Saying Goodbye..

Today we said goodbye to the girl we thought would be our daughter... It's hard to explain this type of loss. It's not like a child has died, but it kind of feels that way. She will still be alive, living in Europe with her forever family. But, the family of five that we had been planning to have in a few months will not be.

When we first found out in November that something, somewhere had gone terribly wrong with our adoption we were just devastated. {and angry!} It was like I had been dreaming of life with this little girl for more than 6 months and BAM, just like that the dream was over. We knew that China was unpredictable, we knew that things weren't 100% for sure, but everything had been going so well, we had given our hearts fully to this girl. It's very hard to feel so helpless in the situation as well. There is just nothing you can DO. I've experienced loss through miscarriage before... and for me, this has been SO.MUCH.WORSE. Not to minimize the loss of any child, but I already knew what her face looked like... I already knew her spunky personality, we already have smiles, and kisses and memories of her... and now she's gone. We had already carried her in our hearts for 6 months. 

It was good for me to see her one last time. She was here for a medical check up and we know the family taking care of her. It was also super sad to see her again, but I hope for all of us this will help us to move on. It still hurts though. We have been praying with the boys that YiLi will have a wonderful life with her new family and I really do pray that for her. 

She was sleeping today when we saw her. All tired out from a long morning at church. It was still good to see her sweet face and for the boys to get a chance to say good-bye.

We appreciate your prayers as we grieve this loss and also continue to move forward with our adoption dream. I'll write more on this later, but we have switched agencies since this all happened and continue to cling to our passion to add to our family through adoption. 

Good-bye little one.. we love you!

Cookie Exchange and Decorating party

This afternoon I hosted our annual cookie decorating and exchange. It was as crazy and fun as usual. The kids had a blast and I walked away with a lot of cookies... so it was all worth it!

Let's start off with a peek at my kitchen this morning... oh wow!

And now some fun! Max was very "helpful" this morning.

 Decorating cookies

 Eating cookies!

 Taking cookies home!

Thanksgiving and Disney

We had our big Thanksgiving dinner last week last Saturday. The food was amazing and it was a really fun time. We spent actual Thanksgiving decorating our home for Christmas, then yesterday {Friday}at Disney. It was the first time we had all been together as a family. I had been with the boys and Bryan had been with school groups. We also met up with some friends and it was a super fun and long day!!

Sports Day

Today was the Elementary School Sports day... I was in charge of this fine group this afternoon. {with another mom} We took the kids around from event to event.

the sack races...

 Even Max got a job helping the teacher direct the kids...

 Ring Toss

 Egg on spoon relay

 Jack and his buddy Malcolm

 Heat 1 of the 50M race

 Max and Annette

 Max enjoyed the day too! He didn't have school due to Parent Teacher Conferences, so we had a nice day all together! These are two other teacher's kids, so max knew lots of friends.

 the P1 {jacks grade} 50M final

Jack was so happy! The fastest kids in P1

 Three fast kids!!! The girls ran a separate race..

 Great buddies!!!

Fall Festival and camping weekend

Grandma and Grandpa Schroeder are here for a couple weeks. We are having a great time. Last weekend was the big school walkathon and fall festival. It was a beautiful day and we had lots of fun. After that was finished we had all our camping gear ready to go and headed out to our favorite beach with a few friends. My Mom had said that she really wanted to experience camping on a beach, so we had planned to take them while they were here. It was a great night with good weather and tasty food. The kids had a blast in the water and sand... We finished with pizza dinner back in Sai Kung before heading home. 

 Nothing like time in the ocean at 6am ;o)

 yeah for coffee!!