A Jake Update!

I received these pictures of Jake just last week! A sweet family was at Jiang Cheng for a visit with their newly adopted (and adorable) daughter. I had asked them to peek in on Jake if they could...never really imagining that they WOULD. After all, I know how hectic and surreal it is when you are in China.

However, this family took the time to take pictures of Jake and even interact with him a bit. Amazing.

THANK YOU! You know who you are. :)

So, here are the pictures:

Oh, I want to eat his little mouth right up in this first picture. The tongue is juicy his hair is precious. I am pleased to see him showing such great eye contact again! I love how Jake is using his pointer finger and middle finger to grasp things-just how the hand doctor said that he would. Thumbs are overrated. ;)

It looks like my little man is walking quite well for 15 months old. (Yeah!). He looks pretty full of himself too-don't cha think?

;)

 Jake's spirit is one of the first things that drew me to him. Seriously, look at little mister happy pants!

As if taking these pictures was not enough, this is what the visiting family wrote about their encounter with Jake:

"We were able to see your little one today. He is a happy little man, toddling all around the room. He was very responsive to both the nannies and with us. At one point and time he was holding two toys, one in each hand. The nannies had let him out of his crib so we could take his picture and he was taking full advantage of the opportunity and wandering all around picking up any toy he could find. My husband bent down to his eye-level and smiled and chatted with him and he smiled back and was jabbering. We took his picture and also said a silent prayer for him. I know how hard it is to wait but I will say that the nannies all seem to really care for the kids. They were all very clean. His crib is right at the front of the room as you walk in the door so he gets greeted by all the nannies that walk in the room".

 We have been very blessed. With all 3 of our children we have had the good fortune to have families visiting their SWI's check in on them. I can really say with all honesty that Jake's situation appears to be BY FAR the best of all three. Now, please don't forget-he is STILL in an orphanage. And, that is NO place for any child to be. Period. Even the "better ones" do not have enough food, enough toys, enough clothes, enough medical care or enough attention to go around.

:(

I am SO looking forward to bringing my precious baby boy HOME!!!

~~Catching Up Through Pictures~~

 Wow, June is almost over! We have gone to the pool a few times this summer. The girls are just not into it that much this year. There are a lot of obnoxious teenagers unattended teenagers that hang out there now, & it gets extremely loud. It seems like alot of trailer park trash new neighbors have moved in this year.  It is a lot different than when we first moved in 3 summers ago. But, just look at my beautiful bathing beauties:

We rode our bike for awhile the other day. The girls are both doing so very well! :)

I am lucky to have two awesome laundry helpers. Sophie can fold towels like nobody's business & Emma loves to hang her clothes in her closet. :)

 Emma is still taking piano lessons and doing a fabulous job. We are so proud of her. We all adore her teach too! She is adaptable and very kind. Sophie is also doing a wonderful job at dance class. She can point her toe like a pro and is not at all bothered when we leave her alone in the room or her class. (We wait in a seperate room and watch her on a video monitor).

We volunteered as a family at Special Olympics as a family a couple of weeks ago. It was a lot of fun. :) The girls even got to meet Ronald Mc Donald!

This past weekend we were suppose to meet old friend in Kansas City for a reunion. Unfortunately Sophie....then Emma came down with a contagious virus. :::Ugh:::

 I was so ticked off  understood completely, what can you do?! Only MY girls get get ill for special occasions. ;)

We were able to spend a lot of quality time together and that was great. We did some fun craft projects together......

And, they got a lot of rest. They are fully recovered now.

And, We Proudly Announce Our Newest Family Member...

Please meet our son and the girls little brother;

JACOB GREGORY MONTIETH!

:)

I was catching up on reading my favorite blogs

(about the only thing that I get to read these days)

late on the night of April 11th when I came across this post on my friend Tami's blog:

http://gatheringpeeps.typepad.com/gathering_peeps/page/2/#

(Sorry. You will have to copy/paste to see that blog post. I am so not good at technical stuff)!

At that moment I knew that I was seeing MY SON for the first time.

It

was

Jake!

I can't explain it. But, I had known since last fall that we were suppose to adopt a boy from China with limb differences. However I was not officially looking for our third little eggroll the night that I found Jake. But, there he was! He had found me. God placed him right in our laps. So, after almost 4 long weeks of talking, praying, consulting with doctors, praying again, sobbing (that would be me...lol!) , watching everything fall into place...and talking some more; we decided that it was time. On May 7th we made the decision that we were indeed with out a doubt, undeniably Jake's family. :)

We received

P.A.

(that's adoption lingo for pre approval)

from the generous officials in China to be Jake's parents on Friday!

:)

We have been knee deep in paperwork since May 9th and I think that we are making some pretty darn good progress thus far. Of course it will never be fast enough! I will post more about Jake later this week. 

For now I will leave you with some pictures

since THAT is what you are all waiting for anyway. If you bothered to read my post with out scrolling down to the pictures you are probably tired of my rambling anyway.

;P

The Last Birthday Party Post!

Ponies, cake and friends for your viewing enjoyment.....

I have a billion more pictures. But, it would take foREVer to post each and every one. I know that my kids are awesome, but nobody is THAT devoted to reading my blog! *lol*

Snow White Birthday Cake

My birthday girl requested a Snow White cake for her birthday party.

My Emma is definitely original!

;)

So, I did some research online and came up with this concoction.

It received rave reviews. But, most importantly-it made Emma

SO HAPPY!

I will post more pictures of her actual party soon. I promise! I need to organize some of those pictures first before I attempt to post any. Hey-you have waited this long...you can wait a little bit longer-can't you?! :)

Emma's 7th Birthday! (Part 3)

So, after opening presents & eating lunch the girls and I ventured outside to play.

Emma did GREAT on her new bike and only tipped it over once. I think that we will have those training wheels on for a while yet....but, who cares. Not us!

AND,

check out Sophie's NEW dolly stroller.

Yes, my baby has some big news!

She is night time pull up FREE!

Whoo-hoo!!!

So, her reward was a new stroller for her dolls.

:)

Guess WHO ELSE has kicked the night time pull ups to the curb?!

Yep.

That's right!

EMMA!!

:O

My goodness, this sibling rivalry thing is awesome!

Alright, here are the pictures......