Chinese New Year

Yesterday was the start of the Chinese New Year.  To celebrate a part of Mei Mei's culture we decided to take part in a Chinese New Year celebration.  We had some dear friends of ours over (also known as our framily) and celebrated the new year.  

We started off our evening with a little Origami.  We successfully made hearts and not so successfully made dragons.

We then after spending WAY too much time on the dragon decided to make dinner.  Had to play some Chinese New Year music to continue in the celebration.  A little dancing while cooking never hurt anyone right?

We ordered out some Sweet and Sour Chicken, and egg rolls from the local Chinese restaurant.  Then I made some homemade Chicken Fried rice and Melanie whipped up a batch of Longevity Noodles.  A custom Chinese dish that says the longer the noodle you get, the longer life you will live.  Our noodles were pretty long!  The food was delish!

We also attempted to eat all of our food with chop sticks.  It was quite entertaining!  

Our meal wouldn't be complete without fortune cookies.  We attempted to bake homemade ones.  Carter was the master chef but unfortunately I fear I had given him a bad recipe because they failed miserably and tasted nasty.  Oh well we tried.  We DID have fun writing fortunes for our cookies.  This fortune seemed appropriate, we mine as well dropped it on the floor because the taste was so horrendous.  

Luckily Jordan didn't know we were making homemade fortune cookies so he picked up a bag at the Chinese restaurant.  So we shoved our homemade fortunes into the yummy tasting cookies and had a blast opening them, eating them, and reading the fortunes.  

After the meal I gave all the kids their red envelopes filled with Gold Coins, dollar ones and chocolate ones too!  We had Oranges on the table and HiChew candies.  

To finish off the celebration we sat around and played a game of Chinese Checkers.  

We had a really fun evening full of celebration.  Can't wait for next year to celebrate with our baby girl!  

Round the Corner

On Thursday, 2/5/15 I submitted our DS260 forms.  That will probably mean absolutely nothing to you unless you have adopted internationally before.  So let me sum it up, that is our LAST piece of paperwork we have to fill out before we travel.  I have filled out form after form after form this past year.  Mountains of paperwork from passport applications, to adoption forms, to immigration paperwork, and visa applications.  We have had things Certified, Notarized, and Authenticated.  And this, this DS260 form was the last piece to the puzzle.

This DS260 form gets us our last document needed to travel, it's called an Article 5.  I'm not sure what an Article 5 does, but one thing I DO know that it does is say; YES you can come to China to get your baby girl and for that the Article 5 is my favorite form right now.

Currently we are waiting for our Article 5 to be dropped off at the US Consulate in China.  From there they will approve it and send it over to the CCCWA where they will approve it and we can officially set up our Consulate appointment for when we are in China. Then we will be issued our TA (Travel Approval).  Once we get our TA we will be contacted by our adoption agency to give us our official travel date.

Please be in prayer with me that we travel before March 28th.  In order for this to happen it would totally have to be a God thing.  But I have learned to not put God in a box and to let God be God.  We will travel when it is best for everyone I know this.  However March 28th is Isaac's birthday and he will be turning 12.  What that means for us is that he will be considered an "adult" and we will have to pay for another adult fare.  So if you would join me in praying for God to be gracious yet again and allow us to go before that happens.  Or at least the trip booked before they charge us adult rates. My bible study today said to pray persistently, so I will be continuing to do so!  :)

I am getting so anxious.  Anxious to hold my precious girl in my arms.  To stare into her deep brown eyes and tell her over and over again that I am absolutely in love with her.  I cannot wait to tell her how God worked in all of our lives to bring us together.  That she was divinely picked for us and that God loves her SO much.  I want to introduce her to all her family and our friends.  I want to show her her very own bedroom with all her own toys, clothes, and gifts people so graciously blessed us with.  I want to take her to the Zoo and show her what a Giraffe looks like and buy her some dip n dots!  I want to take her to the great lake and let her feel the sand squish between her toes and the feeling of the cold water rush over her.  I want to read bible stories to her and sing songs of praise.  I look forward to the days where we can take walks in the warm summer air and eat Popsicle's.

I long for the days where I see her and her brothers playing kitchen and beauty shop.  The boys have already informed me that they cannot wait for this either.  I want to see the way they look at her with the love in their eyes that I already see when they look at her picture but rather in the flesh.  And to see her stare back up at them.

I want to see her snuggled fresh from a bath in her Daddy's arms as Jordan reads her a story about  princesses, puppy dogs, or Doc Mcstuffins.  To see her look at her Daddy and know that she is safe whenever he is there.

I cannot wait for the days where she will know that we love her.  That we are hers and she is ours.

Those days are just around the corner.

So while I wait for those days to come I will continue to rejoice in the Lord and the blessings He has given to us.  And having a baby shower to celebrate her life with family and friends will make it that much sweeter.  Can't wait to celebrate with you all!