The summer has flown past. Everything flies past now. I look at my walls, covered with old photos. They don't seem like old photos...but in the past 3 years so much has changed. It doesn't take long for something to be an old photo anymore.

This is a short week...at least in work days. Shaun has a follow up visit in Iowa City on Friday so we are going over there in the morning for an early appointment. Then we get to spend some time hanging out with Hannah. As always, one of my favorite things to do.

And, two weeks from Friday, Haoyi will be here. That doesn't seem possible either. We have such nice talks online. We can sit and chat for over an hour at a time and not have any idea where the time has gone. We are really looking forward to having her with us this year.

When Abby saw that I had a layout of Hannah's kitten, she was quite concerned that I hadn't made one for her. So today's layout is Abby with Lovey. This photo was taken at the 4th of July parade.

The other layout is from Callie's wedding on July 5th. The lighting at the reception wasn't good so the photos weren't great. But I love this layout...sure shows the family resemblances doesn't it!

I remade an old layout that I had done with this photo. The old layout

didn't have the blended photo of the

hands in the background. I love this one because it really shows how tiny that little hand was. Sydney is still a tiny girl...but it is so hard to believe that she was ever THIS tiny. And what is even harder to believe is that 3 years ago, we'd never held this hand. Is it possible?

Shaun is often such a "goofus"! He is happy-go-lucky so much of the time. I swear that I can already hear the conversations with the teachers and they are filled with the words "class clown". And yet, sometimes he is so quiet and serious. Here is a photo where he had finished riding his bike in the hot summer sun. You can see the sweat on his head. So much depth in this son of mine!

I love this photo and I think the layout even improves it for me. It was taken on our last trip to Puerto Vallarta in 2004. What a relaxing and beautiful view we had! I suspect that we don't have any "relaxing and beautiful view" type vacations on the near horizon! And that's ok...I've had my time for those. But I'm glad that I've got this layout in case I need a "relaxing and beautiful view" 30 seconds!

I walked through the bedroom one morning and Sydney and Shaun were relaxing on the bed just like this. I ran for the camera but by the time I got back (45 seconds later), they were totally involved in something else. However, this time, they actually obliged when I asked for a re-enactment. And I got the cutest photo!

Wow...can it be? Half of my weekend is over? Brian says that I shouldn't think like that. I'm sure he is right. But, alas, that's how I think.

The layout above tries to capture some of the excitement that Shaun felt about his "fancy clothes"! Can it be that this layout is the same little boy that is shown in the layout below? What a miracle our family is!

Well, we've made it to Wednesday. And Haoyi starts school 5 weeks from tomorrow. We don't have the dates yet for Sydney and Shaun. I have a feeling that those 5 weeks will fly!

A couple of layouts. One of our backyard and one of Shaun. The one of Shaun is the first photo that we ever saw of him. That was the photo of Shaun that we saw when we first fell in love with him! From July 26, 2006 until February 25, 2007 we only had two photos of Shaun...this is one of them. And we would love him from afar and wonder what he was doing. On February 25, a very kind man that had traveled to Nanchang emailed us some updated photos of our son. On April 16, 2007, Shaun walked into our hotel room and the rest is history!

We got the news from Haoyi last night...her visa was approved so she will be here sometime in mid-August. YAY!

Mom tells me that I need to scrap more photos of Shaun. I explained that I have 3 years of pictures to scrap for Sydney and only 1 year for Shaun. I also explained that girls are easier to scrap than boys...lots more flowers and ribbons on the market than boys things! However, I am going to try to get a few more layouts done for Shaun!

I'm back to work today...alas, all good things must come to an end and vacation is included in the good things! We celebrated Zeb's birthday yesterday. He is 15 years old today! Wow! Where did that time go! Zeb is a doll...I just love him! Especially when he smiles. I feel a layout coming on tonight!

In the meantime, I got a few nice pics this weekend of a couple of dolls of mine. Sydney was doing some gymnastics for me and I got this unexpected shot! She looks so grown up. Where, oh where is my baby girl?

Same photo shoot, my little charmer was trying to hold back a grin in this photo of him. He usually has a huge grin on his face!

I think that Haoyi must have had her visa appointment by now. I hope everything went fine.

This photo was taken at my cousin Callie's wedding! The lyrics are from a song by Stephen Curtis Chapman. And wow...how true they are! I love this photo! I love that my daughter has a daddy that loves her so much! I pray that she will always know how cherished she is.

The photo of the deer is taken from our deck. How cool is it to have deer visit your backyard? I love that! We saw her again yesterday!

This is one of my favorite photos of Sydney. It was taken at the White Swan in Guangzhou. And it will soon be three years ago.

The other photo of Sydney was taken recently as she rode her scooter on the driveway. The photo of Brian was taken at Callie and Brian's wedding last week. And the journaling tells yet another Sydney story.

Today was another good day of vacation. I talked with Haoyi online this morning. We are really looking forward to having her join us for the school year.

This afternoon we had family pictures taken around the swimming pool. The kids were all in swimsuits. I spent about 2 hours in the pool with Syd, Shaun and Abby! And boy am I wiped out now. But the water was perfect...85 degrees.

Haoyi sent this photo of her martial arts class. I decided to scrap it so that she would get the feel for what it's like to have her American mom scrap pictures of her all of the time! Haoyi, if you are reading the blog, this is definitely just the beginning!

These photos are from Sydney's first visit ever to the Pumpkin Patch in 2006. It is a tradition now. We make it out there at least once a season...and with school trips, sometimes we make it several times.

I hope that Haoyi can make it out there with us this fall. I suspect that she has not done anything quite like that before. I was able to visit with her online yesterday morning to start my day. What a treat that was! We are so excited to meet her. She has her visa appointment in Nanjing on Monday, July 14th. Right now she thinks that she will be coming around the 15th of August.

We started yesterday morning with mommy and Sydney and Shaun having breakfast at Village Inn. We then went to the Science Center. I had never been to the new Science Center (and I don't think it's that new any longer) but it was really cool! I can see why the kids love it when a trip there is on the agenda. We spent the afternoon at Papa and Grandma's with Beka and Abby and Randy and Angie swimming in the pool and eating hot dogs cooked on Papa's new grill.

After that, both kids had gymnastics and we finished the day with supper at On the Border. It was really quite a nice vacation day!

Oh for goodness sakes...wouldn't you think I could keep a silly food diary for 21 days?! Well, here is something I can do consistently...scrap! Here's a new layout!

Not a good idea to start a habit of keeping a food diary on the 4th of July. Just not smart. So I'll begin round 2 of day 1 tomorrow. In the meantime, I've got some new layouts to post. The Double Diva layout is from Sydney's 2nd birthday. We spent it in Phoenix. And I'm only now scrapping the photos! The photo of Sar and Syd is from last night at Callie's wedding. I have a few more of those coming later.

Day 1 of the 21 day challenge

This is the first day of the 21 day challenge. It comes from my friend Sally. The challenge is on her blog at http://sallysangelworks.typepad.com/. She lives in Texas and I found her through OScraps which is where I spend almost all of my digital scrapping time.

The challenge is to find a habit that you want to create and do it for 21 days. The theory is that if you do something for 21 days, it becomes a habit and you can do it for a lifetime. Part of Sally's challenge is to blog about the habit.

I'm a few days behind everyone else...life seems to roll like that for me now! And there are so many worthwhile habits that I want to develop. But I really must focus on one if I have any hope of achieving any! So, habit number 1 (can you here the drumroll) is....a food diary! For 21 days. No cheating, no forgetting, no nothing! That's all...not changing eating habits (although that could happen if I really kept a food diary that was accurate). Won't my nutritionist be happy?

I scrapped another layout. This one is from last weekend. Hannah called Brian last Friday and asked if we would like to come to Iowa City and hang out with her on Saturday. She even said that we could stay overnight in her apartment.

What do you think the answer was? I would have walked to Iowa City if it had been necessary! You would think that someone had invited me to Disneyland! I was giddy!

We hung out at the mall. We ate lunch, went to see Kung Fu Panda (at Hannah's suggestion) and shopped. Then we bought some groceries on the way back to Hannah's apartment and she cooked supper for us. We had salads and spaghetti with breadsticks and ice cream sundaes for dessert. After dinner we took a nice long walk around the campus followed by bedtime.

This is the amazing part!!! Sydney and Shaun both spent the night in Hannah's room on a camp out. Now that may not sound amazing to others but to me...WOW! You see, Sydney has not slept in a room without her mommy or daddy since September 1 of 2005. Very close to 3 years. Can I just say WOW once more?

I promised this morning that I would do more blogging! And blogging I shall do! The journaling on this layout tells the story!

June 2008 – Sydney, your favorite song is Awesome God. You like to listen to it before bedtime and you light up when we sing it at church. The other night, before treats, you asked if you could pray to Jesus! The answer of course was yes. And then you amazed me when you said, “Mom, can I sing Awesome God to Jesus for my prayer?”
And when I watched you sing, I saw a glimpse into the throne room of our awesome God. On your face was total worship and praise. I wondered in that moment if I’ve ever prayed a prayer that was as pure…as holy! I praise our awesome God for everything about you. I thank Him for how He uses a child to teach me! I pray that you will never lose this depth of understanding that you have today as you try to acquire worldly knowledge.

I don't blog enough. Yes, I add scrapbook pages to the blog. And sometimes those tell the story. But sometimes they don't. The layout that I'm adding today is a couple of years old. While Sydney was still in Pampers.

I love these photos. Largely because it seems that she could never have been that young! Last week was 3 years ago that I saw that sweet little face for the first time. I'll never forget how that made me feel. The joy that sprang from my heart. Literally, that joy just sprang forth from a place inside of me that I didn't even know existed! How I praise God for the children that He has given me.

I've got to go to work. But I promise, I have some other stories that I need to blog...so I'll be back this weekend.