We're Headed HOME!!!!

We will leave the Home about 11:30 a.m. today (10:30 p.m. Indiana time). Our plane leaves at 4:40 p.m. (3:40 a.m. IN time). We will arrive in LA at 12:20 p.m. LA time (3:20 p.m. IN time). We will stay in LA over night and leave for Chicago the next afternoon. We will see everyone when we got HOME on January 1st! Pray for safe travels, content children and mommy, daddy and Mamaw!!! Love to all, can't wait to see you!!

Alea's Family

This afternoon we got to meet Alea's birthmother, grandmother and aunt. They were very kind and loving. They showed us pictures of Alea when she was in the hospital and when she was just a few days old. They told us a little about their family and their wishes for Alea.

It was a very emotional meeting and one we will treasure forever. It was very comforting to be able to hold Alea's mom on this very difficult day for her. She continued to thank us for adopting Alea and we continued to thank her for giving us a gift no one else could ever give us.

She brought us some gifts of dried fruit and cookies. We gave her a scrapbook, poem and necklace that is in the shape of a heart and says, The love you give away is the only love you keep. We hope she will think of Alea when she wears the necklace. It was very hard for her to leave, but she is at peace with the adoption and hopefully we planted some seeds that will one day bloom into her salvation.

Alea will always know that her birthmother loved her very much and made the most loving decision by giving her up for adoption to a forever family who promises to pass on her rich heritage and lead her in developing a strong love for a birthmother she will never know.

This has been one of the sweetest days of our lives. Thank you for praying this part of the miracle into our lives!

Ocean Beauties

Harbor

Today we went to a harbor close by and saw lots and lots of fish and boats. Here are some pictures from our day. This is the first time we have been to the Pacific Ocean. It was beautiful! Carmen even put her feet into the water! It really wasn't very cold. We even found a shell. We bought Braylen a purse made out of shells and bought some really cool looking rocks that were brought in from the ocean. We even found fish candy! Carmen is not going to be trying any of that. Braylen doesn't like it and Mom says it tastes like jerkey. Interesting.

World's Tallest Tower

Tuesday, we went to Taipai and did some sight seeing. We saw the world's largest tower, Tower 101. We also went to a cultural mall and bought lots of gifts to bring back home for Alea to enjoy and learn about her heritage. We went to a memorial museum for the first president of Taiwan. It was very impressive and we learned that he was a Christian.

Tye Dye Results!!

The kids were so excited to see their finished product. They won't have time to add jewels and paint until this weekend, but here are the tye dyed shirts being modeled! What cuties!!! Thank you again, Ross family from all the kiddos here!

Braylen's Problem

Last night, Braylen started yelling, "Hello, anybody, Hello!!" She had crawled into one of the baby beds and put the cage down!!! Of course, we had to take pictures before letting her out!

Santa's Helpers

Noah's Ark

We went to a seafood buffet place called Noah's Ark. Mom and Brad loved it and Carmen was happy to see salad!! Pictures of mom's meal!!!!

Alea and Vicky

Here is the girl who has held Alea during each devotion night since she has been here. The two have a very special bond and Vicky will be very sad when we leave.

Tye Dye Fun!!!

The elementary kids LOVED tye-dyeing. We washed their shirts last night, so we will give them the finished product tonight when they get home from school and we will get a picture of them all in their shirts for all to see. Mom and Carmen's hands are stained and the kids laugh at us for that, but it was fun!!! Thanks Jon, Shelley, Ellen, Madi and Preston for sending all the supplies along for this project!!

Passing out CD's on Christmas

Here is a picture of Braylen playing Santa on Christmas. She passed out CD's to all the high school, middle school and college kids. They loved them and many immediately opened them and began looking at the inside sleeve. Some even when and got their walkmans and started listening right away. Thank you ladies at PHP, Sunday School Class at The Chapel and Liberty Baptist for providing these for the kids! We have heard them being played all day everyday since giving them to the kids.

Daddy and his Girls

Hanging out with princesses!!

Alea's First Bath by Mommy

Alea and Braylen took a bath together. Alea likes her bath time!!! Braylen thought it was fun having Alea in the tub with her. Braylen is quite the big helper! She is a little mommy and so protective!!!

Alea on Christmas

Here are some pictures of Alea with mommy and Vicky on Christmas.

Merry Chirstmas

Here are some pictures of Braylen opening her stocking and present at the orphanage Christmas. It was so nice for them to include her in everything the other kids were doing.

Christmas Eve

Tonight we went to a Christmas eve service in town. It was such a blessing to see Christians half way around the world worship the Lord and love being in love with Jesus! The children from the orphanage played tambourines and acted out the Christmas story. They had so much fun and we were so proud of them. Of course, we video taped it so we would be able to remember forever. The worshipers were so enthusiastic and it made us think about all the things we take for granted everyday in our faith. What a blessing!!

Earthquake...

The earthquake we experienced last night was about 8 km away and was 5 km deep. It measured 5.4 on the Richter scale. I guess this is the 4th one this week. Anyway, all is well here. We are starting to go stir crazy. We have not left the orphanage since arriving. This afternoon we tye-dyed shirts with the kids. They loved it! Tonight we are going to the church in town for their Christmas program.

Hopefully tomorrow we can do some shopping in town for our "Christmas" celebration. On Tuesday we are suppossed to go to Taipai for another visit to the AIT office and Anna said we could do some sight seeing! We are so excited about that. We love helping at the orphanage, but also really want to see some of Taiwan while here.

Thanks for the prayers, emails and comments. Maybe we can get more pictures posted soon!!

Here is a picture of the orphanage (the one with the cross) and the presidential palace entrance. While I am sitting here waiting on pictures to upload, we just had a small earthquake! I have never been in one before. The whole place just started rattling and shaking for about 30 seconds. Weird!! You just never know what you will experience when you adopt!!!

Alea loves her walker. She can't quite make it go forward yet, but she does a fine job going backwards!!

Pictures

More pics for you to enjoy. The one with Brad and Alea was on our way back to the car after finalizing the adoption. Alea just rested her little head on Brad's. Precious!!!

Merry Christmas!!!

Today we celebrated Christmas with the kids here in the orphanage. It was such a blessing to be with the kids and see their faces as they opened gifts. We were able to give each elemetnary child a t-shirt that we will tye-dye later in the week (thanks Shelley and girls) and all the older kids got a CD (thanks Liberty Baptist, PHP and The Chapel). We will celebrate with the baby side on Christmas day.

We enjoyed a catered meal today--it was incredible! Braylen loved it and did so well. Thanks for all your prayers and love! Let us hear from you--we're starting to miss home and would love to hear from you. Braylen keeps asking if today is the day we go home!!!!

Sisters....

Braylen loves her new sister. She is very protective of her. Tonight one of the older children in the Home wanted to hold her and we gave her permission and Braylen ran to us and said that the girl was leaving with her baby sister! She started crying saying she wanted her back. I think they are going to be best friends.

More Pictures

Daddy and Mamaw hold Alea for the first time!!!

First time holding Alea - Priceless!!

Alea is sitting at the computer with me right now. she is typing a messge: tygvfxdrgdv u That is our sweet Alea. I wish I could put pictures on, but they do not have a memory card reader, so we need to go in town and have our pics put on CD and then we will be able to post. Sorry about this.

We are all so busy helping here, we really do not have much time to email/post on blogger. We will have many stories to tell like eating scrambled eggs mixed with rice or tree fungus in water broth.....hmmmfm.... maybe this is the diet we have been looking for to lose weight!!!

Thanks for praying...we are all doing great. Braylen is down for a nap and she had chicken and noodles for lunch (thanks mamaw for bringing raman noodles). We found a box of mac and cheese here, so we will be fixing that for her supper.

We are in Taiwan!!!

We have safely arrived and are loving our precious Alea. She is officially ours as we went to the AIT office this morning and finalized the adoption. We are having some jet lag, but will go to bed early this evening. Alea is so pretty, sweet and everyother great adjective you can think of to describe her!!! Thank you all for praying! We will post picture if we can later.

WE LEAVE TOMORROW!!!!!

Praise the Lord...the time is almost here! We leave tomorrow for Chicago and then the next morning for Taiwan!!! Anna emailed last night saying the final paper came from court!!! WOO-HOO!!! That means, that as far as Taiwan in concerned, Alea is officially ours. When we get into Taipai (7:30 a.m. Indiana time on Wednesday), we will meet Alea at the airport and then stay overnight in a hotel. The next morning we will go to the AIT office and have our interview. We will then go to the orphanage and stay until after Christmas when we can go and pick up the visa and passport. Everything is coming together really well.

We had a HUGE blessing given to us today--members of our church and community gave us money to help with our adoption expenses. We also had a family member give us a large donation as well. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU for all you have done to help bring Baby Alea home. Thank you doesn't seem big enough of a word to show our gratitude to each of you who have prayed and helped us bring our sweet angel home! God bless each of you!

More Dance Pictures

Christmas Dance Recital

This afternoon Braylen had her first dance recital. I forgot to turn the flash on our camera and if it isn't on the pictures all come out grainy. Sorry about that, but here are some pics of the recital. Someday maybe I'll figure the camera out--just in time to get a new one.

Braylen loved having Mamaw Carol, Mamaw and Papaw Weaver and Mommy there to watch her perform!!

Only 5 more days!!!!

Exactly one week from today we will be waking up with our sweet precious Alea and getting ready to spend our first full day with her. I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!!!

Today I went into Braylen's preschool and gave a presentation on Kazakhstan. They are studying about people from other lands and so this was perfect! Braylen wore her traditional Kazakh dress and hat and we showed all kinds of things from Kazakhstan. Braylen got to show them where it was on the map. She loved that part. I took in a traditional dessert, kinda like an apple pie. The kids really liked it and Braylen loved being my big helper!

In a few weeks, we can do this all again, only with Taiwan! Woo-hoo!!!

Only 7 More Days!!!!

Exactly one week from today we will be on a plane to TAIWAN!!!!! We are sooooo ready to go. This week is full of laundry, housecleaning, final baby prepping and a flutter of emails back and forth to the Home in Taiwan. I am so thankful we have all of our Christmas shopping done and we don't have to worry with that. (By the way, this is our first year that has EVER happened!!).

I have a funny to share with you about Braylen: Today she decides she wants a pair of binaculars. She asks me if we can go and buy some. I tell her no, but maybe sometime soon we could make a pair out of toilet paper tubes. She said, "But they won't be pink!!" So I reply, "Well, we can paint them pink!" Of course she wants to make them right away. I told her we would have to wait for 2 toilet paper tubes to become empty and then we could make them. I am sure you can guess what happens next: she disappeared for about 4-5 minutes and returns with the tubes!!! I asked her how they got all empty and thankfully, she put it all in the trashcan, not the toilet!!! Hmmmmm........

Still Counting Blessings....

Here are three more ladies who are loving our baby Alea while we wait...Michelle, Misty and Phyllis. Thank you for caring so much. These ladies are busy, busy, busy with the babies, yet they still take the time to snap pictures and send updates to us while we wait! What a blessing!! We cannot wait to thank them in person!

Coundown and Counting Blessings

Only 11 more days until we fly!!!!

Here are a few of our blessings: Abby, Lettie, Lucille, Anna and Emilee. These dear ladies take care of our little Alea each and every day. We are blessed to know she is being well cared for and loved! It is so reassuring knowing these Christian women are holding, rocking, singing and praying to my baby girl while I wait to do those things. It is
great knowing she isn't being neglected! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!