Thanksgiving...again!

Well, today was our second Thanksgiving celebration. This time it was at my parent's house. My mom is pretty flexible and she holds off for Thanksgiving dinner until the Saturday following the "real" Thanksgiving holiday so that everyone can be together at the same time. We had a great time today and again, ate more wonderful food. Jordyn prepared the mashed potatoes and they were awesome! We ate, played table tennis and attempted the Just Dance Wii game. Flat Turkey came along for the visit as well.





Last night we took Flat Turkey to Krispy Kreme donuts. I had a tasty red velvet donut...so good!




Yesterday, Thomas the Elf came back for a visit this year. Longji was very excited to see him, as long as he doesn't come into his room at night. He spent some time catching Thomas up on how well he did this year and what he wants for Christmas.




This morning, John, Jordyn and I all worked on some crafty decorations for what is going to be Jordyn and Brielle's room. Jordyn already has a beach theme going so we stuck with that and made it a little more "kid-friendly." We have a feeling Brielle is going to be into bows so we put together a bow/barrette holder which we "bedazzled" for a finished product and then we painted some large letters to match the blue ocean wall. The closer we get to travel, the more anxious I am to get there. No update yet, but we should be hearing something soon!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Below are some pictures from the last few weeks. We had a girls weekend and the boys met up with us afterwards for a family dinner. Today we ran the Turkey Trot and then headed over to John's parents for Thanksgiving dinner. It was fantastic as always. Longji attempted the 1/2 mile at the turkey trot. He got a ribbon for finishing which he is very proud of.

This week he has a school project where he has to take "flat turkey" with him to different places over Thanksgiving break. We took pictures for his flat turkey journal. We have had a great week off from work and school and we anticipate hearing about travel dates soon. Enjoy the pictures!

Here they are!

We got four pictures of Brielle yesterday afternoon. It looks like she is at the orphanage and maybe on some sort of field trip. She is missing her top teeth just like Longji. She definitely likes pink because that is all we see her in.

We have pictures!!

But, I can't show them! John hasn't seen the pictures yet so I just don't feel right posting them. They were e-mailed to us earlier today and I can't figure out how to forward them to John with my phone. He doesn't have internet access on the cell and he is down in Corpus Christi for a football game. He will be home late tonight, early morning so I will post them tomorrow. We requested that our agency ask again for photos since the other pictures were from almost a year ago. It was a wonderful surprise today. We are blessed!

Meanwhile...I am posting pictures of Longji in his kung fu uniform. He has attended four classes so far and he absolutely loves it! He is on his way to the next belt - yellow.

I800 approved! And care package #2!!

Fantastic news...we got our I800 today! The approval date was actually 11/02/11 so our paperwork was expedited through the office. Yay!! We are now waiting on a couple of steps and then we should have TA (travel approval) here shortly. It is all happening so fast, yet it feels like we have been waiting forever. Below are some pictures of Brielle's second care package. This was mailed out today. Not sure how long it will take to get there, but we are excited for Brielle to finally get some pictures of her new family.





Longji lost tooth #4 last night and we will have another one here very soon. He has a mouth full of holes at this point.




Longji also started kung fu last week. He absolutely loves it. Pictures to come...

Adam and Brielle Update

Brielle Update: We are waiting to hear if the first care package made it to Brielle. Meanwhile, I have started putting together a second package and hopefully we will hear about our I800 soon.

Below are some pictures of Longji's school project. He had to create a globe and it was definitely a group effort.






The picture here is while we were in Austin this past weekend. We traveled up there for the Beyond Borders Adoption Conference. We got to tell our story to other families who are interested in adoption. It was a quick trip, but it was nice to get away and it was wonderful to see all of the people who were involved in our journey to Longji and currently with Brielle's adoption.



This is a group picture of the students at Longji's Chinese school. Can you find Longji?




Here are some pumpkin carving pictures.







We had a great time with family and friends last night eating chili dogs, spider cookies and witches hats. We do need to get another boy in the picture. Longji was the only boy of seven in our group.








These are some pictures from Longji's Chinese school picnic. We had a great time. The weather was perfect and the food was great.