Photo Booth finds on the kids' Mac!

Imagine our surprise when we found these great vignettes on the kids' computer! This is apparently what they do downstairs when they're alone. We were wetting our pants. Hopefully it does the same for you.

Video 1, set to a remake of Dead or Alive's classic one hit wonder.

Make it go viral on Youtube! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEHOGS4a4rU

And then there's this low budget remake of Michael Jackson's famous "Thriller"

Make it go viral on Youtube! http://www.youtube.com/user/parttimecarpenter#p/a/u/0/yCLaasnz9Co

Christmas Day 2009

We had an enjoyable Christmas. My parents drove up from Phoenix this year and my brother was visiting from South American.

The kids are always able to open their stocking first thing Christmas morning and they are able to see their gifts from Santa because he does not wrap them at our house. Keaton was the first one up at 5:00am!!! Yes, you read that right! We go to church Christmas morning, so we got ready for the 9:00am Mass. Once we got home we had our Christmas breakfast then sat down to open gifts.

It was a very light Christmas this year. The kids each got one gift from Santa, little ones got two. Their gift from Mom and Dad was our drive to Disneyland in November! They also had a gift from Papa and Nana (my parents), their Uncle Norm and Uncle Heath and Aunt Julie (my brothers). Papa John and Grandma Lori sent each of the kids a gift too. They had a few gift cards to spend from Great Grandma and a Great Aunt.

I forgot to charge the camera battery so all the pictures are courtesy of my Mom!

Gavin and his DS game from Papa John

Keaton and Ava, with her chair and wooden fruit from Santa

Ava feeding her baby breakfast before church

Keaton and Mommy. He bought this for me from his schools Santa's workshop!

Ava getting a new shirt from Nana and Papa

Ava and Uncle Norm and the Winnie the Pooh book he got her!

Soren and the "Monster Hunter" game Papa John and Grandma Lori got him

Gavin and Power Miner L*gos from Nana and Papa

Keaton and the Wii game he wanted so bad from Papa John and Grandma Lori

Preston and Keaton with a Wii game that Uncle Heath and Aunt Julie bought the whole family to share

**I will be having my first GIVEAWAY on the blog in a couple days!!! Please check back and one lucky comment/person will win. This will be your chance to leave a comment so I can meet all the people that read my blog. I cant wait to share this gift with you! I will give you a hint, I have a hidden talent/hobby that I have never talked about on this blog! :-)

Making Sugar Cookies!! YUM!!

Well I got brave this year and spent the afternoon making sugar cookies with the kids. We actually had a lot of fun, even though the entire upper floor of our home was covered with sprinkles!!

Ava was so cute, her job was to put sprinkles on every cookie after Mommy put the icing on. Every time she would say "sprinkle, sprinkle, sprinkle" as she sprinkled the cookies.

The boys got quite creative as usual.

Soren "Mr. Detail"

Keaton enjoying his finished product

Soren

Gavin enjoying the peppermint sprinkles!!

YUMMY FUN!!!

What's a girl to do with so many "Hair Bows"??????

SUPPLY LIST

1. Any size canvas

2. Some fun funky fabric (to cover the canvas)

3. Some fun and funky ribbon

4. Scissors

5. Staple gun

6. Tape measure

7. Picture Hangers for the back on the canvas

8. A Hot Hubby (to be your tool man)

9. Cute little girl (to help measure)

10. Lots and Lots of Hair bows!!

Okay so after being a Mom to 4 boys, I really had no idea how many hair accessories I would start to collect?? I purchased some, received many as gifts and Ava does some modeling in return for FREE flower clips, headbands and hats.

For the last 15 months they have been collecting on my bathroom counter top and multiplying by the 10's!!

I finally decided to do a search on the internet to help me think of something that would organize all these bows and flowers. I came across the cutest idea ever!!

It took less than an hour to throw together and it is pretty inexpensive, especially if you hit the craft store on a 50% off everything sale like I did!! My canvas is about 22X28 inches. For the canvas, fabric and ribbon, it cost about $17!! I already had the picture hanger and other tools.

Since Ava is 2 1/2 and still gets into things, I knew I wanted to display her hair bows in my room/bathroom, plus that is usually where we do her hair every day. So I purchased fabrics and ribbons that would match my decor.

Enjoy the pictures of our step by step process!!!

My messy bathroom counter top! And this is not even all of them!!

Materials

Getting ready to start!!

"Hot Tool Man" Helper!!

Cutting off extra fabric before pulling taut to staple

That "Hot Tool Man" again, folding the fabric over to staple

Figuring out ribbon spacing

Ribbons spaced, stapled behind canvas and ready to attach hanger to the back

The "Hot Tool Man" and "Cute little girl" to help measure the hangers on the back

Hanger attached!!

Hung on the wall and ready for hair accessories

All done with room to spare!!!!

These would make great Birthday or Holiday gifts for the special little or big girl in your life.

**Next project- What to do with all those cute headbands???? You will love it, check back soon!

Thankful Thursdays

Dont have a lot of time for a huge post. We are still working with paypal and should have some details tonight.

Im thankful that God has called us to adopt again and cant wait to meet our new daughter!!

CRIB MATES

17 HOURS IN THE CAR WITH 5 KIDS = LONG, LONG, SOOO LONG

3 NIGHTS IN A MARRIOTT HOTEL = FREE WITH POINTS!

2 1/2 DAYS AT DISNEYLAND = FREE WITH POINTS!

2 GIRLS, CRIB MATES IN CHINA, MEETING AGAIN 15 MONTHS LATER AFTER BEING ADOPTED = PRICELESS!!!!!

FIRST MEETING AFTER 15 MONTHS OF LEAVING THE ORPHANAGE

STILL CHECKING EACH OTHER OUT. DO THEY KNOW???

Riding It's a small world with big brothers, yes it is a small world!!

Ava, Hannah, and Keaton. Big hugs!!

Having fun playing at 12:00am!!

Giggles and more giggles.

Chasing each other and having a blast

Friends Forever!!

They did not want to go back in the stroller!!

Having fun on Winnie the Pooh

Lovin Pluto

Keaton and the girls, lucky guy!

They LOVED Tigger!

This was their favorite part of the day!

Cozy, comfy!

Ava's favorite, Pooh!!!

My little Flower Bug

Ava had a little modeling job recently for Woobie Wear. She loves us taking pictures of her and my hubby and I had fun taking them!! I just cant believe how much she has changed over the last 15 months!!! We look forward to modeling for Woobie Wear for 2010 and cant wait to see all their flowers, headbands, and hats on little miss Ava!!!

Bai Jie Ya soon to be Gemma Jie Ya

Where to start??? First of all I have to tell a funny little story from tonight. I was showing the boys the new blog makeover and my 10 year old Gavin read the title. He said, "Mom why are we the Mayhem?" ha No words for that one. {{WINK}}

We have not decided on a middle name for Gemma, we will definitely keep her Chinese name as part of her middle name. I hope she will want to be called Gemma but if not we are totally fine calling her by her Chinese name. As you can see by the name she to is YaYa. They call her little Ya. We will have to let her know that in our family she will have to be "Big Ya" because we already have a little Ya. ha

This all started back in August. We were not really looking at starting another adoption this soon, we had gone back and forth about whether we would even adopt again. It has been quite a change having a baby in the house again and honestly it has been a really hard year home. Ava has attached beautifully and she can be so sweet but she can throw the punches too! She holds her own with her brothers. The most difficult adjustment has been sleep and Ava does not do it!! Night time is so hard for her and it is our biggest struggle. Even 15 months later she wakes multiple times a night and she will not sleep in her bed without my husband or I. I have had sleep issues for almost 8 years now. My wonderful amazing hubby has taken over night duty since we have been home. He puts her down every night, comes back upstairs to go to bed and within a couple hours when she wakes up he goes back downstairs to sleep with her the rest of the night. My sweet boys have all offered to sleep with her but she will not have it and wants us. When my hubby travels for work my oldest Preston steps in and does the night duty, sometimes it works and sometimes it does not. She deals with lots of nightmares and just constant restlessness. Any help or suggestions would be much appreciated!!

Towards the end of August I happened to be on Holt's Waiting Child List just looking like I always do. To my surprise they had just stared a new program called "Journey of Hope". This program was started to help find homes for kids between 7-13 that are mostly healthy but will be aging out of the process. As a scanned the pictures I came across hers!! I read her little bio and just fell in love. I ask my hubby to take a peak and together we decided to call Holt and ask to see her file. We had discussed that if we ever did adopt again that it would be an older child between 4 and 9.

About Bai Jie Ya:

DOB: February 07, 2001
Date of entry into care: February 12, 2001
Diagnosis: Normal
Bai Jinya is currently living in a foster family and is a 1st grade student. She is conscious of her studies and can basically progress along with her class. Her math scores are excellent and her language scores are good. She likes music and dancing and energetically joins her school’s activities. In terms of daily life, she is basically independent and volunteers to help “Mom” with household duties such as sweeping the floors, cleaning the tables, and making the beds. Her favorite food is chocolate, but because it is bad for your teeth, she pays attention to how much she eats. Bai Jie Ya is a young woman who certainly understands what is going on around her. This healthy, pretty little girl has been in care since February 2001 and has been living with a foster family since 2004. She is described as a lively, warm and smart little girl. She enjoys literature and also memorizes and recites classic poems. She has won awards for her jump roping abilities and also enjoys drawing, dancing and paper cutting. Her goals in life are to be a good person and possibly an artist. When asked about adoption she states that she would like a home that will last forever.

We feel she will fit into our family nicely and we were officially matched with her October 1st. We are currently working on our dossier and starting our Homestudy this coming Monday the 16th. We hope to have our dossier done in the next month. I have been reading and talking to many families that have adopted older children. We know there will be many challenges with an older child and we are trying to prepare as much as we can. Im blessed to have a wonderful Adoption Attachment group that I attend once a month and these ladies have been amazing. Once Gemma is ready to start school we also have a public Chinese Immersion school not too far down the street that she will attend. I think it will be a great transition for her. We are so excited to add her to our family and look forward to our return to China. We are happy that both Ava and Gemma are from Guangdong province and will have so much to share as they grow up together. We hope that Gemma will be able to keep her language so she came stay in touch with her foster family and friends from school.

It is so different to start our this adoption with a picture in hand but also with no money!! We know by choosing this plan God has laid out for us that the funds will come. We have decided to do a fundraiser. Please continue to follow our journey to Gemma. Thanks for all the wonderful comments about our new blog and adoption. :-) Blessings.