WE GOT THE CALL.......

Well to say that it has been a crazy few days in the Whitten household would be quite an understatement!
I had surgery last Friday, can't sleep well, can't drive for at least two weeks, and during my 6-week recovery time cannot lift anything over 10 pounds.  I can't clean, do laundry, load the dishwasher, wait a minute...those are a few of the benefits of my surgery.  At least they are for me but not so much for my husband (hee, hee).   But I am happy to say that I am healing very well and starting to get more rest, which is a very good thing. Going on 6 hours of sleep in a 4 day period will do CRAZY things to your emotions!

Speaking of emotions, last night was a big night for our family as we finally got the call from Cori, our adoption counselor from Great Wall around 11 pm.  Cori had been searching through the shared list for a "match" for our family and she called David's cell phone with the good news.  To be honest I was asleep and when David came running up the stairs with the phone I thought something was wrong.  David put Cori on speaker phone and we were told about a precious little 3 year old girl who is waiting to be adopted.  This little girl was left on a street corner when she was 3 months old.  Not sure why because her special needs are very minor and now we are in the process of finding a Dr. who will look over her file to tell us more.  Now that we have her file we only have 72 hours (until Thursday night) to make our decision, so please join us in prayer as we make this very important decision.

David and I prayed over her last night before we even opened her file. We prayed that the Lord would
give us clear direction and unite our family with this decision.  We woke the girls up this morning to show
them pictures of what may soon be their little sister (I get chills just typing those words) and they were both excited.  Morgan even asked if she could take her picture to school!  We are not allowed to do that just yet but it was good to know that both she and McKinley are feeling good about her.

Over the past 5 months God has continually shown Himself to our family in some big and small ways.  As we make this decision I trust He will do so again.  Keep praying and we will keep you posted!

Melissa

WE ARE LID !!

We have our LID date!! Hooray! I cannot tell you the excitement I felt this morning
when I opened my email & saw this letter.

           

Dear Great Wall Family,

We are happy to report that your dossier was registered in China on January 31, 2012. The registration date is also known as the Log in Date or LID.

If we receive any additional information we will contact you as quickly as possible.  In the meantime, if you need assistance or support, please feel free to give us a call.

Congratulations,

The Referral Education Team

Great Wall China Adoption

We are one step closer to bringing our child home from China! We should start

getting files to look at any day now, so I covet your prayers , as we pray over

these children. I know that the Lord will make it clear to us, which child is ours.

Keep checking back!

Melissa

Birthday Weekend!!

Yesterday was McKinley's 6TH birthday! I cannot believe that my little girl is 6!

So we celebrated at Pump it up.

                           I think everyone had a good time.

But, I must say, the best part was that may AMAZING parents got up at 3AM and drove through

the night,(10hrs) to surprise the girls! And they were BOTH super excited to see there Nana & Pawpaw.

Thanks Mom and Dad, for making our weekend.

Happy 6th Birthday McKinley, I am SO glad that the Lord entrusted me to be your mommy!

DTC!!!!!!

Hooray! We got the official email today that we are DTC (Dossier to China).
Tomorrow morning they will overnight our Dossier to China and we should get a
login date 7-10 days after that.

We will be working closely with our adoption specialist named Cori. Please
pray for Cori as she will be the one looking for a match for our family. Pray that
the Lord will guide her as she searches on our behalf.

Now, let me just take a moment to brag on my girls...Both girls have started sports
this past week. Morgan has started cheering & McKinley started Basketball.

                                                        First game!                
                                         

Happy Thursday!

CHOPPED

We watch the food network a lot at our house, and one of the shows we love is Chopped!
Well, Morgan has been asking if she could do a" chopped challenge", so last night that's
just what we did!

She was given a basket with 4 random ingredients in it, and she then had 20 minutes to
"wow" the judges ( aka: Me, David & McKinley).

Her 4 ingredients were: cream corn, pineapples, chicken breast & buttermilk biscuits.

She prepared the biscuits and added the cream corn & some cheese, she "pipped"
them into the mini muffin pan( cause obviously, that is what a real chopped competitor would do).

She then made some sort of pineapple sauce, just to garnish the plate with.

Nope, it isn't as thick as  she would like it to be so, let's grab some cornstarch

Plating the food for the judges :)Love that she didn't bother to wash off the cornstarch. Ha!

and the final product looks like this::::

What a fun night we had, and I must say we just might do it again! It actually wasn't bad
at all,. McKinley ate most of the chicken, and her little corn muffins were mighty tastie!
So the next time your kids are bored, just have a "Chopped Challenge"



On another note, I will hopefully get word by the end of this week or first of next week that our
Dossier has made it to our Adoption Agency. Once that happens, they mail it to China!!! Chinese
new year starts next week, so that is going to push us back a week, but we should still get a login date hopefully by the first week in Feb.  We still appreciate your prayers as we go this this process.

Blessings,
Melissa

A Day at the Park!

Since the girls were out of school today, we took them to this park in Tampa.
we recently found this park & the girls LOVE it!

And yes, we are STILL wearing our Alabama clothes! Roll Tide Roll :)

Rolling down the big hill! I remember doing this as a child in my back yard.

So after a fun morning at the park, we headed to IKEA. What a way to end our afternoon :)



I tell my girls all the time how Blessed we are to live so close to all these amazing places. We are
an hour away from Disney World and a hour from several great beaches. BLESSED, that's for sure!


Happy Monday!

My Little Entrepreneur!

Morgan has started making Duct tape items, and I must say they are turning out really cute!
She made a back Pack and took it to school yesterday, and came home with several "orders"
from her classmates:). Her plan is to make a bunch of back paks, purses, bows & wallets to
sell at out Garage sale that we are going to have in a few months, to help with the Adoption costs.


Here are a few of her Masterpieces.....

she made this one for her sister!

cute little hair bows

It just wouldn't be complete without  zebra!



Keep up the good work, Morgan!