Nadia holding a baby for the first time – her cousin Caleb.

We headed down to Sugarland, TX for a quick trip to see Chris and Jen’s twins and to meet Lisa and Michael’s new son Matthew. It was a whirlwind, but so fun! I have been dying to see the boys and was so happy we worked it out for a visit. Nadia was not sure what all the hype was since they couldn’t “play”, but then she thought it was cool to hold one of the boys. Jen suggested we head for the park since it was a beautiful day and our girls had been cooped up in the car all morning. While the kids played and Chris walked the boys in their stroller Jen and I chatted. Her mom Jane came by and we had a quick visit.

Nadia is so strong.

Sweet sisters.

That night we headed over to Pearl Dynasty to have dinner and meet Matthew. Nadia and Angelina were so happy to see each other and started to play right away. Meanwhile Amelie tried to eat her weight in spring rolls.

Thank God for His blessings poured out on our two families. And that we live close enough to see each other regularly. The next morning we got up and had breakfast, packed up and went back to Chris and Jen’s. I had the girls bring in their toys and books and they had a great time showing Jen everything while Mike and I fed and held the babies. It made my heart so happy.

This photo is precious! Thank for having us for a visit!

Click the photo above  to see the whole album.

The week of Thanksgiving this year we headed to Albuquerque, NM to my Grandma’s house so that she could meet Amelie and see Nadia again. That will be a separate blog post, but I did want to mention where we started. From there we headed to Denver, CO to spend the weekend with our friends Randy, Jessica and their children. On Thanksgiving Randy smoked a turkey and Jess has prepped everything else the day before while we were driving up. The weather was so nice that the girls had a blast playing outside in the morning.

Abby set the table and made name plates for each of us. The food was fantastic as always with the Petermans. Jess made 2 kinds of pumpkin pie and a chocolate cream pie based on a Colonial Williamsburg recipe.

Here is Randy getting the turkey ready to become soup for Friday night. After this we headed to the park so the girls could run around.

After the park the girls did some crafts while Jess and I made our Black Friday attack plan and around 7 am we were on the road. Jess loves Black Friday shopping and it was a blast to just be together! We both scored some great deals and while we were gone Mike took Randy and all the girls out to breakfast. He told me that they saw quite a few other dads and kids which I thought was funny.

Friday night my Dad’s cousin Kathy, her husband John, daughter Emma and my Great Uncle Jack came over for soup and ice cream. Emma was about to turn 3 and it was so sweet to see the girls playing together. It was such a nice visit and we are grateful that they drove south to visit us.

The next morning we packed up to head back to Texas. The girls played until the last possible second and then we took some goodbye photos.

Thanks for hosting us this year Randy and Jess. We love you guys!!!

Our last planned road trip of the summer was to Houston for my cousin Jen’s TWIN baby shower. Everything worked out in such an awesome way that we crammed in seeing so many people we love – if we had more time I think we could have seen even more. On the way down I got an email that I was the “elite member of the day” and when we showed up we had our own parking spot in the front and this sign at the front desk. Plus a little treat at check in.

We ate dinner in the room that night and the next morning got up and headed for brunch at my Aunt Jane’s house. We had a really nice time visiting with her, Perry and her sister in addition to Chris and Jen. After brunch we ran back to the hotel so I could change and the girls could nap while I went to Jen’s baby shower. It was so sweet to see the outpouring of love for their boys.

Jen’s dad is “Mr. Hunting Dude” and sent the boys their first camo. Adorable!

Jen’s sister Leslie makes handmade nursing covers. Isn’t it pretty? She sells them on Etsy.

This is me with Jen and Jane. I love them!

I didn’t think we were going to get a chance to see my Dad on this trip, but he flew in early from a business trip in London so he joined us for dinner at Pearl Dynasty. SO YUMMY! One of the families from Nadia’s travel group owns it and the food is delicious. You should go there! After dinner we went to have ice cream with our friends and my dad headed home to get over the jet lag.

Could these girls be any cuter? Melts my heart!

Last of all on Sunday morning I was thrilled to death to see my sister Tahni. She was in town to shoot a wedding and drove up to the hotel to visit with us. We haven’t seen her since last year when she moved to VA. We miss you Tahni and were so happy you were in town the same weekend as us.

After check out we headed home. It was a whirlwind, but fantastic weekend!

Amelie, Reagan and Nadia. Click the photo above to see the entire album.

The adoption agency Dillon International  hosts a China Heritage camp in Tulsa, OK each summer. We have known many families that have taken their bigger girls, but children must be 4 to attend so this was Nadia and many of her buddies first chance to attend.  We made plans with local friends and with friends from the Internet that I had never met in real life. All of the girls were in the same class – The Dragonflies. Each day we dropped them off at 9:30 and then picked them up at 3:30. Throughout the day the girls did Chinese language, cooking, Kung Fu, crafts and more. On the first day they had a ceremony for the parents and children complete with a lion dance.

Amelie was not excited about the lion dance. She kept covering her eyes like above.

The first night we invited everyone to our hotel for a pizza and pool party. Our friends the Cannons who live outside of Tulsa came out that night so we got to see them and Alyssa again. After we had pizza and before the swimming the girls played and played. It was so adorable that I actually teared up watching them because I was so overwhelmed by the fact that God brought them halfway around the world to be a part of all these families.

The next day we dropped the Nadia off and when we got back to the car Amelie was saying, “Nadia, Nadia” and pointing at her empty car seat. We told her that we would come back to get her later. Then at the hotel she wandered around the room saying, “Nadia, Nadia”. It was cute to see her wondering where her big sister was. The second night they had a picnic and swim time at a local park, but we were fairly tired and the girls were very sleep deprived so we grabbed some to-go food and had dinner with the Landy’s at the hotel.

At the end of the last day we joined the kids for a Chinese lunch and their program. The kids were all so cute and there were a record setting number of kids attending this year – 258!

After the ceremony we got some photos of the girls (Kiy we missed you). They were SO.TIRED. from going for 3 days.

Nadia fell asleep in the car when we were less than a mile down the road. She slept about 90 minutes and then woke up and talked for almost 2 hours about everything she had done for the last 3 days. We asked her every night, but she didn’t say much; she apparently saved it all for the ride home. We plan on going again as do many of the families who have attended.

Click the link above to see the whole album. There are tons of photos in here so it’s just for the die hard fans

On our way to China Heritage Camp in Tulsa we stopped in Pauls Valley, OK to take the girls to the Toy & Action Figure Museum. Mike had taken Nadia last year when I was in Pauls Valley for a World Vision meeting and Nadia wasn’t hooked on Batman yet so we thought it would be a great stop and fun surprise for her.  The back room is made up like a Bat Cave and they have every imaginable Batman thing ever created. We spent a lot of time in there just looking at all the items. I had a pocket full of quarters, but unfortunately the Batmobile wasn’t working so the girls just played like they were driving.

A really cool feature of the place is the Adult Collectors Bedroom Diorama. The attention to detail on this display was amazing. Mike got photos of almost everything and some of the toys were fun reminders of toys we had as kids.

The girls in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Jeep.

Amelie as a Transformer.

The place has a bunch of different displays and at the end there is a play area for the kids. They have costumes and all kinds of toys. All in all it’s a neat little place and the staff was very friendly.

Mike and the girls – my favorite photo of the day.

Nadia really got a kick out of the guy and when he said he was done we asked for 1 more song. He asked what and I said Nadia would like to hear the Beatles “Come Together” I could tell that she was excited, but she really just watched him intently through the whole thing. I have heard about it many times since then, “Remember when that guy played me the Beatles song? That was cool.” My friend Kathy and her girls were in town for a doctors visit and at a hotel near us so we invited them over to the hotel to visit for a while.

Amelie trying to make her escape. The look on Nadia’s face is great.

While we were out of the room the maid cleaned up and even arranged Nadia’s toys which she got a kick out of. It reminded me of the staff at Disney.

Our last morning at the beach was really peaceful. Mike tried to teach Nadia to fly a kite, but she kept going the wrong direction and then wasn’t really into it. I think she liked the “idea” of flying a kite, but not the actually doing at her age. Amelie went back to her favorite thing; chasing the birds.

If you look closely you can see the kite up on the left.

The girls spent a good amount of time on the beach with their 2nd cousins and they found all kinds of cool critters like crabs, clams, jellyfish and even a tiny hermit crab.

Kim got some great photos of all the kids in the morning.

That night we went to eat at a place called “Sticky Fingers” and as you might guess they served some delicious ribs and other food. We got a kick out of the napkins being as big as dish towels and we our order of Banana Pudding was as big as Amelie’s head! It was a very nice last day and after dinner we headed home to start packing to prepare for our long drive back to Texas!

Fun photo, huh?

It was days like this that I wondered what we did before we had so much technology? Since I had my Blackberry attached to my hip we headed down to the beach so the girls could play and I could still coordinate all the people and teams going in and out of our house to deal with the flood.  What a blessing our friends and family were on this day so the girls could continue having beach fun!

Amelie would have chased the birds until she turned 3 if we let her. In that toddler mind she was just sure she could grab one!

Amelie and I collected shells while Nadia did a lot of digging. Amelie was proud of herself for finding shells, but she would scream sometimes if she accidentally picked up anything that looked like a bug.

Mike played with the settings on the camera while we wandered around.

Cute girls!

For dinner we decided to try a place we drove past constantly called “Kings Famous Pizza”

The place was PACKED OUT and the servers were running every direction taking care of their tables. It smelled awesome when we walked in and we loved the food. We split garlic bread, mozzarella sticks and a pizza – then we took our desserts to go. Here are the girls after dinner in their new Batman Shirts.

Four years ago we entered a sweltering hot room with 8 other families to have our lives changed forever. Babies were screaming and all of us parents, grandparents and siblings were desperately trying to pick out the new addition to our lives based on photos that were months old. We were looking at all the children and then the nanny holding Nadia pointed to me with Nadia’s hand and I could hear her saying, “Mama! Mama!” I thought I was going to faint right there.  It was agony waiting to hear our name called so we could go forward to meet her. Here is our Gotcha Day video for those who haven’t seen it (or would like to see it again).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQPvtOXRSeU

Sweet Nadia we love you so much! You are such a delight and so much fun to have around. You say the funniest stuff and so often I wish I had a permanent recording going because I can’t remember it all. You love to dance and make up songs. You love to take photos and now to also stage videos. You are eager to learn and have a memory that shocks me most days. You can be incredibly strong-willed, but I think it will serve you well later in life mixed with your sweetness. You have become such a good big sister to Amelie. You try to teach her things and I hope they are all good since she tries to imitate every single thing you do. It’s a delight when you say things like, “She just said this or that for the first time. Isn’t that great?” I love that when we told you that we would buy you a Batman and Superman t-shirt you immediately asked if Amelie could have one of each too – “so that we can match.” Right now you love all superheroes and Batman most of all. You want to fight for justice like they do; I hope that fire continues to burn in you and God uses you in an amazing way.

As I watch you grow and learn more about the world, I am so grateful that God saw fit to make you a part of our family.

Click the photo above to see the whole album. (lots of photos in this one)

This was by far our busiest day on our trip. We got up early and ate breakfast at the Spring House Family restaurant. Then we stopped at Walmart to buy an umbrella stroller and more sunscreen. We also found Batman and Superman shirts for the girls which thrilled Nadia to death! We headed over to Broadway at the beach to go to Ripley’s Aquarium. Nadia was really excited about this and wanted to get in and start looking around. They had a special shark exhibit which was really cool.

This cracked me up!

After the aquarium we walked around the boardwalk to have lunch at Amici’s Italian restaurant. We stopped to feed the fish and Nadia laughed at them jumping on each other to try and get the food.

We made our way to We R Sweets to buy 57 pounds of salt water taffy and then let the girls play outside on the dinosaurs.

We also went in a store called “It’s Sugar” which had the best sign ever!

The girls were asleep before we got out of the parking lot.

We gave them a real nap at the condo and then headed to PF Changs with everyone else for dinner. That is when the call came about water pouring out of our house. Dinner was wonderful as always, but I was busy texting and making calls trying to get things figured out.

Here we are after dinner with no idea what condition our house was in