New Family Blog!

We have moved to http://2groovykids.blogspot.com/ to continue our journey.

March 08 Update!

We had a wonderful Easter Holiday. This month was highlighted with CC's baptism on Palm Sunday, a couple of warm days to play outdoors, seeing the Easter Bunny and egg hunting, meeting Elmo and falling in love, and some fun playing in the dryer (this girl was super quick because I found her in the dryer after dumping laundry on the couch). It's crazy what you can find in your dryer now-a-days! :)

February 08 Update!

CC is doing super! She has a great little personality and a wonderful sense of humor. We are having so much fun watching her explore her new world. It's amazing she has been with us for only 4 months. She fits so well into our family, that we couldn't imagine life without her! Even though she has been sick for the past couple of months it hasn't affected her growth. She has gained 5 lbs in 4 months! At almost 18 months she's a whomping 24 pounds! This girl can eat! She loves everything except carrots! The best thing I've noticed lately is that she loves dolls and girlie things! Yeah! But to keep this in perspective she also loves to imitate her big brother...she plays with Transformers (especially Bumblebee), and she can preform some impressive skills with a Star Wars light saber. Oh well...a mother can dream! ;)

December 07 Update!

We are starting to settle in since our return from China. CC has done amazingly well with the transition into our family. She just goes with the flow and has acquired quite a little vocabulary already! Our son "Spiky Doo" on the other hand has had some bumps along the way. It's been the hardest on him, and we are now seeing some improvements since Nov 11th! We know it will just take TIME and a lot of love and understanding mixed in! Our 23 year old daughter "School Girl" came into town for the holidays and it felt so good to have the whole family together for Christmas! We want to wish everyone a wonderful New Year!

God Bless.

Crazy Cakes's Adoption Video 2007

We Are Home!

We are jet lagged, but very happy to be home! CC is doing wonderful and we are so blessed to have her in our family. It was a long wait to see and hold her, but soooo worth it!

We Have Crazy Cakes!

Katelin's second day with us.

Crazy Cake all dressed up!

Getting ready for the "Red Couch" photo!

We have our daughter! She is so precious! She had a rough first 3 days, but now she is settling in with us. We have our consulate appointment tomorrow and then we head home! :)

Crazy Cakes's Family Day ~ October 29th!

We're totally excited!!!! We are leaving in 6 days! Eleven more days until we hold CC! Everything is done! We have family staying with our son and puppy, our bags are all packed, airline tickets bought, and now we wait! The 6 days are going to be excruciating! :) Sigh.

WE HAVE OUR TA & CA!

We've received both our TA (Travel Announcement) and CA (Consulate Appointment) from China on September 27 & 28! We needed both to travel to China! Whow, I'm totally excited! It feels really good to get this show on the road! We leave for China on Oct 24! That's 23 days and counting! :)

Katelin's 1st Birthday!

Katelin (Lin Ji Rui) is celebrating her first birthday today! I wish we could celebrate this special day together. I know in my heart we will celebrate all her life's accomplishments and birthdays in the years to come, and this is a wonderful feeling. But today, I also think about her birth mother and wonder what she must be feeling. So today I also pray for Katelin's birth mother. As a mom, it breaks my heart to imagine the pain, sorrow, and heartache Lin Ji Rui's mother must have felt as she left her child a year ago.

My wish for Katelin as she celebrates her 1st Birthday is to receive the love and care she needs from her foster care family until we can be united with her in China.

Happy Birthday Katelin! We love you!

Note: Yesterday, I received some additional information on Katelin. She was brought to the Yulin City Orphanage on September 20, 2006. There wasn't a note left with her to indicate her actual birth date. The orphanage doctors estimated Katelin's birthday as September 18, 2006.

Grace & Hope For Children Foster Care Program

I am so happy to hear Lin Ji Rui has been in foster care since December 21, 2006, and extremely excited to hear the foster care program is Grace & Hope for Children.

Grace & Hope for Children (GHC) is dedicated to advancing the care of China's orphaned and abandoned children. Foster care is their primary focus. By recruiting and training foster families in China and by raising financial support for these families, they strive to get eligible children out of orphanages and into loving foster families. You can sponsor a child today by visiting their website!

https://www.grace-hope.org/

We have a beautiful daughter!!!!!!

We would like to introduce the newest member of our family:

Lin Ji Rui (discipline lucky)
soon to be *Katelin RuiAnn* (middle name is pronounced as ReAnn)
Yulin City SWI, Guangxi
DOB: 9/18/2006 and in 12 days she'll celebrate her first birthday!
Measurements: (as of 9-7-07) W: 17.6 H: 26.77
She is currently in the *Grace & Hope for Children* Foster Care Program
and her foster mother has deck her out with accessories...
check out the anklets!
*******
We have been truly blessed!

WE ARE IN!!!!! The cut off is Nov 25, 2005!

C is in bed and I'm doing the snoopy dance all by myself because I just found out at 10:45 pm that WE ARE IN! We've made the cut!!!!! We're getting a BABY!!!!!! I can hardly breathe!!!! We will see our baby sometime this week!!!!!

Now what am I suppose to do...go to sleep?!?! Not likely! I guess I'll go wake C up and tell him the good news! Labor Day has a whole new meaning now. And guess what? It's our 12th anniversary tomorrow. What a great way to enjoy Labor Day! :)

A Sign!

Do You Believe In Signs? I believe we were given one about referrals today! A video about orphans was shown during our church service this morning. It showed orphans from around the world, but the main focus was on families receiving referrals from China and bringing their children home. It showed joyful, tearful, and excited parents seeing their children's faces for the very first time! It gave me goose bumps, and I was a little choked up after watching, and just knowing our time for seeing our child was coming in a few days. Out of all the Sundays over the past 2 years of this very long wait, it just happened to be this Labor Day weekend prior to referrals! GOD works in amazing ways!

*UPDATE: Today (Sunday, September 2) around 10:30 pm (est), CCAA updated their official site to show they matched up to the 25th of November! We are INCLUDED in this MONTH's REFERRALS! YEAH! The long wait is finally over and it feels soooooo good! :)

TA DA!

After 17 months Katelyn's quilt is finally done. Why? The long wait took the air right out of my sails. I'm a novice quilter...actually this is my second quilt, but I started out really gung-ho about designing and making this special quilt. Then as the wait got longer I was concerned I might have a quilt and no child. Kinda like jinxing the process so I put a hold on the quilt. So now that we are actually getting closer to our referral and my husband's threat of completing it before his return, I had to get on the ball and finish it, with a week to spare. It's not an official 100 Good Wishes quilt, but a quilt made up of 48 beautiful fabric hearts from family, close friends, and some Nov 05 families from our agency. Thanks to all who contributed the wonderful good wishes and fabric squares. I'm sure Katelyn will love it!