Happy Chinese New Year!

Today began the year of the Rabbit. We had a great celebratory day at our home.

We had a huge dinner of Gingered Chicken and Broccoli, Oranges, Egg Rolls, Steamed Rice and Hot Tea. We used Quinny's red and turquoise tea set from China. The girls wore their beautiful dresses, and we played both traditional and contemporary Chinese music for dinner. Afterwards we celebrated with jelly-filled spongecake, fortune cookies, and firecrackers on the back deck. Yes, the deck is still there.

Mother Nature, What Have You Done?

Boo Hoo - My Mother's Day Willow Tree..10 years old. :(

Frozen berries on John's trees across the street

The McKim Observatory - Beautiful no matter what the weather holds.

Me - Beautiful no matter what the weather holds! :)

Alex - Spending as much time with him as I can....Two more years and he's gone..

We have been battered by an ice storm. Two days off of school so far, and the kids have been pretty well behaved.......so far. (It's still 8:30 a.m. and only one of them is up.)

Yesterday Alex and I walked to the dentist over by Kroger. Our car is frozen solid, and currently Henning's tree is in our driveway.

So far, we've lost the Willow tree, and many large branches from some of the older trees. This pleases me, since they were rotting and needed to come down anyway. However, there are just as many mangled ones dangling up there in the tree now.

It was so quiet walking to the dentist yesterday. Like today, yesterday there weren't any cars on the road, so it was peaceful. You could hear his high school bells ringing from over a mile away.

We took lots of pics on our one mile hike to the dentist, and I didn't even have a cavity!

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2011!!

What a great night last night! We saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in Terre Haute and ate at Steak and Shake. We got home at about 9:00ish, and the kids made New Year Hats. When the ball dropped we were all together hand in hand yelling Happy New Year!! It was a very special moment, and one I'll never forget. Hand in hand....our little family celebrating the future together. I love my family! I hope you all have a great new year full of adventure, love, God, and family. Peace.

Christmas Card Pictures!

Once again, we have taken the annual Christmas Card. Showering on a Saturday goes against my personal protocol, but when it's all finally over, I'm always glad we take the time to make those cards. It's stressful, somebody usually ends up crying and we have to take a five minute break here and there, and every time, and I do mean everytime, it gets harder and harder to find a good picture of yours truly. I can understand now why people get nipped and tucked! I look tired!! Now, maybe it's the four children and full time job, but I'm telling you, I need PhotoShop on my computer! We did have a great time and MK and Q were troopers! They are hams! I have included several of the pictures from our "shoot" today!

Time for an UPDATE!

Magruber

Gotcha Day, November 17th, 2010. Two years with her family!

The Northwood 'hood.

Riff-Raff from Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Harry Potter takes flight.

Our little Cheerleader and scary but beautiful vampire!

Happy 8th Birthday MK!

It's been a while since my last post. Our computer was not working, and I didn't want to post from work or on our laptop...But, now the computer is fixed and I'm back in action again!!

My last post was in July, and we've celebrated a birthday, a Gotcha Day, and Halloween. I've almost lost my grandmother to cancer. My grandma was an amazing woman and my mentor in "How to live life"....which was basically be a friend to others, be a patient wife (still working on that one), and have fun with the life you have...So, I'm a work in progress right now. :)

MK turned 8 in September and had lots of friends over. We had a real tea party complete with Bristish tea, (which is what we drink on a daily basis at our home) tea sandwiches, (egg salad, cream cheese and jelly, cream cheese and cucumber) and a six layer strawberry cake. It was yummy. MK is growing up, becoming a beautiful young lady, and looked stunning in her black and white dress.

Gotcha Day was emotional as always, because I always feel extremely blessed that things worked out the way they did with Quinn. She has been home two years as of Thanksgiving (with us since November 17th), and I truly believe God handpicked that little girl for us. She is hilarious, mischevious, and SMART.

Lastly, Halloween was once again lots of fun. We held our yearly, family party and had lots of food and fun. I look forward to this time together every year with my family.

Family

It was great to see my parents, grandparents, and my brother and his family this past weekend. They (my brother) are currently in the process of adopting from Ethiopia. I am over the moon for them, and can't wait until they get to meet their little Henry. I am also thrilled to be going with them on the second leg of their journey as their videographer. I can't wait to be part of their experience. I still remember the day our daughter was brought to us in the Civil Affairs office in Guangzhou. We were waiting with the Macler's and there was another family from I believe Spain or maybe it was France. They brought their daughter out to them and of course they were crying tears of joy and speaking a mile a minute in Spanish or was it French?. And then, they brought our girl out to us. I still remember my shock at how heavy she was. She was finally tangible, and I was amazed at her solid little stature. She had a story to tell, and I could see it in those big, beautiful brown eyes.

Yesterday we were looking at pictures of the orphange. She says the ladies in pink were nice, but when I showed her a picture of her crib, she said "I don't like it, it's dirty." I know we've never talked about the conditions of the orphange, which were very nice I thought, but in her mind, maybe that's what she remembers. I know they loved her though, because she is a very outgoing little girl who loves life with a passion.

Donovan and Quinn at the White Swan Hotel, Guangzhou, China

More Random Pictures

So, here are some more random pictures for you all....I'm so far behind!!

Phillip and I at Halloween. He's Billy Idol and I'm a witch.

Christmas 2009 with the Asbells

Grandpa and Todd

Daddy showing his "tea party" pride......

Alex as Basil in "The Diviners"

Alex and Quinn

MK wearing Ashley's hat.

These are the infamouse mating toads. We also have mating tree frogs, but I didn't get pictures of them. Needless to say we have hundreds of baby tadpoles in our kiddie pool now. It's so much fun to see nature on our deck!

When we dried cherries on our deck, it attracted lots of beautiful butterflies like this one.