Let the countdown begin!!

so how prepared am i not??

 

i did not buy anything for kim to give her when we meet. for some reason i am still drawn back to taking her fresh flowers and i think i saw there is a flower shop here in the hotel so i am going to follow my lead...for some reason God always provides me witht hose thoughts and words so i do pay attention and follow.

 

 i layer and prayed again that kim in these final hours is with an open heart and with the mental and physical strength to go thru the adjustment time. that she is willing to accept us, but i also prayed that the girls with me, that carrie and i and those surrounding us are giving the strength and guidance to help her.

last night late we met amy and bill littlefield. i think them and claude and i would be great personal friends...sort of like four peas in a pod it seemed. i will write more at some point about the gift that they gave myself and eight daughters...but i will say that sea glass is a rare treasure but to have 9 pieces all of the same blue hue, blue my favorite color is more than awesome.

the girls are doing good. kate i will write at sometime to parents thinking of bringing a child for a homeland tour or even just a tcip that is possibly out of their comfort zone. i was thankful yesterday when the plane landed in changsha that kate looked at me, with the mask held over her nose holding a bit of my perfume smell to help her thru the smells of china, that she was feeling so much better already as she could see the sun, that the sun was out here. and sure enough she only has had a couple periods of stress where she would drop onto the bed and lay down but she pulled right out of it and has been rocking and rolling to the point that i told her and penny at midnight they had to knock it off!

penny on sunday a.m. told me her tummy felt bad, it had the night before too, i had marked it up to tired praying it was not food illness, etc.and in just a few moments she had her hand across her face hiding and was crying. where do i get the words that come after let me get the trash can if you are going to throw up! to comfort her and to say honey are you sure you want to see mama g or you are missing mama g? (pennys foster mama who is meeting us here in changes ) and it was she is simply missing her and was overwhelmed in the waiting for her. so some tylenol for the headache from tears and thankfully was able to put away the trash can.

morgan told me that an aunt was bringing a gift for her to the airport(oh God where would we put that along with the 25 pounds of english walnuts and the gallon of honey they so wonderfully gave carrie and i and the pumpkin and sunflower seeds?) and when we were at the beijing airport i was so careful with her as i know she was searching the crowds for the aunt. as going thru security she still did not realize that this would not happen as she was thinking they could come to us wherever we were but when sitting at the gate she said simply well i guess they not coming. mom do you have her card she gave us. so i got it out and she found there is an email for her there and knows we can email them pictures and updates now where in the past it was only by phone that they caught up. this lady is the foster fathers sister so we will send photos, etc. the only photos on the foster families walls were of them with morgan on the day they were told she as going back to the swi and a photo of her when she was either 2 or 7 i cannot remember at the moment. none of their biological children. she was so so loved by this family.

so today we get kim...after a year of waiting! i will update with photos as soon as we have a moment, we are to first Skype with claude when we get back to the room and then the girls when they wake up in their morning....

One More Day!!

then kate and Yue Yan laying Jinga and then one of the needlepoint that yue yan made for kate that took her three months.

now the amazing thing was that the needle point is a total copy of the painting watercolor we had bought for kate in china only it was in black and white...now that is crazy as yue yan would never have seen the painting we have!

we are in changes now and counting the hours til we get kim. we get her about 10 to 10:30 a.m. monday. night all we are beat!

We spent the day saturday visiting Morgans foster parents and then met Yue Yan here at the hotel who had cared for Kate at hanzhong.

                         Just a little ad lib here but the flower picture is my absolute favorite!!

Continue to keep them all in your prayers. Only one more day until Kim is welcomed into her forever family!!!

An update from Ruthi!!!

Can you hear me squealing with excitement?!?!?!

Here it is~

As always aunt Carrie is great. First flight delayed and Kate not a good waiter...doing a wood search.

             Not much longer now for "Kim day"!!! We can not wait, safe travels Ruthi!!

A lot of you know we are adopting again, others are gonna be shaking their heads saying I thought you said seven was completion? Well I think we will practise eight (daughters) is enough. Myself, Morgan, Penny, Kate and my sister Carrie leave Thursday July 7th for Changsha, Hunan Province, China to being the new Kim Coats home. Age is 13, and we pray she loves us and accepts us. Please say prayers for safe travel, good health, and cooler weather! Also include Claude and the girls that are at home as he goes into "Lock Down Mode" and orders everyone to not get sick, not get hurt, don't ask to go anywhere! My sincere thank you to our family, to Cindi and Crystal, our sons, our daughter in-laws and friends for the care you give to them at home. We will get home Thursday July 19th into Peoria about 10 p.m. While in China we will see Morgan's foster parents, Penny's foster mama and meet the caretaker of Kates, Yue Yan, that so cared for her that she named her own daughter Kate's Chinese name Jia Xin. This will be the first time that they will meet each other since 2004. Thank you for following the blog and the prayers. The photo is the last one we received of Kim.

a life (and physical) changing experiance

left-this was the moment Judy and Vicky, and the rest of us got to see the full extent of the 5.63 inches added to her height.

right-one of Judy's friends, Sarah, she was helping get Judy in the car to come home, but through Judy's stay at the hospital she also cared and comforted her.

the pain button was her best friend at times, the x-ray on the left is before, on the right is after.

December 6th Claude, myself and Judy checked into the Children's Hospital in St. Louis, MO for spinal fusion surgery. We were all thankful for what was a fast start to getting changed into surgery clothes, vitals taken, medical information sharing, and a perfectly set up I.V. on the first try. Judy had to receive a massive dose of an antibiotic since she was going to have a lot of metal rods and screws put in the back plus some artificial "bone". This med can create itching, and getting very warm...thankfully Bendadryl solves the itching and cold rags helped the warm face. We called Vicky on the phone and shared prayers as Judy was getting sleepy from pre-surgery meds and then said our good byes to her at the doors to surgery. Claude and I both had tears, praying for this child who waited forever to be adopted and to come America for the best Dr. to treat her Scoliosis. And for what we knew she would be going through during recovery. The surgery started at 9 a.m. and we did not see her in recovery until about 6:30 p.m. and when we did we saw a child attached to three I.V.'s and a central line, compression socks, heart monitors, simply everything....but she opened her eyes to say to us thank you Mama, thank you Baba...oh baby thank YOU!

Judy was in PICU overnight, the next morning when Dr. Linke came in to see her she opens her eyes to say Thank you, Dr. How humbling this child is in her gratefulness. She sat up on the side of the bed while yet in PICU, was moved to a regular room that afternoon, which turned out to be the same one we were in with with Gracie in 2010!

On this floor Judy continued to touch everyone with her thank yous, she called the nurses girlfriend or friend, and they all were simply the best ever! We had to deal with several pleasant things, balloons and stuffed animals sent to her, wonderful care from the providers, great pain team to keep her comfortable...but some yucky things too, breathing treatments, laying flat on her back and not able to turn to throw up (imagine long hair all around her now covered in it) getting up several times a day to walk (she stayed very very strong and walked as far as they wanted to each time).

Judy was released on Tuesday afternoon, a week after her surgery. The Nurses aid Sarah and I got her in the car, her and i held hands and I said just be strong and brave Judy for this 4 hour ride home. She had a wonderful smile for me. What a daunting thing to face, a four hour ride with a spinal patient...at the Alton, IL exit I let my friends Mark and Barb know that we had went past their check point and things were ok and she sent me back the message that she had placed Angels all around our car to get us home. This message stayed with me the whole ride home! Thank you Babs.

We stopped in Springfield next and she got moved to the back seat to lay down and she rode the rest of the way home there. Claude opened the door here at home and looked down over her and she just giggled in delight to be home. I felt like crying in relief to be home!

We are so thankful for Judy having came through this HUGE surgery safely, for Dr. Leinke and his whole team of nurses, pain management, and all for handling this child's health and care as if it were themselves being treated. We are thankful for the 6 girls at home that handled the separation of family during this time as well as they did, and for our family helping or offering to help. Thank you to Carrie and Jodi for the care, and the daunting task of taking 6 girls to get their photos taken, to Cindy and Crystal for filling in here at home besides everything else you do for us. Judy's recovery will be in stages, the first two months the critical time of healing, after that it is 6months of limited activity and then for the rest of a year she still has to be careful. right now she is to lay straight, and has to be helped sit, lay, get up, with no twisting. Even washing her hair now is a task as her back cannot get wet. Everyday will get easier we are sure...today she wanted to do Match class so now she is resting until it starts...an amazing child! And the even better parts to this story is that Judy has seen God answer her prayers and learned that He does listen to you. Plus she "grew" 5.63 inches in height. Please continue keeping her in your prayers....will be a long recovery.

Thanksgiving and so much to be thankful for

I am not that good at this blog and editing...so the labels are not by the photos as they should be...the first one is of our son Alex who had to have part of the $ dance at Eric and Chelsea's wedding, I did not get a picture of the end "dip" but it was fabulous! Good job Alex.

The second is Eric and Chelsea with our grand-children Drew and Gabbie

The third is of our grand-daughters (L) Natalie and (R) Ava. What a perfect picture!

The fourth is of all of us "girls". I was so thankful that Beth was available for an early morning visit to our house to do hair for everyone! This is the completed job! Thank you Beth!!

The fifth is of Eric and Alex. They came for a early morning breakfast the day of Eric's wedding. Eric was practising his first kiss of the new Mrs. Williams...Alex was not that excited about him being the practise target.

We seem to have been in a whirlwind lately. Claude and I made the decision to home educate the girls that are in Jr. high and High School. It was hard to understand how a child can be an A student but not be able to read close to that grade level, or how can a child be considered to be put in drivers Ed when they cannot read a sign?, and when a child asks to be moved out of an environment and you speak to them to ask more questions to understand why and to see why it became clear it was time to act on that little push/idea we had been having for the last 2 years. So 4 girls start home education this coming Monday! We are very blessed to have a great team, both Cindy and Crystal will be our educators and we will be involved as well.
Our son Eric married Chelsea and joined his family with hers. We now have another grand-daughter named Gabbie and who is so sweet!. The day was perfect for all and was a wonderful wedding.

Judy had been scheduled for a Halo traction starting in Oct but another child was in need of the Dr much more than Judy and she was bumped out of the line-up. We met with Dr. Leinke the Wed before Thanksgiving and she is now scheduled for surgery Dec. 6th and has been blessed to be found flexible enough to skip the month in Halo traction. We are all glad of this, it would have meant long distance parenting for that whole month as she would have been in the hospital in St. Louis all of that time. Now she is expected to be in the hospital about 5-7 days and then home for recovery. The surgery is a huge surgery, correcting a 107 and a 106 degree curvature in the upper and the lower back. Please hold this child in your prayers for a easy recovery and quick healing.

We have gotten our finger prints done-yes again-and are now waiting for the next document to come so we can send our dossier to China for our next daughter. We have chose the English name of Kim and yet are prepared for the fact that when we get to China she may already have an English name picked out.

Claude and Andrew, Kris and a friend of ours went to Lake Weiss a few weeks ago to enjoy some days of fishing. They were all successful catching fish and having a good time. It was deer season already and Alex and I this year were joined with my grandson Drew age 10. He was so fortunate to be out and see a 8 point buck and get to bag his first deer! Of course Alex had to have him mark his forehead of the first deer a tradition he has carried on from his Uncle Andy, my brother.

As we are closing in on Christmas I hope that everyone is well, and that we are home for St. Louis with our Judy healing well. We are grateful for our family and friends that will help Claude with the girls here at home while I am with Judy at the Children's Hospital in St. Louis. Thank you for the prayers for our family.