Better late than never

Isaac and Clayton went fishing and caught these. We enjoyed fish with Yi for dinner a few days later. She accused us of being wasteful since we didn't bring her the eggs and head.

 We've had a full but good start to summer. Here it is in pictures.... For Memorial Day weekend we went camping at Stone Mountain. Micah had a fun, first camping trip. He did well for his first trip. He is slowly getting better about sticking to his boundaries and we also brought the high chair that we could put him in when we couldn't watch him closely ;) As you can see he is still quite full of personality.

We also sold the ferrets upon promising to get kittens. Here they are and they are SO much easier than ferrets to care for.

 We also celebrated Yi's birthday. She'll leave to visit her family in China next week and will be gone for 6 weeks. We'll all miss her alot. She'll go camping with us next week for a few days before she leaves though so that'll be nice.

We also have a date for Joshie's next ear surgery (round 2 of 4 I am calling it) (insert loud groan followed by a sigh here). Not even remotely looking forward to it. I think it's harder knowing how difficult it was last time keeping him still and seeing how long it took to heal, what he was like post op, and then all the sensory problems he had from not being able to be active for a month.

Although I think when the time comes it'll be good to be able to be more prepared. Either way it's set for June 27th. I'm with Faith when she said today, "Why Josh- I wish it could be me instead of him." That's so sweet but unfortunately it just doesn't work that way. (insert another loud groan and sigh here)

Happy Birthday Joy

We will be camping on Joy's birthday weekend so we celebrated a little early. She also got to talk to her foster family a few days ago which was an extra special treat. We don't talk to them as much anymore, mostly because Joy just doesn't ask to. I think it's because they really don't have much to say to each other any more. Both live such different lives now they just don't have alot in common to talk about beyond news, sports, and weather. It's sad yet just part of life I suppose. They still enjoy hearing one another's voice though.

Here are the pictures from the party. Joy seemed to really enjoy herself and received some gifts she's really been wanting.

Faith and Isaac made this lego person because Joy has been wanting one that looked like her.

Micah was not happy. We were making him stay in one place instead of being his hypervigilant self going from person to person and place to place.

Joy wanted a kitty birthday and Grace, Faith, Joy, and I made the cake. It is meant to look like Elvis, our yellow cat that Joy loves. He loves her just as much!

After Micah had to be held by daddy instead of walking around from person to person being obnoxious he had to be buckled into his high chair to eat his cake. All the other kids were outside so we turned his highchair around so he could see.

Her and Faith worked on the girly legos for several hours on Saturday and have loved playing with them. She had 2 girls spend the night on Friday and is also looking forward to being camping for her actual birthday. We are all looking forward to it!!!!!!!

I'm breaking down and buying a "kids leash" for Micah... Oh yes I am... After 5 kids and thinking that only mean parents did that I am one of "those" parents. I've had near panic attacks thinking about loosing him at a campground and I'm telling you he IS JUST like Curious George!!

Twins

Faith and Joy came down dressed alike for church this morning. Then they decided to put on some of Joy's birthday gifts...

 Grateful for times like these that make the dramatic times with these girls more bearable ;)

And of course George a.k.a. Micah had to get in on the picture taking... notice he is showing off his hands too!

We shoulda named him....

George... for Curious George.

He has LOVED the cartoon since he attached to a stuffed monkey we had for him at home. We thought it was sweet as we bought this sock monkey from a family doing an adoption fundraiser. We bought all the kids one for Valentine's Day and had his waiting in his little bed for him. Well... we now know why he likes his "mundee" so much! He is one! :)

He gets into EVERYTHING! It's like Curious George in the fact that he doesn't think about it until it's too late and he's in a mess.

Happy Mother's Day

To 3 special mom's halfway across the world. I can't thank them enough for the gifts of 3 of the 6 lives we are blessed with.

AWANA

 The kids have all had a very fun year in AWANA at church. They have learned tons of Bible verses and enjoyed going with Clayton to pick up kids for church from 2 neighborhoods close to our church. They've learned a ton about serving the Lord and loving people through this. The most important lesson, in my opinion, they've learned is perseverance even when it's not "fun" anymore and requires commitment. They've stuck with it and been able to see God reap what has been sown, 5 children from those neighborhoods have become believers in Jesus! Now the hard task of trying to invest in their lives so that they learn what it means to be a follower of Him! I'm sure they'll be lots more lessons learned!

Recital time...

 Yi is taking lessons from the same family we take from.

 Have you noticed yet that this child LOVES to have his picture taken! It's a good thing since his older brothers hate it.

 Poor Grace was so nervous I thought she was going to throw up. She had practiced SO much!

Next year Isaac will be in this group of Dinn's. He gets to start taking the piano next year.

Unbelievable

I know I've reached an all time record for how many posts in a day a person can do but words just can't describe what I'm about to say...
No, we are NOT adopting again ;) and I'm definitely not pregnant!

Better... for awhile now Joshua has been wanting to know who his birth parents are and where they are. He has wanted ANY connection to his birth country. For awhile now I have wanted to try to get in contact with an ayi of his that obviously had a STRONG attachment to him. When I say strong I mean tears... LOTS of tears when she passed Joshua to us on his adoption day. He LOVED her... so, so much. I can't imagine what it was like for him when she was not working... her shift was over. I've thought about that a million times because of Joshua's HIGH anxiety with transitions.

Anyway... tonight Yi called the numbers we had for the director's of the orphanage. As only God could do she actually sought out information on his ayi for us. You see... this carer worked at his orphanage from 2006 until 2008. She arrived shortly after he did and left shortly after he was adopted.

Amazingly God worked it out to get us her phone number from the director! Y'all directors of orphanages in China aren't known for being extremely forthright with information.

So... Yi called the number. She answered!!! Bi Wei now works in Xian and was BAWLING on the phone! I mean sobbing!! She was so happy.

I am utterly amazed at the Lord's timing and ability to work this out. I am unbelievably grateful! Joshua is a bit overwhelmed but I am so happy for him that we get to know someone that knew him for his first 2 years of life. We are going to continue to talk via QQ.

God is amazing!! I am so grateful for what He has done for Joshua in allowing this. I know this is going to be quite the journey but I am SO happy for him. He deserves any answers the Lord can give him.

Finally...

We had some new pictures taken....

We got lots of pictures of the girls and Micah but not so much of Josh and Isaac. I'm hoping to get some with a few more natural smiles of them soon though!