Ok...

Enough of the email and comments about my slacking : ) Seriously, I have a lot of pics and journaling to do about Vietnam but for now I will just do a coming home post to tide you over. He is still on Vietnam time and Annslee is a little too. Last night he screamed from 1-5 am unless he was being held or his back rubbed so no sleep around here. Annslee wants to be in on the comforting too so she isn't getting her rest either. Continue with all your prayers for his adjustment and ours : )


Here he is in the bassinet on the plane. He didn't sleep well in it b/c he is almost too big for it and he is a wild sleeper who needs room to move!

Annslee enjoyed bulkhead because it gave her some play room. This is on the short flight from Hanoi to Taipei (on the LONG one she slept 9 hours YAY)

If you have to ever have a long layover (ours was 8 hrs) then Taipei is the place to do it. This is just one of the great play areas they have. They also have many nursery rooms with couches and cribs ~ Sweet!

They do love their Hello Ki*tty there!

Such a great big sister helping him on his first slide ride : )

She charmed the flight attendants on each flight and here she is in the San Fran airport with the crew. We were waiting for Coby's immigration papers to clear and yes, Mark got in trouble for taking this picture : )

Eating a chicken nugget from Burg*er King in the San Fran airport (we had a 7 hr layover here and no fun play areas) Her first taste of "American" food in almost 2 weeks and I think she is enjoying it!

Our newest US Citizen!!! I forgot to pack a flag for him to hold like I did with Annslee and couldn't find one in the airport. He does have his red straw though.

We were entertained by a "puppet show" at the airport

After almost 34 hours of flying or being in the airport we almost missed our last flight (we would have CRIED) Luckily this was right by the gate and we were happy about that for sure!

Mia was at the airport waiting on us and what a wonderful sight to see!

I think she is happy to be home!!

He loved his baths in Vietnam but apparently not so much now.

Now I fully understand how hard it is to get two looking at the camera and smiling ; 0

Gigi is here!!!

Sweet boy~ he is so tired and can't get his schedule down yet. As you know he loves his two fingers just like Annslee but he also rubs the back of his head with the other hand just like she did!!

We are blessed beyond measure. Our church friends have provided dinner each night and all of your prayers are felt. I promise to post more later!!

We Are HOME!!!

I don't have the time or energy to post now but wanted to let you all know we are home. Poor daddy had to go into work and I am getting things done here...both kids are sleeping.

Here is a pic I have waited on ~ Coby sleeping in his own bed at HOME!!!



I promise I will catch up later!

Heading Home

We are leaving for the airport in a few hours to come home! We will be either in the air or in airports for the next 36 HOURS!! I am not looking forward to that part at all but will be thrilled to sleep in my own bed and brush my teeth with tap water : )

Please keep us in your prayers as we travel. Coby is a very LOUD crier so pray for the other passengers as well.

See you on the other side of the world!!

My Twins

I think blogger is finally playing along but honestly my babyjellybeans site is loading the pics faster so I will just stay over there for now : ) I hope you all are able to see the pics and I love reading the comments. I just wanted to toss this one on here as it is my new favorite!You can also see that he has only one "boil" left. They say it is from the "heat inside his body" He fell and bumped his head and burst the other one and now it is almost gone. I swear I want to just pop this one too!

Pictures, updates, etc

Hey everyone..sorry if I led some of you to believe we are home already..we arrive Monday morning. Anyway, I added a new page to Coby's site and added pics to the Shopping entry. I will try to journal some tonight. Last night's sleep was much better..thank you for the prayers. Our travelmates are doing much better too.

Oh, and the password is removed from Coby's site so everyone head on over!

We are fine!

Just wanting to touch base and let everyone know we are fine. It has been a whirlwind and now he is grieving hard so no one is sleeping. I will try and post more later....

A family of four!

Not sure if this will post as Blogger isn't cooperating....anyway, we are finally a family of FOUR!! You can check out the pics on Coby's site on the sidebar. Love to all!!!

COBY HERE WE COME!!!!

We got our approval!!!!! We leave on Wednesday and will have Coby on Friday (Thursday night here) Yes, you are reading this correctly! I obviously have no time to do much else but get ready so you may not hear from me until we are in Vietnam!!! Praise God all our prayers are answered and sweet boy will be opening gifts under the tree with his big sister this year!!

December

I usually love flipping the calendar over to December. It means Chris*tmas is close and the holiday season and all the fun that means is starting. A local radio station plays holiday music all day and it is on in my car. My tree is up and the house is becoming festive. I must admit though that this year it also is all a reminder that Chris*tmas is so close and yet our son is still so far away. I am still hopeful that he will be home for Chris*tmas and we will all be around our tree enjoying our day together. Please join me in the prayer that it really happens. In the meantime I will still try to get in the Spirit of the holidays. Having a very excited four year old definitely helps with that : )

Just so you know, she has worn her Chinese Princess dress all weekend (except for the two hours at church) and insists on being called "prin ess" as long as she is wearing her crown!

Yes, she sleeps in it too!

This morning as she was leaving to go to school I called her Princess but since she didn't have on her Princess attire anymore she said "just plain Annslee" ha ha....oh sweetie you are still my Princess, crown or not!

*note, the calendar is a gift from my travelmate/friend Michelle~ the picture is from last Christmas : )

Sleep Over!!

Not Annslee sleeping somewhere ~ better yet her cousins stayed here!! Jacob is 8 and Shelby is 12 and they had a great time!! Of course Annslee was the Princess, I was the Queen and Daddy the King. Shelby got to be the Fai*ry Go*dmother last night but this morning she had to be the Laborer (don't know where that came from) Jacob was the bad guy, the Prince and today, the pet Panda. No matter who anyone was they were to wait on her hand and foot and she loved it!!



Lots of different outfits were worn by the three of them but A always had her crown on



This morning Jacob announced that Annslee was a China Princess...well she certainly is. Yesterday Jacob said that when he grows up he is going to adopt a baby from China or maybe Vietnam : )




They have been gone two hours and she is still in her Princess attire. Luckily she hasn't been ringing the bell for us to serve her. Of course I guess she already knows we do that without the bell LOL

Check out Coby's site for the pics we got yesterday. I am almost hesitant to send you over as he is sick and really looks bad. He has a fever and rash and of course we worry because we are so far away. I know they will take care of him but we are ready to do it ourselves! Please keep him in your prayers. Our agency rep is going to go again next week and check in to make sure he is feeling better. Hopefully we will go ourselves soon!

Happy Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!!! Here is my girl as we were getting ready to watch the parade. Yes, she is still wearing her swimsuit~she slept in it actually : )

In the car on the way to dinner she talked to Gigi on the phone telling her all about how much she LOVES turkey and chocolate pie. As usual a kiss goodbye is needed before hanging up : )

When we found out we wouldn't be in Vietnam to eat duck today I jokingly asked on a blog post if anyone wanted to have us over. Seriously, so many people invited us over and I am touched by that. We would love to visit all of you!! My friend Tracy was one of those and she lives close enough for it to happen so we went there! She had these really cute turkey hats for the kids to make.

They took a ride on a "horsey"

We kept commenting on how nicely they all played together.

One of the funniest things was watching Annslee and Amelia push a baby stroller around together. They would laugh as they ran it into a wall and tipped it over. We said we wouldn't want them pushing our baby around but no worries as they were pushing a kick ball in a bag. The pictures do not do justice to the giant laughs we heard!

When we were getting ready to leave we jokingly said Annslee should just spend the night. She went for it and kept saying she was staying. She and Amelia had it all worked out. We told Annslee she didn't have her lovey but Amelia agreed to share hers. Seriously, at one point we walked out to the car just to see what she would do~ well, they both stood at the window saying "bye see you later" Hmmmmm..... it got to the point that we had to think of something. I told her she didn't have her Ari*el toothbrush and that did it. Maybe she can sleep over sometime but I don't think she really would have made it and I didn't want to come back and get her later : )

Thanks again Tracy..we had a great time!!!!

I need help!

Ok..it is that time of year for lots of pictures by lighted trees and I don't know how to do it!!! Anyone out there know how to capture the lights of the tree? I tried with no flash and got this~



This is the tree she has in her room and she is so proud of it..I finally just gave up and thought I want pics of my girl and will have to sacrifice the tree I guess so I got these~

I love the sweet pics of her but need help capturing the whole thing! Oh, don't you love how she dressed to decorate for Chris*tmas LOL

I have a Ni*kon D 40 by the way....

My crazy girl

Sometimes you just find the perfect outfit and you have to show it off! I think we read too much Fancy Nan*cy : )


Sarah and her dad come over Sunday afternoon to bring us a crib for Coby~ yay, he doesn't have to use Annslee's girly one : ) They had a great time playing together. The funniest thing was when Sarah complained to her dad "Annslee has like 90 toys and I only have 50" ha ha... I think they both likely have way too many!


Just one more pic of my crazy girl from Saturday


Since everyone seems to be posting pics of their school pictures I thought I'd share Annslee's. She had them done twice because she changed schools but neither turned out good. Come on...what is the deal? I have always liked her school pics in the past but these are at the elementary school so they are lined up a mile long I am sure and so no time is taken. No, I didn't buy them! Yes, she is still beautiful in them but it just doesn't look like her.


I am sure you notice my sweet new bloggy look. Thanks so much Connie...as soon as I get some wintry pics of my girl I will get them to you for the header!

Oh and 5 Minutes for Mom is having their Chris*tmas giveaway..there is a link to it on my sidebar!!

So much fun!!!!

To say we had a busy Saturday would be a huge understatement...

First we went to our church to make an Advent wreath. She loved making it and when she saw the candles she sang "Hap Birfday to you Jesus" and commented that His favorite colors were pink and purple too...well, of course they are otherwise why have that color candles : )



Of course she and Sarah had fun hanging out together too!



Our neighbors go to our church and their son Elijah is 16 months younger than Annslee. He absolutely LOVES her and will follow her anywhere..she thinks she is totally in charge of him. His mom and I have already worked out an arranged marriage as they also have a daughter who is 5 weeks younger than Coby. So I guess it will be really easy at Chris*tmas in the future with the grandkids LOL



After we left church we went to our other neighbor's house who just got home from China on Thursday with their daughter Wendi. She is also 16 months younger than Annslee (hey, I hope she doesn't think she can have Elijah for herself!) Anyway, the poor child is still jet lagged and well, shell shocked so I don't think she was ready for how excited Annslee was to meet her. I love this pic b/c when I took it I then asked A why she made that face and she said she was trying to look like Wendi LOL



Wendi's lack of interest in her didn't phase Annslee at all. I am sure they will be BFF in no time : )



We went home and grabbed some lunch and then it was off to the Festival of Nations at a local church. All the nations represented were Asian and Miss A loved it. You know she is obsessed with oragami so here she is showing off her crane.



Most of the performances were from the China group and she was upfront doing everything they were doing. I think a lot of the audience was watching A instead. It was so funny b/c she was so serious and deliberate to have her feet and hands in the right spot. You may have to enlarge the collage to see her closed eyes and smile. Oh, and she loves meeting the "stars" after they perform.



Her friend Sofia was there too and they were all over the place. I didn't get many pics of them as they were never in one place very long!



We came home and got Daddy then we headed north to Mia's house...well, to a restaurant for dinner first. They haven't seen each other in way too long and they were wild!!





Mia got an Easy B@ke oven for her birthday (which is today...Happy Birthday Mia!) and the girls loved baking cookies in it. They were so excited and had to watch for them to come out!



After getting all sugared up they settled down to watch Tin*kerbell : )



We left their house around 10 pm and Annslee fell asleep in the car~ finally she was tired : )

Feasting with an Indian Princess

Today was the day Miss A has been waiting on ~ Mommy and Daddy went to her school for lunch!!! She was so excited! I got there and they were choosing whether to wear their In*dian headdress or the Pil*grim hat. She chose her lovely headdress with of course a pink and a purple feather : )

Ashleigh and Brandt came over for a pic and notice Annslee grabbed Brandt's hand for a little squeeze

She couldn't stop beaming about us both being at "her school" and we loved being there too!

Since it looks like we won't be in Viet*nam for Thanks*giving like we thought we would we have no plans ~ anyone want to have us over LOL

Which timezone am I on?

Maybe I am not the only one doing this~ I am pretty sure others of you out there are too. I find myself looking at the clock and calculating what time it is in Vietnam (not hard to do since they are 12 hrs ahead) and then checking my email for that coveted approval if the time is right. Basically I stalk it starting at 8 pm (my time) and then when I go to bed checking one last time, try to sleep, wake up and realize it is now 6 pm in Vietnam and so another day without approval. For it to happen this week it will need to come by 5 am on Friday or we wait until Sunday night and start over again. One night this week I woke up at 1 am and thought "hey, they are back from lunch so maybe they sent it" No such luck!

When we got our referral he was 7 months old..now he is 10.5 months old and I am soooooo ready to have him with us. I haven't posted much about feeling this way because I know how lucky/blessed we are to have received our referral before the shutdown. I know there are many families out there hurting so badly and they probably want to throw something at the computer right now and tell me to stop whining. I also know a lot of my China buddies are sitting there thinking the same thing. I guess it is just that we have waiting so long since our referral and our 24 month LID anniversary is coming up at the end of this month so I am whinny...sorry!

Because I can't post without pics here are some of my favs from our trip to China three years ago (we were there right now!) We were hoping to be back in Asia : )


My beautiful sleeping girl with those fingers in her mouth. When I posted this on our travel journal I titled it Yu Nu Ping An ~meaning "one girl, peaceful and safe" and oh we still hope she feels that way!




The President was in China while we were there and here she is at the White Swan reading all about it



This was on our last night in China and I admit we were all a little punchy which is why I thought doing a puppet show for NaNa with a pigeon head on a chopstick would be funny~ she was not impressed




We visited the SWI while there and here she is sitting on the steps ~her "finding spot" I love how happy she looks but can't help thinking of what was going on the last time she was left there...this time of course she was not left but scooped back up in her Daddy's arms : )




Please continue lifting us all up in prayer and especially our little man on the other side of the world.