmother, Ruthie's, was born August 21st 1926.

Ruthie was at Asbury Acres on the Alzheimers floor, with a note somewhere near her, maybe in her hand, that read something like "You're going to be a great-grandmother."

Unbeknownst to my family, one precious life was about leave this Earth to join her Heavenly family and another was about to enter this Earth to begin her life with her Earthly family. I became acutely aware as the clock ticked into August 21st that God's hand was in this and that these two lives were intertwining,if only briefly, for a reason.

There really are no words to describe how much my grandmother meant to me. There's just this big ache deep in my heart that is summoned up when I least expect it when I think about her and my 34 years with her here.

Ava is in her third year of life, and this story unfolds sometime after she turned two, August 21st 2010.

Ben and I were in the kitchen washing just Ava's hair. This night was different than most because she normally has a FULL bath! She can get dirty in two seconds flat as our adventure girl! :)

She was lying on the kitchen island counter with her head in my hands and water pouring over her hair. Wanting to "entertain" her while I washed her hair, I handed her a little rock that I keep propped up against the flower vase in the middle of the island.

After my grandmother passed and away, Mom gave me the little rock back that I had given to Ruthie some years before. On the front, it said "Blessings." On the back, in her ink script, she had written five letters that spelled my name, "Emily."

Ava was holding the rock and looking at the side that said "Blessings." I was looking at the rock as she held it in her tiny little hands.

Suddenly, and just as matter of fact as "I like chocolate", she said, "This says, Emily." The clock stopped ticking and Ben and I both stopped and looked at her. I looked at the rock, and she was looking at the side that said, "Blessings." I knew that we had never told her that this rock said "blessings" or that it said Emily. In fact, when Emily came out of her mouth it sounded so strange because she never says my name.

Trying to process this, I asked her a very simple question.

"Ava, how did you know that rock says, "Emily?"

She answered with one word.

Jesus

Ben and I were stunned and again asked her the same question, and she, again, would say, "Jesus."

My heart racing and mind thinking, I scooped her up and started to towel dry her hair and do the get ready for bed routine. I thought to ask her another question as we were putting on her clothes. I asked her something like, "Did Jesus talk to you or what did He say." The next thing that came out of her mouth was, like the first, very simple. She said, "He's the Lamb." We had never told her that.

And that was it.

This blog is something for the girls now I as journal about our daily happenings, and before anymore time went by, I wanted to record this story for Ava to read someday.

Do I believe that Ava could have heard this from Jesus? Yes. Do I believe my grandmother is with Jesus in Heaven right now? Yes. Do I believe that that August 21st, shared birthdays, are a coincidence? No. Because God knows my heart so intimately that He purposed for those dates to line up.

I believe, for a moment, that the veil was removed and Jesus revealed that little gift for me to my child, Ava, whose life would begin as another one began, just in two different places with one Heavenly King keeping watch over both.

That is the story just as it happenend. Heaven is real. Jesus is Alive! This is all temporary stuff down here. He's coming again. He loves us enough to die for us, to take our place, so that we could be rescued and have eternal life. Spring is here and eternal spring is coming!

Praise the Lord!

Happy Easter, everyone!

May Family Visit Day 3

2011-04-09T15:00:00.004-04:00

Sunday was a very laid back day for us. Bless Auntie Jenn's heart. She woke up with a terrible stomach virus and headache and just felt awful on Sunday. We played mostly outside while she rested upstairs. Later in the afternoon, we took a walk down to the ponds and trails property with the kiddos and ordered Papa Murphy's pizza for dinner before calling it a day. The kids had a lot of fun exploring together and looking for wildlife!

May Family Visit- Day 2

2011-04-08T14:32:00.009-04:00

The sun showed its face on Saturday, and it wasn't as blustery as Friday, so we decided that a trip around Cades Cove Loop in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park would be fun. As always, we were hoping to spot some bears! We didn't see any bears this go around, but we saw some playful deer chasing each other right next to our vehicles... probably the best deer sighting I've ever seen there in the park. We had a picnic on a giant log - laugh out loud - and then took a short hike to the Elijah Oliver Cabin and just enjoyed the beautiful scenery around us. Then, it was back to the house for some more playtime with the cousins while Auntie Jenn and Uncle Chuck enjoyed a date night! :)

Cousin breakfast

Push me, Maia!

Little Miss Curiosity

Peekaboo, Ava!

Mommy's adventure girl

Maia has this fascination with Ben's ears.

If they're exposed, she goes for them!

Ava LOVED the pine branch Auntie Jenn found for her.

Uncle Ben and Uncle Chuck

Whee, Evan!

Special time with Uncle Chuck

May Family Visit- Day 1

2011-04-06T15:07:00.010-04:00

The fun-factor increased exponentially in middle February when Ava and Maia's cousins, Chase and Evan, and Uncle Chuck and Auntie Jenn came for a weekend visit from Maryland. We were so ready for some FUN! This was a much anticipated family visit! They were meeting Maia for the first time. :) We had cool but beautiful weather and got to do a lot of outdoor sight-seeing. The first adventure was up to Look Rock observation tower to look at the mountain view. It was breezy alright, but we made it to the top! Here a a few pictures from our first day. This is a four-part May series! So so glad you all could come and visit us! We love you and had a ball!

Evan breaks out his trumpet to show Maia.

Chase and Auntie Jenn opening Valentine presents with Ava

Ava and Auntie Jenn sharing a story

Uncle Chuck and Miss Maia

The gals at Look Rock Tower

Lil' Bit and Shorty - Someone must have known that we were coming! ha ha

Uncle Chuck trying out his new camera

Chase takes Ava for a ride!

Valentine's February 4, 2011

2011-04-04T14:15:00.013-04:00

APRIL UPDATE- Tomorrow is Maia Grace's 1st birthday!!

Maia is SO happy Roseola virus is gone! Her face is still swollen from the rash. :(

By the time Valentine's Day rolled around, our family viruses were finally gone and we were ready to spread some love! Mimi and Papa, Aunt Jill and Aunt Syd came by to love on the girls shortly before Valentine's Day. Unfortunately, the girls were napping when Syd came by so I don't have any pictures of her visit, but girls, she was here to love on you! :)

Here are a few fun pictures from the 13th and 14th of February. Valentines morning began with some Valentine stories and a heart for the girls made out of raspberries in some yogurt. We had a special surprise planned for the girls' special Valentine (Daddy) later in the afternoon. Ben and I even got to go out one night before Valentines to have a much-needed date night out! I had not been anywhere in quite some time!!!

Visit from Auntie Jill

Mommy and Daddy are on our way to date night! Thank you, Mimi and Papa!

Mimi and Papa love you!

Good morning little Valentines.

Maia enjoyed her Valentine surprise. Maia enjoys ALL food!

Peekaboo, girls.

Ava got into the dress-up closet, and this is how I found her --- deep in thought.

Creating a masterpiece

Surprise, Daddy! We love you!

We took red velvet cupcakes that Mimi had made with the girls to eat with Daddy. Ava loved hers!

Love you, Dada!

Maia thought it was hilarious to be in Dada's chair. She giggled the whole time!

Daddy surprised his girls with two white roses and hugs and kisses. We hope he'll be their leading man for a very long time. :)

The sun sets on Valentine's Day - more love to spread for the May family coming up next!

February Pictures!

2011-04-01T15:04:00.012-04:00

I'm so glad that cameras were invented, because when I remember the first half of February in my mind, I remember the villian virus of Roseola and Maia, and two other viruses that attacked me and Ava and being completely overwhelmed and exhausted. Well, looking back at the pictures, you'd never know it! ha ha Somehow, between the nose-blowing, temperature reading and sponge baths, we managed to capture the fun, lighter side of the first few weeks of February.

Ava's big virus during her first year of life was Hand, Foot, Mouth, and Maia's was Roseola, both documented in their baby books! Mean little viruses! Sweet little girls.

Here are a few random fun pictures from the first half of "FUN" February!

Happy Spring to everyone! I'm ready for warmer temperatures for sure!

Happy Chinese New Year 2011, Maia! She was born in the year of the Tiger.

Maia turns 10 months old on February 5th.

Kasey Alwood comes to visit us!

Ava decorates her Valentine's Bag for preschool. She took Tinker Bell Valentines.

Can't wait until these two can HELP me with laundry!

The Thinker

Sleeping angel

Daddy's girls

Valentine's Day and May Family visit up next!

The Famous One

2011-03-24T14:49:00.022-04:00

"God is my strength and my song."

He is the Famous One. Great is His name in all the Earth.

I am continually suprised and humbled by how the Lord has used my story of grief, despair, longing and waiting to spread hope and healing to others and bring glory to Himself. I came to "the end of myself" during my struggle with infertility and loss, after much struggle and wrestling with the Lord, and now, my story, which is really His story, is shared with you in the hopes that it will bring hope and comfort. If you're visiting from Blount Today, welcome. This is my unpolished, unplugged, honest and authentic story of how my faith in Christ made all the difference in my struggle with infertility and loss.

It's important for me to tell you that although I am in the "spotlight" for this story, it's not about me or my glory. It's about God and how He redeemed my struggle, pain and broken heart and worked everything together for good because I was called according to His purpose for my life. These were the plans he had for me. As I waited for Him to reveal them, impatiently I must say many times throughout the struggle, I ultimately surrendered my life, my plans and my heart's desire to Him. Then, He moved in His perfect timing to bring Ava and Maia into my life to be my daughters.

My eyes no longer see just the tangible worldy things around me. They now see through eyes of faith, trusting and believing in things unseen and being orchestrated by a God who knows this daughter and her heart more completely and intimately than anyone. There is a clarity of vision now that no contacts or glasses or perfect 20/20 vision can compare to, and I am forever grateful for new eyes. Thank you, Father. I can see so much better now because of the wounds in my heart and your healing balm.

I am and remain...

imperfect, broken, lacking and completely dependent on the Lord to transform me as I walk with Him.

The good news for this broken daughter is that...

In Christ, I am being perfected and molded into His image along the way.

Because of Christ, I am made whole.

With Christ, I lack nothing.

His grace covers me completely for always.

I needed grace more times than I can count as I wrestled and yelled and withdrew, as I said and did hurtful things to others because of my pain. That's the real, non-sugar-coated story. I wasn't always the epitome of faith and hope and trust. I went through a dark valley that at times felt like hell honestly. I wrestled with demons of fear, bitterness, resentment, anger, rage, and the list embarrassingly goes on, but that's what gives my testimony authenticity. I wan't always a nice person in the struggle. I didn't always smile. I didn't always have a kind word. I didn't always celebrate and rejoice with others. That's the truth, and the Lord's grace was totally sufficient through it all. As I'm asked to share this story over and over again, I'm always finding new nuggets in it, new pieces that the Lord is bringing to the surface. Pain is funny that way. It has a way of bringing out the hidden things in our lives and exposing them to the Light.

This story has been told and retold, my testimony shared, but He is the Famous One, who redeemed the struggle for this daughter. I am simply a character in the great love story that God is writing in my life as I journey homeward, Heavenward.

"I lift my eyes unto the hills. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and Earth."

With God, nothing is impossible... in His timing. All praise and honor and glory be to Him.

I'm including my full testimony (momentarily) in the hopes that it will encourage even one, wherever you find yourself along this journey. May the Lord encourage your heart through it. It's long, but so was the journey! :)

I am simply a vessel, broken, deeply flawed and chipped that the Lord has put back together. I still see and feel the sharp edges, the flaws and the cracks, but it is the Lord who fills this vessel and pours His love out of it. The sharp edges, flaws, and cracks are refined for use by the Lord. He holds this vessel together with His mighty hand.

I rest in that. Every single day.

This is my Testimony written in its entirety to present to my Sojourner’s Sunday School class on Sunday December 6, 2009. We were still waiting for Maia Grace to come home from China. This is how I began...

Before I introduce myself and share my testimony, I simply want to tell you that I am an adopted daughter of a mighty King who I call Abba, Father.

I am a child who has seen troubles, many and bitter, but the Lord restored my life again.

I am a child whose steps have been ordered by the Lord. Many were the plans in my heart, but it was the Lord who directed my steps and upheld me with His hand.

I am standing here today to tell you about His enduring faithfulness. All praise and glory and honor is due Him. Let the words of my mouth be pleasing in thy sight oh, Lord.

Have you ever been in the card section of a store and liked a card so much that you thought, “Man, I wish somebody would buy me this card.” But you knew the chances of that happening were slim. Somehow, the words were just what YOU needed at that moment? I found such a card sometime after my life dramatically changed August 10, 2000. I liked it so much that I bought it for myself to hang on my refrigerator. It’s been with me ever since. I brought it with me today to show you.

On the front is a quote from Stormie O’Martian.
It reads, “Going through a waiting period doesn’t mean that there is nothing happening, because when you are waiting on the Lord, He is always moving in your life.”
The inside reads, “Lord, it is so comforting to know You never turn away from me. In every moment of time, Your hand is at work designing what is best for my life. Help me to rest in You, keep a quiet heart, and look forward with hopeful expectation to the things You are working out for my good and Your glory.”
“Praying for you through the waiting time… trusting with you to see His goodness revealed.”

Bebe approached me last Sunday after church and asked me if I’d be willing to share my testimony with you today. Knowing I’d asked the Lord to use my testimony whenever and however He pleased, I hesitated, gulped and said, “um, sure.” I’ve told bits and pieces of it at the grocery store and the post office, and many other places. Many people know more than a little about our struggle, but I’ve never really shared the whole story at one time.

In the book of 1st Samuel scripture tells us that a lion came to threaten and destroy young David’s flock of sheep. David was doing his job, faithfully shepherding his sheep, on just another ordinary day. And there came a lion. It came to threaten and destroy, but it also came as a wonderful opportunity for David. Through his faith in the Lord, the lion was defeated and also a bear and later, the mighty Philistine, Goliath.
p. 86- Streams in the Desert excerpt from C. H. P.

“And there came a lion.” Normally, we think of a lion not as a special blessing from the Lord but only as a reason for alarm. Yet the lion was God’s opportunity in disguise. Every difficulty and every temptation that comes our way, if we receive it correctly, is God’s opportunity.

When a “lion” comes to your life, recognize it as an opportunity from the Lord, no matter how fierce it may outwardly seem. Even the tabernacle of God was covered with badger skins and goat hair. No one would think there would be any glory there, yet the Shechinah glory of God was very evident underneath the covering. May the Lord open our eyes to see Him even in temptations, trials, dangers, and misfortunes.”

On August 10th, in the late summer of 2000, there came a lion. I was out in the fields, much like David, doing my job,, preparing to shepherd the first group of 6th graders at Maryville Intermediate School.

The lion struck suddenly and it threatened:

• My physical well-being
• My emotional well-being and stability
• My relationship with my husband
• My relationships with family members and friends

It attacked my identity, my worth, my joy and my peace. Its attack left deep emotional wounds and scars and severely tested my faith.

The lion that came into my life was infertility and a barren womb.

On August 10, 2000, I went to UT hospital to have a routine laparascopic outpatient surgery performed to remove a dermoid ovarian cyst. During surgery, my doctor accidentally cut an artery in my abdomen and had to make a larger incision to stop the bleeding. I remember being groggy and the doctor explaining all of this and telling me that she had discovered that I had Stage 1 endometriosis. She then looked at me and said that if Ben and I want ed to start a family, we needed to go ahead and try. We were told that the longer we waited, the harder it would become, because endometriosis can impair fertility. I was 26, and Ben was 27. We had been married for a little over two years. Suddenly, the joy of trying to start a family turned into panic, stress, anxiety and fear.

After a stressful year of failed attempts, we were advised to see a fertility specialist. Our first appointment was on September 11, 2001. That day forever changed our nation and much of the world, and it also marked the beginning of many painful treatments to come for me – medicines, procedures, injections, and surgeries. After our third procedure, known as an IUI- intrauterine insemination, we became joyfully pregnant. We had had the successful procedure performed on February 14th, 2002 and soon discovered that two of my best friends here in town and one college roommate were also pregnant and we were all due in the month of November 2002. It seemed perfect and meant to be. My due date was November 7, 2002.

My best friends and roommate went on to celebrate their November births, and November 7th passed as a very painful day for us. I had lost the baby earlier that year in May at around 10 weeks. A DNC was performed to remove the baby, and I was subsequently discharged back into the business and daily routines of life with an empty womb and an aching heart. I finished out teaching that school year with the grace that the Lord supplied for me.
More grace was scheduled to come in the years ahead, unbeknownst to me, and over time, and reflecting back, it would prove to be sufficient.

I went home after the DNC and wrote the date 5-3-02 beside these words in my Bible.
Psalm 27:14 – “Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage. And He shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.”

At that point, I had no idea just how long the wait would be, so I tried my best to be of good courage with a broken and contrite spirit. The Lord promises that He is near to such as those who have a broken and contrite spirit, and that He will not despise it.
I went back to teaching 6th graders for the 2002/2003 school year. At the time, we were plugged into a young couples Sunday School class where couples were announcing they were pregnant literally almost weekly, and on top of that and my best friends being pregnant, my inclusion teacher assistant was pregnant and our team’s student teacher.

Like Paul in 1 Corinthians, I felt “burdened beyond measure, above strength, hard -pressed on every side.”

I continued my fertility treatments of injections that school year, often having my 1st period class covered so I could go to UT early for blood work and ultrasounds. Every month was a disappointment and these disappointments began to add up.

Psalm 38: 6-10, 15.
I identified with the Psalmist when he wrote these words.
“ I am troubled, I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long... I am feeble and severely broken; I groan because of the turmoil of my heart. Lord, all my desire is before You, and my sighing is not hidden from You. My heart pants, my strength fails me; As for the light of my eyes, it also has gone from me.”

At the end of that 2003 school year, I decided to take a year’s leave of absence to pursue further treatments. It was in the fall of 2003 that I became extremely depressed and began taking Well-butrin and receiving Christian counseling in Knoxville. I also started attending Sheltering Tree meetings at Cedar Springs with a group of women who were also struggling with infertility and loss.

These were not easy steps for me, and God looked on from His dwelling place as I took them. All the while, He was longing to be gracious to me, and I was longing for His strong arm of rescue.

January of 2004 was our last round of fertility treatments with injections and in May of 2004, I made a gut-wrenching decision to leave the job I loved so dearly – teaching children. I couldn’t handle both worlds anymore, and I was physically and emotionally exhausted.

At this point in the journey, we switched to a different fertility specialist. By the time we reached him, we had had 20 IUIs, one devastating miscarriage, and three surgeries. In the fall of 2004, we began preparing for In-vitro fertilization. We finished the cycle in February of 2005 and it proved to be unsuccessful. We cried, the nurses cried and family and friends were in disbelief. We had prayed and waited for so long and had tried our best not to lose heart. Was this God’s answer and why?

In the kitchen that afternoon, I distinctly remember feeling the peace that Jesus gave to me that passeth all understanding. It washed over me like blessed assurance as I sat on the kitchen counter, mourning and grieving and saying, “Why God?” I knew He was with me, even though He had not granted our petition.

Finally, I had come to the very end of myself. At this point, I was completely broken and surrendered my plans for a family to the Lord. God’s refining was doing its work producing in me submission, humility and complete and utter dependence on His unseen hand.
The gift of faith was being established deep within me.

Charles Spurgeon once said:
“The answer to our prayer may be coming, although we may not discern its approach. Delayed answers to prayer are not only trials of faith. They also give us opportunities to honor God through our steadfast confidence in Him even when facing the apparent denial of our request.

The Lord slowly began to put His desires in my heart and make them my own. Four days after the failure of IVF, I remembered an old magazine that I had brought home with me from the doctor’s office years earlier. It had a picture of Mary Beth Chapman, wife of Steven Curtis Chapman, on the front, and she was holding Stevey Joy, one of their daughters adopted from China. As I flipped to the Table of Contents, I stopped one page short, and I believe the Lord guided me to a little blurb on the side of a page about an adoption agency in Portland, OR named All God’s Children. As I read the little article and cried, I found these words.

“Beloved, search your heart and pray. Somewhere in the world there may be a little one waiting for you.”

With tears in my eyes and a very shaky voice, I called All God’s Children right then and requested an information packet on China. After we received it in the mail, God began to confirm His calling on our lives by giving us glimpses. We began to run into other couples who had adopted children from China. All God’s Children was having an information meeting for the 1st time ever in Tennessee. It was in Knoxville and was scheduled for April 19th. He also gave me a vision in a dream where I was holding a Caucasian baby boy, and as I turned to leave the room, I turned back toward a bed and lying in the middle of the bed was a Chinese baby girl. I sat the baby I was holding down and reached for the baby girl on the bed. I’ve always thought that He gave me this special dream to confirm what He had in mind for me. For me, it was surrendering my plan and reaching for His.

We began the process to adopt from China June 9, 2005., I had an opportunity to teach 6th grade again in the fall of the 2005/2006 school year at MIS on the same team, so I returned to teach one more year. Our mountain of paperwork was submitted to China April 28, 2006, and I submitted my resignation once again in May, after being told that our China referral would be coming 11 -12 months later.

In October 2007, 18 months had passed, and we were still waiting. China’s processing and issuing of referrals had come to a crawl. Ben and I were caught in a huge backlog from 2005, and all we could do was wait and know that our expectation was to come from the Lord.
Habbakuk 2:2-3 says:

“ Write the vision and make it plain on tablets that he may run who reads it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it; because it will surely come. It will not tarry.”
I clung to this verse as our wait continued to increase and friends were having their second child.

It was in October of 2007 that a very unexpected turn of events happened. I became pregnant. When we visited my OBGYN, they confirmed that there was not just one but two heartbeats. I was pregnant with twins! We were stunned!

Was this our reward, a double portion, my strong arm of rescue, finally the beginning of our family, the appointed time?

At 10 ½ weeks, we lost the babies and went on to discover that they were girls and had a chromosomal abnormality known as Turner Syndrome. Had they survived, they could have had major health issues. I had a DNC in December of 2007 and life went on.
This time in our lives remains simply too profound for me to possibly understand.
February of 2008 rolled around with us still in the waiting. It was now over seven years into the wait for our family to begin and almost two years into the wait for our baby girl from China.

As the waiting continued, my faith in God grew deeper and stronger than I had ever known. A quiet resolve was there, trusting and believing that all things work together for good for those who love the Lord and who are called according to His purpose.
As it says in Isaiah, “I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

I began to sense that the Lord wanted me to do something with the public. I inquired about helping out at my vet’s office, and they didn’t need anyone. I interviewed for a third grade interim position at Foothills and wasn’t chosen.

A new bakery, Sweet Celebrations, had just opened in the fall of '07, and Kate Kiser, a good friend of mine from Fairview, was one of the wedding cake bakers/decorators there. She happened to be sitting in front of me at the movies one night while we were watching 27 Dresses , and she approached me about working part-time. I decided to come in for an interview with the owners. Kenny and Leyanne Harper. I already knew them after having their daughter in sixth grade back in '99/'00. I came in sometime in mid-February for an interview and was hired to work part-time throughout the week, selling baked goods and dipping ice cream.

I began to talk to God about where I was in life many times and why I was dipping ice cream. There's absolutely NOTHING wrong with that. I just felt funny after having been a math teacher. I think it was a pride thing when people came in and seemed surprised to see me working there. I felt like I needed to explain my position in some way. Daily, I had to remind myself that it was not between me and everyone else to guess why I was suddenly saying regular cone or sugar cone; it was between me and the Lord. Me and Jesus. Dipping ice cream. Ok.

I Chronicles speaks of a group of people known as the “potters who dwelt among plants and hedges; there they dwelt with the king for his work.”
From Streams in the Desert:

We may dwell ‘with the king for his work’ anywhere and everywhere. We may be called to serve Him in the most unlikely places and under the most adverse conditions. It may be out in the countryside, far away from the King’s many activities in the city or vice versa. It makes no difference! The King who placed us there will come and dwell with us. It is what He has seen fit to place in our hands and is for now, “his work.”

While I was happy to be interacting with the public again and seeing MANY familiar faces, there was something inside of me that continued to ask, "Why am I here in this place, Lord? More importantly, why I am still in the waiting?" I really enjoyed the people I worked with at the bakery and I loved the public, but these thoughts were with me every day.
It was on one ordinary springtime sunny day in late April that I met Patty, and I am utterly convinced that it was a divine appointment for us. God used her to speak to me and
fulfill His plan for our family. Patty is one of Leyanne’s sisters and just happened to be at the bakery that day with her little girl, Jennifer. We struck up a casual conversation, and she asked if I had children. I told her we were still waiting for our referral for our little girl in China after a long battle with infertility and miscarriages. One thing led to another, and our conversation became very intimate about our similar struggle to have a family. As I put my apron on and went to work, the wheels started turning in Patty's head, and she approached me about a daughter of a friend of hers from Atlanta who was possibly looking for an adoptive family. I wasn't immediately excited about this plan as I had grown to be VERY protective of our adoption from China. I told her I would go home and talk to Ben about it and let her know something the next week.

This was on a Friday. I then went home and boarded the "fear and what if" train. Maybe you're familiar with that train! It makes daily runs to pick up passengers. Well, I was a passenger on that train all weekend and came back to work on Tuesday and told her, "no." Later that week, I relayed the story to the women in my weekly bible study. Bebe was in that study at the time. They spoke some hard truth to me that day and said that I was maybe making the China adoption an idol and protecting it so much that I wasn't being open to what God maybe had prepared for me. Ouch.

Later in that same week, I got a message from Patty on my home answering machine saying that she felt like the Lord wanted her to call me back. She felt this strongly and decided to act on it, even though I had said,"no." I have to tell you that BeBe had given a mini-devotion in church the Sunday before about the Lord speaking to Elijah a second time. Ben and I had a serious discussion that night, and the next day, we decided to take a GIANT leap of faith and go for it, knowing that it may or may not work out. The birthmother was six and a half months pregnant.

Over the years, I had built a protective wall around my heart that was inpenetrable. Saying yes to move forward with this domestic adoption made a crack in that wall that would later tumble down completely!

So, after we said yes, my words to friends and family were these. "We're walking through doors as they open until the Lord closes them." I described going through these doors and being in a dark room. I couldn't see anything - completely cave-dark. There were no easy answers, a billboard or positive affirmation that this was going to happen - just walking through doors as they opened and groping around in the dark. The birthparents changed their mind in the beginning of July and then changed it back. Next, we were told that the birthmother fell over a bicycle and had to go to the ER. The cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck and the baby was out of position. I fought fear with everything in me.
Finally,we received the call August 20th that the birthmother was in labor and we packed our provisions to go to Georgia for the delivery! We arrived at around 9:00 that night, and Ava Faith was born at 1:56 August 21st, 2008. This day was my grandmother’s birthday. She passed away 5 months later after a battle with Alzheimers and Lymphoma. I firmly believe that these dates lining up wasn’t coincidental.

In most states there is a 10 day recission period for the birthparents to change their minds, and because day 10 fell on Labor Day for us, we had to wait 11days. We stayed with Patty and her family in GA for 8 of those 11 days waiting for the interstate adoption councils to clear us to come back to Tennessee. Right before we were to come home and wait out day 11, I got a phone call from the birthmother saying that the birthfather was having second thoughts. I hung up the phone after talking with her and listening to her heart and went and sat down. My family and the family we were staying with were around me. Ben was back in Tennessee because he had to go to work. As I relayed the news to them, panic spread in the room like a virus. What I should do and say were thrown around and the situation became emotional and intense for everyone in the room-everyone but me. By this point, I trusted the Lord so utterly and completely, that not even the demons of hell could shake my faith in Him. He was going to do what He was going to do. I didn’t have to control or manipulate the situation. My God was in charge.

I went to bed that night with Ava sleeping near me and picked up my daily devotional that I hadn’t read in a few days, and I read the scripture verse for August 21st 2008.
It read, “ He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because He delighted in me.” Psalm 18:19

I had been praying specifically that the Lord would bring me out into a spacious place for a very long time. That verse had become dear to me throughout the course of the waiting and suffering.

The Lord and my trust in Him has become my spacious place.
Hudson Taylor, a great missionary to China, once said, in response to, “The Lord is my Shepherd.”

“Not was, not may be, nor will be. He is on Sunday, on Monday, and through every day of the week. He is in January, in December, and every month of the year. He is when I’m at home and in China. He is during peace or war and in times of abundance or poverty. “
I would add that He is… when there comes a lion.

Blessed be the name of the Lord!!!!

I’m also learning to let that fear train keep on rolling down the tracks as I journey on. I'm learning to look for new form of transportation these days.

My Heavenly Father carrying me.

On July 15, 2010, two days before my thirty-sixth birthday, we got the call from our adoption agency that we had a three-month old little girl in Jiangxi China waiting for us. We traveled to China in the fall of 2010 to bring her home, and the Lord fulfilled the vision he had given me long ago of a daughter with raven-black hair. He was faithful to bring that to pass in the right time. I would have waited for Maia Grace as long as it would have taken, because I believed in the Lord's promise to my heart and knew He would fulfill it because He is faithful 100%.

2011-03-22T20:30:00.001-04:00

Back up to posting later this week. It's been crazy with post placement reports, cat vet visits, preschool pictures, and I could go on and on! Back up soon! LOVE SPRING!

Snow Cream and Daddy Days

2011-03-17T15:18:00.005-04:00

It was SO cold outside for several days in January, so we brought the fun inside! One of my favorite memories from childhood involves a green tupperware bowl, a spoon and some snow. Endless fun! We're carrying on the tradition with a snowman bowl. Ava had a ball with these. I got out green food coloring at one point to color the snow, and I have now added that to my "what was I thinking" list! :)

I'm on to February pics! Yay! I am determined to get caught up. :)

Maia is 9 Months Old - January 5th!

2011-03-14T16:19:00.005-04:00

Ava at 9 months - wiggle worm!

January 5th, Maia turned 9 months old. We have been home from China for a little over three months, abd the time has flown by! Our red luggage is back in the closet, but much of what we brought home still sits in piles here and there awaiting storage and memory-keeping. We've officially begun the transformation of our guest room to Ava's room, and Maia will be in the nursery soon! Maia's sleeping in the guest room now, a move from our bedroom just recently. We have chosen pink and blue for Ava's room and hope to start painting soon!

Here are Maia's wiggly nine month pictures!

Sweet Sisters

2011-03-14T14:21:00.003-04:00

Every single day is an adventure with these two! They are both really active and on-the-go non-stop! Most of my days are spent not going down a project list and checking things off. They're spent just keep up with them and loving my girls and watching them grow - much too fast for my liking! Ava is approaching 2 1/2 in these pictures and Maia is nine months old! They'll be in their teens before I know it!

The Snowy Morning

2011-03-14T14:06:00.004-04:00

As the snow kept falling, Ava's excitement kept rising, and ours, too! We haven't seen this much snow in I don't know how long - maybe the early 90s. Our visit drew to a close, and Grandma and Granddaddy packed up and made the trek back to Maryland in the snow - which they are very used to! Granddaddy and Ava have one more romp in the snow before it's back inside to warm-up and say goodbye. We had a wonderful visit! Thank you for coming, Grandma and Granddaddy! We'll see you at Easter!

My goal is to get completely caught up this week. Everyone is finally healthy, and Ben and I are seriously just now recovering from a very busy and unhealthy January and February. I told him just last night that I am finally feeling like I am getting back on top of some things. This is a laundry/blog week! Happy spring to all! We are READY!

More Christmas Weekend Fun in January

2011-03-07T14:02:00.006-05:00

The fun continued all weekend as we watched the snow fall and enjoyed family time and opening gifts. Thank you, again, to everyone who sent gifts for the girls! They have all been played with in our house! Several bitterly cold days afforded us a lot of time indoors this January and February. :) I know I'm posting Christmas pics, but I just have say that my forsythia is blooming and my daffodils are UP! Spring is here!

Celebrating Christmas with Grandma and Granddaddy

2011-03-01T15:25:00.008-05:00

Grandma and Granddaddy drove down from Maryland to celebrate Christmas with us in January, and we had a wonderful time. We had the deepest snow East Tennessee has seen in a long time, and it was so much fun to play in it! We relaxed indoors most of the time and had a peaceful snowy weekend.

Here are a few pictures from the first few days.

Maia's sweet grin from ear to ear!

Our 15th Christmas together. We started dating the summer of 1996!

Grandma and Granddaddy with some gifts for them from China.

Ava and Maia with their room signs that Granddaddy made. :)

Change in Plans

2011-03-01T10:34:00.002-05:00

Hi, all!

Due to a recent development with folks possibly getting encouragement from our adoption stories, I've decided to leave the blog open until further notice. So... I'll be back up and blogging very soon! Lots of fun photos to share!

Ava's at preschool this morning and Maia's napping. She's about to turn 11 months old, and she just took her first steps two days ago! She can now wave bye-bye, too. So precious!

Love to all,

Emily

Trying to Send Invitations... In the Meantime.... :)

2011-02-24T21:37:00.005-05:00

Hi, everyone!

I have collected several addresses for the invitation list, but Blogger keeps saying I have an invalid something or other, so I can't send them. I'll keep working on that, but in the meantime, I'll post some pictures!

We are coming off a crazy last few weeks since I blogged, and as usual, I am coming up for air. I am thrilled to tell you that Maia slept through the night last night, and this is one of the first mornings in forever that I woke up before the girls and actually felt great!

Ava is now officially 2 1/2 and Maia is 10 months old going on 11 months. They are an active pair and I am operating lately at a break-neck pace until bedtime, not leaving much time for posting. The Lord has been faithful to minister to me in this season and sends me reminders of His care and provision during my days of craziness. I don't have much time at all for quiet times lately and spiritual refreshment, so I've been counting on Him to refresh me while I sleep, and He does. How grateful I am for His ministering during my sleep to prepare me for the next day and what it holds, be a task or a conversation with someone.

Now, let's see. Where was I? Oh, yeah! January!!!

It's 9:44 p.m. and I've had my Happy Mommy drink made up of a cup of milk, a few teaspoons of vanilla and a dash of cinnamon, and I'll leave you with one photo that sums up the New Year.

We've jumped into it and haven't stopped since!

Here's to a New Year! 2011, here we come!

An Invitation

2011-02-11T15:38:00.005-05:00

Just that word, "invitation" invokes something warm and comfortable and safe. I am extending an invitation for you to follow our family blog in the hopes that it will continue to uplift and encourage you and remind you that the Lord has His eye on all of His children and has good things planned, even when we can't SEE. My blog will be open to those by invitation only in the coming days. If you are following and would like to continue, please leave me a comment on this post with your e-mail address. Please tell me a little about yourself if I don't know you and why you are choosing to follow our blog.

There are many of you struggling in a waiting period with any number of things, something I'm intimately familiar with along my own journey with the Lord. Some of you may be struggling with infertility or you're on a journey with domestic or international adoption. To all of you, my hope is that my blog will continue to encourage you, as I write from my heart.

Again, please leave me a comment if you haven't already received an e-mail from me, and I'll add you to the invitation list.

Thank you and may God bless you abundantly.

Christmas with Mimi and Papa

2011-02-09T16:25:00.013-05:00

Every Christmas, we drive the much-traveled route to my parent's house to celebrate the Christmas season, eat a yummy supper together and open gifts. We've been doing this ever since Ben and I were first married. It's always so warm and inviting, and Mom always goes out of her way to make it a special night for everyone. Thank you, Mimi and Papa, for a wonderful Christmas celebration! We love you!

Snow Day Play!

2011-02-07T15:21:00.008-05:00

On the 26th of December, (whew, I'm getting there!) the cold tempertures held, and the snow was still on the ground... a lot of it! Ava could not wait to go outside to play in it. Maia had the sniffles, so she had to wait for her snow play day until a few days later. Daddy and Ava had a ball playing in the six inches of snow we got, and Ben took Ava sledding for the very first time. She loved it! She is our outdoor girl- absolutely loves to be outside doing anything! Just like her Momma. :)

Every morning, before anything else, Ava liked to play with the Christmas train.

One of Maia's last meals in her Bumbo.,, We have loved the Bumbo!

Hat, scarf, mitten, boots, I'm ready!

I was determined to try my hand at "making" something special for Ava for Christmas this year. I thought, "surely, I can make a pillow," and I did! She loves Tinkerbell, and I found some fuzzy fabric at Hobby Lobby to use. I was so tickled it turned out! Who knows, maybe I'll make a dress someday! :)

Calm, Quiet, Snowy Christmas Day

2011-02-07T14:54:00.005-05:00

Good afternoon!

Miss Maia's Roseola virus is officially gone, and we were not sad to see it go because she was so miserable! I wrote a few posts back that she was diagnosed with the virus early last week, and Ava and I both had pesky viruses at the same time, making for a very very difficult week. We are like the groundhog poking our heads outside today. No public places for us this week! As of today, Maia's measle-like rash is completely gone, and she's returning to her happy-go-lucky self with giggles and grins. Ava and I are both 100%, and I am catching up on literally a million things it seems. The girls are napping on this Monday afternoon, and yes, I'm STILL posting Christmas pictures!

We awoke to a snowy Christmas morning, and the girls came downstairs to see what was under the Christmas tree. Ava is much more interested in surprises this year, and it was so fun to watch her approach her toys. She was so funny. We thought she'd rush right in, but I think she didn't know quite what to think of everything being under the tree. She just stood there for the longest time looking at us and then at the toys. She first spied a baby bed/changing table with some babies and bottles and such and has loved taking care of her babies. For the life of us, Ben and I don't know what happened to our pictures from Christmas morning. We have video but can't find the pictures! If I can find them, I'll upload them later to this post. We enjoyed a family Christmas breakfast, and the girls played with their toys before we headed back over to my Aunt Jill's house for our traditional Christmas meal. Maia was wide awake when we got there, so we were able to capture a few shots of her opening her presents that we saved from the night before.

There are more Christmas pictures coming up that capture the girls better as we celebrated with my folks a few nights later and then with Ben's folks a few weeks later. It was pretty much a non-stop Christmas celebration through mid-January!

Mommy and Maia opening her presents

My Dad sampling the turkey!

Christmas Eve

2011-02-05T08:00:00.012-05:00

It took literally 25 takes to get this picture! We were on our way to the Christmas Eve candlelight service to meet my family.

Around 6:30 Christmas Eve, we loaded up the girls and met my family at Peck's Memorial UMC for the annual Christmas communion service. We kept both Ava and Maia with us in the pew, and they did pretty well! Ava even got to hold a candle for a few minutes before I decided that that was a bad idea with the wax and hair around us, especially mine!

We then headed to my Aunt Jill and Uncle Rick's house for our family Christmas celebration. My Aunt and Uncle live in my great-grandmother and great-grandfather's brick house that was built in the 1920s, and over the years, it has been the place of countless wonderful family memories. It's one of the most special places on Earth to me.

Because communion was late, Maia conked out when we got to the house, and she went to bed. That's why you won't see any pictures of her on this night. She was so tired. Ava got to stay up a little later and open some presents and play with some toys before heading to bed.

My cousins. Wes and Katie, sat behind us.

Aunt Jill made a play corner for Ava with stuffed animals and a cradle.

Aunt Jill and Ava

Mimi and Ava sharing a hug

Papa's here, too!

Hmmm... I think that's a cookie Ava is getting from Mimi!

If I could take a snapshot of one of my favorite spots in the whole house, it would be this dining room where the Christmas Eve treats are! Everyone brings something to contribute, and it is always the best food!

Uncle Rick and Ben in the kitchen... another one of my favorite spots filled with family banter, laughs, tears and prayers.

Ava opens her tricycle from Mimi and Papa. She'll be zooming around the circle in the spring!

Mommy helping Ava ride through the kitchen... Zoom zoom!

Here I come Aunt Sydney and Uncle Lonnie! :)

Uncle Rick helping out...

Ava playing "five" with Uncle Lonnie

Ava's characteristic big grin. :)

Katie and Wes with Ava

Roseola Virus Update and Christmas Eve Day

2011-02-04T14:55:00.007-05:00

Hi, everyone,

It's been quite a week here at our house with viruses. Last weekend, Ava started getting sick, followed by Maia and then me. We're all still recuperating, and Maia has had the worst go of it. On Monday, without any symptoms or warning, her temperature shot to 104, and we sponge bathed, called Chilren's and gave her Infant's Motrin to try to bring it down. With all of that, we could just get it down to close to 103. When I took her in to see the doctor, he mentioned Roseola Infantrum virus which is notorious for high fevers and no other symptoms. When the fever return to normal, a measle-like rash develops. Just yesterday, her fever broke and returned to normal, and sure enough, she woke up with the rash this morning on her arms, neck, face and chest. She's having another tough day, is having a hard time sleeping, and Ava and I are still blowing our noses every 10 minutes and feeling lethargic. Thankfully, Ben has escaped all of this! Needless, to say, it's been a really tough week for us, but I think we're over the worst of it.

On to happier, more joyful things! Sorting the remainder of our Christmas pics today, and trying to catch up. I hope everyone is well!

Ben is like a kid at Christmas when it comes to trains. Every year, he can't wait to set it up. This year, he bought more track and we had enough to make the train go in a circle around our staircase. Ava absolutely loved it!

I turned around and found Ava putting Mary and the Wisemen in the green-pick up truck that goes on the train. Mary got to ride up top!

Christmas Cheer

2011-02-01T15:33:00.000-05:00

As Christmas drew closer, so did Ava and Maia towards the Christmas tree. Ava especially loved sitting underneath and playing with her toys are picking up and shaking the presents! We got out our plastic manger scene, and they were both entertained for quite awhile!

Good Heavens!

2011-01-31T14:53:00.004-05:00

As my dear friend, Beth, says, "Good Heavens" this potty-training has got me on super alert all day! Ava's doing very well, loves her pink decorated potty and washing her hands in the big sink, and now says, "Uh, oh, I have an accident." We still have quite a ways to go, though, and it's taking a very vigilant momma to stay consistent and clean accidents and change Maia's diapers... thus the lapse in blog posts recently.

Yes, it's the day before February, and I still have my snowmen around the house, so that makes me feel a little better for just now posting the rest of Christmas! I'm trying to beat the crocuses!

There are several, so I'm going to start uploading and hope for completion by the end of the week, so we can get to the present! All my best to everyone. Spring is coming... in more ways than one. Hallelujah!

Maia enjoys her bath! She loves to play with bath toys.

In winter, I break out my brown boots, and Ava found them one day and put them on HERSELF!

Maia is eating finger foods for the first time.

I was celebrating and SO was Ava!

Where you can find the sisters on any given day. In the playroom jockeying for position on the slide.

Potty-Training in Session!

2011-01-24T14:33:00.003-05:00

This little post deserves just a brief explanation of what's going on in our household right now.

Ava is in full-time potty training mode, and so are we!

She has officially said bye-bye to her diapers and hello to princess pull-ups. Our little girl is growing up. :)

The rest of our Christmas pictures coming up soon!

December Fun

2011-01-21T15:45:00.003-05:00

Boy, am I behind! Just ordered Maia's 9 month pics and am still trying to catch up on a million other little details. Hopefully, I can post and upload pics before the sleeping beauties wake up! I hope everyone is well this new January. We're seeing a lot more snow in East Tennessee this year! It has been beautiful; more snow than we've seen in a very long time, like since the 90s! Still waiting for our hill to ice over so we can use our old-fashioned Radio Flyer sled. Still hoping...

On to the rest of December pics! These next few are just random pictures of the girls having fun at home on cold December days.

Maia Turns 8 months old December 5th

2011-01-16T14:20:00.005-05:00

The 5th of each month has gone by SO quickly since we've been home from China. I remember a friend telling me that it would take three months for things to slown down, calm down, and she was right! We're still tying up loose ends from China paperwork and my huge red suitcase with the bright blue ribbon is still sitting upstairs with summer clothes spilling out of it. Unpacking summer clothes in the dead of winter became priority number 0 for me! Maybe I'll get to that today after thank you notes. :) There's always something to be busy about doing, so I have to be intentional about making myself a cup of hot tea and just sitting still. So hard to do when there's so many things on my to-do list!

These pictures show a fun Christmas evening with Mimi and Papa, Maia turning eight months old, and Ava building block towers, dressing up in her Little House on the Prairie dress and decorating Saki with fourth of July Hawaiian leis. Saki just never knows what will happen when she emerges from the basement. :)

Celebrating the Christmas Season

2011-01-13T14:41:00.008-05:00

Ben puts the tree up and it's time for the angel topper!

Hi, everyone,

Well, mittens are put away, the washing machine is running, the snow is melting a tad, and I'm sitting down to catch up on Christmas posting and pictures! I appreciate everyone's patience as I've been a little "snowed under" lately with just the goings-on of daily life with a 2 1/2 year old and a 9 month old running and crawling circles around me!

Like you, I'm regrouping for the New Year, ever mindful of my brokeness and ever mindful of the chisel that the Lord is using to hammer away impurities and shape me into more of the likeness of Jesus. I'm a willing participant in the chiseling on most days as I try to put off the old self more to make room for the new. There are days when the old self (flesh) bullies its way through, and then there's the victorious days when the Spirit wins! Wish I could have those days every day, but ah, the Lord is so patient with this daughter. He never gives up or condemns me. He just says, "Get back up and keep going, daughter of Mine." That brings me great comfort because I can have some very ugly heart days. Anybody?

Ava and Maia are growing up way too fast, and they are still two peas in a pod and get along great most days.

Ava is now 28 months old and is a little firecracker most of the time. She explodes onto most every scene with enthusiasm, exclamations and a fervent curiosity. She is a bubbly, energetic little girl who loves activity of any kind! She has the most adventurous spirit and loves to play outside. She's very independent right now, (hello two year old!) and her favorite expression these days is "Ava do it!" Like I said, she's adventurous to the core of her little being, and any opportunity to climb, dance, sing, play with water, or go anywhere in the car, even to the dump, is met with, "I'm SO excited," or "I'm having FUN!" With all her newfound independence, she is still dependent and looks to Ben and me for snuggles, safety and comfort, assurance, hugs and kisses, tenderness and storytime cuddling. I wonder all the time what God has in store for her little life. She's pretty strong-willed and very determined and likes to "study" things around her, be it a bug, a piece of lint, or a Vermont Country Store magazine! She has a kind and compassionate heart and will check to be sure Mommy, Daddy and Maia are ok if we get hurt or are crying. Just today, I bumped my elbow on the corner of a wall and she heard me say, "Oww!" from two rooms away. Soon, I heard, "I'm coming! Want to kiss it.) She's tenderhearted and gentle with Maia (most days) and will come out of nowhere and give her a hug, a pat on the head or ask, "Maia, you ok?" She also loves to help me around the house, and one of her favorite times to help is when I clean out the dishwasher or we set the table or clear the table. We've only broken two dishes so far! She has a giving heart and often shares her food or toys with others. The other day, we had a popcorn party, and I ran out of popcorn. She noticed and gave me all of the popcorn she had left in her bowl. Ava attends the Learning Tree preschool two days a week right now and loves her teachers and her new friends. They still describe her as "busy" and we would totally agree with that. She's a busy little bee!

Every single night, I creep into her room after she's asleep and just watch her sleep, at peace from a very full day. I've started praying over her, for her sleep and a million other things that mommas pray for. I'm already feeling that desire to shield her from the pain of this world, especially as the little girl in me still encounters it, but I know that I can't and really, I shouldn't, so I pray that God will be her strength when her heart is in the midst of it, knowing that He'll be with her just as He's been with me. Hope, effervescent, I pray, will come bubbling up in those times, and I pray that she will grow up to depend on Him as her everlasting Father who has the power to transform her heart. In this world, she will have trouble, but I pray that she'll take heart that He has overcome the world!

Wearing Granny's apron. Granny was my great-grandmother, and yes, dadgummit, she made this apron!

Miss Maia (Little Ti or Ti Ti) has a few nicknames in the short time we've been home, and one of them is "giggle girl." She is an asbolute hoot, and she cracks herself and us up all the time. She will belly-laugh over seemingly nothing and is full of smiles. She has a very determined little spirit and is on the go when those eyes are open! I marvel at how quickly she can get across the room and into something. One of her favorite daily activities is to find the tiniest piece of dirt, woodchip, leftover crumb or piece of a house fly and try to eat it! To most, I would probably seem obessive compulsive about vaccuming but I'm telling you, if there's something on the floor that my vaccum missed, she'll find it! I don't even want to think about how many pine needles she ate at Christmas. Since we've been home, she has reached a few little milestones, within a few days of eachother. On December 4th, she crawled for the very first time toward my Shark vacuum cleaner. Now, she can almost keep up with me! She uses one foot to propel herself and boy, can she go! On that same day, I found her first tooth, and she now has two that she's very excited to use for all kinds of new foods. She LOVES to eat and is very serious about her food! The following day, she said, "mama" for the first time. She had been saying "dada" for awhile, so I was thrilled to finally hear her say, "mama!" Another nickname we have for her is the Nuzzler. She has this really cute habit of grabbing any cloth around her or a ribbon or fabric and nuzzling in our necks. She'll instantly put her index finger in her mouth when she does it. It's so sweet. Attachment and bonding is going well, and I've tried so hard to follow the advice of people that know a lot more than me! It's been three months, and folks are beginning to hold her a little more, especially grandparents. She's now nine months old as I post this!

Note the speck of dirt that she's going after!

So, I'm now going to upload pics and go and take a shower! I'm sure there's yogurt or mac and cheese in my hair! The cats are cleaner than I am most days. :) Love to you all, and I'm stil here, the same old me, trying to be real and authentic in life and in this blog. My life isn't perfect, so don't let me ever fool you into thinking it is!

I'm a sojourner with you, trying my best to walk it out most every day with God's help.

Dependent on Him, I am.

Coming Back!

2011-01-09T15:10:00.002-05:00

Hi, everyone!

I'll be up and blogging again very soon! I've taken a short break during the holidays, and Ava has been feeling sick off and on between an ear infection and flu shots. I hope to be uploading Christmas pics and posting this week. I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and you're having a wonderful start to a brand New Year!

Maia's Christening

2010-12-22T14:38:00.010-05:00

On December 4th, family and friends gathered to witness the Christening of sweet Maia at Fairview United Methodist Church. While shopping on Shamian Island in Guangzhou, I came across a pretty litte white Chinese silk dress, and thought it would be so pretty for her Christening ceremony. I bought some sweet little silk shoes at Belk to go with it and she wore some tights with ruffles on the bottom! I bought several other Chinese silk dresses in various sizes for her and Ava, and Ava wore a soft pink one with her little toddler belly sticking out! Ava and I both dressed up in Chinese dresses. I chose a classic cream one with black flowers at the silk factory in Beijing. As an adoptive Mom of a Chinese daughter, I made a promise to Maia long before her adoption that Ben and I would do our very best to honor her Chinese heritage and birth country and parents. It takes intentional effort, but it's been a joy to gather special things for her from China and hopefully pass on the sights, smells, sounds and feel for her country of birth.

China. Just writing that word conjures up so much for me just having visited a few cities and one village. Today as I write, I'm excited to tell you that we have located her foster mother and father's home, and we have ordered a picture of her foster mother standing in front of her house, the house where Maia spent the first 5 1/2 months of her little life. We had gotten a disposable camera back with pictures of Maia and profile images of her foster mother in front of the orphanage and a panorama view around the orphanage. We're thrilled to receive a picture of the actual house where she was cared for soon! We'll also have her address so we can send pictures of Maia to them soon and thank them from the bottom of our hearts for caring for her until we could come to China and bring her home!

After the Christening ceremony, my family headed to Courtyard Grill to celebrate with a late lunch. It was yesterday that we were there with Ava! I hope you guys enjoy the photos. There were lots of tears on this long-awaited day!

I have to tell you, too, that as our pastor carried her down the middle aisle for folks to see, Maia let out the loudest yell! Our pastor, Dr. Russel, said, "Well, that must be Chinese for AMEN!" We laughed so hard. Maia is VERY vocal! You'll see a picture of me and Ben laughing, one of our favorite pics. I think that picture captures the completion of the journey to Maia and the celebration of a promise fulfilled!

Maia still has a little bit of carrot on her face from lunch!

Christmas Tree Farm

2010-12-21T08:00:00.007-05:00

On a cold and blustery day in early December, (Yay! I'm on December pics!) we bundled everyone up and head to Baker's Creek Christmas Tree Farm. We had our pick of all kind of trees, and we saw several that looked just like Hershey kisses! Ava even found a little Charlie Brown Christmas tree. :)

After playing chase and hide and seek among the trees with Ava, we finally chose our little 2010 tree to be cut. Ava was wide-eyed as it came crashing down. Then, it was off to be loaded on top of our car. We headed to Papa Murphy's pizza to celebrate the beginning of the Christmas season.

See the Hershey kisses?

All this tree needs is a little love.

Thanksgiving Celebration

2010-12-20T14:32:00.012-05:00

This year, we celebrated Thanksgiving in Tennessee with my family. Over the years, it's become tradition to celebrate at my parent's house. Warmth, love and all kinds of good food envelope us as we walk in the door! A special treat this year was a homecoming visit from my cousin, Lacy, who lives in Nevada. It was great to see her and visit, and she got to meet Maia for the first time. We had a wonderful time as family and as usual, ate lots of yummy traditional favorites! I was in charge of green beans this year, and they certainly were NOT like my grandmother's were! :) Miss those green beans, but not as much as I miss her.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and you're enjoying this Christmas season and finding some time to just be still. Mine is usually in the wee hours of the morning while I'm trying to quiet Miss Maia and I'm looking out the window at the stars. Last night, she was up on and off until three and I could have sworn that I saw a bear in our neighbors yard. That kept my eyes open while I walked back and forth. This morning, the bear turned into an electrical box. Oh, well! We're hoping for some snow this year! Love to all!

ps- Joy! I got your comment but it got lost in Blogland for some reason! I told Ben that I had an announcement to make and it was that we are going to Oklahoma to visit your family in the future! Thank you, dear sister, for everything. Maia and Ava are BOTH little monkeys! Maia is full of spunk already!

The Thanksgiving spread! Ben always snitches some turkey before we start!

My Dad always says the blessing as we hold hands together. I'm there beside Wes, my cousin, and Ben's taking the picture. :)

Ava and Papa share some pumpkin pie. Ava says, "mmm... I like it!"

Mimi and Papa and the girls

So thankful for Ava and Maia together and at home at last!

Mimi, Aunties, Jill and Syd and cousin, Lacy join in on Maia's Thanksgiving meal, vegetable turkey dinner. Yummy!

Lacy and Maia

Katie and Maia

My Uncle Lonnie and Katie

Maia loves to play with her toes.

Aunt Syd and Maia

Give me five, Wes!

Enjoying a Fall Day Together

2010-12-17T08:00:00.001-05:00

Before Ava and Maia came along, Ben and I would enjoy taking long walks in the backyard with Bear and Lucy. Saki was always lazy and stayed at the house. :) Now, Ava absolutely LOVES to take walks. Her favorite outside activity is to pick berries from bushes. She would do it for hours if we let her! We found some pretty leaves to play in and Maia had a fun time in the Maya Wrap. Colder temperatures were soon on the way, and we miss going outside now!

Wrapping Up November Days

2010-12-16T15:47:00.004-05:00

Right before Thanksgiving, we had our first out of three, post-placement reports with our dear friend and social worker, Pam Frye. Pam always makes us feel very relaxed. She's like family!

The other pics are some random cute and funny pictures of Ava and Maia. You'll see little mamma Ava giving Maia some water in a couple of these! The hand on her hip cracks me up!

This is where I found Miss Ava one day!

November Days of Play

2010-12-10T14:19:00.010-05:00

These are a few shots we took of the girls during November just doing their normal thing - eating, sleeping and playing! They are a hoot! Thanksgiving up next! :) Whew, I'm almost to December. It will probably snow before I'm there, though!

Crafty Day!

2010-12-09T11:45:00.004-05:00

Those who know me best know that I'm creative but I'm not crafty! I've bought books in the past and even somewhat recently about sewing crayon pouches and such thinking, "I can DO this!" If you've seen Tinkerbell (we have about a million times now - Ava loves it!) she tries to be a light fairy and a water fairy and a nature fairy, but that's just not her thing! I'm a good tinkerer and can build a fort or cardboard box grocery store with the best of them, but crafty I'm not. So, this is a shout out to my sweet friend, Treva, who is a craft fairy! I will live vicariously through you!

Seriously, I do want to do crafts with the girls, and the other day, I withstood cold temperatures to scrath in the pine needles under a pine tree in our backyard to find long buried pinecones! I was thrilled to unearth about five, for you guessed it, peanut butter birdseed pinecones! I don't have to tell you that there was birdseed all over my kitchen, and as I surveyed the extent of seed, I laughed out loud and told Ava, "We did a craft today!" This is my warmup. :)

Maia Turns Seven Months Old

2010-12-08T13:16:00.005-05:00

On November 5th, we had been home a little over one month, and sweet Maia turned seven months old. She is full of giggles and grins!

Ava at 7 months

Early November Pics

2010-12-07T10:19:00.004-05:00

Ava's baby. :)

I'm almost caught up to Thanksgiving! LOL! Whew. I barely have time to even brush my hair these days!I wanted to share a few early November pictures with you. Maia and Ava have had a ball playing with each other on most days, and Ava loves to pretend like Maia's her baby. I found her feeding Maia one day when I went to put dishes in the sink. She's very good at it! She also like to give Maia head hugs. It's hilarious! Not sure Maia likes it too much. Also, my dear cousin Katie came to meet Maia for the first time right around the beginning of November. Hope everyone is staying warm in these low temperatures around here! We are layering. Ava and Maia look like Eskimos!

Long-Awaited Playdate Fun!

2010-12-04T15:00:00.002-05:00

Traveling the road of adoption has brought dear friends into our lives. As Maia's referral got closer and closer, friendships with new women starting popping up, almost as if to say, "It's almost time." I truly believe that the Lord gives us opportunities and appointments to meet others who are sharing the same things in life as us, be it struggles or passions or joyful moments. Amy and Shannon came into my life very recently, and we have become dear sisters. Amy and Eric adopted Caden domestically and are awaiting their miracle, Kinsey, from China this spring. Shannon and Jim were also called to adoption from China and adopted sweet Grace three years ago. This playdate was our first with all but Kinsey in the group. We went to Amy's beautiful home near the mountains and shared toys, laughs, tears, joyful anticipation of Kinsey, and some really good chicken salad croissants! Thank you, dear friend, for hosting us. The kids had fun together, and Caden is about to have another fellow in the group to play with as Beth and James Milhollin are bringing Robert home from Guatemala next Wednesday! We've waited for Robert for three years, and he's finally coming home. Praise the Lord!

Beth and James with Robert at six months - Guatemala, February 2008.

Amy and Shannon playing with the kiddos

Ava loved Caden's train table.

Buddies

The gang's almost all here. Grace, 3, Caden, 4, Maia, 7 months, Ava, 2. Robert Milhollin is 3, and we're waiting for Miss Kinsey from China expected spring 2011!

Maia's big giggle grin!

Just a Normal Week

2010-12-04T11:00:00.000-05:00

Here are a few pictures of Ava and Maia playing together in the nursery no doubt while I was trying to put away and sort their clothing! Early in the week, a dear friend of mine came to visit us to and bring me a much-craved hamburger. How grateful I was to have some meat after China! BeBe Gillooly has been one of my spiritual mentors for quite some time now and has blessed me immensely! My other mentor is now a missionary in Ireland, and how I miss her! Love you, dear Kathy! We had a fun, laid back week this week.

BeBe and Maia together

I found Ava asleep with her pink trash can one afternoon!

Playing in their room together! I could never have imagined that there would be two little girls sharing this long-put-together nursery. :)

Carving Pumpkins Together

2010-12-03T14:00:00.001-05:00

While Ben was at work one day, we decided to have some fun with our pumpkins. The goal of carving turned into taking the "hat" off and scooping out the pumpkin goo and roasting the seeds! Nothing welcomes fall for me more than that first roasted batch of pumpkin seeds. I use butter, salt and a lot of Worcestershire. Ava liked them! Maia had fun watching the action from her bumbo. We look forward to pumpkin carving contests in the future! The best part for Ava was "looking" inside the pumpkin. She had so much fun. :)

Mimi and Papa's House

2010-12-02T11:09:00.007-05:00

On October 31st, it's become tradition to head to Mimi and Papa's house for a warm and yummy dinner and Halloween treats and fun. Mom ordered pumpkin face pizzas from Papa Murphy's for us and made a delicious salad. As always, we were warm, loved and welcomed with open arms and the girls had a ball! Thank you, Mimi and Papa for a fun night! We love you!

Halloween Fun

2010-12-01T13:12:00.008-05:00

Towards the end of October, Ava's preschool teachers asked the children to come dressed as their favorite storybook character, and Ava's is Curious George right now! So, she dressed as a monkey for Halloween and Miss Maia was a little ladybug. The hat barely fit, and the wiggle worm could not be contained in the dotted wrap! Our fun started at about 4:30, and we headed to my Uncle Lonnie and Aunt Syd's house for treats and peanut butter cookies. Yum! We then loaded the car and headed to my Uncle Rick and Aunt Jill's house for more yummy treats and fun!

We had a wonderful time visiting and laughing before we headed to my parent's house for dinner and more fun! Those pictures are coming up next. There were so many that I divided them up. There are lots more pictures to come of Maia turning seven months, our first play date with all kiddos present, Thanksgiving and Maia's Christening last Sunday. Today, we're indoors sheltered from the drop in temperatures! Ava had her flu shot yesterday, and she's feeling a little lethargic today. Enjoy the Halloween pics!

On the adoption front, we're applying for a passport and new social security number for Maia and we have to get 10-15 various pictures of Maia and our family to our social worker this week. I hope to get to Christmas cards soon! AGHH!!! Love to everyone!

Fall Fun and First Family Night Out on the Town

2010-11-27T22:22:00.006-05:00

With falling leaves and cooler temperatures, we've enjoyed a lot of downtime just playing and having fun at home, indoors and outdoors. Ava and Maia were instant buddies when we got home from China, and they just love each other! Ava entertains Maia a lot, and Maia will kick her legs and just grin and giggle. Maia is now on Ava's radar throughout the day, and Ava will check on her and ask, "Where's Maia?" if she's sleeping. Sometimes, Ava will try to feed her her food! Maia's not quite ready for chicken nuggets. :)

After being at home for weeks and just venturing to preschool and the grocery store, it was time for us to venture out as a family for an evening. With fall underway and festivals, we headed to Loudon to Stonewall's Barbeque with the Butterworth family for some fun! Jim and Shannon were performing, Jim on guitar and Shannon doing vocals, at this great barbeque place. They are wonderful together, and even little Grace, who they adopted from China, joined in with her little microphone. We had a ball, and it was SO GOOD to get out of the house! No major meltdowns, and Ava and Grace enjoyed each other, Maia was a trooper, and Ben and I LOVED the barbeque. It's quite famous in these parts. :) Here's to good barbeque and even better friends! Very talented friends, I might add. :) Love you guys.

A Wonderful Weekend Together

2010-11-26T22:32:00.009-05:00

It was a beautiful weekend to build a screened in porch and enjoy the great outdoors. We enjoyed time just playing, relaxing and taking a walk together in the sunshine. Ava thought it would be fun to completely cover Granddaddy up with her stuffed animals. We've accumulated quite the collection!

Thank you for a wonderful weekend, Grandma and Grandaddy! We love you.

Grandma and Granddaddy Visit!

2010-11-24T14:30:00.003-05:00

During the weekend of October 21-24, Ben's folks drove down from Maryland to visit and meet Maia for the first time! We had a terrific weekend, and there are many pictures to post, so I'm going to split them into a few days. These first pics are of their arrival and spending time getting to know little Maia.

A Beautiful Day for a Boat Ride

2010-11-22T22:03:00.003-05:00

Beautiful fall days greeted us when we arrived home with Maia, and our first venture out to eat and for some fun was with Mimi and Papa a few weeks after we were home. My Dad purchased a fun pontoon boat that we can cruise around in, and we took it out for a maiden voyage with both girls in tow. Ava had a blast, and Maia was a little trooper. After our boat ride, we headed to Pizza Venti in Vonore, one of our favorite places, to eat. It was uneventful, but Ben and I neither one remember eating our pizza or salad. Thanks, Mom and Dad for a wonderful evening! We look forward to more boat rides in the spring!

A Month in Pictures to Come!

2010-11-20T22:19:00.007-05:00

As you all know, I'm so WAY behind on my posts and pictures. I'm so sorry.:( Having two little ones 20 months apart has kept me so incredibly busy while just trying to maintain a household, do more adoption paperwork and go to appointments and such! I was telling a friend just today that I am starting to have more of a predictable schedule with the girls now and am finding some quiet time for myself. I even read Mary Beth Chapman's book in the last two weeks and remembered what I had read! I'm no where near as exhausted as I have been and can stay up like I did in China to post! I'm so sorry I've left you with no pictures for awhile, but I promise I'll make up for it, as there are MANY to post!

I'm not going to fill up this post with a lot of words so I can get to the pictures. My plan is to do the "month in pictures" but it will take several posts to get them all in, and then, maybe, just maybe, I'll get caught up.

News on the post adoption front is that our first post placement report/interview was completed by dear Pam Frye, our social worker, last week. All went well, and we just have two more to do over the coming months. We've had a lot of commitments on top of just adjusting, and I'm starting to see the end of that list, only to be replaced by more, I'm sure!

I'll start with the dates of October 17-20 as we were settling in. On the 21st, Ben's folks came for a visit to meet Miss Maia, and I'll be posting those next. Then, it will be on to Halloween pictures of a ladybug and a monkey. I'm going to post post post in the next few days even if I have to stay awake with the coyotes in our valley!

Our love to all!

Maia loves eating in the Bumbo!

Mimi and Papa come for a visit with the girls.

Mimi loves her granddaughters. :)

Papa holds Maia for the first time!

Maia learned to sit up all by herself within a few weeks of us being home! Now, we think she's close to crawling. She is the most active little monkey! Following in her big sisters footsteps we think...

Sweet sister time together. Ava still loves to pat Maia on the head.

Ava usually runs circles around her, and you can see her "on the move" in this picture.

Playing on her floor mat is a favorite activity for Maia.

Mimi gets full attention when she's here!

Daddy spends some outside time with his girls.

A Baby Changes Everything

2010-11-16T22:11:00.009-05:00

The girls are sleeping peacefully, and I am sitting here at the computer trying to condense my five page testimony into a 2-3 minute talk for a church Christmas video. I wasn't sure I could do it, but this, at 10:10 p.m., is what I came up with while drinking apple cider and listening to the rain beat against the windows. My testimony is to appear at the end of the Christmas song, "A Baby Changes Everything." I wanted to share it on my blog in the hopes that it will encourage. This blog remains a place in cyberspace that's meant to bless and encourage others and point to the One who brought me out of the depths of my despair and redeemed my suffering and Who continues to do so as I long as I have breath here on Earth. Here's my 2-3 minute video talk from my heart.

After tomorrow, things should slow down a bit so I can post pictures!

When I was a little girl, I remember sitting in a tiny wooden chair wrapped in blue cloth, playing the role of Mary in a Christmas church play. My part was to hold baby Jesus, wrapped in swaddling clothes. I held him gently, and I remember there being innocence and the simple joy of that moment in my heart.

This same baby that I held onto as a little girl would grow up to become my Savior and King who I would desperately cling to as I journeyed through an eight year valley of suffering and pain with sorrow and the brokenness of the world in my heart.

To be followers of Christ is to be partakers in His suffering, and we each have different crosses to bear in our broken, earthly lives. The cross that Jesus carried ultimately reflected His glory, and our crosses we carry are meant to do that as well. My cross that the Lord allowed me to bear was infertility and a barren womb.

After eight long years of painful treatments, miscarriages and surgeries, I finally came to the end of myself and my plans. I was completely broken and surrendered my plans for a family to the Lord. In the difficult place of indefinite waiting, I was learning that God’s refining work was producing in me submission, humility and complete and utter dependence on His unseen hand.

I would later learn that the gift of faith was being established deep within me while I carried my heavy cross.

I allowed the Lord to replace my heart’s desires with His, and today, I am the joyful mother of two adopted daughters. Ava Faith was born in the state of Georgia in 2008, and we just returned from China with Maia Grace who was born earlier this year.
The baby who changed everything for me and in me is surely Jesus, my Prince of Peace, and the Redeemer of my suffering. A baby does change everything for those who choose to believe.

God's word says, “Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.”

AND

“Surely, I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

Praise be to God, who came to Earth as a tiny baby, to change the world, one human being and one story at a time.

Coming Up for Air

2010-11-12T13:08:00.003-05:00

Hi, everyone,

We're still here and doing well! We've been knee-deep in many things these past few weeks, and as of last Wednesday, we've officially been home for one month. Part of us feels like we still have one foot in China and one foot in the US, wrapping up final details of Maia's adoption and preparing for post-placement reports and just trying to still adjust and get somewhat on top of things. We are simply overwhelmed and so incredibly grateful for all of the kindnesses that have been shown to us by family and friends. I want to say thank you SO much for everything, and I'm preparing to write special thank you notes this weekend. I've been spending just about every waking moment with Ava, Maia or both at the same time or taking them to medical appointments and such, and when that time is spent and bedtime arrives, Ben and I finally have time to eat and catch up! Then, there's the cat to let out, the dog to let in, and laundry and dishes to clean. I do feel like I'm finally "coming up for some air," and we're getting more and more settled and marking things off a pretty lengthy post-adoption list.

We went out on our first date night last night to "A Night with the Chapmans" in Knoxville. It was an intimate performance and story-sharing night with Steven Curtis, Mary Beth, Caleb and Will Franklin. Mary Beth and Steven shared very openly and genuinely about their grief and hope about losing precious Maria in 2008. Mary Beth has written a book called, "Choosing to SEE," and it is honestly one of the best books I've ever read. Warning though, get your kleenex ready. She is so transparent in the book and reveals many of her lifelong struggles and how God changed the plot to her story so many times and how she's learned to trust Him, no matter what. They are choosing to SEE the Lord in the tragedy of losing Maria and cling to His promise that they will see her again someday in Heaven. I hope to share a more intimate story with you soon about something Steven told us last night.

The girls are doing really well, and Maia is a hoot! I'm looking forward to posting "the month" in pictures since we've been home. We've got some precious pics of Ava and Maia together.

Have a wonderful fall weekend, and I'll be back soon. Ava's napping AND Maia is napping (within 30 minutes of eachother just today), and it's time to bathe and do the dishes.

Love to all!

Emily

Ava Turns Two! August 21, 2010

2010-11-03T19:09:00.021-04:00

In the midst of the China prep hustle-bustle to bring Maia home, something wonderful happened in late August. Miss Ava turned TWO! She can now proudly hold up two fingers and "catch" the others with her thumb after much practice. :) She is an adventurous, curious, loving, compassionate, energetic, brave little two year-old! Everyday is full of wonder with Ava. :)

She's had the nickname of "little monkey" for quite some time now, as she's curious about just about everything and loves to climb and swing. She's our on-the-go, non-stop busy toddler most of the time, and there's never a dull moment when she's around. She absolutely loves monkeys and all things Curious George, so I thought it would be fun to throw a Curious George party for her and all of her "monkey" friends. We celebrated August 21st and spent half the evening outside doing her favorite activity - playing in the water! We set up a Scooby Doo sprinker splash pad, two kiddie pools and Clownie from the 70s! He's just as much fun as I remember him! The hat still goes up, and her friend, Sam Arendale, loved jumping through the water stream and seeing if the water would catch the hat.

I decided to try my hat at making a Curious George cake for Ava, which, given my history of cakes falling and literally catching on fire, was quite a feat! I'm proud to say that it stayed together, tasted pretty good and actually looked like Curious George! Ava came downstairs and looked at it and said, "Curious George," and I knew my cake labor had not been in vain. :) I had a ball making it for you, sweet Ava.

She had her very own bowl of homemade vanilla ice cream with it and decided to forget the spoon and stick her face in it! She had a great time with family and her little buddies, Sam, Sera, Caden and Grace! Thank you all for celebrating her life with us!

Her birthday morning started with a new little play kitchen. She loves to help me cook, and we thought she could rustle up a few meals of her own. :)

Rinsing her fruit and veggies...

Yum, I like watermelon.

Opening Itsy bitsy spider card from Grandma and Granddaddy.

Sharing some fruit with buddy, Sera Arendale.

Amy and Caden Jones come to help us celebrate!

Ava playing in Clownie. My favorite backyard water activity when I was little.

Sam Arendale enjoyed Clownie, too.

Grace Butterworth checking out the Scooby splash pad.

Ava, Caden Jones and Sera had a ball in the pool together!

All smiles with Mimi celebrating with Ava in the backyard.

A wet swimsuited Ava climbs in Papa's lap for a birthday hug.

It's time to light the birthday candles, Ava!

The party scene in the kitchen. :)

Oh, boy, my very own bowl of homemade icecream...

No spoon for me!

The Butterworths, Uncle Lonnie, Papa, Daddy and family friend, Tony.

Aunt Syd, Aunt Jill and cousin Katie watch Ava open her presents.

Cousin Wes in the "kitchen" with Ava. :) Wes makes a mean hamburger.

This is sure to be an active and adventurous two-year old year!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Ava! We love you, sweet pea!

Mommy and Daddy

Getting Ready for Maia!

2010-10-30T15:01:00.004-04:00

Well, I'm estimating that I have about 5 minutes left out of naptime today to post, so this will likely be a short one! :)

The girls have finally recovered from their viruses this past week, and we are enjoying this fall weekend carving pumpkins, making banana bread and playing outside. I'm just now getting on top of pictures from our camera and Mom's camera before and after we left for China, so I'm going to play catch-up for a bit. Getting ready for China was like a whirlwind, and I still can't believe we're home, and I'm looking at empty luggage. Carpets and bedspreads are starting to resurface from the chaos of packing! As busy as we were preparing to come home with Maia, Mom and Ava were busy themselves preparing for her arrival. I came across these on Mom's camera from the day that she and Ava went shopping for balloons for Maia and came over to hang the Welcome Home Maia banner. I laughed out loud at Ava in the Kroger buggy surrounded by mums and balloons!

In about an hour, we're headed to Loudon with the Butterworth family for a fall festival and to hear them perform at Stonewall's Barbeque. It will be a nice change of scenery from preschool and grocery. :) I did manage to take both girls to Food City this past week, and we made it out the door without any major meltdowns or mishaps! I was so relieved! I actually had the right groceries in my buggy, too! Sometimes, I'll find some stray things in there.

Ava will be dressing up like a monkey this year for Halloween, and Miss Maia will be a little ladybug. I hope to post those pictures next week sometime!

Happy Fall Weekend, Everyone!

Giggles and Tears

2010-10-28T10:39:00.007-04:00

Hi, everyone,

This week, we've been enjoying this beautiful fall weather but have also been under the weather, as both girls have been battling a little virus.

Today is Thursday, and the week is coming to a close with lots of things to report! We had a great weekend with Ben's folks, and we spent a lot of time just taking walks and playing with the girls. Ben and his Dad tackled a screened-in porch project, and I am happy to say that I no longer have to run interference with Ava falling off the high end of the porch! We're awaiting screen, but it's safe for her to play on now. Yippee! Thanks, guys!

Ben's folks left to journey back to Maryland Monday morning after some mild trauma with sweet Maia. I had made a cup of my favorite Chinese Pu Er tea (really, I'm addicted, I think) and when I turned my head for a split second, Maia stuck her fingers in it. It wasn't boiling but was very hot, and she cried for at least 30 minutes with my father-in-law rushing to get burn cream at a grocery store, my mother-in-law taking care of the spill and Ava and me trying to calm Maia's cries on the front porch. What made everything worse was that she was battling a virus, and we had to be at the pediatrician in two hours to review her international medical report from Children's Hospital AND start her overdue vaccinations! After Ken and Ellen left to journey back to Maryland, Mom came and got Miss Ava, and I loaded a calmer Maia into the car to go the appointment. All went well at the appointment, and Maia's stats are as follows at 6 months, 2 weeks. She's put on quite a few lbs since China!

Weight: 15 lbls, 13.2 oz (In China, she was 12 lbs.)
Length: 26 inches

Needless to say, Maia had a pretty rough day, but by that afternoon, she was giggling and playful, and I was happy the drama of the morning was behind us.

I'm still playing catch up when I can find ten minutes of down-time. Right now, I'm choosing not to shower and blog. Most every waking moment I have is spent with the girls or just keeping some semblance of order around the house, but today, Ava's at preschool, dressed like Curious George, and Maia is napping peacefully upstairs. If I'm lucky, I'll get to load pictures AND bathe! I'll load a few of Maia's first bath at home! She likes the water, too, but big sister wins the prize on adoration of water so far!

Joyful Days

2010-10-21T09:42:00.009-04:00

Hi, everyone!

I'm trying to find time to post at least once or twice every week right now. I have been flying below the radar much of the last two weeks as I'm just completely exhausted! The girls are doing great, and we are, too, but this 20 months apart thing is challenging to say the least! :) Everyday, I'm tweaking schedules, doing laundry, unpacking, getting processes underway for readoption in the US and just trying to find some "me" time. This morning, that "me" time looked like drinking pu er tea from China out of a travel mug while driving down a fall country road with Maia. Tuesdays and Thursdays are preschool days for Ava, and we're all up with the chickens most days anyway! These days are proving to be the most challenging as I strive to get everyone dressed, fed, loved and out the door with me somewhat looking like a normal person! I managed to put on my face this morning, but the hair is looking a little like Medusa. I'm laughing at myself these days, and letting go of expectations of perfection which is wonderfully FREEING! If I'm bathed, it's all good! :)

Maia is just precious and giggles and smiles a lot at the antics of her big sister. They are so sweet together. That's not to say that we have perfect sibling moments all of the time! I've found my hand blocking an incoming toy missile a few times lately!

Maia's napping as I type, and I'm cleaning house in preparation for Ben's folks to arrive later today to meet her and see Miss Ava! Ok. I'm going to quit typing now and load pictures!

We hope to see everyone soon!

On October 5, Maia turned six months old!

Proud Daddy!

Sisters... We hum the tune "Sisters" from White Christmas all the time now!

Awesome Big Sister badge for Ava! Thanks, Barb!

Maia and her Mimi

Our First Two Weeks at Home

2010-10-07T22:21:00.006-04:00

Hi, everyone!

More pictures coming later today!

Well, it's a beautiful Sunday afternoon, and I'm finally able to find some snippet of time to post! The girls are both napping peacefully. Whew. As of the last few days, Ava is sleeping from about 1-3, and Maia is sleeping from about 2-4ish. Since China, it's taken some time to get their naps remotely close to each other, and I've barely had any time to bathe much less read the mail or blog! :) I'm slowly resurfacing and thinking clearly and am hopeful to post today and get some pictures up from our first two weeks at home!

We're all doing well and are starting to get into our groove a little more this weekend as a family. We've spent the last two weeks adjusting to new schedules and routines and trying to maintain predictable ones for Miss Ava. Maia and Ava are like two peas in a pod, and Ava has been very loving with Maia and checks to be sure "Maia is ok" when she's crying. If she hears Maia crying, she'll say, "Be right back. Make sure Maia ok." She will then come over and pat Maia on the head just like she pets Saki, our cat, on the head, and then she'll hug her and give her a kiss. Maia thinks Ava is very entertaining and will giggle when Ava does something. Ava is miss busy bee ALL of the time now, so there's hardly a moment that's not entertaining for Maia. We've tried really hard to spend some one on one time with just Ava and do some fun things outside the house as new little sister is requiring a lot of care and attention right now. So far so good with jie jie and mei mei, big sister and little sister.

Maia is adjusting really well and is very vocal, active and curious about everything! She has a really fun little personality. She's now sleeping through the night and is on a more predictable schedule. She wakes up at about 7:00 a.m. and goes to bed with Ava at around 8:00 p.m. with two or three naps a day. She's been a little trooper, and we did venture to church today for the last service and all went well. I stared at the altar where Ben and I had knelt so many times throught the years of waiting and praying for her. Surely, "I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." He is faithful and good to each of us even in the midst of our hurting and WILL bring good out of it in His time. As unique as each of us is, so is his hand on each of us and in our lives, working all things together for good. I pray all of the time that what I've walked through will be a testimony to others that He CAN redeem suffering and give you beauty for ashes. Believe Him. His promises are true. For as long as I have breath, I hope to tell of His faithfulness and love, and my deepest prayer for Ava and Maia is that they will deeply know that they are first and foremost, daughters of a Heavenly King.

Our next steps with Maia are to complete 3, 6, and 9 month post-adoption reports and send pictures back to China, readopt her in the United States, acquire a U.S. certificate of citizenship, a passport and a social security number. This paperwork is involved, but honestly seems like a cake walk compared to all that we did preadoption to bring her home! We'll start all of this some time this week. :)

I'm still limiting her activities as I don't want to overwhelm her too much, but we have ventured out to the pediatrician, ET Children's hospital for medical testing, grocery store, swim lessons and preschool for Ava, church and one night of a pontoon boat ride and eating out with Mom and Dad. She turned six months old October 5, and we can't believe that we were in China a few weeks ago to meet her for the first time! She hasn't been with us for an entire month, yet it feels like she's always been here.

Again, MANY thanks to everyone for the phone calls before and after we got home, the cards, e-mails, comments on the blog and facebook and meals and phone calls and visits of support and encouragement. Please know how deeply grateful we are for you and how we thank God for you. He has blessed us through you!

Going to upload pictures now, that is if both girls stay asleep as I attempt to upload! If you read this and there aren't any pictures, I promise I'll get some up by some time today.

Blessings to all,

Emily

Sisters!

2010-10-06T13:05:00.005-04:00

Ni hao to everyone!

I'm still gathering photos from different photographers to show you guys from our welcome home time at the airport. There are many, and I want to show you guys the best ones, especially of Miss Ava and Maia together! I'm going to go ahead and post this one to give you a glimpse of the two sisters together at last!

Ava is a great big sister to her mei mei!

Love to all! I'll be posting welcome home pics on our journeytomaia site in the next few days. So without further adieu, here is Ava welcoming Maia home!

Follow Our Journey to Maia!

2010-09-10T21:47:00.009-04:00

Hi, everyone!

You're invited to follow our journey to Maia!

This will be my final post on the With Open Arms site before we leave for China on Monday morning. I wanted to let you know that we'll be blogging and posting pictures on Maia's China site, www.journeytomaia.com. This is the special China adoption website I started years ago, and it's very China friendly! I think you'll like how easy it will be to check in on us and Maia. Please go to this site and click on the Travel Logs button to follow our journey to sweet Maia! I created a hyperlink, so just click on the website address above.

I've already posted our itinerary to give you a good idea of where we'll be while we're there. Each day, we hope to journal and post pictures of the day's happenings, especially after we receive Maia on the 19th! Keep in mind there's a 12-hour time difference. They are ahead of us by 12 hours.

Love and blessings to all!

Ben, Emily, Ava and Maia

Two and a Half Days Until Departure!

2010-09-10T15:43:00.004-04:00

Hi, everyone! We are two and half days before departure and counting! I'm running final errands with Miss Ava today, and I have two bags packed under forty lbs - in-country weight limit! Of course, they are the smallest bags, but still! :) It bolstered my confidence. Amy, I got the almonds in my carry-on!

I found this article in TIME magazine and thought I'd post it about China's One-Child Policy. I get asked this question a lot, and I thought this was interesting. What it doesn't mention is that currently, families are fined about $30,OOO if they break the one-child policy rule according to their family status. That's more than many families make in four years! I'm happy to see that they're relaxing the policy a bit. It will be interesting to follow the new pilot programs.

"The Chinese government is beginning to rethink its famed one-child limit as it begins to lift the restriction in five provinces with low birth rates.

The pilot projects, which are set to begin in 2011, allow for a second child per family if at least one spouse is an only child. USA Today reports that Beijing, Shanghai and four other provinces will follow suit in 2012, with nationwide adoption of the new policy expected by 2013 or 2014. In 1979, China's one-child policy was introduced after decades of huge population boom followed by mass death due to resulting food shortages. The policy, which has prevented 400 million births, restricted the country's ethnic Han majority to have only one child per family (exempting most ethnic minorities) and has remained nearly the same since, though a few exceptions have been made. (Some rural farm families have been allowed to have a second child if the first is a girl.)

A wide gender imbalance, as well as the need for more children to care for parents, has likely influenced the government's tight control on the country's birthrate.
What the article describes are some incremental changes. The rule already allows more than one child when BOTH parents are only children, now it seems they will allow it when only ONE parent is an only child. Incremental change, but a good change nonetheless."

The Dream

2010-09-07T21:56:00.004-04:00

This next post has been tucked carefully in my heart for many years now, and up until July 15 of this summer, faith made a light to follow on the long and often arduous journey to our baby girl in China. Faith has become my eyes now, and I want to share this special post with you and ultimately with Maia. I will tell it just as it happened.

I'm not sure of the date. I know that it was after 2002, likely in 2003 or 2004. We had lost a baby in March of 2002 at 10 weeks and were entering into an unanticipated eight years of waiting for children. "The Lord gives His beloved sleep," and how desperately I wanted to just sleep peacefully during those years and the aching and longing of my heart vanish when I awoke. The Lord was with me in my rising up and in my lying down and during all the times inbetween, much closer than I could possibly imagine with my limited vision and understanding during that time. Oh, if our eyes could be opened like they were for the servant of Elijah! What great and mighty things we would behold around us.

I had a dream, rather I believe that the Lord granted me a special dream during the waiting years. I have only dreamed this once, but I remember it as clearly today as when it came to me in dream. The Lord still speaks in dreams. I'm not one that would say that He uses that method often with me, but I don't limit Him and I never know what or whom He's going to use on this life journey to speak to me. Like Mary long ago, I've pondered this in my heart many times, knowing in my heart that Lord revealed a piece of His plan in the middle of the ache and the long-suffering and the "endless" waiting.

I was in a room, and the only thing I remember about this room were three things. In the room, I was standing holding a child in my arms. I remember this child being Caucasian, and I don't know if it was a boy or girl. I remember holding this child for awhile in my dream and having peace. I turned to walk out of the door in the room, and what happened next is still a mystery to me in many ways. Part lies hidden behind the veil in Heaven for my eyes to behold someday, and part lies seen here on Earth.

Before I left the room, I looked at the child I was holding and sat him or her down. I didn't see my child on the floor. I just remember sitting them down. That was the last time I saw the child. I then turned away from the door and looked at a bed, and in the middle of the bed on a comforter was a little girl with black hair and she was tiny.She was bundled. I peered down at her and reached to pick her up. That's all I remember.

As I try my best to interpret this dream many years later, I understand more fully that the Lord was asking me to surrender my plan, my child, to His care. I was laying it down and reaching for the Lord's plan for my family. I had to give my desire for a family and the loss of our baby to the Lord in order to find what He had planned for me. Knowing how great my heartache was during that time, the Lord tended to my heart and was patient and tender with me. The fulfillment of this dream or vision would have to wait many more years, but I truly believe the Lord allowed me to have this dream to keep in my heart, waiting on its fulfillment in the appointed time. That's why I have the verse from Habbukuk at the top of my blog. It's become one of my life verses that I've clung to all this time, largely because of this dream.

Maia is the baby I reach for now, knowing that El Roi, the God who sees, sees me and sees Maia, no matter how great the distance, and He knew the appointed time that we would find each other.

In the Lord's time, the vision did not tarry.

Referral Package Day!

2010-09-07T13:32:00.005-04:00

Amid all the hustle and bustle of this summer, we got the referral call in the quietness of a Thursday afternoon July 15th. Words exchanged quickly were soon followed by the original medical and social report and pictures of sweet Maia from China! We had to wait over the weekend to receive these, and I missed the UPS man when he left the packet. When I arrived home that day, this is what I opened the door to find. Our referral packet for Zhuang, Lu Ti, Maia Grace! We signed our Letter of Confirmation as soon as Ben got home and put it in the mail to our agency to then mail to China the very next morning. The faster we could get the LOC to China, the faster we could get our Travel Approval to come and get her! We've signed an insane number of documents throughout the last four years, but this one was the most anticipated!

A "Wild" Birthday!

2010-09-06T14:21:00.010-04:00

Ni hao, everyone!

We are seven days and counting to our flight to China! I have a few more posts from the summer I'm trying to get up before we leave! I have a little time while Ava naps today and while I take a break from my ever-shortening "to do" list. I really want to take a nap, but I'm forcing myself to stay awake as I hear it's not good to nap before the East! Packing is going well. Ava is almost completely better, and I had a crazy virus over the weekend that a Z-pack knocked out thankfully, so we're playing catch up around here on this Labor Day. Still leaving on the 13th for Beijing! I still can't believe I'm writing that! We're bringing Maia HOME!

On the 17th of July, my family drove up to our favorite mountain spot at Metcalf Bottoms to celebrate my birthday, and we were all in for some "wild" surprises. Never in my whole life growing up here have I seen what I'm about to show you. Maybe a few crawdads and trout in the river/picnic area, but that's it! During the few hours we were there, we saw a water snake catch a fish and eat it, a black bear get in the water a few feet from where we were playing in the river and a rattlesnake on a log near a well-traveled tubing path in the woods! We kept saying that we were going to see wild turkeys, a boar and a mountain lion next! It was crazy. We got some great pics of the wild animals we did see. We had a great time that day, and a few of the pictures show my aunts, Jill and Syd,and my cousin, Katie reacting to the news of our referral of sweet Maia! There's quite a few pics, so I'm going to try to get them loaded off and on throughout today. I may or may not have time to do captions but the pictures speak for themselves! :) Here's to fall weather, finally!

Water Girl!

2010-09-03T20:07:00.002-04:00

If we didn't know better, we would think Ava had gills! We were headed out the door to church on Sunday morning a few weeks back, and this is where we found her!

Packing Like Crazy, Crazy Like Packing!

2010-09-02T21:09:00.002-04:00

Hi, everyone,

First, Catherine! Yes, I got your comment and I was so excited to see Austin in my box! I'll e-mail you soon, ok? Can't wait to catch up. Please tell Tim I said, "Hello from Monday." :)

I have been away from the blog for several days since the retreat, and a lot has been going on in our household! When I came down off of the mountain, literally and figuratively, chaos began! I came home to Ava having a 104.4 fever, of course, late Sunday night, and the nurse advised us to bring her on the Children's if it got close to 105. Well, thankfully, her fever broke and we were able to tuck her in bed with her penguin humidifier very late Sunday night. We had tried the Infant's Motrin alternating it with Infant's Tylenol every four hours AND a sponge bath or two, and nothing was helping to bring down the fever most of the day. Crazy virus I'm guessing. Monday, she woke up and felt much better and her fever was completely gone by Wednesday. She had no other symptoms but a high fever. Go figure!

Since then, I have been a crazy woman packing and making lists for China! I need to tell you guys, though, that something bizzare has happened on my playlist! Number three is NOT the Britt Nicole song that used to be on there! It's some weird heavy metal just odd song. THANK YOU KAREN! Hopefully, you guys just skipped right over that or thought I was a weirdo one. I took it off tonight.

On another note, we had a small crisis in our family tonight. Ava was missing her purple blanket, and I knew that she had left it at preschool. This is her number one comfort item, and she is not fooled with the pink one, even in the dark. I had gone back to the church earlier today and "searched the world over," to no avail. Later tonight, I reached her teacher and she told me to look in the stove. I remembered that the kids have a play stove with all these drawers and doors. When I got to the church, Ava was balling at home with Ben, and there was only one lonely car in the back of the parking lot. I thought it was a lost cause, but much to my surprise, the door opened! That never happens this late at night. So, sure enough, there was the purple blanket stuffed in the back of the stove. Everyone in our house is sleeping better tonight.

Lately, I've needed a gigantic purple blanket for comfort as I try to get all of this China stuff together! We leave the 13th and have asked sweet Brynnan Webb to house sit for us. Every day, I'm marking items off of a long list of to dos, and if you've e-mailed, called or texted me, I promise that I've received each and every one. I just have not had a single second to respond. Thank you so very much for encouraging me/us. We need it right no as the time draws nearer.

Since I've blogged, we have found out that we will have Maia on the 19th of September, and because that's a Sunday, her orphange director will bring her to the hotel in Nanchang where we'll be staying! I can not imagine standing there in the lobby waiting for her to be carried through that door. They may come to our room. Not sure at this point. We plan to be up and blogging the whole time we're there and I'm planning to use the journeytomaia site to chronicle the last leg of this journey. That's the site I began with, and it's going to be something I'd like to keep for Maia in hard copy. Plus, there is a massive firewall in China, and I think it would be easier for me to use this site. As it gets closer, I'll give you instructions on how to "follow." I so need to buy waterproof mascara!:)

Also, some of you are leaving comments and blogger is moving them to a spam folder and I can't get them out. I can read them, but they're in spam land. So, I apologize if you don't see your comment! I am reading them, and they always lift my spirits.

Ok, it's time to find my beloved pillow...

Talk to you again real soon!

Oh, PRAISE! Today, officially marked the day that we are finished with all adoption paperwork this side of China to bring Maia home! Hallelujah!

Lots of thoughts and there's a lot more I could say, but for now, I'm going to go find my pillow and collapse on it.

Love to all! I'll be back soon with more pics!

Emily

Flights Finalized!

2010-08-27T11:29:00.003-04:00

As of last night, our flights are definite. Now, we can focus on packing!!! Headed to Beijing, formally known as Peking, on the 13th! More details coming soon.... Going to Eagle Rock for a Women's Retreat this weekend. Looking forward to a refreshing in the mountains! There is a rocking chair with my name on it I do believe. :)

Love to all,

Ben, Emily, Ava and Maia!

Gotcha Date!

2010-08-25T18:04:00.002-04:00

It's official! We have all appointments in Nanchang and Guangzhou solidified as of today, and our gotcha day will be the 19th of September! We'll have Maia in our arms some time that day!

Water Fun!

2010-08-25T10:00:00.004-04:00

Undoubtedly, Ava's favorite pastime is anything having to do with water. I had bought this little ladybug sprinkler before Ava anticipating Maia's arrival one day, and Ava had a ball one evening playing till her heart's content. Who needs a bathing suit! :)

Going out to buy orphange caregiver and notarial gifts today along with a small pharmacy that we'll need to take with us to China! Luggage will arrive tomorrow or Friday. Still waiting for confirmation for our Civil Affairs and US Consulate appt. It's looking like we're back to plan A and leaving the 12th of Septmember for Beijing! Picking up the pace now!

Possible Travel Dates!

2010-08-23T13:43:00.004-04:00

Hi, all!

We are completely crazy around here, but all is well. I wanted to briefly update everyone on our travel dates to get Maia! We're waiting for word from our agency about the US Consulate appointment and the Civil Affairs appointment, both of which are smack dab in the middle of the Autumn Festival in China and the National Festival. Um, they have a LOT of festivals! It's looking like Gotcha day is likely the 27th of September if we can secure an appointment with the Civil Affairs office. So, that's actually one week later than we were planning on, but we think that would work out just fine. My brain might just NOT explode. :)

Going to Kohl's to take advantage of their luggage sale today! Also on the agenda for today is a coming home outfit, plastic accordian folders for all of our paperwork, and possibly gifts for all of the officials and caregivers in China we'll meet. Oh, and our Visa paperwork is being mailed today! Yipee!

Prayer is key right now, and I have been so blessed by so many folks lifting us up and covering us in prayer. From the bottom of my heart, THANK YOU! The Lord goes before me and is my rear guard. Pretty awesome! More pics soon!

We received our TRAVEL APPROVAL to CHINA!

2010-08-19T13:44:00.003-04:00

This just in! We just received our travel approval to come to China to get Maia! More details coming soon. I'm a crazy person right now balancing a Curious George birthday cake for Ava and a VISA appointment application to get Maia!

The Lord, who calls me onward to do this, will EQUIP me! The Israelites DID make it to the promised land but they had to prepare their provisions before they could cross over. I'm so thankful I don't have to take cattle with me. Whew!

For you Bebo Norman fans, or if you're not one yet :), there's a new song on my playlist. Sing it, Bebo.

Until Next Year

2010-08-19T08:00:00.001-04:00

Before we knew it, it was time to reload the car and Miss Ava and say goodbye to our family beach week. We had a great week and love you all very much! Next year, there will be two little girls running around with their cousins and probably driving them crazy! Until then...and until more crabs with drawn butter and Old Bay! :)

Bubbles and Birthdays

2010-08-18T08:00:00.000-04:00

We had a relaxing time one evening sitting on the deck and blowing bubbles and probably eating something yummy. I think I remember hummus? Later, we came in and celebrated my and Uncle Vince's birthdays. We are almost exactly 10 years apart. My b-day is July 17th and his is the 18th. He's my birthday buddy forever! Love you, brother-in-law!

Eating Crabs!

2010-08-16T15:19:00.003-04:00

It's usually tradition to eat blue crabs at the house when we're all together, but we didn't get to do that this year. So, one night, we went to Uncle Vince's favorite restaurant, Jimmy's Seafood, for the buffet! Jenn and Chuck were so bummed they couldn't join us! :) hee hee Love you guys! We were surprised to see a play area set up in the back of the restaurant which is a GREAT idea! Talk about helpful for kiddos in waiting! They had a corn ball toss, mini golf green and a pony ride. It took a little convincing for Ava to sit on its back, and we were able to capture a quick shot before, "mommy, hold me!" Here's to CRABS!

Beach-Bound

2010-08-15T15:50:00.009-04:00

The weather at Nags Head this year was really nice, and I have to say that I miss that gentle ocean breeze here recently with our 99 plus TN temperatures! I could talk about how hot it is for a paragraph or two, but I won't. Let's just say that all of us East Tennesseans are READY for fall!!! I do think I've had more conversations this past month with total strangers when I'm out with Ava because folks just want to verbalize to another human being "how hot it is." Sometimes, we just look at each other and say, "Whew" and we both feel better. :)

We spent a great morning at the beach playing in the water and sand. Ava is SO adventurous and loved exploring the beach this year.

Ready for the day - pj top, a grass skirt and bunny slippers!

Handsome cousin, Evan!

Come on, Mom and Dad. Let's go!

Nothing would do her but to push it herself. Here comes the twos!

Walking out to the beach with Mommy

Ava, Daddy and Auntie Jenn

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A pelican flew into the Uncle Vince and nephew Evan splash picture. Jenn, I think you captured this with our camera.

Talking things over with cousin, Chase. :)

Singing with Granddaddy!

These game pieces were sticking to Ava's palms, and she had fun picking them up over and over again with Grandma.

Special time with Grandma and Granddaddy. :)

Nags Head, NC 2010!

2010-08-12T21:19:00.009-04:00

Earlier this summer around July 4th, we packed up the car with our almost 2 year old Miss Ava and headed to Nags Head, NC to spend a week at the beach with Ben's family. As always, we enjoyed spending time with them and relaxing and catching up. We had a great week and Ava really misses her cousins, Chase and Evan! We love you guys. Thank you for a wonderful week of family adventures and fun!

There are quite a few pics, so I'm going to divide them up. These first candids are from our first day on Sunday.

China update: The rest of our required agency paperwork is being mailed to Oregon tomorrow! Yippee! Still expecting our Travel Approval around September 7th. Getting ready for Ava's 2nd birthday next weekend!

Ava loves to brush her teeth. Well, actually, she just loves to put her toothbrush in the water!

Auntie Jenn, Uncle Chuck and Uncle Vince share a laugh at the meal table.

Ava's favorite chair.

Uncle Ben and nephew Chase together :)

Playing with Grandma

Enjoying smoked oyster dip on the deck that evening.

Sharing some special time with cousin, Evan.

Relaxing in the breeze...

To Leigh

2010-08-10T13:33:00.001-04:00

Hi, Leigh,

Thank you for your comment! It disappeard, though, when I tried to publish it! If you can, will you leave me another commment with your information? I think I remember it saying that your daughter is from Jiangxi as well. Have a great day! We're waiting for Travel Approval expected close to the first week of September!

Biscuit and Other Stories

2010-08-09T13:14:00.005-04:00

In the box. This is one of Ava's favorite places to look at stories. The other place is in the "big blue chair" with one of us. We just LOVE storytime! Her favorite story right now is about a little dog named Biscuit. She'll say, "more biscuit, more biscuit." Even when we try to put it on the bottom of the stack of other books to read, she'll find it and dig it out! If we adopted a new puppy right now, I bet it's name would be Biscuit. :) NOT that we're adopting a new puppy right now or even thinking about it! A grasshopper would push me over the edge at this point I think!

China paperwork is wrapping up in the next two days, and my mind is switching to care package for Maia. I'm excited to go and gather a few sweet things for her.

More pics coming up soon!

From 6th grade, to Young Woman to Bride

2010-08-07T08:00:00.002-04:00

The story of a daughter is still unfolding, and I've had the privilege of watching one of my dearest little sisters in Christ grow into the woman God is molding and shaping her to be. Cindy Goodson, now Blanchard, has been a part of my heart for many years now, and she asked Ava to carry her teddy bear from childhood down the aisle at her wedding a few weeks ago. I wanted to share some pictures with you of the lovely Cindy and her teddy bear girl. I love you, Cindy! I give thanks for you. I know that the plans God has for your life, He will fulfill as you walk in step with him and allow Him to lead. May it be a beautiful journey, a faith legacy.

The last pictures I posted were of our trip to Edisto with my family, and I'll just pick back up where I left off! My goal is to get all caught up by Sunday with posts scheduled to appear into next 2 weeks.

On the 20th of June, Ben and I celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary! I love you, sweetheart!

As of this summer, Ava is very into cooking! A little chef in the making? I can't wait to share Auntie Jenn's and my love for Cooking Light magazine!

Cindy's rehearsal kicked off on June 25, and her wedding was the following day. These are candids we snapped of those two days. Cindy, I'll give you a CD, and you can choose which ones you like. There's a lot more!

And on to the beautiful day...

A lovely pair. Cindy's bouquet is made of buttons that have been a part of her family for generations. I thought it was so beautiful and so clever!

A few of the girls who were in my discipleship group before Miss Ava and Maia came along. They have become my little sisters, and each is so very precious to me.

Mr. and Mrs. Andy Blanchard!

My dear friend and long time spiritual mentor, Kathy Alwood. She and her husband and son just followed the Lord's calling to Ireland to be missionaries. Oh, how I'm going to miss them!

Helloooo!

2010-08-05T14:42:00.006-04:00

Note: Pictures are scheduled to begin on the 7th! Catch-up time! Cindy's wedding!

Emilie! Yes, I remember you and sweet Ellie from Sandy Springs park! I was SO in the waiting then and just seeing you guys together gave my heart hope that day. I hope to see you around town and get connected with FCC of Blount County or Knoxville. Are you guys involved with that? Thank you for leaving a comment. I was wondering about you guys just the other day. We're great friends with Jim and Shannon Butterworth who adopted Grace, almost 3, and Eric and Amy Jones, waiting on a referral with an LID of June 06. We should all get together! I hope you guys are well.

As for an update for us - Yes! We are still here! I have taken a break from most all forms of technology the past 5 days to just rest and be as still as I can. We mailed all of the paperwork that came with our referral package, including the lengthy transition report for Lu Ti, to our agency yesterday and guess what? Our FINAL US approval came in the mail a couple of days ago! I've never been so glad to see an envelope from the Department of Homeland Security in all my life! Whew! That has been one long saga.

Now, our LOC, letter of confirmation, is in the hands of someone in Beijiing and we're told to expect TA, travel approval, some time around the 6th of September with travel likely near September 27th! We'll be in Beijiing for about 5 days and then will fly to her provincial capital of Jiangxi province, called Nanchang. That will be our base until we meet her! We'll have her in our arms within one to two days of arrival there in Nanchang. We'll then go to visit her actual town and soak up as much of her birthplace as we can. I will be a MESS! Kleenex is so on my packing list. Hmmm...I guess they have Kleenex there, right? You never know. They don't have deodorant! Ben had to buy some for me at the store not long ago and he, um, purchased the one that says, "highly responsive for emotional moments." Ok, yes! I am emotional!

Miss Ava's about to turn 2! I know. Can you believe it? So, I'm working on her birthday plans this week and a little care package to send to Maia in Jiangxi. I have LOADS of pictures to share and I promise I'll get to it! Let me see what I can do today. Mom is keeping Ava for me today while I run around and take care of some things and just try to get my head together.

Love and peace to all. God is looking on from his dwelling place and sees your waiting and your innermost heart's desire. Waiting for Him is hard. I will not say it's easy, but His plan for our lives AND for our children's lives, no matter what, is GOOD! Trust Him with all your heart. Every bit of it. Faith is born out of the questions and the hurt and the suffering we all often experience, and you are being refined in a way that only He can see as you walk through the valley. Hold on to hope for this earthly life and the one to come!

He is with you.

Plugging Along

2010-08-02T13:04:00.003-04:00

Hi, everyone,

We're almost finished with our transition report (whew), and even though it has been very emotionally and mentally challenging this weekend, it's been great for us to think through the grief and loss and attachment and bonding process with Maia. It's definitely better equipping us for the future, and I'm grateful for that.

Ava and I went to Walgreens for the 50% off sale on water toys last night. We needed a break and some outdoor fun! We bought a little Scooby Doo splash pad for her and took a break from all of the paperwork after dinner last night. It was great just to sit and watch her play before my mind switched gears to the transitional report.

Many of you have e-mailed me or called during this time, and I really appreciate your prayers.

One of my all-time favorite quotes is:

"Fear knocked at the door. Faith answered, and no one was there."

I know that God has ordained this journey to a foreign land to bring our daughter home, and I know He'll never leave me or forsake me. He also did not give me a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind.

Without a doubt, His word hidden deep within my heart is of great comfort during this preparation time. He holds Ava and Maia in His hands. There's no formula. Just love and trust of Him to fulfill His purpose in our adoptions of these sweet girls, our daughters.

Bless you,

Emily

Snowed Under

2010-07-31T19:32:00.003-04:00

Hi, Everyone!

We're still here, enjoying some cooler weather at last. I know you Tennessee folks are glad, too! I have been absolutely swamped with an eight page transition report that we have to fill out for our agency by Tuesday of this week among just every day life with Miss Ava, and I haven't had a chance to upload more pics. I will upload just as soon as I can. We're falling more and more in love with Maia every day! We've begun important steps to prepare Miss Ava for the arrival of her baby sister! This means walking around with a Chinese baby doll in my front-carrier for China. Ava has her own Chinese baby that she is talking to and taking care of, too. So far so good!

Took much needed time just be still today. Um, that was after I burned the sandwiches I was doing in the skillet. The tears flowed and I knew it was NOT about burned toast. I let them flow for awhile and talked to God until I felt more at peace. This is exhilaratingly wonderful, but it is overwhelming at the same time, especially with all of the US/China/agency paperwork and hoops and phone calls.

Looking forward to hotdogs tonight! Maybe it's what we had for dinner last night, too. :)

Peace, everyone,

Emily