Long overdue!

Opening Presents!

2 years Photo

Halloween 2010

So much time has passed since our last post. Amelia is growing like crazy and changing every day. We enjoyed her first birthday party at our home, Amelia quickly learned how to open gifts, but was a little overwhelmed with all the people being in her home. We were so thankful to be able to share this special day with her and so many family and friends.

Belated Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July! It is hard to believe we have been a family for a little over 7 months now. Time goes so quickly.

Amelia has been part of our family for 3 months now! Time has really gone by so quickly. She has changed so much. She has gained 6 pounds and 2 3/4 inches! She can do so many things. Her attitude and behavior is nothing like I expected. She goes at any task with confidence. She almost has an attitude of "you people with two hands must have it rough, with that other hand in the way". I imagined that she would look at something she wanted to do, and just need help. That is just not the case.

She has a beautiful little spirit, and has really captured us completely. She does have issues with seperation at daycare. She also can't seem to chew (we are working on that with speech therapy).
The hand is really just not an issue for her right now. I would imagine when she gets older, there will be things that are very difficult.

I am so happy to be able to say she is my daughter. We love her so much.

With all the time that has past since we waited for our daughter, you would think I would post more. I am enjoying every moment with her and I really believe God has put us with the right child for us. She is amazing. I know that we are so blessed to be together. The overwhelming joy I feel when I see her face is more than I could ever put into words. I never imagined this kind of happiness. It can really only come from a miracle. We hope she is as happy as we are.

Red Couch Photo Day

These are a couple of photos from "red couch photo day". It is a tradition for adoptive families to take a photo on the red couch at the white swan hotel. Our group photos were not very good and Amelia was in a terrible mood that day. She didn't like the traditional Chinese outift. No worries, I will retire this outfit after we get home!

We leave on Saturday night U.S time so please pray for safe travel for our family. Thanks so much for writing on our blog. It really helps us to know that people are praying for us.

Another update

Sorry the updates have been so delayed. We have been very busy and Internet connection is very slow. Amelia would never allow us to get on the computer during her waking hours!!!!
Please send prayers for our little sweetie. She has visited the Doctor several times since we got her. They kept trying to say she had a cold, but I knew from the day we got her something was wrong with her breathing. Yesterday she had what appeared to be an acute asthma attack. Fortunately we were able to get her to the doctor in time to get a breathing treatment. She has another scheduled for today and hopefully they will do another before we leave.

She is in otherwise good health and believe me she has been checked many times. Her clinic visit had her weighing in at a whopping 15.8 pounds and 27.5 inches. She is free of any infectious disease that we know of. We think she had a bad cold before we got her that led to this bronchitis. Most likely she had underlying asthma. We will get that checked as soon as we get home!!!!!!!


The weather in Guangzhou is amazing. It is subtropical and if you could drink the water, and my family was close by, I could live here. This is the first place we have been that you could leave the hotel without a group and it be considered safe. We are so anxious to get home!!!!

Amelia has made several gains physically since we got her. She has already gained weight. She could eat 24/7! She can stand easier, she holds her head up better, she doesn't use her head as her second hand as much when trying to stand. We are so blessed. This child is a great match for our family. Thanks for the prayers.

Our little sweetie!

Here are a few pictures to get things started. We aren't the best photographers but we are getting a lot of practice. She seems to be trying to bond with both of us. Brian gets the cold shoulder every now and then but when she is in the mood, she really likes to play with both of us. She prefers I feed her, she fights sleep like nothing I have ever seen, they said she likes bathing but changing her clothes or diaper or bathing is like trying to give a cat a bath!!!!
I can't say for certain how much she weighs. She is as we thought, 12 months in size if it shrinks and 9 months if it doesn't. I have been obsessed with how much she will weigh (It is a job related thing). A bottle is the way to get her in better spirits. When she smiles, she really cheeses and she has about 3 teeth in the front!!!!
The experience is sureal! Having somebody need me for everything is so very different. We are just trying to let her go at her own pace (except for the bath!)
She really is protective of her hand. She is able to do much more than I expected. She can't walk and her balance is not great, but she can stand by pulling herself up and has made a few gains in the past 16 hours!

Thanks for the prayers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!