April 6, 2007- Mia's Referral Day!!!

Three years ago today I received a phone call from our China coordinator that we had received our referral for our beautiful little girl. She was only 5 months old on that day and we immediately fell in love with her! It was a long road to get the referral for Mia. Our file had been lost the month before and we were skipped. That month was hard to get through, but knowing we would one day see our little girls face got us through. Our agency worked VERY hard to find our file and get it where it needed to be in order to get us our referral the next month and thank the LORD they made Magic happen and on April 6, 2007, we saw our little girl! I know some people don't believe in the whole "meant to be" philosophy, but I can tell you that God moved time in order to bring us our little girl. She was meant to be a part of our family from day one and God did some amazing things in order to get us our referral in the month of April. If we would have got our referral in March (like we were supposed to) we never would have received Mia. We were skipped on March 5, 2007 and March 6, 2007- the day after we were skipped- Mia's file was processed for International Adoption. She was not even available for adoption until the day after we were skipped and traditionally in international adoptions the babies are not supposed to be available to be adopted until the are 6 months old but Mia became available and was processed when she was only 4 months old. Totally crazy. Believe in "meant to be" or not, but I know supernatural things happened in order to place Mia in our family!!! AMAZING!!!

Our adorable little girl- Ba Jun Fei born on October 29, 2006 in Yueyang County Hunan

This picture was when she was 3 months old. She is so cute!!!

I look at these referral pictures and I really don't see Mia in them. I think she has changed so much and looks so different now. WOW!! My beautiful little girl!!!

Happy Easter and Happy Birthday Honey!!!!

Easter was a lot of fun. Besides being Easter, it is Kevin's birthday!!! Cool day!! Anyway, we started our Easter traditions last night with our nice time at home alone reflecting on the reason we celebrate and the sacrifice Jesus made for us. We decided that this was the year we would show the boys THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST which is a very hard movie to watch for an adult let alone a tween. We decided they were ready and both have grown so much spiritually this year that we wanted them to see in a very visual way the sacrifice Jesus made for us. It was a powerful movie and both boys were very moved but I am thrilled we showed it to them. It brought Easter to a new level for them and I am thankful they have those images to pull from.

Mia at hockey game before our movie night.

The kids woke up to their Easter baskets. We don't really do the Easter bunny and Mia doesn't really know about it, but we do Easter baskets but rather focus on Jesus rather than Bunnies.

Awwwww Legos!!!

After church we had an Easter Hunt for the kids

We did it up really well with high quality Easter baskets-- Grocery Store Plastic Bags-- oh ya!!!

Mia had removed some of Owens eggs and Owen was less than happy about it--

Mia was thrilled

The adults having our cheese platter. My cousin Sara lives in Switzerland with her husband Andy. Remember Sara is the World champ in Woman's Track Cycling. She just won Worlds again and is on top of the game again. She flew home and surprised her parents for Easter. She will be here for a week so we are planning on getting together this week for lunch. YA!!!!

Sara with her parents and my 95 year old grandma in the background.

It was also Kevin's birthday today so we celebrated his special day as well. Happy birthday my dear!!!!!

Cute Little Thing

Today was kind of cold here in Southern CA, but we have been having amazing weather- in the 70's and 80's for weeks. These pictures of Mia were taken in my parents front yard a week or so ago after church.

Scruffy, one of my parents dogs in the background.

Balancing on rocks



My cute little girl!!!


We have great friends who have a box at the Ducks arena for hockey. They were nice enough to give us the box for one full night (they were unable to use the box that night) to invite whoever we wanted. So, we decided to make it a boys and kids night. We invited the boys good pals and my brother and sister and all the nieces and nephews. It was a great time!!!

Sammy watching the game on the TV in the box

My brother and Kevin watching the game

Boys having fun as always- Owen, Jake, Carson, Ethan and Christian


The girls were not as into the game as the boys and spent much of their time running around the suite and playing tag.

Mia and Haileyanna - Cousins-- too cute!!!

Judah, Nathan, Christian, Ethan, Carson-- and the girls running around too

The players on the Ducks were in the Olympics and on many different county teams. Here are the jerseys of the players that were on the top 3 teams. Very cool display!!!

Blogger Break

I guess to say you are taking a break you really have to be a consistent blog poster-- which I have not been recently--sorry, but I figure I should at least let you know when I'm going to be gone. I'm off for spring break in the school district I work in so I'm doing some fun things with Mia and my Lucky Mommies group. Tomorrow we are having and Easter party and Tuesday we are doing Disneyland and past then, plans are in the works. So, I will have lots of cute pictures to post but wont have time to post until later in the week. Then, after this week off, my boys are on spring break next week so we will be busy doing things that week as well.

So I leave you with some pictures from the last few weeks. Kev and I always do a birthday Vegas trip. Remember last year we flew the helicopter to Vegas and this year we went and stayed at the Wynn. It was amazing!!! We had one dinner at an amazing restaurant in the Wynn called Bartalotta. Fabulous!!!! The following are pictures from that dinner but I'm having issues with my computers and uploading pictures and I have not figured it out yet so the pictures are small and sideways -- sorry. I will work to correct that this week.

My dinner

Kevin eating his fish stew which he thought was phenomenal!!!

Me eating my dinner

And here is Mia at one of our friends Birthday Parties

And another-- so cute!!!

So, that is about it for now and I will attempt to post in a few days. Hope you all are enjoying spring-- it was mid 80's here today!!!

Nehemiah Childrens Home

First off, I'm so sorry it has been so long since I have posted on the blog but I have had a lot going on. Besides running off to Vegas last weekend for a birthday get away for Kevin and I, things have been nonstop around here. The end of the school year always is met, in my line of work, with exceptional business. Because of this business and all the other commitments, I have not had hardly any time on the computer and when I am on the computer, I am working. So, sorry for being missing in action.



Onto my next line of business. Kevin and I have really grown a heart for missions. Kevin has spearheaded this as God has really been working on his heart and he has a renewed commitment for missions. Both Kevin and I are going to Haiti with our church at the end of June and Ethan will be going on his first missions trip to Guatemala at the same time with our dear friends. I am thrilled at the direction our family is headed and I strongly feel that God has called us all to missions work, but He is poking us hard right now to remind us of our calling. I will begin fund raising for the Haiti and Guatemala trip soon but for now, I have another passion I want to present.



I was asked to be on the Board of Directors for an Orphanage in Manipur India. The orphanage is called NEHEMIAH CHILDREN'S HOME and it is in the heart of the child trafficking ring. It is a very needy place with children suffering trafficking, malnutrition, disease, poverty, neglect, rebel insurgents, violent crimes and unfortunately, children often fall victim of crimes as they are not valued. Many children are orphaned in this area and are left to fend for themselves while others are sold into the sex trade by their own parents. Nehemiah Children's Home works to not only provide these children with hope and a safe haven but also to provide a Christian education with all their physical needs met. It is a worthy cause to support and I am blessed to be a part of the board in order to help fund raise for these kids.

One of the orphans





Sorry this is so small, but here are some of the orphans.

There are a couple ways to help. First off, we are heading a drive to get school uniforms for the orphans. We just raised enough to pay for their tuition to get all the school age orphans into school but we now need to get the funds together to purchase their uniforms. Each child's uniform costs about $50 each and that includes shoes, socks and everything. We are looking for people who would like to provide a one time gift (tax deductible) of $50 to purchase a uniform for one child. We have a long way to go to get all the kids uniforms so please spread to word so we can get all their uniforms soon (school has already started but the orphans are wearing their normal clothes until we can get the uniforms).

The next way to help is monthly sponsorship for a child. We need approximately $42 a month to cover all the care for one child. If you would like to be a part of the month sponsorship, that is a great way to help these kids. I have come up with a program I would like to spread in an effort to get the basic needs of these kids met (ie. monthly sponsorship). I am encouraging school classes to take on one child--- 1 CLASS FOR ONE KID-- Ill come up with a better catch phrase later but essentially that is the program. One school class sponsors one kid. If there are approximately 20 kids in a class, each child would be responsible for a monthly commitment of $2 to sponsor their kid. The class would get a picture of the student they sponsor and the students info. The class would be able to collect the money and send it off each month to Nehemiah Children's Home to sponsor their student. This is a wonderful way to teach kids within an American class about giving their resources to kids around the world who are less fortunate. I encourage all of you to approach your kids teachers and ask them if they would be interested in sponsoring a student. Get the principal to buy into this and have all classes within a school to do this-- imagine the ramifications if we got a whole school on board!!!! This Children's Home can grow significantly and the more sponsorship we can get, the more children we can help. So sell this to your kids school and if they need more info, email me and I can talk with them. I know its the end of the year, but if the teacher adopted this child, then the sponsorship for the child will just go into the next school year and the actual child they support will stay with the teacher. It would be an awesome opportunity for these classes to learn about giving (and of course this is a 501(c)3 so everything is tax deductible).

Please help with this cause. I know so many of you out there have a heart for orphans and we are called to help these kids. The website is http://www.nchindia.org/ and I am including some pictures of the orphans and a picture of the uniforms. Please prayerfully consider giving to this charity. If you would like more info, please email me and I can email or call you back. Also, if you would like to copy this post onto your blog to spread the word, please do so-- I would soooooooooo appreciate you helping. Remember, this is a new orphanage and a new program for this area so we are in the beginning stages of building this and this is the time we need your help. So please spread the word.

Playing with flowers

The weather has been beautiful here in Southern California and while leaving the house the other day I decided to snap a few pictures of Mia as she looked so darn cute.

I love this picture. I turned it sepia because I thought it looked better that way but I just love looking at her features and realizing what a beautiful little girl she is.

She loves picking all the flowers off a bush in our entry courtyard. I have had to tell her to stop since she is literally picking all the flowers off the bush.

Busy week ahead of me. I hope you all are well!!!

Holy Cow Anonomyous!!!

I dont have to deal with this often because most of the readers of my blog are nice, but I just read a comment from, of course, an anonymous poster that decided to bash me because Mia is 3 and was still on a paci. She was not on a paci during the day, just at night and really I should not have to justify myself to anyone for the decisions that are right for my family. By the way, I have had a ton of emails from this post that have laughed because their 4 and 5 year olds are still trying to give up the paci. So, please don't come to my blog and bash me!! I don't need that! Mia is fine and giving a paci up at 3 is NOT a big deal- Thank You Very Much!!!!!

Gone for a bit

IM GOING OUT OF TOWN TILL THURSDAY. ILL ATTEMPT TO POST WHILE GONE. HAVE A GREAT WEEK!

Guess What Mia Gave Up

Yes, it is true. Mia is still on a paci. She is an awesome sleeper and has always been so and I have to attribute her awesome sleep to the use of her paci. Kevin took Mia to the dentist on Monday and the dentist said that it is time to give up the paci as it is starting to affect her bite. We decided that we would do the whole exchange thing and give Mia something desirable and in return she gives us her paci. That evening I took Mia to Target and she picked out a baby doll - see below- and when we got home she gave us the paci and we opened the doll.

The first night without the paci seemed ok. She woke up a few times but went back to bed easily. The next night she did great and didn't wake up at all. Last night was another story. She was up and down maybe 7 times. It was horrible. She would cry and she work Owen up and he started to cry out of desperation because he was so tired. I was at the end of my rope and was ready to shut the door and not go back and I think that was essentially what I did. Honestly, I don't remember what I did in the haze of no sleep and having to sit through a training all day today-- try staying awake as you are being trained in Applied Behavioral Analysis with maybe 3 hours of sleep--not easy. Anyway, I am praying tonight is better-- it must be better!!!!!

So, good job my sweet girl on giving up her vice- and ours too!!!!

Blast From The Past

I was cleaning out an old file drawer and found my big folder of notes and pictures Kevin and I exchanged during high school. It was so fun reading through our old cheesy notes-- totally cheesy with words used like RAD and BOSS-- but it reminded me of how close we were when we were only 16. We literally grew up together. I found some school dance pictures so I took pictures of those pictures and here they are.

WOW we looked so young in this picture. Kev was such a baby. I think we were 16 or 17 years old. Crazy!!!

Again, babies. We were high school seniors entering the big world. We thought we were so old and so cool-- wow 3 kids and 20 years later!!!

We had just entered college and we were loving the freedom. Love Kevin's mullet-- he rocked the mullet!!!!

It's not our anniversary or anything but I thought this would be fun to post.