Our family Christmas 2009

Christmas 2009 was one of the most memorable and special Christmases yet!

To have our family together was truly an overwhelming feeling of completeness and joy. Last year was hard for me because I thought we would be traveling to China in December to bring home our little Mia. So, of course all I could think about was her during the holidays and wishing she was here with her family.

This year was so nice having the whole family here. Mia home for her first Christmas and having Jason, Matthew, Kristen, her husband Max and our Grand daughter Emma all here was especially nice. Mia and Emma had such a great time together and opening gifts in the morning was really fun to watch. Mia loves Emma and she adores her big brothers and big sister. It was just nice being all together, it’s a rare treat anymore. They are all growing up and moving/living in different cities in VA. So it’s great to actually have family time together.

The rest of our families (grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins) come to our house every year to celebrate Christmas together. Scot’s family and mine combined so we have a big crowd and a great time together. We have a big Christmas dinner and then we always play the White Elephant game or Chinese gift exchange. The younger kids play their game and then the older kids/parents play a separate game.
This year we still did the White Elephant but we added a new spin to it…you had to make a home made gift-made by you. This was so much fun and we were all so surprised with the amount of talent this family has. I can’t wait to see what everyone comes up with next year.

The idea was to take the money that we normally used buying a gift and donating it to a charity instead. I think this will become a new family tradition

Look who's 3!

Mia turned 3 today!

We had a family get together to celebrate Mia's first birthday in the USA and turning 3 years old:) She had a great time having everyone sing Happy Birthday to her and opening her presents. The tissue paper from gift bags were a big hit with her as you can see from the pictures.

It has been so fun watching her learn about each holiday/celebration this past year. My baby is growing up so fast; I can’t believe it has almost been a year since we brought her home to her forever family.

Mia's first Halloween 2009

Portraits by Kevin Hurley

We finally went and had Mia’s portraits done. This was a gift given to me at my baby shower before we went to China to bring Mia home, I think I was just waiting for life to slow down a little so we could take some time and go see Kevin Hurley. With adjusting to her new home/family and Mia’s surgery, recovering from surgery and my work-it just had to wait.
We had such a great time and Kevin was wonderful with her, he really captured her personality in these pictures.

Mia's first dance class

Mia's first trip to the Pumpkin Patch

Prayers answered...Mia's home

Thank you to everyone who has prayed for Mia this week. God has been so good and gracious to us! Mia was in surgery for 5 hours Tuesday morning. We were told that Mia’s VSD (hole in her heart) was much larger than they expected.

While we were in the waiting room we got the call from our wonderful surgeon that things went well and Mia was on her way to the recovery room. About an hour and half later she was taken to ICU where we could then visit her. We went in to see Mia and she was not a happy camper to say the least. She was scared and MAD!!! The nurses were able to adjust her pain medication to make her a bit more comfortable and to help her sleep.

Mia did much better when we weren’t in the room, every time she heard my voice she got all upset and wanted to be held but we couldn’t hold her, this was heart breaking. She slept most of the day and really did amazingly well throughout the night.

Wednesday Sept.9,2009 Wednesday Morning we hurried over to the hospital to see Mia but we were afraid she might react the same way she had on Tuesday but she was very calm and we were able to sit with her and comfort her. She was doing so well.
Every hour that went by Mia was feeling better and they were able to remove one of the IV’s from her hand and the catheter.
It was also nice for all three of us to see Mia’s Grandma Penny, Poppa and big brother Matthew, Sheri and John Moore came to visit and got a few smiles out of her today


Thursday Sept.10,2009By Thursday she was even better and getting more lines removed and the drainage tube and IV in her neck was finally taken out. This was in no way a pleasant moment for anyone-especially Mia, at this point she was just ready to go and hated to see the nurses walk in the room because that meant someone was going to do something else to her again. She was just fed up! We did have a little fun today; both Grandmas’,Shirley and Penny were here to visit today-so she enjoyed them. We also were able to give Mia a ride in a little red wagon they have there for the kids. We pulled her around her floor and took her down to the cafeteria for dinner with us. After dinner we headed back to the room and our friend Sheri was there to visit us

The doctor’s came by and check Mia and told us that she was doing so well that she should be able to go home Friday morning! We were thrilled, two days earlier than we expected.

Friday Sept.11,2009 Were going home today!!!!
After the doctors did there last check on Mia we were able to leave. We left around 10am and got home and we all just crashed and took it easy all weekend.

God has been so good! We thank Him for all that He has done and for His hand being upon this entire process. How blessed we have been to have a truly AMAZING surgeon repair Mia’s heart and all the nurses and staff at UVA were all truly wonderful.

We want to thank everyone for your support and prayers during this time.