Persistence

I have to preface this picture with the fact that this girl LOVES to eat.  It is her happiest times of the day, every single day!  When it's meal time, it's time to get down to business, with no messin' around.  Well, to her, for the first two months of being home, praying before meal times was considered "messin' around", and we usually prayed quickly, while she fussed and hollered for her plate of food to be delivered!  Tonight, for the first time, after working on it for so long, she stopped, bowed her head and folded her cute little hands and closed her eyes while we prayed.  Okay, so I have to admit that NONE of the rest of the family had their eyes closed after we saw what she was doing, and we all clapped and clapped after prayer.  What a sweet, sweet moment that I (we) will never forget!  Yes, THANK YOU, Lord, for our food, and for our many blessings, including this sweet one!

(and no, I don't photo every prayer time, we had a re-enactment after dinner was done!)

The girls....

The beautiful grown up girl in this picture is my niece, Kaylee!  She's really more like a big sister to my girls, and she's AMAZING!  She would do anything for my girls, and has spent hours playing with, entertaining and loving them since the day Allyson came home!  Kaylee was so excited to finally have a GIRL cousin!  And my girls.... they think that "KayKay" can pretty much do anything! 

It's taken a little bit for Ella Grace to warm up to KayKay, but she hasn't given up!  She stops by often after school just to spend a few minutes playing with Ella Grace and bonding with her!  She brings her friends down to meet Ella Grace, cause she's just so excited to show her off!  All of her hard work has paid off.... Last night in church, Ella Grace started pointing behind me and putting her arms out... she had spotted her KayKay and wanted to go to her! 

Kaylee is going to adopt LOTS of kids from China one day (we've already discussed it), and I can't wait for the day that she brings her first little one home!  But for now, I'm so thankful that she wants to invest so much into my little girls!   Love you, KayKay!!!

LOVE IS....

....A big brother who brings home a book of sign language, so he can teach his baby sister how to better communicate! 

He has the book memorized after reading through it (so wish I had that ability!) and we can ask him just about anything and he can show us the sign.  We are working on more signs for Ella Grace, but her favorite sign, by far, is "more" and "eat"!  She giggles every time! 

Sweet Saturday!

Breaking her into the GOOD stuff!!!