The cake

Here is the BEAUTIFUL cake from the shower that my friend Nadia made. It took 8 hours to make!!! She actually left school early so she could make it and told me she had a dentist appointment :) I said she needs to go into business!! It even has Chinese characters for her name written on it. (You can also see the "sushi socks" in the picture above)

Here are the party favors:

BABY SHOWER!!!!

My coworkers surprised us with a baby shower on Saturday and what a surprise it was!!! I was completely shocked and it took a while to recover. I still can't get over their generosity. It was so beautiful---the entire house was decorated in a Chinese theme and the cake was gorgeous and so detailed. The girl who made the cake organized the whole shower down to every detail!! I don't have the pictures of the shower yet but I will post some pictures of what we got. Everyone was way to generous!!!!!
Some of the things we got (I am posting these so our families can see everything :)):



My sister-in-law has decided she will be the best dressed baby around :)
Emily- she now has three red dresses!




Summer- here we come!

The yellow one says "hand picked"


Everyone brought a board book for Kaili- it was so creative!



Bath time!



A waste basket and hamper to match our bed set.





THANK YOU SO MUCH TO EVERYONE FOR THEIR GENEROSITY-- I can't express how thankful we are!

3 Months!

Kaili Hope is 3 months old as of yesterday! It is hard to believe that we will be getting her in less than two months. We called the orphanage last night to see how she was doing. She had just finished a bottle (which they said she ate quickly) and was falling asleep. They tried to wake her up to get her to giggle for us on the phone but she wasn't gong to wake up for anything :). They did say she giggles a lot! We didn't hear anything else they said because the connection was really bad.

My sister has been bugging me to buy her red clothes so I did finally did buy her a red dress. She is ethnically Atayal, (a minority group in Taiwan) and traditionally they like to wear red. The Atayal people are interesting to read about. This site has info and pictures http://www.taiwandna.com/AborigineAtayalPage.html.

Almost 3 months old and........AWAKE

What a joy to open our email today. This is our first picture of Kaili with her eyes open and what beautiful eyes she has!!!!

They said she is doing really well. She eats about 4 ounces each time she is fed. They also wrote that she is smiling and giggling a lot. We are so excited to go get her.

Here a picture my sister in law sent me of all the babies at the orphanage. Can you find Kaili? I actually don't know which one she is but I have an idea.

Court Date

We finally heard about when our court date will be....It is on March 25th at 10:45 am Taiwan time (8:45 pm our time). They said we should be able to get her one month after the court date so it is coming up soon!!! The time seems to go by really fast and really slow all at the same time. Matt and I were counting and we could have as little as seven weekends left before we have a baby in the house.

We should get another picture soon as it is the beginning of March. I keep checking my email hoping to see one.

We did get to talk to the director of the orphanage the other night and Kaili was eating a bottle when we called. He said she is eating well but that she just eats really slow- he called her a "dainty eater". I often pray that she will get enough attention with her being one of 20 babies and so I guess it is good that she eats slow because then it makes people have to hold her longer!

Keep praying for our precious little one!

We went out and bought a new outfit for Kaili to send to Taiwan and decided that she needed a color other than pink :).


Here are a few "coincidences" that we have had happen leading up to Kaili's adoption:

1. One day before Kaili was born, we had the completed homestudy in our hands. She was born early so it was like she was born as soon as we were ready with the paper work.

2. Before we even knew about her, we had picked out the name Kai (恺 )-joyful Li (莉)-part of the word for white Jasmine flower. When the orphanage called us, they said that they had named her Ai (艾)-to be just unfolding Li (莉)-same as the character we had picked out! How neat that the names which were picked out seperately were so close!

3. Money: a few years ago Matt's family started an "adoption fund" for us. They collected change and gave it to us each year on our anniversary. That money, plus the generosity of my family, and an anonymous gift we had EXACTLY(plus a hundred dollars) the right amount of money to cover ALL expenses. I think back and wonder at the needless worrying I did about the exorbitant amounts of money you need for adoption. This orphanage is amazing on how much they provide and God knew ahead of time just how much we needed. Oh me of little faith:)

4. Timing: It is looking like when we get her will be right at the end of Matt's schooling. He will be able to take care of her until I finish school and then we will have a semi-free summer where we can bond with her before Matt gets a job (hopefully in September after he takes his Bar Exam).

- we could look at these as a who bunch of cool coincidences OR we could look at it as coming from a LOVING GOD WHO IS IN CONTROL OF EVERYTHING. I choose to believe the latter!

God is Good

We got another picture today! It was taken when she was a month old after we sent the package to her. The outfit is my favorite of the ones we sent- they put the adorable headband on her! I can't wait to put this precious picture in her baby book. Thank you to EVERYONE who is praying for her. It is so hard to wait!!!!!!!

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. psalm 139:13-14