scraped knees

This morning, Annika went to KiDZ Church for the first time. I stayed with her and as I watched her there, standing before me, I was in awe. I watched her take it all in, intrigued with each activity, having fun and participating....she is only just beginning to learn the love our Heavenly Father has for her.  And I am in awe and wonder as I see my little girl standing before me... in person.... finally. 

This afternoon, we enjoyed the nice Spring weather (someone please tell Winter to get here, please! I need some snow in my life!). The kids were riding scooters, playing ball, and spending time with our neighbor friends' grandkids currently in town. I had gone inside to catch a moment of down time while Jay stayed outside with them. I was sitting on the couch when Annika came in looking for me, tears streaming down her face and crying in pain. Sweet Jadyn had followed behind to let me know Annika had taken a hard fall on the concrete and had badly scraped her knee. As I examined the knee and consoled Annika, Jadyn fetched a bandaid and items for me. Annika cried and cried..... long after I had tenderly bandaged her knee .... she cried. I just held her, sang to her and rocked her, and I listened to the cry of hundreds knee scrapes and thousands of tears of years before now.... I heard the cry of a little girl who had not known the love of a mother's arms to rock away the sadness, ease away the hurts and wipe away the tears.... until now. My heart wrapped a little bit tighter around her as she cried for about 20 minutes as she let me caress her hair and hum "Jesus Loves Me" until she had emptied the reservoir of tears she had been holding in. And once those tears were gone, she sat up, looked at me, and pointed she was ready to go back outside.  And off she went to enjoy 2 more hours of beautiful daylight.

Appointments and finding she belongs

Annika's first Dr appt was a success. She's still a whopping 42 lbs. She did great through the exam, including getting poked for a TB test and blood draw. After the appt, I took her and got her a hamburger and thankfully she ate it!! We have been working to get her to eat more meat! My friend, Jewel, who is fluent in Mandarin explained to Annika that she needed to eat more meat (Annika's blood draws are sloooowww) and she listened! She ate her whole hamburger with no qualms. :-)

A great big thank you to Kyndal for watching 3 of my monkeys while I took Annika! Words cannot express my gratitude. You saved my sanity 😜. 

Another great big thank you to Jewel for going with me today to Annika's Dr appt and translating. You are an invaluable friend. Thank you for being so helpful and kind!!! I know her appt would not have gone as smoothly without you!

We will go back in 2 days for TB results. And we should hear sometime next week about blood results. One of the things the blood results are testing is for her immunization titers to see what, if any, shots she needs. 

We also will be going to an ENT soon to get CT scans and whatever we need to find out more about her ears and begin a plan for those! And we go next week to see the eye specialist! 

I was excited for Dr. Deitchman and Nurse Dianna to get to meet Annika today. Our pediatrician office has been so supportive of us in our adoption journey! And she's finally here !! :)

We had lots of fun last night seeing our friends, the Delgados! I loved they got to meet Annika and they quickly won her over!! 

I captured video of how Annika's starting to pick up speed in her English words and she had a lot of fun making animal sounds with Vanessa!! 

This morning, Annika is exploring the house more and looking for connections. She went through the kids' water bottles this morning, learning her siblings have names on several of them. So, she began looking for one with her name on it. So, she literally filled up 3 water bottles with water (I had to resist the urge to make her stop at the first or second 😐), finding one she could have as her very own too. Once she found not one, but two that she asked if she could have, I then asked if she wanted her name on them. She was very happy about this! Black sharpie came out and Annika was written! :-) 

Later, she wanted to get dressed and she went through the closet and asked if it was both sisters, to which I replied yes. She smiled and when I found the Faith shirt for her to wear, and nodded a happy yes to wear it. 

My heart melts as she's inquisitive and learning that she has a permanent place here, and she has everyday items mixed in with ours.....because she is our family. 

Annika Faith is wearing the shirt with her name on it....and the symbol in my and Jay's hearts that stepping out in Faith and trusting the Lord to bring her home was just what HE had planned for us, for her. 

Welcome home, Annika Faith.  ❤God is good!

Christmas Eve

It's been a wonderful last 2 days. We ate dinner (thank you, Kirokiro family!) our first night home as a family of 6. Jet lag had done Jadyn in by that point but at least she was at the table. 

Christmas Eve was a perfectly laid back day. The kids opened their gifts from Jay's work (thank you, CMJ Engineering!!) and a couple other gifts. We started with Asher since he was the youngest with letting him unwrap a couple presents and worked our way up in birth order. We did it that way so Annika could see 1.) everyone gets gifts at Christmas and 2.) it's okay to unwrap it! She's never experienced Christmas before that we are aware of and she has turned down gift attempts since being home. By the time it was her turn, she was all smiles and a bit shy as she began unwrapping her gifts. The only thing she wasn't very excited about was the bike helmet and probably because it was pink ;), but the excitement of the new red scooter was more than enough for her to don her helmet outside! 

We enjoyed playing outdoors, eating Ramen noodles (she got very excited for this and ate it twice today!), colored new pjs, went looking at Christmas lights and ended the day with smiles, prayers, hugs and kisses. 

My heart is full. 

Merry Christmas!

Jet lag and Christmas blessings

Jet lag - so much fun. Lol

Both girls have been wide awake since 2:30 this morning! 😳😳 Jay and I took turns being up with them. I slept til about 6 am and then traded with Jay. We plan to lay low today and just rest and recoup, decorate gingerbread houses and tonight, drive around looking at Christmas lights! This is Annika's first Christmas so everything is new to her. Some things she seems to like and other things she rejects (unwrapping a gift). She's also is learning to not be started or afraid is our pets. She actually wanted to hold Squared and learning to let nice and gently just a few minutes ago! She's also fascinated with our motion-activated trash can! :) 

So many things are new to her (family life, living in a house, etc) that we will be in a constant state of learning for awhile. And even though she is 8, her behavior is often younger - more like a 4 year old at times with the tantrums or whining. But she is also a quick learner and is soaking up family life. 

This morning, as I saw Jadyn and Annika in our kitchen together, I got all choked up with awe that she is really here now! And I thanked the Lord once again. And looking at Jadyn who also traveled half way around the world with us to get her, I asked her if she was happy that Annika was here. The big beautiful smile said it all. 

I'm also thankful for the treats food Andrea and neighbors left for us! Not having to think about making something from scratch to eat right now - HUGE BLESSING! Lol as I ate cinnamon roll bread thingy to chase the excedrin I had to take at 6 am. 😋 

As I checked my email this morning, I was blown away to see notification that we had received two very generous donations to our Crowdrise sight! 😮 One of them for $500 and the other was anonymously given for $5,000!!! 😮😭😮😭 Jay and I are blown away!! To you, if you're reading this: thank you so very much! We pray the Lord blesses you in more ways than you can imagine!! First, God provides the way to bring our little girl home and now He continues to use people to help provide money for our medical journey with Annika! Thank you thank you thank you!

Annika's first medical appt is next week as we go to her first pediatrician appt. And next week, I'll be scheduling her eye specialist appt!  With 2017 starting in just a few days, we are getting the ball rolling on correcting her eyes and beginning the journey on her ears!  It shouldn't be long before we will be meeting our deductible! Lol I can't wait for my sweet girl to not be self conscious about her eyes and ears and to realize how truly beautiful she already is!

home!

I wanted to share a post my mom (Grandma)made today talking about our arrival home:

"It was early!  Whew!  But worth it. When we were leaving Shannons I went to hug the GKids bye.  Of course Jadyn was her usual loving self, and Asher was a willing participant in the hugs as well.  Eli gave me his usual "love you grandma" with his hug.  After I hugged Eli, Annika was standing near, I opened my arms to her and she came in for a quick hug!!! She's amazing and I think her adjustment period will be short.  On the other hand, our adjustment period might take a while.  The girl loves to talk and does not care one bit that I cannot understand a single word (past "no" that is)."

I am so blessed and amazed at how Annika is blossoming and accepting love. In the last few days, she has really started coming out of her protective shell a little more and allowing more people in.  And today, Grandma got the first hug from someone other than mommy and daddy!

We have had some hard moments in the last week and this afternoon especially as Annika is learning what a family is and how to walk in love (not gruffness or being a bully... things she's learned to live by in the orphanage)....but in those hard moments, Jay and I are striving to walk in love and compassion as we show her what it means to have and be a part of a family who loves her. Unconditionally. That it's okay to make mistakes (and admit to them), that sometimes she makes bad choices (who doesn't, right?), but that we still love her. And we aren't going to hurt her for those bad choices.  Something I fear she's faced all too often in her short 8 years. 

Tonight, we thank the Lord we are all under one roof. Thankful for grandparents who brought us breakfast so we didn't have to think about it, for friends who brought us lunch and helped us with some communication with Annika (they are fluent in Mandarin!), and for friends who dropped dinner off and ran as we were in our jet lag state! We are thankful for kind words and lots of prayer as we learn to be a family of 6 and recover from world-traveling. 

God is so good. He is so good to me....

homeward bound!

After an overnight delay, we are headed back to the airport for our 5 AM flight HOME!!!!!  Not our ideal time for travel, BUT who cares as long as we get home! We can't wait to be in our own beds, our own home, hug our boys and see everyone!!! 

Keep us in your prayers as we fly home. America is about to have a new citizen!

❤️

flight delay

It's Thursday, which means we all woke up early and excited because it's the day we travel home!!! And we just found out our plane has been delayed by EIGHT HOURS!!! 😫😫😫😫😫😫😫😫😫

As of right now, our flight gets in at 11:45 PM instead of 4 pm. And we will still have to go through customs and immigrations when we land. 😫😫😫😫😫 

Please pray for us 

So. Ready. To. Be. Home.