Road Trip 2012

We just returned from a road trip through the South.  We were able to visit friends and family and just enjoy time together.  We first went to Nashville to visit with friends who just returned back from China with their little guy, JonJon.  We had a great time getting to see them and sharing time with our growing families.

We then headed even further south to Alabama and spent a few days with Bella's foster family.  (For those that don't know, they are originally from Alabama but lived in China for 15 or 16 years.)  We had a wonderful time hanging out with them.  Bella and Cassie LOVED being together again and the boys thought it was awesome to be with Cole and play Legos and video games.  We ate lots of yummy food (thanks Bobby and Julie for your hospitality!), went to a peach park and were able to meet extended family who all knew Bella before she came into our lives.  They really enjoyed getting to see her again.  We think that it is so special for everyone that we all get to see her grow up. 

Here is a picture of the dynamic duo - Cassie and Bella

Keenan, Cole and Aidan

After Alabama, we went to Hilton Head for our yearly trip to meet up with my family.  We all rented a house and there were 13 of us this time (we missed you this year Thomas!).  We were able to do some of our yearly traditions ... spend lots of time at the beach, visit our favorite restaurants, go golfing, ride bikes around the island, spot some wildlife (alligators, horseshoe crab and dolphins), go to the Shannon Tanner show (favorite for the kids) and just spend time together with family.  Keenan really loved riding the waves this year.  Bella continues to be a mermaid and we can't get her out of the water.  As soon as we would get to the beach each day, she would take off and be completely in the water before we were even off our bikes.  Aidan really enjoyed playing soccer on the beach and building things in the sand this year.  We also celebrated Father's Day, my sister Janel's birthday as well as Michael and my birthday.  Some pics from our trip ...

Family pic

My hubby and I

Keenan - look at those baby blues!

Our little mermaid



Bella-boo

Our niece, Addyson

Michael and Aidan

The trio hangin' with Neptune



Michael and the kiddos

Aidan, Keenan (check out his blue lips from a slushie) and Bella

Aidan, Keenan, Bella and Addy

Bella

From the adoption front, we have sent all of our dossier docs to CCAI today with the exception of our I797 (USCIS approval to bring a child into the U.S.).  We hope to receive that approval within the week.  Once we get that document notarized and authenticated, we will be ready to send our dossier to China!!!  Once we get logged in China (LID) we should get matched pretty quickly.  Please pray for us as we start reviewing possible files that are referred to us.  Please also pray for Eli wherever he is right now; that he is being cared for, fed, held and loved.

More Spring Fun

We have been busy this spring with projects around the house like painting Bella's new "princess" room and moving her into it.  She has been so excited about it and loves it.  I will have to take some pictures to post since she is so proud of it.  Michael has also made me a couple of garden boxes.  I have wanted these for several years and now I have them!  Just hoping that with all the torrential rain the past couple of days that the seeds haven't gotten washed away!!  Keenan has especially enjoyed helping me plant both the seeds and the plants.  I think he is going to be my helper with this new project of ours this summer. 

We have also tried to get outdoors and have some fun together.  We went to the West Chester kite festival in April on a gorgeous Sunday afternoon.  The wind was actually a little too much for the kites and people were having a hard time controlling them, but it was so neat to see so many different kinds of kites.  Here is a pic of Keenan, Michael and Bella in front of the huge octopus kite that we saw ...



 

 And here is a picture of Keenan with the kite in the background

Bella having fun 

April also brought many birthday party celebrations.  I think we are averaging one a week for the past several weeks.  The fun thing is that all three kids have had parties that they have gone to together as a family as well as individually for their friends.  Our nephew, Hunter, turned 6 in April as well.  Here is a pic of Hunter and Aidan ...

Since the weather was so cold and crummy last weekend we took a little road trip to the Dayton Air Force Museum.  I had heard a lot about the museum, but had never been even though we don't live that far from it.  The museum is free, which is an extra bonus.  We had a great time and the kids were amazed (as was I) seeing all of the airplanes, rockets, satellites, etc. that this place had on display.  We could not even see everything in a day, so I guess we will have to go back again soon.  Here are a couple of pics from our day there.

Keenan, Bella and Aidan



Michael, Bella, Keenan and Aidan

After the museum we sought out the local Friendly's.  My grandma used to take me to Friendly's when I was a kid and unfortunately there are no longer any of them around Cincinnati, so we took a little bit of a "scenic" route home so we could stop at one.  Each of the kids enjoyed their treat.

Aidan with his

Keenan did not hesitate to dive into his

Who needs a spoon??

We don't have any updates to report on our adoption.  We are anxiously awaiting the home study report to be finalized so we can move onto the next step.  Hope to have more updates on this soon!!

Documents, Documents, Notarizations, Certifications, Authentications and on and on and on

The question we keep getting asked is, "Since you have done this before, you shouldn't have to gather all of the documents like you did before,right?"  Well, I wish!  But that is not the case.  We need to gather everything again and then some new things.  The process has changed a little bit, so there are even more checks and documents that are needed.  The good thing is that we have done a dossier (the documents that get sent to China) before and so it is not completely new to us. 

Where we are.  We are currently completing all of the documents that are required to be part of the dossier.  We have all of our documents completed, all have been notarized, and the notaries have been certified by the local clerk of courts. Our Indiana documents (marriage certificate and Michael's birth certificate) have also been certified by the Indiana Secretary of State and are currently at the Chinese Consulate's office in Chicago for final Authentication.  The rest of our documents (or what we refer to our "Ohio documents") are ready to go to the Secretary of State's office this week.  We have also completed all of our home study visits and are awaiting the report to be written so we can send it in with our I800A application.  This application will lead to fingerprinting and then hopefully approval by the USCIS.  Once we get that approval, we are almost ready to send in our dossier to China.  Confused yet?  Yeah, we are too at times.  We keep telling ourselves "one step at a time".  We are so anxious though and the wait is already hard.  But each step gets us closer and that is what we are focusing on.

We have also been having a great spring and enjoying the warmer weather.  Aidan is back in the full swing of things with soccer.  We had a good spring break and were able to visit my sister and niece in Indianapolis for a couple of days.  The kids also spent time with grandparents and enjoyed coloring Easter eggs and playing with their cousin.

Here are some pics from our spring so far ...



We won tickets to LegoFest - here is Bella in front of Lightening McQueen

Bella, Aidan and Keenan on Easter morning 

Keenan, Bella and Aidan all ready for church

Family pic

 

All of the kiddos after their egg hunt (Hunter, Keenan, Ashlynn, Bella and Aidan)

The boys having some 4-wheeler fun (Matthew, Hunter, Aidan, Michael and Keenan)

Bella being Super-woman!

Keenan being Superman - scary!

Someone once said ...

if you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.  We thought our family was complete, but God has made it very clear to us that it is not.  We are very excited to share that we are adopting again!!  If someone would have told me years ago that we would have 4 kids, I would have told them they were crazy.  The truth is, we are thrilled and can't get all of the paperwork and home study visits done quickly enough.    
We feel led to adopt a little boy from China.  Some people have asked us, "Why a boy?"  What a lot of people don't realize is that there are a lot of little boys with minor special needs who need homes.  Many people think that only girls are adopted from China, but boys can also be adopted. 
We have completed all of the applications for both the home study agency and adoption agencies. We have also started gathering our documents for our dossier.
We are now trying to come up with a new name for our blog and are taking suggestions.  :-)  The kids have also started the great debate on a name for their little brother.  The kids are all excited and cannot wait to bring their new brother home. 
Next steps is to complete our home study and to then complete our dossier.  This can take a few more months because certain things have to be checked and approved by the government.  We are hopeful that we will be matched once our dossier makes it to China.  We appreciate all of your prayers and support as we journey back to China!!

A long time

A few nights ago I found myself looking at our blog for the first time in what seems like months.  I started reading some of the entries and going back all the way to when we started the blog and realized that this is serving as a family diary for us and that I don't want to give up writing in it.  I am not sure if anyone even looks at this anymore, but I figure this is a way to really capture what is going on in each of our lives.

Sooo, with that being said, here is a brief overview of the past several months ...

In September, Bella's first family (her foster family) visited us and we had a wonderful time, as always, with them.  Here is a picure of her "sister" Cassie.  They were being pirates and were so cute together.  They truly feed off of each other and enjoy getting into trouble together.  One thing they did was to go into Aidan's room and destroy (and I mean absolutely destroy) several of his Lego sets.  He is still working on putting them all back together.  He took it pretty well, actually A LOT better than I would have.  Silly girls.  I also should say that this all happened while Julie and I were out shopping and the guys were home with the kids.  Would this have happened if us moms were around???  Maybe, but I like to think that it would not have. :-)

Michael and I got to take a trip to Las Vegas in October to attend a conference.  We  had a really great time and got to do a little extra sight seeing.  Here is a picture of us at Red Rock Canyon, which was beautiful!  And it was nice to be in the warmth and able to swim in October (can't do that in Ohio!).

Halloween is always a fun time at our house.  We have some really great neighbors and we got together with several of them and had a fire pit and ate yummy food before the trick or treating began.  Once it was time, the kids took off and got around the neighborhood in record time. (They are still talking about the king size candy bars that one of our neighbors handed out to everyone.)  Bella and the neighbor girls went around with us and they were so cute.  As you can see from the picture, we had a muscular ninja warrior, a tae kwon do ape (Aidan's own creation) and a beautiful Belle.

We added to our family this past fall as well.  Lulu joined our family and has been such a joy to us all.  The kids adore her and Bella finally has someone to boss around so she is in her prime.  Lulu is a Yorkie Coton mix, so she is called a Yo-ton.  She has been the best puppy ever.  She trained quickly, hardly barks and is so good with the kids.  We really could not have asked for more.  This is a precious pic of Keenan and her just a couple of days after we got her.

Certain seasons of the year, I truly become a "soccer mom" and tote the kids to practices and games throughout the week.  We love it!  Michael has been assistant coach for Aidan's team the past couple of seasons.  Here is a pic of the team right after they won the tournament in the fall.  Such a fun group of boys!! 

Christmas was wonderful this year.  The kids really had a great time and I took the last couple of weeks off at the end of the year.  We did a lot of fun things ... decorated cookies with friends, visited with other friends and had a lot of family time; went to Niederman Farm for their Christmas Walk with our small group and just played ... a lot!  The one thing that did happen right before Christmas was that Michael was in a car accident.  Everyone involved was fine, but our car was no so fine.  So in the midst of getting ready for Christmas, we also got to add car shopping to the list. 

Here is a pic of all three of the kiddos at my mom's house for Christmas. 



Last week, Michael, the boys and I took a trip to Copper Mountain, Colorado.  Bella is not a skiier yet, so she stayed with grandparents while we were gone and had a blast!  I think she really enjoyed the one on one time and all of the spoiling.  She is already asking to go and stay with them again.

We had a wonderful trip to Colorado.  This was Keenan's first time to Colorado and he truly cracked us all up from time to time (like he always does).  As we headed over the first mountain pass outside of Denver, I said, "Keenan look!  Aren't the moutains beautiful?"  His response, "Am I skiing down that?!" (disbelief in his voice)  The boys both did amazing skiing and took on just about anything.  Their favorite thing to do was to go off of the marked run and ski through the trees.  We all went to the very top and skiied all the way down which took about 30-40 minutes.  We cannot wait to go again.  Maybe next time Bella will be ready to tackle the mountains also.    Here are some pics of us and the beautiful mountains that God created ...  

I also attended a retreat in January for adoptive moms called Created 4 Care.  Awesome!  That is best way I can describe it.  I want to blog about it and hope to do so soon.  So, until next time ...

Goodbye Summer

As it was pointed out to me recently, I have not blogged in a VERY long time.  So here is a quick re-cap of our awesome summer.  My one goal for this summer was to have fun with the kids and we did! 

My wonderful sister Janel came and lived with us and watched the kids on the days that I worked.  She did an amazing job and the kids miss her so much now that she is back in school.  They played, swam, went to the park and just had fun all summer long.  Here are some pics from our summer ...

My sister Alyssa grauated from UC in Fashion Design.  She is getting ready to move to Milwaukee to begin her careeer.



 Keenan graduated from preschool in May.  Here he is with his aunts, Alyssa and Janel.

For Mother's Day, my sisters and I took my mom to a fun new place, Paint by the Glass.

( Alyssa, Me, Tiffany, Mom, and Janel)

We took our annual trip to Hilton Head.  Michael and Jeremy showing off their dinners. 

Keenan and Bella in the ocean.

Beach beauties ... Addy and Bella

Keenan and Aidan getting ready for a dolphin cruise ... check out Keenan's face.



In July, we went on a long weekend trip to Chicago with our good friends, Kim and Tad.  We had a blast and can't wait to go again next year!

Trip to the Children's Museum in Indianapolis.

Aidan, Bella and Keenan - they are quite the warriors, aren't they?

Another trip to Indy to visit with college friends.  Nick, Michael, Brad and Chris

Alisha, Lisa, Me, Laura and baby Sawyer

 The boys had another great birthday party with friends. 

Good friends, Josie, Aidan, Shelby, Keenan and Bella

Golf outing - Benny, Aidan, Michael and Keenan

The crew getting ready to get on the bus. 

(Trent, Abby, Troy and Aidan)

Back to school for all - Aidan (3rd), Keenan (Kindergarten) and Bella (pre-K)

Michael and Aidan on the field at the Reds game.  Michael presented an award and was able to take Aidan.  He got a lot of autographs, won a signed ball - all on his birthday! 

The boys showing off their new hats (family birthday party).