Happy Father's Day!!

It's Father's Day!! Time to celebrate your father, dad, daddy, papa or whatever you call him. The girls were really excited to give their Dad a card this morning and we worked on our annual T-shirt with the kids' handprints all over it. Somehow time slipped away from me this year and I forgot to get this project started sooner! Now we need to wait and have Tessa add her hand prints and I will see if Big Bro wants to add his.

We then let Dad choose where he wanted to eat. Montana Mike's was the choice and we all filled our bellies up full and waddled on home.



Happy Father's Day Sweetie! Your children and wife love you very much!! XOXO!!

Swimming and haircuts

The girls finished their first swimming lessons of the year yesterday. All four girls were in the same class, but with individual attention to each one's need to learn. RaeAnne and ZoraLin both passed 1st level!! Their Dad and I am really amazed at how much they have learned in two weeks! Rae does a very strong stroke, but is still hesitant in the water. Zora does not have the fear of the water, but looses her concentration after she comes up for a breath.





For the next two weeks, Kendalan and Jordis will be in a class together to help them catch up to their big sisters. Last year we didn't get the girls signed up in time to have lessons, but they spent a lot of time at the swimming pool and have really become fish!

Jordis and Kendalan both decided that they wanted their hair cut off short for the summer. Ah, summertime!!

Out with the old....and in with the new

There has been one thing that has held our whole family back from traveling to China. My old van is just short of 145,000 miles. It is a 2002 that we have had for over four years. It has been a very reliable ride, but the last year things have started falling apart on a regular basis. The AC started blowing cool to more warmish air last summer. After a trip to the service department it never did really cool off completely and on those super hot and humid days....well I guess some warm air circulating rather than hot air is an improvement.



Then just before Christmas, I had to pay over $1200. to have a new head put on the motor. Ouch! That took it's toll on Christmas. There have been two other things here of late that have each cost me $250./each. So we decided it was time to roll out with the old....and in with the new. Okay, newer to us!



The new to us ride is a 2007 with only 19,345 miles! It is also a limited, so it has all the bells and whistles, plus a sunroof! It is a prettier blue and has off white seats. That should make it cooler just to look at! Look out road trips....here we come!!

RaeAnne does it again!!

RaeAnne has been saying that she wanted to get her hair cut for a while now. Originally, we were going to wait until after we returned home from China to cut it. However, we talked it over and since she will be starting swimming lessons daily this summer for four weeks, we decided that now would be the best time!

RaeAnne has been blessed with very thick, wavey hair. Of course, she doesn't see it like that. She would much rather have the thin, straight black hair her sisters have. Once it gets down to her waist, it becomes quite the chore to wash, brush it out and it takes forever to dry!

She wanted to donate her hair to "Locks of Love" again this time. So I took her to the JCPenney salon at the mall. I did ask her several times on the way there...."Are you sure this is what you want to do?" She would nod her head, yes.

I am very proud of my beautiful daughter. She is glad that she can give her hair to someone who can benefit from it and she is gorgeous with it long and short!

We love you RaeAnne YuQi XOXO!!!!!

~~Happy Birthday ZoraLin~~

It is just so hard to believe that our Guangdong, Buddha baby has grown up and is now EIGHT years old!! Since we were going out of town Saturday, we had to give her present to her early. Especially since it was a suitcase! How do you go out of town and not have a suitcase to pack?!! So Saturday morning she was excited to find her suitcase and robe in Mom and Dad's bedroom. So shocked that she really didn't know what to say for a while! Speechless she was! Then she says, "But my birthday isn't until Monday!" Okay I felt just a little bad for actually trying to surprise her with something that she had been bugging us that she needed! She just wasn't ready for the surprise, so obviously she did not have her self psyched up for the gift.

At school today we surprised her by showing up with cake, drinks and a balloon for her. Of course, she was not going to admit she was surprised! Never saw a cake disappear so fast!

This evening found us going to ZoraLin's pick to eat supper. Red Lobster was her choice. They came over to the table with a piece of Chocolate Wave cake and sang to Zora. Let the sugar high begin!!

Happy Birthday sweetie!! We love you!!! (Will add photos later on....time for night, night!)

Busy~~busy!!

We hit the ground running this weekend. Friday my van was back in the shop for repairs. Over 140,000 miles and they tell me has a lot more left on it! I sometimes wonder if they are telling me that because I am a good customer and keep bringing it back in to be worked on?!! How do you tell when it is time to park it and move on to the next vehicle? Do the wheels actually have to literally fall off?

Then Saturday morning we were up pretty early getting things packed to go see Bubby, aka Nicholas, graduate from High School. Actually, graduation was this afternoon at 5pm and the girls had to be at their dance studio at 7pm for photos for their recital program next week.





Nick's mom had three life sized cutouts of him over the past 18 years. The girls posed with their brother!



So we arrive in Great Bend for Bubby's party. The girls had a great time! There was a candy bar set up at the party and even though they had strict orders to only have one....the girls consumed enough candy=energy to light Las Vegas for one night! After entertaining....er, was it annoying everyone at the party for a few hours, off we go to the hotel room. Okay, so I headed back to the hotel room, helped the girls get in their swim suits and then Bubby and his girlfriend....aka Delaney or should we call her Pinkie?.....took the girls swimming.

I will almost be ready to go back to work this week!!

Tessa's Journey

We do have a special site for Tessa's Journey. Or you can go to Journey to Me and click on Adoption Journey's and look for Tessa JiXing.

We will be blogging to the Journey to Me site while in China as Blogspot is blocked.

The extra photos are there too!