Lily Re-Adopted and visit to the Beach/Magic Mountain

This Friday we completed our re-adoption of Lily. In California (the most bureaucratic state in the union) we have to re-adopt our child in order to get a California birth certificate. Plus, due to the great government efficiency it will only take 18 months to get it!!! Anyone who wants big government ought to think twice...

We went to Magic Mount*in recently with our kids, grand kids, and daughter in-law. As you can see, our little Lizzy is very stylish sporting her latest purchase in shades...

The kids had a great time in the "kiddy" section. We also found out that Lily is a little dare devil when it comes to rides, she loved the little roller coaster and this ride. It's a bus that goes around and around, up high then down low.

We went to Carpenteria Beach and found that Lily does not like to get her little feet in the sand. Notice in one of the pictures that she is standing on a beach towel because she didn't want to touch the sand....nor the water for that matter. But, she didn't mind putting her peanut butter and jelly sandwich in the sand! Yuck!

One Year Ago Today We Received "The Call"

It's hard to believe that one year ago we received "the call". I had been watching the "rumor queen" site and knew that the call was coming. The phone rang and our caller ID said the name of our agency. I knew it was the call. The conversation went something like this. Agency " you have a daughter! She is 8 months old." Me "really? That young? When is her birthday?" Agency "October" Me "October, what day?" Agency " the 17th." Me"that's my grandson's birthday. What year?" Agency " 2006." Me "she's not 8 months old. she's 19 months old and exactly the same age as my grandson."

I asked if they could email me a picture. They could not. We would have to wait until Tomorrow to get the picture along with all her info. I waited all day for UPS to deliver that package. UPS came and picked up packages for our company, but no package. About 5 pm still no package. I began to cry. Ok I finally got a hold of my self and we ate dinner. As we were eating dinner along comes the UPS truck again at about 6 pm. There was our long awaited package with all the info. about our precious daughter.

Here is the referral picture we received along with several others which are shown on our blog. She is about 1 year old in this picture so it didn't even give us a good idea of what she looked like at 19 months.

This is the day we got Lily in Nanjing China at 22 months.

This picture was taken on May 30th of this year. Our happy little girl loves to swing!

One thing we would like to point out for those who may be working on their second adoption is that the second one was completely different than the first. In other words, God did certain things during our first adoption process to confirm His direction for our lives in the adoption but He did not do the same thing for the second, but none the less confirming of His will. For example, when we received the referral call and found out that Lily was exactly the same age as our grandson, it was God's way of showing us that he hand picked this little one to be part of our family. Jerry had been saying...."I don't care how old she is as long as she's not YOUNGER than our grandson" Well, she's NOT younger than our grandson.....she's exactly the same age!!! God does have a sense of humor and the joke was on Jerry!

Miscellaneous Happenings

Today was our youngest son, Nick's 17th birthday. Emily turned 7 1/2 today. Nick was giving Emily a thank you hug for her birthday present. We will have a big family celebration this week-end.

This picture is for Kevin. That is Lily's best friend from China. He just got a new scooter . Too bad they live in another state they could ride scooters together. Lily is waving hi to Kevin.
We hope you enjoy the picture Kevin. Have fun on your scooter!

The kids are all piling on top of Aaron. They had a lot of fun together last weekend.

Lily was pretending to be a bride. The girls like to play wedding after being in Jacob and Jolina's wedding earlier this month.

More Pic's from Jacob and Jolina's Wedding

Here is Lily hanging out at the bar waiting for her drink, well, not really, it's actually a baptismal in the church.

Just another beautiful day in California. Great day for a wedding!

This is a picture of our extended family

The Happy Couple

The "not so happy" couple

Lily gave up on Micah decided to have some fun on her own

Jacob & Jolina's Wedding

May 2 Jacob and Jolina said " I do"

Emily, Micah, and Lily were ready for the wedding. They were practicing what they were supposed to do. Emily was great at getting the two year olds to practice.

Enzo, Lily, Emily, and Micah all going up and down the aisle before the wedding practicing. They did this all by themselves at practice. At the wedding everyone except Emily needed help down the aisle. It's a lot more scary with a church full of people.

Here comes the bride! Jolina walking down the aisle with her Mom and Dad.

Lily and Emily were so cute watching Jolina coming down the aisle.

Lizzy decided to sleep through the whole wedding. Lauren's Dad, Mike (a really good Grandpa by the way), is holding our sweet little grand daughter.

Jacob and Jolina are exchanging their vows.

It was really hard to get a good picture with all the kids in it. Micah had been sick all week and he wasn't going for it. We were all laughing at all his cute funny faces. He definitely takes after his Dad.

This is Floyd, our daughter-in-law Jen, our goofy son Jeremy, and baby Lizzy. Jeremy always makes faces at me when I take pictures. Maybe next time he won't make funny faces if he knows I'm going to post them on our blog. Not!

Jolina is having the first piece of cake. They are such a sweet couple.

The three girl's outfits matched.

Nick with his friend Sam. He didn't want any pictures, but I wanted to show that he was there.

Aaron was dancing with Emily. Lauren was dancing with Lily. The girls loved the dancing. Lily kept throwing herself on the floor. Her own version of break dancing I guess.

Christy holding Lizzy. Jerry holding Lily. Lily was loving on Lizzy. She loves her niece.

We are both happy to have our new daughter, Jolina. What a blessing!

Lily's First Visit to the Zoo

We are embarrassed to admit that we have had Lily for 7 and 1/2 months and this is the first time we took her to the zoo! We decided to avoid the crowd at the L.A. Zoo and we went to the Santa Barbara Zoo (easier on the legs too). It just so happens that Lily turned 2.5 on the 17th, the day we went. Emily is funny at the zoo. she goes around holding her nose saying "Eeewwww" they stink. Let's get away from here" She's such a princess.

Behind this picture of the three girls there is supposed to be a snow tiger, you have to enlarge the picture to see it.
After we were home I asked Lily what her favorite animal was, she said the elephant. Unfortunately the picture of the elephant didn't turn out too great, so we inserted the Giraffe.

I had to throw in this picture of our little flower. The other day Lily and I were playing in the back yard and I decided to put these flowers in her hair. She loved it and was willing to pose for me while I ran into the house to grab the camera. What a cutie!!!

Easter-Family-Friends

A play date at the park with friends. 

The girls were so cute in their matching outfits. They love dressing up.

Lily loved the chocolate in her Easter basket. She has a real sweet tooth and would have nothing but chocolate for breakfast if we let her.

The girls had a lot of fun decorating eggs. The look Lily is giving Emily is a classic "Lily look".

Our friends who adopted 3 children from Ethiopia were out visiting. Emily and their daughter Kali really hit it off. The next day Emily asked if she could have Kali over. Unfortunately they live out of state.

Here's the whole group. We had a really nice time. If our three families would of had all our children here there would be 18 "kids". We only had 10 this day. We are all truly blessed.