My Little Hobo

So, do you remember that Isaac is possessed with Hobos?  He talks about them quite often and I'm sure I've mentioned it here before. Remember when we disconnected our DirecTV and he discontentedly declared that "now we are all just a bunch of hobos". And the time when walking downtown and seeing a homeless man on the steet and him being overwhelmed with excitement "MOM, A REAL LIVE HOBO" ...as I quickly ushered him away from the scene!  Now he's lost three teeth in about three weeks time and has declared that he himself now looks like "a real live hobo" lololol!!! I don't know what the deal is with this boy and hobos!! It pops up over and over again! I don't even know where he heard the term!?!

We have a group of retired folks at our church right now. They are here for two weeks. They came in from all across the nation to help us follow up on our contacts we got from our county fair. They call themselves "Sojourners". Our family made them a meal on Monday. We were there serving the meal when one of them asked Isaac his name. He proudly told her his name and he told her that he was a "real live hobo" because he didn't have many teeth and he proudly gave her a big huge grin. She got the biggest kick out of it!!!! :)

So, as I'm sitting here typing this Tom is busy getting the boys to bed. I already went through the ritual once, but now Tom is in from the shop and getting them all wound up again. Isaac comes out of his room sporting some "red bull" shorts that are way too small for him.....Heidi says with a giggle "Isaac, I didn't know you liked red bull" bwaaahahahaha! He looks SO STINKIN' CUTE!!!  Now, Heidi and I are both giggling. He bursts into tears and runs back to his room. :( Poor baby! We can here Tom talking to him from the bedroom. He is saying through his sobs "I wish I was a hobo so no one would laugh at me" Poor baby...he's so sensitive! And then Tom says, "Well, you would be the cutest hobo around". HA HA HA!!! It's all about hobos...I'm tellin' ya!!

All is well with the little hobo now. Tears were short lived. ;)

Good-night ....from the Momma of the cutest hobo around! ;)

ps...oh yeah..started to tell you before I was interrupted with the current hobo story. So, we met all the sojourners at church on Sunday morning. On the way to church on Sunday night Isaac asked "Mom, do those soldiers at church have guns??" ha ha ha ha!!! (soldiers instead of sojourners)

Off to the RACES!!!

When we leave the house I often say, "Off to the races". On Saturday, Aug. 14 I said it as I often do except for this time it was literally true!! :) Tom and I have lived very near the Michigan International Speedway much of our lives and neither of us has ever been. Tom has been saying for a very long time every now and again "we really need to go to a race". So, for his birthday in June I gave him tickets for the whole family to MIS for the CarFax 250.....250 miles...125 laps of blazing SPEED and SOUND!!!!!!

Start Your Engines!

 

What does Gracie spy??

Little Man...taking it all in!

Pit Stop...So Awesome!!!

Jacob,....a tad warm

James, Heidi and Jacob...racing is serious business! ;)

What an exciting new adventure!!!!!! :)

Love,

Wendy

EGGS!

We have eggs!! We did some research and were not expecting our first duck eggs until October or so, but it's official we have our first eggs! We discovered our first egg on Sunday evening and lo and behold another egg Monday morning. :) As soon as Isaac's eyes have opened the past two days he heads for the door and runs out to the duck pen to see if we have another egg. No passing Go, No collecting $200 and No kisses howdy doodies for Mom.....straight out the door! ;) Yesterday we did have another egg, but today nothin'! We cracked the first egg just to see if it looked like  a chicken egg. Yup it does! ;) The second egg is still out in the duck pen...the kids are hoping for a duckling. I'm not too optimistic about that because neither one of the females seem interested. Shouldn't they be sitting on the egg....or something?! lol!!

Gracie and Joanna

Wow! So, Aug. 7 is "Gracie Day".....the anniversary of the day that Tom and I were united in China with our beautiful Gracie girl. This year we celebrated in grand fashion with a visit from Joanna and family. Most of you who read this blog already know who Joanna is. Gracie and Joanna were the very best of friends in China. They both were from the same orphanage in Xi'an City China. Many people from the orphanage there have told us stories about how An Zhai Yan (Gracie) and An Wu Chan (Joanna) were absolutely inseparable! Both Gracie and Joanna's families in the states were praying for our daughters before we even knew exactly who they were or where they were. God blessed Gracie and Joanna with the comfort of each other while in China and He brought them both home to the great state of Michigan 4 months apart ....Joanna in April and Gracie in August.... and their new homes only  2 hours away from each other. What a blessing!!!!!!! God is good and His plan is always perfect! We have made a big effort to keep the girls in touch and connected. Whenever we get together they pick right back up where they left off.....no awkwardness at all. I'm sure they will always share a very special bond. Thank you Lord for the blessing of our beautiful girls and for giving them the comfort of one another until we could make our way to them!!!!!

Here they are in China at about 18 months of age or so......enjoying some vittles! :)

Again, about 18 months

About age 2 in China

April 05 in China...age 3. Joanna's parents were there to pick up Joanna. They happened to be there for Gracie's 3rd birthday and delivered a birthday gift for us.

Aug. 05...age 3. Joanna and family met us at the Detroit airport upon our arrival from China. The girls were a tad happy to see each other. :) Joanna came home 4 months prior. Gracie is exhausted in this photo. She did not sleep a wink on the 14 hour flight home from China. Not a wink. Yikes! ;)

Age 4

Age 5

Age 6

Age 7

Age 8...this month...the year of the big teeth! Boy, those teeth sure do change their looks don't they?!

We love you to the moon and back Miss Gracie Zhai-Lynn!!!! "I'll love you forever. I'll like you for always. As long as I'm living my baby you'll be" I'm so very thankful for the blessing of YOU!!!!!!!

BOO!!

As you can see I have a new look to my blog! I like it....and had fun creating it. The only bad part about it is that while I was creating it I got slapped on the hand for going over our "fair access policy" with our satellite internet provider. UGH!!! We aren't too happy with our satellite internet, but it is TONS faster than slow dial up and it is the best we can get out here in Amish country. One of the big drawbacks to it is this "fair access policy" they have in place. So if you upload or download over a certain amount they punish you by slowing your internet waaaaaay down to a snails pace....comparable to dial up speed. You can still use it, but it drives you batty....S-L-O-W! And you have to put up with it for 24 hours. :(  So, while I was changing things over on the blog.....blogger has upgraded the way you redesign things on your blog and it involves them continually uploading the blog over and over again every time you make a change. Well, I have music playing on my blog and every time the blog uploaded as I made changes the music was re-uploaded too. So, because of that we exceeded the "fair access policy" and they shut us down to the slow boat. ARRRRGH!! So, to avoid that happening again I have opted to take the music off the blog. That is where the big fat BOO comes in! I enjoy my music, but I do NOT enjoy having to deal with S-L-O-W internet. I'm sure in some ways the music could be annoying to some anyway. There ya have it. The good, the bad and the ugly! ;)

Love,
Wendy

Tale of a Tooth

Ok, so the last time Isaac lost a tooth the fairy messed up big time and forgot. :( Poor Isaac!! I explained that the tooth fairy must have been swamped that night and that he must be on her list for the following evening. That was the truth....she WAS swamped! So, the second day he got $2 instead of $1. Ya know because he had to wait an extra day and all!


So, last night at church Isaac lost another tooth. We tucked it into a baggie. He didn't mention it when we got home or when I tucked him in. You know what is coming right? The tooth fairy was swamped again last night. OH MY!! So, this morning.....

Isaac says, "Make a guess Mom, do you think the tooth fairy came and got my tooth last night or not?"

Mom: "Hmmmmm? Um well.....ummmm.... I don't know"

He flings the baggie out with tooth sliding around inside. :-O
Mom: "Wow!!! There must be so many kids losing teeth these days!" .....gulp.

Then Gracie pipes up "No Mom....he hid the tooth from the tooth fairy. He did not put it under his pillow because he wanted to wait an extra night so that he could get $2 instead of $1"

Isaac: "GRACIE BE QUIET!!!!!!!!! YOU AREN'T SUPPOSED TO TELL!!!!" Hmph!!!!

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

This Mama didn't raise no dummy! ;)

The boy has $2 waiting for him under his pillow tonight!

Love,
Wendy

LAKE MICHIGAN!!!

Heidi had the day off of detssaling last Tuesday, so we all grabbed our towels piled in the van and headed to the beach for the day. We had an awesome day of sun, sand and waves. I absolutely LOVE a nice relaxing day at the beach! love, Love, LOVE Lake Michigan!!!!!!! :)

Mega pictures...you know me and pictures! ;)

James and Eveny went with us

Littlest Mister :)

Heidi Jo

Big Sis, Little Sis

Jacob, Eveny and Isaac

James and Heidi

James and Gracie Lou

Gracie's piggies

They have a clay put nearby, which is what on Isaac's face here.

James

Huey, Duey and Louie ;)

Thee BOY!!! :)

The Three Stooges

Boys will be Boys!!! ;)

Best Buds...Ev and Jake. More clay...

Heidi in her shades

Busy Boys...James, Jacob and Eveny

Ev

Sweet Grace!

James, King of the Sand

Ev, Up to his neck

Silly...

More silly...their natural state ;)

Proof that I was there...OUCH!!!

But, it was worth it! :)

Love, Wendy

My Rebel ;)

So, when we went canoeing we discussed how we should NOT take electronic devices of any kind on the river. Kind of obvious right? It's just not a smart idea! Electronic devices and big bodies of water usually don't mix too well. So, we take a bus up river, so that we can paddle down the river back to where we have parked our vehicles. When we get off the bus and start putting the canoes in the water, I look around for Tom and he is talking on his cell phone. Huh???? His cell phone....definitely an electronic device. I called him a rebel. LOL!!! And, I have to say it was the second time in a week I called him a rebel. The first being when we were on a detour for road construction and he went down a road that was marked "road closed". lol! Back to the phone.... he said he brought it along so that we could have the time....neither of us wears a watch. ok, that DID make sense .....I guess. lol!

So, we are all in our canoes having a little mini pit stop. All just sitting around chatting when "plop".......I know you've guessed it already.......Tom's cell phone hit the water........down to the bottom of the river it goes. We all discussed it and Tom was searching for it. James dove under and came back up with it. One of the guys there advised Tom to take his battery out of the phone immediately. And then go home and put it in a bag of rice to dry it out. We decided to give it a try, but we were not very hopeful at all......especially since Tom has already lost one cell phone to a cup of coffee....sigh.... But, guess what? IT WORKED!!!! We were shocked when he put the battery back in the next day and Whaaaa Laaa....restored cell phone!

Pretty cool huh?!!!

Love,

Wendy

A thought....

I read this today and thought it was worth sharing. Love, Wendy

"Dear God,
Please untie the knots that are in my mind, my heart and my life.
Remove the have nots, the can nots and the do nots that I have in my mind.
Erase the will nots, may nots, might nots that may find a home in my heart.
Release me from the could nots, would nots amd should nots that obstruct my life.
And most of all, Dear God,
I ask that you remove from my mind, my heart and my life all of the 'am nots' that I have allowed to hold me back.
especially the thought that I am not good enough.
Amen"

~author unknown~

Canoeing in Mongo

Last Thursday we had a great time canoeing the Pigeon River in Mongo, Indiana with our youth group. At five hours it was the longest canoe trip that our family has ever done, but there was no complaining. Everyone had an awesome time!!!! :)

Here's a shot of the group:

So, Jacob partnered up with Zach. Zach and Jacob don't know each other all that well, but they do now. ;) Neither one of them had much canoeing experience before this trip. So, after 5 hours on the water together.....4 tip overs, hitting two kayaks...and a fisherman who was standing in the water fly fishing...ha ha ha....and a multitude of heading the wrong direction, hitting trees, stumps, rocks, etc etc. etc...they know each other MUCH better now!!! That's the great thing about trips like these...you really get to know folks! :) And, the two of them were such good sports and so very entertaining! They made for some great belly laughs, which is very good for the soul!

Oopsie...Zach out of boat! Hee Hee! :)

Oopsie Wrong direction...ha ha!

Oopsie tip over, water in the boat...snicker, snicker

Dad Gum Rock!!

Now, I don't have any photos of the hitting of the kayaks or the fisherman standing in the water because....well, those involved hitting of human being and not inanimate objects. Human beings who were not a part of our group....and they didn't seem to find much humor in the error. YIKES!!! So, I thought I better not go there with my camera....but, truth be told...underneath I was laughing my tail off! BIG HUGE GRIN!!! BWAAAHAHAHA!!!!

By the end of the trip Zach and Jacob were rowing along quite nicely actually! :)

James and Heidi seemed to have their act together when it came to canoeing. Strolling along quite nicely with their passenger in tow.

And, James was quite gentlemanly at getting his feet wet when necessary

A problem did arise with the passenger though. Look at him here, so very happy, calm and content

Notice where he is sitting here though...the positioning of the cooler.....and the oar behind him. This turned out to be problematic for Isaac. Isaac won the award for the most wacks in the head with an oar...two! And, two good wacks was all it took for Isaac to declare VERY LOUDLY!!! "I DO NOT WANT TO RIDE IN HEIDI'S BOAT ANYMORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Uh oh! So, we had to make a canoe pit stop and do a switharoo of pasengers about half way through the trip. We also switched the positioning of the cooler and the passenger. So, the second half of the trip looked like this:

Gracie as their passenger sitting in FRONT of the cooler with a huge smile on her face! :) That put an end to the wacks! Phew!

And us, the second half of the trip with our happy passenger. :)

Oh, and may I add....what is going on here?? Who is doing the paddling? hmmmm? And, what is stud muffin doing back there with his paddle! LOL!! ;)

And again.....ahhh hem!!! ;)

A pit stop for lilly pad flowers...what do you call them?? Lilly pad flowers???

Finally, I was able to upload photos to the blog. I'll have to say though that it IS 2 am! I am only up at this hour because yesterday I finally went to the doc for my asthma. It has been REALLY acting up since we got home from Utah about a month ago. Had to go to prompt care instead of my regular doc because my doc is out of the office for two weeks. Couldn't wait that long. Was so bad off yesterday that the doc was threatening to hospitalize me! Anyway, one of the meds he put me on is a steriod. I am SOOOOOOO much better today! Thank you Lord! BUT, with the good comes the bad. One of the side affects of steroids is insomnia. ugh....thus the late hour! But, it allowed me to upload these photos! Hopefully it doesn't take 2 am uploads from now on. That would NOT be a good thing!

Love,

Wendy