Photos

Crazy Busy

Dear Family and Friends,

Life is crazy busy in our house!

We have finished all of the requirements for follow up with China and for the state! Last Friday was our re-adoption day! It was great!

Sophie ran the show in the courtroom. When they let us into the courtroom, while we were waiting for the judge, Sophie made a bee line to his desk and proceeded to wrap herself up with the flag next to the desk! We have some cute photos of her standing by the flag and the judge bending down to talk to her. He was GREAT! Kept everything informal.

I've been very busy with my volunteer work with Love Without Boundaries. I've been named coordinator for one of the new programs called Formula to Any Orphanage Program. Basically, you can arrange to have a case of baby formula sent to the orphanage of your choice and if you have a child from the orphanage, we will send photos and a personal message to the orphanage. If there are any families interested in this program, you can read more about it at:

http://www.lovewithoutboundaries.com/nutrition_gen_nutrition_send_formula.cfm

Or if you would like to make a donation to the general fund you can do so via this link:

https://www.causes.com/fb/donations/new?cause_id=51591&fundraiser_id=45098279&m=38d81d22

Anything you can give will be multiplied tenfold once it reaches China.

I'll post pictures separately,

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Dingxi Social Welfare Institute

Dear Family and Friends,

**********************************************************************
I am THRILLED to report that through the efforts of one of my Yahoo groups, we have been able to get committments of $50/month in support for this orphanage! Only $50/month left to raise! God is so wonderful - I know He will speak to some of you out there to commit to the rest! PRAISE GOD for His faithfulness!
*********************************************************************

I am adding the information below in the hopes that some of you will find it in your hearts to help the orphans in China. Although the situation there is better than it once was, for many of these smaller and poorer orphanages the situation is simply a matter of life and death for these babies.

Think about it: for a TOTAL of $100/month the children of an ENTIRE orphanage will have had their lives improved ten fold! PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE.. help these babies. $100! How many times have we spent this amount on things that are so meaningless in life?


****Folks, I am a nutrition coordinator for Love Without Boundaries. One of the SWIs assigned to me is Dingxi. The current report was depressing -the babies are not doing well, in fact two babies died! And the pictures! Oh, these babies need help!

I currently sponsor a child's education but am now also going to support the Dingxi Nutrition program. There are not a lot of adoptions from this orphanage so there's not a Yahoo orphanage group to appeal to so here I am appealing to you.... Was your child adopted from Dingxi? Would you like to help the orhans left in China? Can you spare $10 or $20 a month sponsorship?How about $5 a month? We're trying to find $100 a month sponsorship for this SWI. If 20 of us donate $5 a month, we're there!

If we don't raise this sponsorship LWB will have to remove this SWI from its nutrition program after the July shipment since there is currently too few donations coming for this program - please don't let that happen!

If you cannot at this time pledge a monthly amount, could you do a one time donation? Or do you know someone who might be interested in a sponsorship? Do you know any groups looking for a charity to donate their fundraising to? Any help is most appreciated!!! To donate, you can donate securely on-line at the LWB site:

https://www.lovewithoutboundaries.com/Donate.cfm?child_id=0&category=&spanishFlag=false

Choose Nutrition for the Category and in the note please say that the donation is for the Dingxi Nutrition program.

If you have any questions, please let me know! Thank you!!!!! MaryHelen *****


I will be happy to forward any questions you have to MaryHelen.

Thank you for looking at this,

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Chinese New Year

Dear Family and Friends,

OK! I know now that I'm never going to get caught up on my posting so I just need to get over it and move on!

Let's just do the quick version... Christmas was great - Sophie really got into the opening packages thing but is still more interested in playing with my pots, pans and plastic containers than she is with her toys!

New Year's Day was uneventful since I had to work that day.

We completed our final post placement visit for China! That means no more visits from the social worker - something we are actually quite sad about since she has become such an important part of our lives. We hope to be able to keep in touch from time to time. Sophie will get one more chance to visit with her when we go to court next month to complete the re-adoption process here in the Commonwealth.

OK -that's it for the update - now the current things.

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone! This is now the Year of the Ox. We have done some decorating and had a fun party here on Saturday. This was originally planned as our Christmas party for friends from church, but had to post pone it when we got those storms in December. I made sweet and sour chicken, fake "chicken fried rice" (made it regular rather than fried), mini egg rolls, pot sticker wontons and we had fortune cookies! Everyone seemed to enjoy it and I hope to continue the tradition annually. I need to look at Oriental Trading for some bargains to plan for next year.

I'll post some new pictures soon.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

A year ago today...

Dear Family and Friends,

Breaking away from my goal of catching you up with life, I wanted to take a minute to celebrate our first Forever Family Day! It was a year ago today that I met my daughter in China for the first time.

I can't believe it's been a year already. She has grown and developed so much. She is nothing like the little waif I brought home. She is now a bundle of energy who talks up a storm.

We celebrated tonight with my family. We had a great Chinese meal and reminisced about what it was like a year ago. Sophie is such a perfect fit to my family. I am truly blessed to have her with me.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of lights." James 1:17

And now, for the weather........

Dear Family and Friends,

As I promised, I am trying to bring everyone up to date on the last month or so, since I was so awful about writing.

December was a very difficult month for those of us in New England. In the early morning hours of Friday the 12th, much of the Northeast was treated to nearly an inch of freezing rain. While most of the time, when we get ice storms, it's only about a quarter of an inch or so that covers the trees. As we came to find out, trees cannot take the pressure of anything over about 1/2 inch of ice. That night was spooky.

My condo complex is really in the woods. That night all you could hear were trees cracking and falling to the ground. We lost power at about 1:30 AM Friday morning. I was very fortunate to get my power back on Sunday afternoon - that's right, it took 3 days to get it back. My sister, who lives a mere 5 miles from me, was without power for a week. They got power back late Thursday the 18th. She and her kids stayed with me while my brother in law tried to keep the house warm with a fire place to keep the water pipes from freezing.

Although it was difficult not having the conveniences of electricity, it was amazing how creative people got in coming up with ways to cook a meal. Those with gas stoves did OK, or if you had a gas grill with a full tank, but others - like me- only had an electric grill. Not much luck when you have no power! I got some chafing dishes and sterno and was able to boil veggies and chicken for dinner one night.

The area was devastated with so many trees and power lines down. They had power crews in from all over the East coast as well as Ohio and Kentucky to help us get back power. A month later, you still see huge trees in yards. This is primarily because we no sooner finished with the clean up from the ice when we were socked with a big snow storm. We got about a foot of snow at my house. This was the first real white Christmas we have had in decades!

Here are some pictures from the storms for you to see...

The tree in the picture on the left missed this house by only about 3-4 feet. The picture on the right shows power lines just dangling....

My back yard with a foot of new snow.....

Well, that's it for the weather.....of course we have had yet another storm last weekend and it looks like a dusting or more for tonight..... OK - I've had enough snow to last me the rest of the winter!

Sigh.

Blessings,

Chinamom and Sophie

Biting the Bullet

Dear Family and Friends,

If you haven't given up on my ever writing on my blog, thanks for hanging in there! There has been so much going on in the last month or so that I don't know where to begin. I had great ideas of sitting down for an afternoon and creating entry after entry to catch everyone up, but it got too overwhelming. So now, I decided to start from the beginning, and work my way up to the New Year, one painful session at a time!!! LOL!

I'll start with Sophie's birthday. She is now officially two years old! We celebrated the event on Thanksgiving Day with an awesome Elmo cake that a friend of mine at work made! She loved it. My parents and my sisters were there with my brother in law and a niece and nephew. She was able to blow out the candles but wasn't particularly interested in eating any of the cake. She has a very selective sweet tooth - something for which I am eternally grateful! (just wish I could be as strong as my daughter when it comes to that stuff!!)






















Around that time, Sophie had her first of three encounters with a certain man who likes to wear a red suit! I wasn't sure how she would do but she wasn't afraid at all and went right up to him. She also loved the elves and I'm convinced she might want to try out for that role one day!

She also had an encounter with The Grinch!

That's all I have time for tonight, I'll try to post more soon.

Blessings,

Chinamom and Sophie

Is anyone still with me out there???

Dear Family and Friends,

I am so dreadfully sorry that I have neglected the blog for the last month - the reality of having moved in September is that I have very little time left over at the end of the day to do much of anything - including spending time on the computer. I would like to say things will improve after the holidays but I don't want to make promises I can't keep! I will do my best, however.

We have been incredibly busy getting ready for the holidays. I have been painting like mad since I am hosting two big events in my new home. I have about 30 people from my church coming on the 19th and am hosting my family on Christmas Eve! There is so much to do and so little time to get it done in. Thankfully one of my aunts and a good friend of mine each gave up a Saturday to help me get some things done and that has helped tremendously.

Sophie had her second birthday the week of Thanksgiving! We celebrated with an Elmo birthday cake at my parents house on Thanksgiving day. She is growing like a weed - we had her two year check up last Friday and she has grown nearly 2 inches since last May!! Her weight is up to 26 whole pounds! Skinny little weed!

She is talking up a storm and is particularly fond of the the moon and the stars (the mun and tars as she likes to say!- we are working on some sounds, especially the s and l sounds - socks and clock both sound the same and I will leave it to your imagination as to what she actually says! - sorry gentlemen! lol!!!)

Sophie made the FRONT page of our local newspaper this week! She was with my sister at a local church fair one Saturday (Mom was home doing some painting without the "help" of my little peanut). Anyway, Soph had just finished kissing Winnie the Pooh when the photographer started clicking photos. She is too cute, my little Sophie.

Speaking of cute - I just love this! When I ask her "Sophie, who's cute?" she answers "Momma cute!" I love it! and no - I didn't teach her to say that - she just came up with it by herself!! Sometimes I ask her just to hear her say it!!! LOL!

I need to run for now. I promise to post new pictures soon - hopefully tomorrow. I'll also fill you in on other Sophie activities as the pictures remind me of how neglectful I have been in keeping you all up to date!

Blessings,

Chinamom and Sophie

More Pictures from Fall

Our referral anniversary is coming up!

Dear Family and Friends,

Can you all believe it's been nearly one year since I got my referral from China? November 16th for me - though the rest of my group did get theirs November 5th. I know now that my Sophie from Xiu Shui would not have been in the group of referrals that came on the 5th, so God was holding my little one back so that her paperwork would match up perfectly with my own paperwork in China.

I am so blessed to have her as my daughter. She fits so perfectly in my family. I am often amazed at how many things she will do or of her physical characteristics and mannerisms that remind me of my biological family members. The way she tilts her head and stares off into space reminds me of my nephew, Ian. The way her thumbs are double jointed and she contorts them into a Z shape is something my niece, Haley, does too! The way she plays with the cuff of her sleeves is something my grandmother, Yvonne, would do, and the way Sophie walks (my little flat footed beauty!), is just like my grandmother, Angelina, used to walk! Yes, just as adoption was God's plan for me, my daughter was God's plan for my family! Thank you, LORD, for making our family complete.

Michelle - got your message - the girls are welcome to come over ANY time they want! You know how much Sophie adores them! Maybe you, Chris and the girls would like to come to dinner???

Kim - hair styles in our house are an issue! Her hair is too thin to do much with and too short in all the wrong places! I wish I could braid it like you do for Natalie! Hair bobs for Sophie are really just extra toys that she doesn't have to carry in her hands! Sooner or later they end up in her bed, the floor, the toy box, her lunch bag, the car seat, the floor of the car.. you get the picture!

Shawn - I do so remember this time last year. For me it was the longest two weeks of my life - those first two weeks in November! But, I do remember with fondness the slumber parties with the Queen - my favorite you tube video is STILL the one with the runway model falling off those ridiculous high healed platform shoes! Just in case you don't remember which one I mean, here is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36WgNX_--hI

I'll post pictures separately as I can't seem to get the spacing right with what I write and how I post the pictures!!

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Finally! The Just Pictures Post!

Tried giving you photos...

Dear Family and Friends,

I tried to update pictures but the site would not let me download any pictures.... I'll try again tomorrow - I have had nothing but problems with services since I went to Comcast - I miss my Verizon (not available in my new town), my Direct TV (can't have satellite dish at the condo) and a phone that works! (the Comcast guy is coming to fix THAT on Friday night!!!)

Sorry, just my frustration coming out.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Contrary to popular belief - We are still around!

Dear Family and Friends,

So sorry I haven't updated in such a long time - so much has been going on. I finally closed on my new condo on September 11 and it was a whirl wind of activity since then. That weekend was spent trying to get as much cleaning done as possible. Although not bad by many other people's experiences, this place was not something I was feeling comfortable about having my 21 month old playing in. Thanks to so many wonderful people from church who gave up several weekends of their time, we were able to move in the following Saturday (Sept 20th I think it was). I worked on Sunday and Monday, took Tuesday off to do grocery shopping, have cable, internet and phones hooked up, get Stanley Steamer to clean the carpets and cleaned at my old apartment. On the 24th I checked into the hospital at 6AM to have some abdominal surgery done!

While I have managed to get a lot done, there is still so very much left to do. Believe me when I say that every surface of this place needs something done to it! I will need to do much remodeling to bring this place up to date. It was built in 1981 and it has the original kitchen and bathrooms to prove it! There is a sense of accomplishment when I finish a project and fortunately for me I should have that feel good sense of accomplishment for the next ten years since it will take me that long to get every thing done!! LOL!

Sophie is loving her new house. There are lots of trees and open space here and she loves to collect leaves, sticks and acorns, all of which somehow make it into my house! Can't tell you how many times I've stepped on a stupid acorn in my bare feet in the living room! That hurts! Her room is huge! Twice as big as the one she had in the apartment (which was not small to begin with!). She has plenty of space to play in here - though there seem to be many more toys invading the living room on a daily basis. . . . .

I'm waiting to recover enough from surgery to be able to lift heavy objects. My computer desk is still in the garage and I can't park in there until I move that and some other pieces of furniture from there. Right now I'm working off a TV tray as my desk for the computer! Not too good for one's back - especially at my age!

Kim, I promise to post pictures soon - my camera was among the missing for several days but I do have some cute Sophie shots from last weekend when we went pumpkin picking!

Talk to you all soon,

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

At long last!

Dear Family and Friends,

Finally! A whirlwind week has come to an end and yesterday we moved all of our belongings to our new home! My apologies for not writing sooner but there was sooooo much to get done before I could let Sophie roam about the new condo. It needed and extensive cleaning!

I can't thank my church family enough with all the help they gave me in the last week. I am blessed to have had an electrician (to give us power when the master circuit breaker broke!);a plumber to fix a leaking bathtub faucet;a heating specialist to keep my aging furnace going to give us heat and hot water; and, of course those who gave up two weekends to help me clean, paint and provide their labors to load and unload 5 rooms of our belongings! What a blessing you all are - it does prove the proverb - A friend loveth at all times.... I am so thankful to God for you all!

It will take a few days to get my internet access going, so please forgive the lack of communication - I'll publish pictures when I get back on line.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Sigh.......

Dear Family and Friends,

Yes - you guessed it. We have no closing on the condo. It was rescheduled 3 times on Friday as my bank was waiting for a signature from the selling bank and it seems that this very large, national bank, had no one working who could sign off on the settlement. Now we wait until tomorrow when a new settlement needs to be drawn up (another week has passed in the month and the math needs to be adjusted to reflect this) and we wait again for someone to sign it.... My mortgage commitment expires next Thursday so it looks like I'll need to try and get an extension on this. Keep it in prayer please.

Sophie is doing well. She is adding new words to her vocabulary every day! She now has 3 variations of calling me - Momma, mom and mummy! Too cute! She is finally saying hello to people on the phone. In the past, it was always a listening activity for her, now she will talk a bit more, but is still more interested in pushing the buttons on the cordless phone!

I need to keep this one short - time is getting late and we must get ready for church.

Keep us in prayer,

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

September already?

Dear Family and Friends,

I can't believe it's September already. As I write this, I am brought back to one year ago when I was waiting for my referral. I was excited and nervous - I knew I was one to two months off from becoming a mom and it scared me a bit. Now Sophie has been home for nearly 8 months and it's hard to imagine life without her. She is growing so fast. I tried putting a onesie on her last night and have to admit to myself that she has outgrown her 12 month clothing! She is just now filling out her 18 month clothes. Can't really call her petite since she is so tall, but she is a tiny Munchkin to me.

We have a new closing on the condo! Pray that all will go as hoped for this coming Friday. If all goes well, I will be cleaning furiously next weekend and painting during the week nights to be ready to move the following weekend. I know I won't get all the painting done, but would like to have Sophie's room complete before we move.


I happened to run across an interview with Steven Curtis Chapman that he did for a radio program recently. I don't know if many of you know that he and his wife have adopted 3 girls from China. In May there was an awful accident at their home when his second oldest biological son hit the youngest girl, Maria Sue, when she ran out in front of his car. She went home to be with Jesus that day. I bawled as I listened to that interview (actually was 3 days). If you want to be inspired by a strong Christian faith, listen to this interview.


http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/Focus_on_the_Family/archives.asp?bcd=8/25/2008


http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/Focus_on_the_Family/archives.asp?bcd=8/26/2008

http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/Focus_on_the_Family/archives.asp?bcd=8/27/2008


When Steven sang his song, Cinderella, it made me think about what is important. That day I was caught up in the day to day things of life and Sophie was very clingly. She was napping when I heard this message and it made me realize I won't have this time in her life for very long. God does not promise us one more minute and everything could change in a heartbeat. Tonight, I spent time just being a mom to Sophie. We giggled. Read books. Splashed in the tub. It was perfect.












Double fisted shopping!



















Painter's assistant!

Washing feet!

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

All things on hold...

Dear Family and Friends,

Just a quick update on our move. The closing was postponed from last week due to some additional documents needed to insure the selling bank has the right to do so. No new closing date yet, but everyone is hoping it will be sometime this week. It has really been a stressful week and I don't think the stress is over!

On the bright side, my landlord has offered me two additional weeks in my apartment should we not close by the end of the month. That has taken some of the pressure off. God has certainly blessed me once again with some wonderful people in my life.

Sophie is doing well. She has a huge runny nose this week - reminds me of the week we had in China. She had a runny nose then that just wouldn't stop! Ahhhh! The memories! They all come flooding back (no pun intended!!).

I will write more later.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Still packing....

Dear Family and Friends,

We are still packing for our move. Keep praying that the foreclosure deed is filed before my scheduled closing date of the 22d. I have already given notice for my apartment for September 1st, and have no idea where we will be going if the closing is not completed before that date.... Oh well, God has it all in control and I'm just along for the ride!

Sophie is getting sassy - I think the boxes upon boxes have turned her world upside down. She wakes up and there are new boxes in the dining room and less "stuff" everywhere else! But, she is still too cute and even with her sassyness, she makes me laugh!

I need to run for now. Just wanted to give you some new pictures.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

More boxes???? Where DO they come from??

Sitting in a shoe box! Notice the dry pool in the living room??? Makes a great place for watching Disney movies!

Sitting in a dish drainer headed for the Salvation Army! who needs toys when you have old dish drainers hanging around??

Busy, busy, busy

Dear Family and Friends,

Life is so very busy this month and I expect it will be for the next couple of months as Sophie and I prepare to move! Yes! My offer on the condo was accepted by the bank and I am now in the midst of sorting and de-cluttering and packing my once spacious apartment (sound familiar Kim??) -it was spacious pre-Sophie, now every room has baby gear in it!

Everything is going well so far with preparing for the closing - we are ahead on schedule with the timeline set out in the offer. The only thing that could throw a wrench in it is if the foreclosure deed is not filed in time (there is a high volume in the land court due to the large number of foreclosures in the Commonwealth). But I will turn it over to the Lord and He will make it happen in His own time.

I don't have any new pictures of Sophie down loaded right now - it seems my camera is lost in the clutter that is my sorting system! As soon as I can lay my hands on it, I will add pictures.

Yesterday Sophie went to a new day care for the day. My sister and her family are on vacation and I wasn't able to get all the time off I needed. My good friend, Roberta, who is director of the day care at my church, allowed Sophie to go there as a drop in baby. I think Sophie had a fabulous time! She didn't want to leave! I think having all the other kids to play with exhausted her because she slept straight though the night and I don't think she changed positions more than twice!! I'm off on Monday but will take her back there next Tuesday.

That's all for now - I need to run to the bank before is closes.

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie

Does she look like a boy???

Dear Family and Friends,

I was so excited about the condo in my earlier post that I forgot to post this tidbit...

I was at the grocery store tonight waiting to check out. Sophie was in the cart, bare foot and wearing a onesie with pink flowers and pink trim on the sleeves are neck. Granted she wasn't wearing any shorts but she's only 19 months old - give the girl a break.

Anyway, the woman in front of us starting talking to her and said "Isn't he handsome!" I don't get it! The baby was wearing PINK! I can't tell you how many times people tell me what a cute little boy I have!

Geeeeezzzzz!

Blessings,
Chinamom and Sophie