Welcome to our story...

God has richly blessed us with a big, fun family...
We have 10 children... 3 homegrown & 7 born in our hearts!

Blake... our oldest is 25 and has a heart for the Lord. He enjoys; church, family, mission trips, making music, playing guitar & drums at church, and writing.

Brianna Faith... is 21 and has a compassionate & tender heart. She's a wonderful big sister. She began talking to us about adoption when she was 11 yrs old. She is "Faith in motion"

Brent... is 17 - he's an awesome guy! He's in highschool. He has a special heart for family and God. He loves sports! Brent loves to laugh & is full of life!

Bethany Lidia... now 15, joined our family in August 2006 at 9 yrs old. She's from the beautiful country of Guatemala. She started school for the very first time (at 9 yrs old) and is now in 9th grade. Lidia's passion is sports & dancing!

Benjamin Ross... 15 yrs old. We first saw his picture in April 2007 & came home in May '08. Ben is deaf, but his special need is that he needed a family. Ben loves making home-runs & hanging out with family & friends. Ben is from Tianjin, China.

Briella Xiyao... our beautiful 15 yr old daughter from Fujian Province, China. She joined our family in July 2009. She's always wearing a big smile! She has a passion for the deaf & very proficient in sign language. She loves basketball!!

Bellamei Ying... our Inner Mongolian princess. Bellamei is 14 yrs old and held my hand for the first time on July 18, 2011. She has melted into our big family seamlessly and it is truly an honor to be her mommy.

Brinley Grace FuChuan... is 9 years old and joined our family in July 2007. She's from Jiangxi Province, China. She has the most gentle, sweet spirit... she's an angel!

Bayla Shea Chao-Yu... our youngest. She's 9 yrs old, 5 months younger than Brinley. Bayla's from Hunan, China & came home at 11.5 months. She's bright, funny (and spicy!) We can't get enough of her hugs & kisses.

and our caboose... Braxton Emanuel Jordan - 8 yrs old? (see post below) He's from Guangdong Province and is now officially our son!

This 1 min video shows how we've GROWN!

Bittersweet Goodbye

Although we are having a wonderful time in Guangzhou, tomorrow will be our last day here. Since everything went so well with the chest x-ray, I called the consulate Monday morning and they agreed to move our appt up 2 days (today!). This means we are going home two days early. Lidia's a little disappointed since we've met such nice families here & made friends. There's a lot to do here and it is pretty relaxing, I admit. But Mike and the other kids need us at home and I miss everyone. So tomorrow is our last day. We'll go to the swearing in ceremony in the afternoon at the embassy, then we'll get her visa to come home. We'll leave the hotel Wednesday at 6 am and take a flight to Beijing. Then from there we'll fly to Chicago, and then on to Charlotte. That's a little over 20 hrs actually in the air, not including the 2 layovers. We're flying stand-by again, but the seat availability looks pretty good & it'll be so great if we get to ride in business class again. That really makes a difference on a long trip. Thanks again Kim & Jeff !!!!

Can't wait to see all my other kiddos and give everyone a huge hug! Briella is so excited about going home. Today she said "America Wednesday" to a shopkeeper. She is so well adjusted - I can't believe we have been so blessed yet again to receive a child that so naturally becomes part of our family. She has been simply delightful, happy & smiley. She is talkative and chats with our guide a lot. She also tries to communicate in English and does quite well. By the way, she's a wiz at math... been testing her on different math problems, and she gets them all perfect... and fast. At one shop, she added up in her head what she thought our total was, and before the shopkeeper used his calculator to add up our items (about 14 items), she told him what she thought it was. Well, she was off by 12 Yuan (their dollar). Turns out there was 1 item stuck in the bottom of the basket that she hadn't seen and it was exactly the difference.

Tomorrow morning will be my last chance to email, as I am packing up the laptop and mailing it off to Nancy's brother who lives back in Briella's province. It is for him, but I've had the privilege of using it while in China. Thanks Nancy!!!

Well, can't wait to see everyone... we're supposed to arrive in Charlotte about 9:45 Wednesday night, about 27 hrs after we step foot on our first flight. I can't wait to see Mike & the kids at the airport. Here are some pics... hugs to all


Briella and our guide Sarah, who took good care of us!

Lidia standing in an underground tomb of an emporer buried 2,000 yrs ago

Octopus for sale at local Walmart

Maybe your in the mood for sting-ray instead?

Such little parking space - so they have double stacked parking

Last year while I was here for Ben, the terrible earthquake happened - this time we had a typhoon that landed ashore this province, but thank goodness I don't think there were any injuries

Fun in the streets!

Inside our beautiful hotel

Photo op!

At Lucy's Diner - wonderful western food. Briella says "hamburger please"!

Dinner with new friends

Out on the town

2 comments:

Melissa Swinson said...

Lisa,
Congratulations on your new beautiful daughter. I am not sure if you remember me or not. I teach 3rd grade at MPES. I wanted to let you know that I have met 2 other families in our county that have also adopted from China. We are going to try and have a get together in late Sept.-Oct in the park to get to know each other. Since their isn't a group in Cabarrus from families with children from China we would like to maybe start one in the future. If your family would be interested please email me at ameswinson@yahoo.com. Again congratulations on your beautiful new daughter, and I hope you guys had a great trip home.

Melissa Swinson

Livin' out loud said...

She is beautiful! Thank you, thank you THANK YOU for reminding me how very much I left a piece of my heart in China!!
Susan