Care Package to LeahJean

I haven't posted in a while. Things here are quite. We are not so patiently waiting for our LOA (Letter of Acceptance) from China. Once we get our LOA we should travel in 5-8 weeks. I am so ready.
We know that this is all on God's time and when he says it is time to go we will go. He is giving us plenty of time to get other things done, so that we will be ready when LeahJean gets home. One thing he is getting us ready for is the surgery that one of my daughters has to have. Please pray for her that all goes well and her understanding what and why this is happening and that all is going to be fine. Pray for me to be strong for her and my peace of mind with this as well. I have all the faith in God that all will go well.
I have been working more on LeahJeans room. It is almost complete. I just need to do some arranging of shelves. She already has so much stuff.
I am going to be sending her one more care package. It will be going out in the mail tomorrow. I say one more. I will probably send one more around Easter. Every time I send her a care package, I send all the other children in the foster home a little something. I am sending candy, yogurt bites, coloring books, foam alphabet letters and numbers, bracelets and little cars. I am sending LeahJean two little photo albums of our house, family pictures, pet pictures and pictures of some of her stuff and her room. She should receive all this in a couple of weeks.
We went Saturday and bought a new Honda Oddessy ,well not new, but new to us. We will definitely need a van now since we will soon have three car seats. I can't imagine putting a 4 year old and two three year olds in the same back seat. I do believe they will need a little space between them. It is silver, with gray interior. It is an 03 model, but with only 47,000 miles. It should be good for awhile.
There is a large group of families getting ready to leave for Chine to be joined by there new daughter or son. I am so happy for this group. For the most part they are all going to Henan China, which is the same Province that LeahJean is from. some of the children are in the same foster care that LeahJean is in. We wish each and everyone of you the best and pray for save travel. We will be following all of your blogs and wishing we were with you all. We hope to be traveling soon behind you all. We pray that the adjustments for all goes well. I know how happy and overjoyed all of you are. Can't wait to see the pictures of all the families being united with there new son or daughter. Some of these families are traveling the first week of March and some the second. The group had to be split cause it was so large.
The pictures are of the care package leaving for China tomorrow and updated ones of LeahJeans room and stuff waiting for her.
Blessings to all.
Melissa

While We Wait

Saturday morning we had to purchase a new freezer. It never fails when you are pinching pennies, and right now we are pinching every penny we can to finalize this adoption, you have to come out of the pocket for something. We are really trying hard not to have to borrow money to finish LeahJeans adoption. The last two we have been able to borrow against our retirement. This time we can't cause we still are paying back into our retirement for Tanner and Parker. If you have any extra laying around, send it our way...LOL. Anyway, for the past couple of days we thought our freezer was going out. Well Saturday morning it went. We managed not to lose everything in the freezer. Thank you God. I was in a panic, cause not to long ago the door was left open and we lost everything. We have just recently got it stocked back up with meat. So off to Lowe,s Keith and Tanner went and returned with a new freezer. While they were gone Parker and a I worked in his and Tanners bedroom. I had started a while back changing the wallpaper, so Saturday morning I finished it and put some decals on the walls. We are going to put shelves up to put some of there stuff on that they don't need to be playing with. Especially the all the stuff we brought back from China for them. I also worked in LeahJeans room. I managed to get her wallpaper border up and put some decals on her walls. We still have along ways to go to get her room finished. Her room will be Tinker Bell. Tanner doesn't like Tinker Bell, says it is girl stuff, ugh. He will soon be getting use to alot of girl stuff.
We made a trip to Stockbridge Saturday afternoon for a welcome home party for a very special young lady. Baylee has been in the hospital at Scottish Rites for 2 months. She finally got to come home last Friday. Baylee, it was so good seeing you and we are so thankful that you are getting better. You continue to be strong and make a full recovering. We are praying for you. Dana, Patrick and Maideline, you are all in our thoughts and prayers. We love you guys.
Today, we went to Church, got lunch and came home. The boys took a nap and I tried to. I should say Tanner took a nap, I am not sure if Parker ever fell asleep. He just doesn't do naps very well. After nap, they both got hair cuts, way past due hair cuts. They don't do hair cuts very well either, but it is getting better.
well I am just rambling here, so I will go. May God bless each and everyone of you and your families. We love you.
We love you LeahJean and I promise we will be there to get you as soon as we can. Your mama, daddy, sisters and brothers are all so ready to get you home. You are already so loved by so many people.

Just A Few Things Waiting For LeahJean

Here are a few things waiting for LeahJan when she gets home. A few things she got for Christmas. This dress will be the first dress she wears to Church. Her Papa Cole bought it for her when he was up visiting a couple weeks ago. We were hoping she would get to wear it for Easter, but it dosen't look like she will be home for Easter.

Slide Show

Update

Today we received an update of LeahJean:

Zheng Luo Dan

1-30-09 Update


Note from Foster Care:
Luo Dan had a great Chinese New Year. She really enjoyed Gong Li's birthday party too. These two have become great friends. There is a new teacher at Swallow's Nest who will be there for three months. She is teaching Luo Dan sign language. She lives at the same house as Luo Dan and is makes even more of an impact on her learning.

Luo Dan's weight is now 30.25 lbs.

She is getting so big. March of 2008 she weighed 20 lbs.

Aug. 08 she was 24 lbs

Oct. 08 she was 27 lbs

She went into foster care late May , 08. Since then she has really blossomed. She is a beauty. We love getting these updates, it makes the wait a little easier. We are overjoyed to know that they are teaching her sign language. We are so thankful that she is in foster care. Please keep all of us in your thoughts and prayers as we wait and LeahJean as she waits to be joined with her forever family.

CNY

We had a wonderful time celebrating Chinese New Year last night with some very special people. Thank you Lisa and Bryan for inviting us, we enjoyed it very much. We had lots of great food and fellowship. It was good seeing everyone. The kids had a wonderful time playing. The boys were wore out when we got home. They sleep very well last night. We are so lucky to have such great friends.