A Day of Emotions and SNOW!

Yesterday was an emotional day for me. I was REALLY missing my little girl. I am amazed at how deeply you can love somebody you have never met. When I look at her picture I seem to fall more in love with her everyday. Oh, how I long for her to be home so I can hold her and tell her that I love her!

After a tearful morning I decided to take lunch over to my mom's house. She has been taking care of my grandma who has bronchitis and my boys and I thought she could use the company. When I arrived with lunch my mom had set the table for our yearly "snowman" lunch. We all love the snow and snowmen and since we don't get much snow in our part of Oregon we decided we would celebrate snow just for fun every year between Christmas and New Years. I started feeling better as the lunch went on. From there I left to take the boys skating at the local roller skating rink. Right when we were about to open the front door, I look out the window and I saw the smallest snow flakes falling from the sky! My boys were jumping out of their skin with excitement!!!! A "snowman" lunch to celebrate snow (which we didn't have when we arrived) and now snow is falling from the sky! As we drove to the skate rink the snow poured down. By the time we left the skating rink 2 hours later there was about 2 1/2 inches of snow on my car. We had a VERY slow drive home, because everybody FREAKS out when we get snow and don't know how to drive in it. After a 45 minute drive, which should only take 15 minutes we arrived home safe and sound. My boys then raced as fast as they could to change into their snow clothes and head outside to start building something before it all disappeared.

As I walked around outside I couldn't believe how beautiful it was. All the trees covered with snow and everything blanketed in white. To me snow has such a peaceful and calming feeling. It makes me happy. The boys were busy for the next hour and a half building castles, snowmen, and enjoying the long awaited snow for the year. It was already dark by the time they got outside so my pics are not that great, but you get the idea. This is the first year I was able to get a picture of our Christmas lights with snow on the ground. It was a mini display this year as the strands for the house were half dead and I didn't take the time to replace them.....maybe next year.

My day ended with two very happy boys and a heart still longing for my Alesha. I am excited to think that next year she will be home for Christmas and hopefully it will snow for her, too.


I have the most creative boy. Luke built his snowman SO HUGE that he couldn't lift the second or third ball on top of the bottom one. He decides if I get the ladder that went to the tree house, I can roll it up and it won't be so heavy. His brother helped him roll the 2nd ball and I helped with the last one, because they were not tall enough to reach the final stretch. I was blow away at how they worked together and conquered the objective!

Luke, filling in the gaps so it wouldn't roll off. Check out the size of that thing!!

Finished snowman! He is dirty because he rolled it in the bark dust...oops.

Our mini light display.

Martin's snow display and snowman

Martin's snow fort. He was throwing snowballs at me while I was taking his picture.

FANTASTIC NEWS!

Hey everybody my mommy and daddy got their I-800A extension and I-800 approval this morning. This means they are one step closer to bringing me home. Can you tell I am excited!!!

Miracles DO happen!

Today my husband and I went to our local USCIS immigration office. My husband took time off work in hopes of us being able to get our fingerprints done today. Here is where the miracle comes in....our scheduled appt. is for December 21, 2009. This was WAY too long to wait to have these prints done, because at this point our adoption is on hold, because our previous fingerprints have expired and they need current prints to continue the approval process of our next step.......the beloved I-800.

We showed up at 1:00 p.m. with our official USCIS fingerprint appt. paper and ID in hand. My husband explained our situation to a very nice man behind the desk. He said "Please fill out this form and I will see what I can do. It probably won't be until after 3 p.m. and can't make ANY guarantees." We said "Thank you SO much. We totally understand that the people waiting had an appt. on THIS day and we would be happy to wait." We sat down and began our wait. I am glad I brought an adoption book to read (still working on all that education). I began to get a bit worried as more and more people began showing up. I wondered if they would be able to fit us in, but I was confident that THIS was the day we were going to get this prints.

At 2:20 p.m. he announced that we could proceed to the next station. At this point we had about 13 minutes left on our parking meter (the meter only took 90 minutes at a time). The lady said we should be out before it expired. I was happy to hear this, because getting a parking ticket just didn't sound like fun. The men were able to fingerprint us in no time at all and we were at our car with 2 minutes to spare!

I cannot tell you how relieved and happy I am that we were able to get our prints done today. This will allow us to continue with our I-800 and not fall behind 2 weeks. Thank you God for answering our prayers. I appreciate everybody who prayed along with us. God is good ALL the time, ALL the time God is good!

I will leave you with a current photo we received of our precious Alesha. Every time I look at this photo I start laughing. Her feet all propped up on the crib. She looks so easy going. Can't wait to have her home! Until then I will gaze at her beautiful face and pray that she stays strong, healthy, and safe. We love you baby girl!

Adoption Update

I haven't received any recent pictures of Alesha so I thought I would post a few other that I received with the referral. The first is her referral photo and the other one was the first picture we received along with our referral information. I absolutely love the sweet smile she has on her face. I can't wait to see her smiling face while in am holding her in my arms......soon this will be a reality!

We have sent all our acceptance paperwork to our agency on November 23, 2009. Here is a photo of us at the shipping place. I told the lady who helped me that this was paperwork for our baby girl we are adopting from India. She was very excited for us and thought Alesha was beautiful...I couldn't agree more. I asked her to take a photo of us for our scrapbook....she honored my request. Here we are holding a priceless package of VERY important paperwork.


We didn't send the photo on the box....it was just for the photo :-)

At this point in the process our acceptance paperwork has arrived at our agency. We have a bit of a hiccup in the process right now. Our original I-800A (which took like 6 months to get) expired on Nov. 29, 2009. I had put in for an extension on November 10th to make sure it didn't expire since we hadn't received a referral. I am SO happy that I filed for the extension, because we would have had to start back at square one with the entire process if our original I-800A expired without the extension.

We worked very hard with our agency to get our I-800 in and have it logged into USCIS systems before my I-800A expired. If this happened we wouldn't have to worry about the extension and just move onto the I-800 portion of the process. Wouldn't you know it that USCIS logged our I-800 paperwork on NOVEMBER 30TH just ONE day after our I-800A expired, which included our fingerprints not being valid after the 29th. This delay was due to the Thanksgiving holiday.

Since this happened they cannot process our I-800 without having valid fingerprints. Our fingerprint appt. isn't until Dec. 21st. At this point we are delayed in our entire process until we get our fingerprints redone. With valid fingerprints USCIS can process the I-800A extension FIRST AND THEN the I-800.

I am praying that we might be able to walk into the fingerprinting office with our paperwork on Monday or Tuesday of this week and they will fingerprint us without an appointment. If this happens we can continue without a 3 week delay. I am documenting this as it will be a move of God if this happens. I will just do everything that I can do to help move this process along and then wait on God for His perfect timing.

I'll keep you posted on what happens next. The journey of adoption is full of twists, turns, miracles, and surprises.

BEAUTIFUL!

We are beyonds words! We now have the privilege of introducing to you our daughter Alesha Mugdha Pfeiffer! She was born on March 1, 2009. We feel so blessed!!!!! God has answered our many prayer and we are SO thankful. I had prayed specifically that when I saw our referral picture I would know without a shadow of a doubt that this baby girl is who God had planned for our family. When we opened up the photo to see our first glimpse of our future daughter our entire family knew deep in our hearts that this was indeed our precious Alesha!

We accepted a referral for this precious Indian princess on November 17, 2009. The wait to post her picture has been killing me. The policy is to wait until we receive the acceptance paperwork package. The FedEx man delivered the package this morning at 10:20 a.m. as I was watching out the window to make sure he didn't drive by our house. He was supposed to deliver by 10:30 so I was ready with open arms to receive "the package" . This package contains a TON of documents that need to signed so our weekend plans have just been made. A date with a massive stack of papers and a few ink pens. Let the signing begin.

You may be wondering when we can travel to India and bring our daughter home. We are told that it can take anywhere from 6-8 months to complete the remainder of steps and paperwork. We are trusting that God will bring our precious daughter home in HIS timing, whatever that looks like. We will continue to trust and wait like we did for our referral. Although this wait is going to be much harder when we have this beautiful face to look at every day.

Our hearts are bursting with joy! We are praising God for his faithfulness to us and trusting HIM for the remainder of this journey.

Alesha, we love you SO much and we can't wait to have you in our arms!

Love, Mommy, Daddy, Martin and Luke

Taekwondo

I signed Luke up for a beginners class in Taekwondo this term for school. Triforce Northwest Taekwondo offers classes at our local homeschool campus. It has been a great experience for Luke and we are already signed up for the next term. On the last day of class Luke took his test to advance from white belt to white stripe belt. For this test you must break a board with a single kick. Luke did GREAT! He broke the board on the first try and then broke it in half again! It was so cool and everybody was really excited for him.

Luke with is Instructor. He is holding the pieces of the board and his advancement belt.

Practicing some round kicks

The board break!

The kick that broke the board

Adoption Update

Just a quick update on our adoption process. First, on, November 6th, we moved up to #2 on the waiting list for our precious Alesha! Gidget and her family accepted a referral for their precious Maiya. I got the news on my son Martin's 11th birthday. We are so excited for her and to finally see some movement on the upper portion of the wait list.

On November 10th I completed and mailed our paperwork for our I-800A extension. We are the very FIRST I-800A family to go through since they switched from the I-600 and we had a tough time getting our original I-800A approval. I pray the extension will go smoothly.

I am so happy to see that the passports are finally coming through so all my adoption friends can go and pick up their precious babies! We continue to pray for God's timing and perfect peace.

BIRTHDAY BOY!

Our son, Martin, turned 11 years old on November 6th! I can't believe it has already been 11 years since I first saw his precious face. I am so proud of him. He is growing into a wonderful young man. His heart that seeks Jesus makes me smile. I love to watch him with small children. He is so gentle and patient with them and they just love to follow him around. His little cousins always want to know where Martin is. I long for the day when I can watch him play with his sister. I appreciate his creativity and energy. There is never a dull moment around my house :-) Martin we love you very much and you make us proud to call you our son.

They sure grow up fast!

85 years old!

My grandma turns 85 years old today. She is the only living grandparent I have. I have enjoyed spending more time with her over the past few years as she is living closer with my mom caring for her. God has done a lot of work in my grandma over the years. A couple of years ago she was baptized. This isn't something you see everyday. God is faithful to continue a good work in His children. Grandma, I wish you a Happy Birthday with many more years to come.
I love you!

June Update - Luke Turns 9 Years Old - The Party!

My youngest turned 9 years old on June 16th! This year Luke decided to have his birthday party at TopNotch. We did a homeschool P.E. class there this year and he really enjoyed it. TopNotch puts on a GREAT birthday party complete with trampoline fun, foam pit, tons of great games with Jeremy, the owner, and the famous sling shot!

Luke and his friends prefer donuts over cake.

This gift bag is hysterical!

THE SLING SHOT!



Getting fastened in.

The launch!

GAME TIME!

JUMP TIME!

Luke's Family Birthday Dinner 6-16-09

We always have the boys pick the restaurant they want to go to on their birthday. Luke has always picked Red Robin (he takes after his dad). This year Grandma and Grandpa Pfeiffer were able to attend his birthday dinner. We had a great time. I can't believe my baby is 9 years old! Where do the years go?


Me with my handsome 9 year old son.

Last Day of School- June 2009

The boys requested that I make Indian food to celebrate their last day of school. I served it on the plates they painted at homeschool group this year. I should have taken a photo before I put the food on the plate so you could see what a great job they did. Martin's is on the right and Luke's is on the left.

June Zoo Trip

My brother and his family came down from Spokane for a visit. We surprised my mom by having me take her to the zoo for the day and my brother showed up with his family. We definitely surprised her. It was a fun day as you can see by the pictures. My boys were SO excited to see their cousins and I enjoyed spending time with family.


Me and my brother Dan (Dan you look so much like dad in this photo)

Martin and Luke with Uncle Dan and Aunt Tina
All the cousins together.


Boys will be BOYS!

The new baby elephant.

Inside the elephant exhibit. We had fun messing around with the elephant bike.

Typical DAN!

Too funny...look at Luke plugging his nose!

My nephew Spencer, Martin, Luke and Dan

My sweet nieces, Madeline and Sophie!