another month has gone by

This picture was taken at the Daddy/Daughter dance held in February. They both had a great time. Here it is already the end of March...2009 seems to be flying by and before we know it summer will be here...J will be finishing her kindergarten year...which reminds me that I still need to get her registered for 1st grade at the elementary school.

We need to start on "project schwen"...which means we need to begin to tranform J's room into a room for J and S. J currently has a double bed and we are on the search for two white twin beds and night stands for the girls. I also need to start shopping for summer clothes for both of the girls.

J went to a bowling b-day party yesterday and had the highest score of 16 kids! She had a 96. This is only her 3rd time bowling and yes, it is bumper bowling but still pretty good for a 5 year old. We laugh b/c BV (the high school) has a really good bowling team....it could be J's ticket to college!!!!

It looks like referrals are coming close to 90 days from LID's which means we could potentially receive the ok from China at the end of May...I REALLY need to get my act together here and start on the forms that we will need to return to China. I also want to go ahead and get J a passport in the slim chance that the three of us could travel.

I'll try this one more time!

ok, it's been months but I'll give blogging one more try...I wrote down my log in and password so that I can actually access the blog...

We submitted our dossier to Hand In Hand the second week of February and it was sent to China (DTC) on 2/13/09. We found out the other day that our log in date is March 2, 2009...and so the countdown begins..


I so wish Adam, Jia and I could all travel but at this time our finances just will not allow it..so I am playing $2.00 a week on classic lotto and mega millions and just hoping that I hit even $10k!!!

In the mean time we enjoy this time with Jia and get the house ready for Schwen.

I'll try to make the blog a bit prettier and post pics next weekend.

tis the season

Tis the season where we are supposed to be jolly. Somehow I am just not feeling it. Part of the reason could be that I've been sick for over three weeks now-first bronchitis and now a cold on top of it. We don't have our christmas tree yet and the house is a mess. I am exhausted every night and just want to go to bed. Does it get any easier?
On the plus side. I will have the next 5 days off and hope to get a tree, get the house cleaned up, get gifts for my niece Alyssa to take to Toledo, make cookies with the Jie and visit with friends.

Time for an update

It's been over two years and if I am going to do this thing I better catch up! Life is good-my son Justin is engaged to his girlfriend of over 5 years, Jia is in kindergarten and we are in the process of adopting another girl from China. Her name is Yan Qi Xuan and we refer to her as Schwen. She is in the Nanjing SWI and is 4.5 years old. We are using a different agency this time-Hand in Hand is one of two agencies that adopts children out of a specific orphanage. I am hoping to be able to travel in the spring but more than likely it will be the hot hot summer.

We just celebrated our 4th year of having Jia in our family. Adam wishes she still had the innocence of a baby! They do grow up fast.