My Dear Little Evan

Evan has been so cute lately. He has to wave at every person he sees and won't leave until they wave back. Today we were just leaving Pizza Hut when he spotted this little girl about his age. She was very pretty with a delicate face a little blond ringlets. When he saw her he made this small sound like "ooh". He then went over to her and just stared. As we were getting in the van he just took off. I turned to see him standing on the sidewalk waving to the little girl who was about to drive away. He then started blowing kisses. She blew one back and then the grandma drove away. It wasn't till they were gone that he would come with us. It was so sweet! :)

He's also been quite the sweet heart at home. Although he can't talk yet he understands so much and communicates very well. He has started kissing us (with real kisses) all the time. He likes to kiss one cheek and then make me turn so he can kiss the other. It's also common for him to do the signs for "love you". He puts his little fist on his chest and rotates back and forth as hard as he can (meaning love) and then he points at us. He'll do this just out of the blue and it warms my heart!

Ellie's "Big" Bed

Today we are going to Witchita to get a twin mattress for Ellie! I'm so excited to be moving her to a "big" bed. We will then move her toddler mattress in with Evan and I can start preparing for two little boys in there!

At some point I hope to strip the wall paper in Evan's room (I wasn't going to but he already started for me) and paint. We might even replace the carpet before Ethan gets here.

Well I should go and get ready to leave.

New Blog...Ethan's Story

I have decided this blog is great for family and friends who are interested in our lives in general. But when it comes to the adoption, it can be a bit confusing. I will continue to keep this blog updated with all the details of the adoption, but I have started a second blog titled "Ethan's Story". This one will be dedicated to the adoption only. However, I will probably not post as many details of the paper work in that blog as I do here. It is my goal that "Ethan's Story" will be just that...a story of how God brought us together (not all the tedious details of paperwork). I have a lot of work left to do on it and I'm not quite up to date on the post, however, I'd love to hear what you think. I will put a link under "fun links" on the side of this blog if you want to see it.

June...

And finally, the recent pictures!

"Cinderella"

Poor Evan...falling asleep!

That's my crazy girl!

Evan has learned to "swing" by himself.

This is a terrible picture of the two of us but I thought I'd show you the sling Evan's been riding in (sorry you can't see it very well, I might post a better one if I can get someone else to take it). Evan loves being carried by mommy! I thought I'd get into practice before I have to carry Ethan who will probably be two. I'm planning on carrying Ethan a lot since we'll need the time to bond. I was originally going to just try it out to see if it would work with a "big kid" but Evan now begs me to carry him in it when he's tired. We have had some great cuddle time.

May...

Here are the pictures from May.

Ellie got a new (new to us at least) flannel night gown which she loved! In fact, now it is the middle of June and very hot yet I still can't convice her not to wear it!

In May our whole family drove to Michigan for a friends wedding.

Tyler was the best man.

The Bride-to-be gave Ellie a play veil which she loved!

April...

I know I've been terrible about posting pictures. But I didn't realize HOW bad until I saw it had been April since I even took the pictures off my camera! SO...here are some pictures from April. May and June will be coming shortly.

This is Ellie's room. We took down this old wall paper (first picture--taken last Aug.) and got down to the plaster (second picture--taken in March) and finally textured, painted, and put up flowers! As you can see in the third picture it is quite busy but girly. :)

Ellie loves to brush her own hair and teeth

Evan and I just being silly. :)

Caring for the Orphans

I just received an email from my agency. They are trying to spread the word about their sponsorship program for orphans. If any of you have ever considered sponsoring a child but you're not sure who to go through, I think CHI is wonderful! They work with several countries and the cost is only $32 a month. On the sight they have stories of the different children in need. Some are very sad! Just reading what some of these children (and in many cases their parents) go through makes me grateful for all the blessings I have! Here is the address if you are interested. Even if you're unable to sponsor a child at this time maybe you could pass this information on to someone else who may be interested.

www.HelpAnOrphan.org

"Pure, unstained religion, according to God our Father,is to take care of orphans and widows when they suffer and to remain uncorrupted by this world."James 1:27

Officially Waiting

We just heard that our paperwork has been submitted Hanoi, Vietnam. Meaning we can officially start the "4-5" month wait for travel. I don't really have anything else to talk about so I'll quite for now.

Updated Pictures

The kids and I are alone now until next Sunday. Tyler left this morning to fly to Michigan for a wedding. Although I'll really miss him, I'm looking forward to getting a lot of house work done.

We just received some more pictures of Ethan today. He has the same outfit on as last time but judging by the out fit on the little girl in the picture with him I'm pretty sure these were taken at a different time. The little girl is one I've seen on the waiting child list with our agency. I think she's a year older than him and she's waiting for a family.

Late Dinner

Yesterday was interesting. We went to Salina in the afternoon (we live an hour from the closest Walmart). We went to Sonic for some drinks around 6:30 but because of our late lunch and the fact that we wanted to save money we decided to eat dinner at home. Well we got home and got busy with baths, putting kids to bed. We put Evan down and finally got Ellie tucked in by 10 or so. As we were giving her her last kiss when she informed us that she was hungry!

10:30 found us feeding her and getting Evan up who had decided he was hungry too. Instead of relaxing by ourselves, we all sat down to watch Star Gate together while we ate. They were finally back in bed at 11. Their bed time is 8! There is nothing more frustrating after a long day of kids to realize after the "last kiss" they still need dinner which means mess...and brushing teeth again...and tucking in again...!

Grant Money!

Also, I forgot to mention this in the last post, we received a grant from Shaohannah's Hope today. They are giving us $2500 toward adoption expenses! We also were approved for a loan. Hopefully now we will be able to build up our credit enough to get a good loan for when we have to pay travel expenses in about 5 months. I'm a little worried about that one since we don't have much to put up as collateral. I'm excited to see the way God is working. It was such an encouragement to get that grant!

Update on Ethan!

I apologize for not putting more pictures on my blog. I haven't loaded the pictures from my camera to the computer yet so I'm a little behind for pictures with Ellie and Evan. I promise I'll post some one of these days.

HOWEVER, we received updated pictures of Doan Phu Loc (aka, Ethan) today! I was really hoping to hear about his measurements and growth...but I still love pictures! He finally looks a little bit Asian and you can see the dark hair a little better. Also you'll notice that the big cut on his forehead is healing nicely. He looks so different...but still so VERY cute!

"What are you looking at?"

“You have got to be kidding me…
I’m being adopted by who?”
(I love the raised eye brow and curled lip!)