Jungle and Tornadoes

Tornadoes don't happen very often in good ol' Wyoming. So when the clouds start rolling in, the sky is lit up by lightening, and the tornado sirens go off, it creates some.... well, should we say, excitement. We spent a while in our basement last night while monitoring the weather closely. There were a couple of tornadoes touching down about 20 miles outside of town, but thank goodness, that was it. Needless to say, I made sure all of our adoption documents were in the basement with us (I really didn't want to get a new I 171H!!!). Once the warning passed, I finished cleaning and decorating our upstairs bathroom, which is pretty much the kids' bathroom. I painted it over the last week, and we decided to turn it into a jungle bathroom. I never had a "theme" for a bathroom before (besides the obvious ;-)) ), but it sure turned out cute! Look for yourself!

Our LOA is here!!!!

Wow, what a day!
We received an email from our agency today, stating that our "Letter of Acceptance" had arrived from China. Of course I was hoping that we would get this important piece of paper very soon, but prepared myself to having to wait until at LEAST until the end of May. And here it is! God is so good, and this process has been so smooth and quick!
We will receive it tomorrow, sign it and send it back to the agency right away. After the CCAA in China receives it, they will issue our Travel approval (TA). This has typically happened about a month after the LOA. This all means that there is a good chance we will be leaving for China in appproximately 6 weeks! How amazing is that!!!!
I can't believe we will have Nina home in 2 months!! It SO warms my heart to think about it! We're READY (well, maybe not logistically, but in our hearts!)

Uebersetztung: http://chinagirlswitzerland.blogspot.com/2007/05/loa.html

Welcome to the family, Caleb!

I have some very happy news to share today...
Yesterday afternoon, a beautiful little baby boy was born. He is our newest nephew, and his name is Caleb. He is TINY! He was born almost 6 weeks early, but he is doing wonderful! His Mama and Daddy and big sister are VERY proud!

Be touched...

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Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful Mothers I know! First and mostly though to MY mother who loves me even when her "Baby" goes ways that just seem too crazy to her (like marrying an American and moving half way around the globe, or making her a Grandma of a sweet chinese girl, just to name the most drastic ones :-)) )

Happy Mother's Day to two other mothers, who hold a special place in my heart: Nina's Birthmother, whom we will never be able to meet. I don't want her to hurt anymore and agonize over what happened to her little baby that she left behind three years ago. And to Nina's Foster mother who has invested to much in our daughter's life. You are an amazing woman!

Did you hear it?

I had my last Hepatitis B shot today.
You have to understand that Hepatitis B vaccination is not an easy thing for me. I had an allergic reaction to my first shot many years ago, and never finished the series. At this point in our adoption and with travel coming up, I wanted to try to get re-vaccinated. Our employee health nurse was willing to give it a shot (literally!), and with the proper precautions I did okay with the one I had in January (if you call sheer panic and nervousness okay *sigh*). Today was my last one, and I was just as nervous as before, maybe even more so.
But, I'm here, I did okay, thank God, and you may have heard the boulder come off my chest.
I certainly feel a LOT lighter today!

In the "Match room"

We just received notification from our agency that we can download a new travel package, which includes our visa application. This notification means that our Dossier has been moved to the Match Room at CCAA, where our Dossier and Nina's file officially get matched with each other. There is still no clear guideline as to how much longer it will be until we receive travel approval, but things are definitely moving into the right direction.
We'll keep you posted!

The girl's room "transformation" - sunglasses required!

This last week, it was time to paint the girl's room. We wanted to have it pretty much done for Anya's birthday. Here are a couple of pictures from "before". This used to be Nico and Anya's, later on Alex and Elia's room.

Work in progress

On Friday we painted: Mike's Mom helped me, and so did Elia. He really surprised us by sticking with it for about three hours. He had his own little roller, and just loved it. As you can see, he added his own personal touch to the walls ;-)))

And the finished room...

What a difference the paint made! It feel like a totally different and new room! Mike's parents put up the chair rail yesterday, and I finished touching up today. Friday the carpets will be cleaned, and then we will start moving Anya's things in her new room. In the last picture you can see the bedding the girls will have. I bought this set last year already, and it will go beautifully with all the other colors. Now I can't wait until the beds get here *hurryhurry*....

Happy Birthday, Anya!

Our big girl is EIGHT! She had four friends over friday night, three of them spent the night, and two of them spent all weekend with us. Anya had a blast and loved every minute of it.

Anya, we love you, and we are very proud to have you for a daughter. You are a kind, funny, smart and caring young lady, and it's a joy to have you in our family!

Another Care Package

We sent Nina another care package last week. I SO hope she gets our mail.

I want her and her foster parents to know that she has a family waiting for her. Otherwise, the families and kids often don't know that until it's almost time to travel, and I don't want this to be a harder transition than need to be.

The little bunny is SO soft. We have another one here and will bring it to China with us, just in case she doesn't have hers with her. Any little thing that will be familiar to her will be a good thing.

My heart aches when I think about her leaving her Foster family, and about them letting her go as well. I am so thankful for all they have given her over the past two years, and even though they knew that this day would eventually come, it has to be hard for them. I hope that we will be able to stay in contact with them, so they can know how Nina is doing, and also for Nina's sake. They will always have a special place in her heart, I'm sure.

50 days

Today marks our 50 day Milestone in our wait for Travel Approval. How much longer will it take? It could be 2 weeks, it could be 2 months.... nobody knows. I believe it will come at the right time, and until then, we will be soooo busy with end of school events, soccer, remodeling and so on, I know time will fly!
Until then, we are praying for Nina daily. And I believe this is the best preparation anyway....

Stalling...

This just happened....
The kids just went to bed. Mike and I are downstairs, and I hear a small little pitter-patter on the stairs. Elia and Nico come downstairs... and Elia goes: "Mama, when is Nina BoBo coming?" I say: "This summer." Elia: " Uhhhh, why is this taking so long?" And off he goes again, back to bed. So cute!

Decided!

Here she is... our little girl with the name we as a family have chosen for her:

Nina means "little girl" in Spanish, but also "Grace" in Hebrew.

Gabriella means "God is my strength" in Hebrew.

FuBo is her given Chinese name, Fu meaning happiness and Bo is in the hopes that she will advance bravely like great waves

Beds and Promises

This is the bed we picked out for the girls. Up until now two of the kids had slept on mattresses on the floor, so this was a good time to buy some beds. We really liked this set up, as it will give them enough floor space to play. I see some airy fabric hanging loosely over that corner section, to make it a dreamy, girly hideaway.

Can't wait!!

But more so, I can't wait to have my daughters together.

I just emailed our agency, and the earliest update they can request on BoBo is May. Hopefully we will be able to get an update on her. God has blessed us with so many personal, special details during this adoption process, that I have no doubts he can do this too.

I came across a wonderful promise during my biblestudy yesterday, that I just have to share. I felt like the Lord was saying this over our adoption of BoBo:

See, I'm sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared . (Exodus 23:20)

God is AHEAD of us preparing not just logistics, but most of all, the heart of a little girl, who is undoubtedly loved, but who will go through some tremendous changes over the next few months! What a wonderful reassurance!

Another home improvement picture ;-)

It's amazing how empty spaces are enticing to children, isn't it? Especially when they're not ususally empty. I was re-arranging what used to be the little boys' closet, and what will be the girls' closet.

The boys had a lot of fun (I know it doesn't show in their faces, but HONESTLY, they were in there by their own free will :-)) )

The girl's room is just about ready to get painted - I think I have a just a couple of days of cleaning, patching and taping to do. I can't wait. It's going to be so nice in there.

Their beds are on backorder, but I will post a picture of what they will look like.

A new look

Here is our "new" Anya - she got glasses last week. Doesn't she look adorable with them?

She mentioned about a month ago that things appeared blurry, and we had her tested after that.

She enjoyed picking out the frames (they are light blue), and she can see much better now.

Going to the eye doctor was fun, especially when Elia tried to help her naming the letters correctly ;-))

House project Part 1

Here is the situation in our house: We have three bedrooms upstairs. Nico and Anya have their own, and Alex and Elia share a room. Now with BoBo joining our family, we had to rethink the room arrangements. The result? ALL the kids will switch rooms!!! Talk about a logistical challenge *ha*. And then Nico decided that he did not want to be the only one who HAS to be in a room by himself. Now THAT was a surprise! So we thought some more, and changed plans again.
Last week the project got under way. Elia was a great help, and all three boys loved to paint.

Here are the results of our efforts.


These are two "before" pictures. The one below shows my little helper masking off the outlets... and himself ;-))
The next three pictures show the newly painted room. It's a very "calming" feel in there now (and the three boys will need that!). I picked two different blues and the greenish color that is called Bamboo Shoot.


After the painting was done, Mike, Nico and our brother-in-law Jon put the new bunkbed together
And that night, the boys spent their first night in their new room. They were very excited. The two bunk beds are on opposite walls, and we turned Nico's bed more into of a loft bed for him (We 've had this bed for a few years already) It's very cozy in there now, and the smallest room, which is right next door, will be their playroom, so not all their belongings and toys have to be crammed into their bedroom. Anya was very tired that night, so she looks a little sad in this picture. All in all, it had only taken from Wednesday to Saturday to get this room done, so now the girls room will be next. Pictures will follow.


Only a couple hours after they went to bed, we found Elia sleeping on the floor. He has been sleeping on a mattress on the floor for a long time, so being ON a bed without a rail is new to him. I hope he will get used to it quickly :-))
Needless to say, our cat liked the new sleeping arrangment too!

Snow Days

Here are a few pictures of the Spring Blizzard we had last weekend. School was cancelled for 2 1/2 days, and we were completely snowed in. There was a 4 food drift in front of our garage, it was amazing! The kids loved going sledding one more time (hopefully!), and we just enjoyed the time off as a family, doing some indoor camping, playing etc.