One trip down, one to go....

Well, I've been back from Armenia for 2 weeks now. The first meeting with our newest daughter went great!! Ted and I leave again in just 10 days to bring our newest sweetie home. We've had a great week of conitnued fund raising efforts!! My sister, Renee, along with her mother-in-law, held a garage sale out in Arizona for us. Renee just sent me a check for $300....yipee (I think she rounded her check up just a little). Thanks ladies!!! Also one of our neighbor's co-workers donated a little, old pick-up truck for us to sell. We had it in the front yard for less than 48 hours and it sold for $525!!! Ted has also been working on cars like crazy, plus working as much overtime as possible. Also my lis sophia jewelry shows have been going good. I still can't believe how many people God has sent into our lives to help bring our daughter home. Our family has many angels out there.....thanks to all who have helped bring this amazing child into our lives. Listening to a herself on the voice recorder. It was too funny to see her reaction of hearing her own voice.

My Aunt Pam and I with Mount Arat in the distance. Mt. Arat is thought to be where Noah's Ark came to rest.
Walking to the children's home. There are some MAJOR pot-holes in Guymri.
A church that was built in the 13th century.....now that's old.

I'm going to miss my kiddos

Look at that precious face......how am I going to go 6 whole days without kissing those cheeks?? There are so many emotions with these adoption trips. Of course I am sooooooo excited to meet our newest daughter but I am going to miss everyone back at home!!! When we adopted Audrey, I thought for sure my heart was going to burst from pain in missing Andrew and Natalie. Then when we adopted Paul, every single little Chinese girl that I saw on the street reminded me of my sweet little Audrey who was back at home. Now Paul is my baby and this will be the first time that I've left him for more than 24 hours. I honestly kiss that sweet boy at least 100 times per day.....how will I ever survive without all of those kisses?????

My baby is THREE.....yes 3!!!!

Paul's birthday fell on Easter this year. We all got him really excited about his birthday on Saturday. If you asked him whose birthday was tomorrow he would start singing his version of "happy birthday." He loved his GeoTrak train that we got him. Be sure to scroll all of the way down. I did 4 post tonight!!!! My baby boy, how can you be three already!!!!
"Can you believe that I'm going to have another sister to put up with soon......these 2 girls drive me crazy!!!!"
Paul doing his "scary" face. He likes to come up to me and say "scare mom" and I say "oh your so scary" and then he tries to be even scarier. I hate to tell him that he is the CUTEST scary-boy that I have ever seen!!!!
All my boys after church Easter morning. I didn't get a picture of the girls. Natalie barfed at the church breakfast so she wasn't really up for picture time.

Pine Wood Derby

Andrew won first place in his den at his very first pine wood derby!!!! He also won a trophy for best design in his den. Oh....if you're wondering why Andrew has a funny look on his face it's because he is now the proud owner of a bionator (huge orthodontic mouth piece). I am so proud of how good he has been about wearing it and we are already seeing a big change in his lower jaw. Besides his 2 trophies, he also won two 3rd place ribbons (I forget what for....yes, I am a horrible mom!!)
Waiting to see whose car goes the fastest.
Audrey and Pastor Kelly weren't really paying attention to the races, they were too busy goofing off!!! Aunt Renee was even out for a quick visit. Andrew thought Aunt Renee had made a special trip just for the pine wood derby!!!

Families Untied Through International Adoption Winter Party

In February we had our 2nd annual FUTIA winter celebration. We had families from Mercer, Auglaize and Shelby county with children represented from five countries. Audrey always loves to see other Asian kids.....of course she thinks they are all Chinese so I keep using the term "asian" and tell her the name of the country that the child is from.
The kids made their own Chinese Cherry Blossom art work.
Elijah and Rachel......our 2 newest members. I really did want to kidnap Eli....he is such a sweet, beautiful baby boy!!!!
Even Ted got in on the fun!!

Chinese New Year

A couple of months ago we went to Dayton's FCC Chinese New Year. The kids had a blast and we had good, good Chinese food. We wrote Paul and Audrey's name in their home province on this big cloth map. What a cool idea. Audrey was the only Shaanxi kiddo but there were many, many Hunan kids there.
Jing Jing is helping Rachel find her home province of Tianjin (for you Chinese geography buffs you probably already know that Tianjin is one of China's four municipalities and not an actual province).
My ornery China girl!!
Fun entertainment.
The boys.......

And the winners are......

I want to send out a HUGE thanks to everyone who placed an order at my cyber show!!!!!! We made about $250. By becoming a lia sophia advisor I have made almost enough money for my first plane ticket to Armenia plus I have enough shows scheduled in April to hopefully make enough for another ticket. This has been a great money maker for our adoption, so please let me know if I can help you become a lia sophia advisor to help fund your adoption. I was thrilled that my 3 winners were all adoptive moms just like me!!! One mom is even a Chenzhou mom (she has also a child from Chenzhou....Paul's orphanage). So here they are....

1st) Majorie from MO won $100 her choice of jewelry
2nd) Laurie from TX won 1 item of her choice up to $100
3rd) Yvette from KS also won 1 item of her choice up to $100

Plus my Aunt Pam (who is going to Armenia with me on the first trip) received a special prize!!

Thanks ladies!!!!!!!