handsful

Last night, we spread out a sheet and ate our dinner in front of the TV…the Steelers were playing for a shot at the Super Bowl. 

I kinda married into the whole Steelers craze.  Randy played football as a kid, on the Cary Steelers.  That was all it took to make him a fan for life.

The kids have embraced the fever as well.  Even the littlest ones.  After every big play, Dylan frantically looked around for someone to high five!

Lainey was in the spirit as well.  She didn’t have a Steelers shirt, so she wrapped a scarf around her waist.  She worked it well. 

First half, our guys were unstoppable.  They probably heard us cheering in Pittsburgh.  Second half, we were biting our nails and everyone else’s nails.  But, they pulled it out and we’re headed to the big game!  I feel a Super Bowl party coming on!

Finally able to get some of our Christmas pics up (yahoo!)

Later that evening…

And, here’s what we woke up to.

Our backyard.

No, we haven’t thrown our pumpkins away yet.

Yes, Ethan is trying to sled on a skim board. We have some winter shopping to do.

The artistic photos are credited to Abbey. She’d want you to know :)

Our neighbor came over with a sled – guess she felt sorry for us! Here Lainey and I are headed down. Did you know sleds are incredibly hard to steer?? We almost hit a tree, and then slammed into the bushes. Fun.

Outside our hotel…they say it’s almost Christmas, but we’re not feeling it yet. I’m sure we’ll be warp speed into it once we’re home!

Today we leave Zhengzhou for Guangzhou – our last leg of this adoption trip. Despite being told there is NOTHING to do here in Zhengzhou, we’ve enjoyed our time. Granted, there isn’t much to do, but we made the best of it. For those who will be coming after us…

– The pizza at the Italian restaurant in the Crowne Plaza is YUMMY.
– We forgot suits, but the pool looks wonderful – not sure if any of our families have tried it.
– Walk to the Wal-Mart at night. It’s quite an adventure. Beware of the silent electric scooters, you don’t hear them coming and they’re not looking for you!
– The park down the street is quite nice…a great time for interacting with the locals.
– The noodles at the Holiday Inn Express restaurant next door are good, but full of curry. Spicy!
– When you order food for your baby/toddler, be sure to explain you want SMALL quantities. They’ll send you a huge bowl otherwise.
– We’ve heard that the New Island Coffee House (beside Holiday Inn Express) is good, but smoky inside. And, the waitresses can be a bit pushy about interacting with your child – not in a negative way, but they just don’t understand adoption etiquette.
– Pizza Hut is good…tastes like home. But, they don’t have non-ice drinks to offer you so bring your own.
– If you go to Wal-Mart for some familiar snacks, be careful to check the label. You might accidently buy blueberry flavored potato chips.
– Strollers are expensive, but there is one decent umbrella stroller at the Wal-Mart for around $22.

We have to finish packing, but here are some views of Zhengzhou…

Punch!! This one’s for the kids :)

Gathered around an electronics store, watching TV.

Dance lessons, outside “Times Square”…a nightly routine.

liking the view…

Walk to the park.

This man was calling the birds…we think.

Fishing in the afternoon.

Very friendly man, we attempted to talk to. Thankfully, our lanyard cards explain that we’re in China to adopt this child. It helps some.

He charms everyone.

two-wheeled transportation greatly outnumbers four.

One of our favorites of the hotel staff.

Dylan and our guide, Rita.

Next stop, Guangzhou!

So our internet access at the hotel in Beijing is . . . well, bad.  Slow connections, bandwidth limitations, and an apparent aversion to loading images.  Long story short, we are behind in posting and will try to catch up when we get to our new digs in Zhengzhou.  Everything is going great, outside of some cold/sinus problems, and we can’t wait to share it.

Virtually no time for words here, but wanted to share our evening. We attended the Carolina Christmas at the Charlotte Motor Speedway…huge drive-through light show with music and tons of other fun stuff. Given we’ll be gone for half of December, we wanted to make some Christmas memories early.

We stopped the car so the kids could run out to the sign and pose.

I only had our point and shoot camera, but you get the idea. It was really pretty!

Of course, we looked at race cars.

Lainey found one just her size.

There were ponies to ride.

And animals to feed.

And, a first. A smiling Lainey with Santa. She still didn’t want to stand or sit by him without me, but it’s progress!

There was a lot of food. Delicious fudge, cinnamon almonds and pecans, and funnel cake. Lainey decided the powdered sugar shouldn’t go to waste.

And, what happens when you eat too much sugar? Crash! Sorry, it’s blurry…

So, what does this picture of our morning milk remind you of? Our Gotcha Day for Dylan, of course! I’m off to do more packing…

Last weekend, the jr. and sr. high leaders at church got together and visited a local farm that has a yearly corn maze. Randy now works in the jr. high at our new church, in case you didn’t know. :)

What is a corn maze? They cut a pattern in the corn when it’s short, then after harvest, there is a tall maze just waiting for people to get lost in!

Each team is given a flag and a “map”. Really, it’s no map. You have to find your way through, visit 12 mailboxes that hold pieces of the map that you attach to your map like a puzzle. Once you have all the pieces, you SHOULD be able to find your way out, assuming you’ve traced where you’ve already been.

Now, I’m not good with directions. At all. Randy is, so he was our fearless leader. Our team was Randy, me, Abbey, Marley, and Lainey. The boys were on their youth pastor, Luke’s team.

Randy was out to beat his boys to the finish line. And, it was gonna be difficult because they had a 30min head start. (Randy was late arriving since he came straight from Abbey’s volleyball game)

But, he had a system, and it worked well. All right turns. Trace where we’ve been. Then, all left turns.

Even with the boys headstart, we beat them to the finish line. Randy was quite proud.

Views from the bridge at the finish…

See all those flags wandering around!

After we all finished, we walked over to a 1700’s homestead on the property to have our pizza lunch.

The area was so beautiful and relaxing. Weather perfect. New friends to hang out with. Can’t beat it.

Highland cattle that roam the farm…very friendly. This one was having a pumpkin treat.

Our little pumpkin who loves a sassy pose.

Trying not to laugh…

Someone is missing from this picture…when WILL we get Travel Approval for Dylan???

A little in preparation for our China trip, a little because they just needed it…the cameras are at the shop having a “bath”. We kept getting this floating line in the D70, and we thought we were having issues with the D300. Turns out we had just hosed up all the settings, so they fixed those and are cleaning both cameras. Should have them back next week.

I do still have our Nikon Coolpix, but haven’t taken any pictures with it lately.  How about a quick “no pictures, short and sweet  update”?

My sweet grandmom had a fall, and hurt her back and arm badly.  She was released from the hospital and is now in a very nice rehab center.  Not sure for how long.  On top of that, her younger brother died on Friday.  She’s 89, the oldest of her 5 siblings.  And, though her body has been fairly frail for years, her mind and memory have always been spot on.  I love her so much…if you feel led, say a prayer for her?  Her name is Dorothy. 

Our weekends are SO busy these days.  On Fridays, Payton has basketball practice.   Then, his game is either 9 or 10am on Saturday.  No Saturday sleep in.  We get home, have lunch, and then head out for Abbey’s volleyball games.  Two games usually back-to-back, beginning around 2pm.  We’re there for at least 2 hours, unless there is another game in between, which means 3 hours.  Don’t get me wrong.  I LOVE watching my kids play in sports.  I’m one of those moms who yells, bites my nails, and stomps my feet.  But, there is a part of me longing for more lazy Saturdays. 

A shout-out THANK YOU to my online friend, Branda!  (Her blog is listed on my sidebar)  She has a little guy named John from China, who is just a little bigger than we think Dylan is.  She asked me if she could send me some of Johns hand-me-downs.  Uh, YES.  We received the big box on Saturday, and had such fun going through everything.  She sent a variety of sizes since we don’t know exactly what size he’s in…we’ll take a little of each.  Between this and a couple of kid consignment sales, Dylan is sitting pretty handsome for clothes! 

We’re big NFL football fans around here.  We love the Pittsburgh Steelers and the San Diego Chargers.  The Steelers because Randy grew up loving them.  The Chargers because their quarterback used to be the star quarterback at NC State, where Randy went to college.  The problem is, here in NC, they rarely if ever show either team.  And, because we can’t use our Direct TV like last year (when we ordered the NFL package), we’re limited to what we can get.  So, Randy has been creative, finding the games online for free to watch.  He also has cords and cables that allow him to put the computer picture on the TV.  He’s techy like that.  So, we’ve been able to watch quite a bit.  The Chargers aren’t doing so hot, but the Steelers are holding their own. 

Lastly, we’re HOPING that we receive our Article 5 this week, so we can be one step closer to Dylan.  I don’t recall exactly what Article 5 is (ha), but I sure do know what comes after.  Travel Approval, approximately 2-3 weeks after Article 5.  And after that, we get on a plane about 2 weeks later.  We could be (MUST be) traveling NEXT month.  So anxious, but at the same time, SO not ready.  Still too much to do!  Ahhh!!