A Merry Christmas and a Boxing Day at TECO!

Sierra made this for Samantha to explain what we do at Christmas (she also wrote her a more personal poem, which she did not want to share) and she's writing a poem similar to this but with the letters in Samantha's name.

Christmas was as good as it could be without Samantha and without Logan and Amber (and with neither Sierra nor I feeling well)...Sierra had the hardest time and missed Logan, Amber (they were with John's side of the family) and Samantha a lot. We spent most of the day just relaxing and playing games, especially Sierra's new Wii! Thankfully I didn't have to cook dinner although I did have some food to prepare - but making some pies and potatoes is nothing compared with an entire Christmas dinner! We went to Grammy and Grandpa's house around 4:00 and after eating we opened our presents and were home before 7:00. We then watched A Christmas Carol - we watched a different version last night and plan to watch another version tomorrow night! All in all our quietest Christmas ever.

Boxing Day was not a good day. We found out just before Christmas that we had to go toTECO (the Taiwan Consulate) in San Francisco because of an issue with Samantha's adoption. Basically her paperwork, which should have already been signed and completed in Taiwan was not and we had to sign for her. Anyway, Boxing Day is usually Jeremy's fav holiday (how crazy is that!?) but this year it was a very bad day. It's usually a very relaxed family day with nothing to cook and nothing to do except play games, eat leftovers and relax! Thankfully we decided to drop Sierra at my sister's house on our way to SF because what we thought would be a four to five hour trip to TECO turned into a NINE plus HOUR trip! It was horrendous. Getting there was fine. Even parking was ok. The hour and a half waiting in line was a little frustrating, especially when they yelled at us for not photocopying our passports (they never even looked at our actual passports) and for not filling out an additional form and then made us get out of line! Basically they were not nice. But still all was ok since we were done and leaving SF just after lunchtime. Plenty of time to get home for our Christmas celebration with Amber, John and Logan, or so we thought. Getting home was a total nightmare. The entire hundred miles home we went between 5 and 20 mph! The entire way and there was never any reason for it! Eventually we realized we were going to miss celebrating Christmas with Amber and Logan. On the plus side at least Sierra got to spend the day with them and celebrate a belated Christmas with them. She would have been miserable in the car all day (she gets carsick) and she would have been profoundly sad to miss spending the entire holiday with Logan since she was already so sad that Samantha is so far from us on Christmas and she didn't get to see them on Christmas. The most frustrating part for me is that TECO didn't actually do anything with our paperwork nor would they tell us anything so we have to hope that they send it ASAP so Samantha's case can proceed as it should.

Here are some photos from Christmas and Boxing Day (they are NOT in order and I am too tired/sick to put them in order):

Sierra giving the dogs their Christmas presents, Sierra and daddy playing Mario on the Wii (on the new TV) and our cat, who never get on the blog because she's shy!!

Sierra expressing her feelings about our traditional Christmas salads; just after dinner with her Cracker jokes, hat etc while trying to cover her bisquit mess and with Grammy and Grandpa's tree.

TECO in SF

Logan, Amber and Sierra having fun on Boxing Day

Sierra is 10 years old!!!

She said it was her best birthday ever! She always says that - so apparently every year her birthday gets better, just as she does! She spent it as she usually does. First she had her birthday breakfast (donuts and an egg for protein, which she's requested every year since she was a toddler), we took our annual mother/daughter in our pj’s photos at the moment she was born (8:56AM), she got a birthday morning present and then we went out with her best friend, Elizabeth, to John's Incredible Pizza for an afternoon of fun (and expense!). For dinner she chose takeout Italian and then we had birthday cake (homemade brownies, which I finished as people were eating dinner!), played games and watched a movie (the 1934 A Christmas Carol). For dinner and her birthday brownies we had Elizabeth here as well as Grammy and Grandpa, Auntie Amber and Uncle John and Cousin Logan.

She went to bed way later than she should have but went willingly so she wouldn't take a chance of keeping Santa away. All in all it was a fun day for her and a great way to celebrate turning 10 YEARS OLD!! We cannot believe that our beautiful girl is now 10 years old! We are grateful that our daughter is healthy, happy and so very sweet, loving, thoughtful and always helpful and considerate of us and others. She is not yet interested in anything “preteen” and spends her time playing with her pretend food, her American Girl Stuff, playing pretend (Vet, Pet Shop owner or something to do with animals being her favorite games although Spy isn’t far behind!) and reading (sometimes too much). We are very pleased that she has no interest –yet– in anything “preteeny” and are enjoying being her parents as much as ever. Every day with Sierra I am mindful of how blessed I am to be her mother and how blessed I am to have such a wonderful daughter! The past 10 years have been the most amazing, joyous, fun and fulfilling imaginable and I am looking forward to continuing to watch her grow and mature and to see what a great big sister to Samantha I'm sure she'll be!

Sierra and mommy's first moments together and 10 wonderful years later!!!!



Photos of Sierra as a newborn (in the hospital blankie and in her first Christmas dress, actually her first dress of any kind!)followed by photos of Sierra the day she turned 10!!!

Sierra with her new American Girl doll - Ivy Ling

Sierra just being her cute self and with her birthday brownies

We sent a doll and look what we got

We have all had a hard time dealing with the fact that Christmas will come and go and Samantha will be in an orphanage half a world away and Sierra really wanted to send her something so we would feel connected and Samantha would have something from us at Christmas. So Sierra picked out this doll, which we sent over on Friday (12/14) with a long note (written in Mandarin courtesy of one of Jeremy's co-workers) asking them to please give her this doll from her big sister. We knew from Judy that they don't like to give the babies stuffed toys but we were hoping the note would do it trick (it was long and heartfelt!!). We hoped that maybe in our next update in January we might catch a glimpse of the doll, or maybe even after we picked Samantha up when we get the CD of photos. We did not expect just four days later to receive photos of Samantha and the doll! She sort of looks afraid of the doll (hopefully that's temporary!) but it made us all feel more connected not only to Samantha but to the women in the orphanage to know that just days after sending over the note and doll we would get such a tangible response. Sierra was beyond thrilled and Jeremy and I were weepy (he'd deny that but I was here!). Anyway, here are the photos of Samantha and her doll and of Sierra with the doll before we sent it!

Sierra and the dogs with Samantha's doll

Samantha not quite sure what to make of her new doll and in her crib with her doll and photos of us!!

FIRST DECREE

Samantha now (9 months) and Samantha at 2.5 months (referral photo) - Sierra at our quick celebratory "First Decree dinner" which was Mexican food to commemorate the day we accepted Samantha's referral lo those many months ago!!

I just happened to be home today because we are getting our new windows in the bedrooms and Sierra is home sick, so when the phone rang at 10:40 I answered (well I screened but when I heard Jennifer's voice I picked up) and Jennifer from HAI gave me the wonderful news. We got our first decree!!! Samantha will be home and joining our family in six to eight weeks! I am so relieved that it is finally happening. It has been so hard waiting for so long and watching Samantha grow (and not grow like she should - we got an update a few days ago and she's still in the 13 pound range at 9 months and she has not even doubled her birth weight yet) for over half a year. She was only three months old when we got her referral. She will be 11 months old (if the 6-8 weeks holds true) when we pick her up. For most of us 8 or 9 months isn't really that long (unless you're waiting to pick up your baby!) but for a baby that length of time brings so many changes it's unreal. We are just thrilled that we are now so close to bringing her home and we will continue to pray for a speedier process because we really want to get her home before her first birthday, especially since we always thought she'd be home by the time she turned 9 months, and so far everything has taken longer than we expected. We are still struggling with not having her with us for Christmas but instead of just being sad that she's not here we can plan a belated Christmas celebration and start wrapping the Christmas gifts that Sierra and I picked out for her. I couldn't bring myself to wrap them when everything was so up in the air. Although I wish Sierra was not sick (she has a tummy bug and a sore, red and swollen throat) I am glad that we were able to share in this moment. She cheered and jumped on the guestroom bed, which is in the living room because our house is totally torn apart (I will post later about all of the work that's going on in our house!) and then we checked the calendar and started planning our trip. Hopefully we will be in Taiwan in January picking up Samantha and starting our new life as a family of four!

Reports, photos, updates and ice skating

From the ice walker (to help beginners) to full out ice skating in less than 15 minutes!
At 25 pounds this is the biggest Turkey I've ever cooked (because we waited so long to buy it they were out of normal sized turkeys); Sierra, struggling to hold Logan, with said turkey(actually only half - the day after Thanksgiving!); Sierra and Logan eating - Sierra only eats biscuits, turkey and cranberries while Logan ate almost everything!

Samantha is now 9 months old. She really is a pretty and sweet looking baby girl! It has been almost six months since we accepted her referral. We sure wish someone could explain to us why it's better for her to be spending so much time in an orphanage when she has had a family ready, willing and able to pick her up for so long but we are hoping and praying every night that the judge on her case will finally see his way to grant her first decree so she doesn't have to spend any more time without her family. This last photo is Samantha with Eric. I will ask Judy who the woman holding them is but she is busy taking care of Eric now since this was the day she picked him up!

The past week was hectic with Sierra's progress report and parent-teacher conference, a school field trip, a Thanksgiving potluck and us cooking and hosting Thanksgiving plus mini updates on Samantha from our adoption agency and a yahoo friend who picked up her own baby girl and another who picked up her baby boy!

First, Sierra's school performance deserves some recognition so I will give her some here. She has always done exceptionally well in school so everyone just expects it but I think she deserves more credit for how hard she works. Academically she is doing great. She will be starting 7th grade algebra in January despite being in 5th grade and being the youngest in her class and she is doing even better in language arts and writing! According to her teacher her reading comprehension is limitless, she is always conscientious and meticulous about the quality of her work, she is very creative, detailed and thorough in her writing and she takes pride in her finished work. She also said she always helps other students when needed and she enjoys helping around the classroom. Her shyness is also becoming less an issue and her teacher says she is now regularly speaks up in class. This is her third year in this school and we are very pleased with how comfortable she now is in school. Although becoming comfortable has taken years if you knew how very, very shy she is the fact that she is now voluntarily standing in front of her class and speaking is huge! She is still shy outside of school but she is slowly becoming more comfortable outside of home and school. As always, we are very pleased with her work ethic, the effort she puts into her schoolwork and her learning and the effort she puts into helping her teachers and fellow students. We are even more proud of what a wonderful, thoughtful, loving and helpful daughter she is in our lives!

Samantha's update was also very good and exciting. Actually there were two mini updates. The first update was from HAI (our adoption agency) who called SLC (Samantha's orphanage) to get a clarification on Samantha's weight, eating and energy issues. They were told that she is now eating better and seems to be gaining weight. They did not address the energy issue at all but our friend, Tiffany, from our adoption group on Yahoo, got a chance to see Samantha on November 19th, when she went to pick up her beautiful daughter Sophia. She said, "OMG Samantha - I cannot even express how her pictures do her NO justice at all - she is cute in the pics but in person - but she is SOOOOOOO cute...she was smilin up a storm at me and cooing!! She is so very beautiful. She was up and crawling around - - she seemed great and healthy - she is a peanut though and the nurses said she was doing really well. There was nothing lethargic about her...smiling the whole time." It is always great to hear what someone I know has to say rather than just a few words from the doctor or the nanny, which often sound like something is wrong, at least in Samantha's case! She also took some photos but because she used a disposable camera we haven't seen them yet. We are so grateful to Tiffany and Chris not only for all of that first hand information but also for giving SLC individual photos of us to put in Samantha's crib and for all the helpful and useful Taiwan information Tiffany took the time to send to us from Taiwan in the middle of her initial days with her baby girl. We are very grateful to her and her husband Chris for their thoughtfulness.

Halloween and an Update!!!!

This week we got our October update of Samantha. We were relieved that she FINALLY gained some weight although we wish she'd gained a bit more. She is only one pound more than she was back in July. That is very worrisome. She only weights 13 pounds and is 25.98 inches long. We’re hopeful that this is the beginning of her eating like they want and gaining an appropriate amount of weight. Our friend Judy took some food for her son Eric and she was kind enough to consent for them to give some to Samantha when the nurse asked. The fact that they're worried too is also worrisome. The update itself said she was a very pretty baby, nice temper, quiet and does not like to exercise! Huh?

Now for the Halloween festivities. Sierra had a good Halloween and although she was not feeling her best all in all it was busy and fun. On the Saturday before we went to her school carnival (both Jeremy and I worked at the carnival) where she won a fabulous art kit in the raffle. That evening we went trunk or treating at the church. On Halloween we took Logan and his dad's cousin’s trick or treating and on our way home Jeremy dropped us off at the beginning of our street and she and I trick or treated our way home. We have a very long street. She received a total of 197 pieces of candy - yes, she counted! She will eat about five of them!! She only likes dark chocolate and kit kats so I will take the rest to work for customers and co-workers.

She had two very different costumes - both of which she created on her own without us having to buy anything except some grey face makeup. The first (trunk or treat) costume was Nancy Drew (currently her favorite book series) but she was not thrilled that no one knew who she was (she even created a mystery). So on Halloween she decided (a few hours before trick or treating) she would be a vampire. She did NOT actually know what a vampire was until I did her make up and then she was upset with the fake blood on her face. I did not know she did not know about vampires until she got upset! She could not look at herself but wanted to stay scary. The scariest thing she's ever seen or read is Goosebumps and those cause her to not be able to sleep alone and to have nightmares so scary is not her thing!

Now for the photos of Samantha, Halloween and anything else that catches my fancy!

Our precious Samantha...

Most of the photos sent this month were actually older than the ones sent last month so I added one of Judy's to these. Oh and the current photos they did take were taken the same day Judy took hers!!

Pumpkins!!!!

The first pumpkin we've ever grown (and we've had many fabulous gardens but usually have no luck with pumpkins and watermelons) -- Sierra and Logan at the Pumpkin Patch
The School Carnival

Sierra running her booth--Sierra trying to win a cake (she won brownies)--Sierra with the art kit she won in the raffle--Logan as Yoda

Trunk or Treating

Sierra as Nancy Drew (she even wrote her own mystery, which she carried with her)--Nancy Drew and Yoda--Nancy and Yoda fishing for treats--Finally trunk or treating!

Halloween Night

Vampire Girl and Yoda--the Trick or Treaters--The Loot with the mean looking Vampire Girl


This is totally unrealted to Halloween but Sierra was very excited, and very nervous, to lead the Girl Scout meetings this month - this is her troop at the zoo meeting/field trip