Memorial Day in Savannah

Spanish moss......beautiful
Elisabeth isn't sure about this "old lady" that we found in one of the stores

Ansley decided to pose with her

John decided to go for a kiss :-)

On the steep slippery steps from River Street

Travis and Elisabeth looking at the river

The Georgia Queen taking a ride down the river

Dad and Elisabeth strolling along

We spent the Memorial Day weekend in Savannah and even though it rained the entire time we still had fun. We went down to River Street and walked around (in the rain) and ducked inside the candy store to get away from the rain and get a nice treat.......warm pralines. Yummy! We also bought a few other treats to snack on later. Glad I don't live down the street from that place! The girls went swimming on Sunday afternoon and the water felt like ice cubes. I couldn't put anything else in besides my feet. Ansley went all the way in and even went under water. Her lips were purplish blue the whole time. Why do that to yourself? It was just too cold to swim! We also went to see the movie: Night at the Museum 2 - The Smithsonian. Very cute and very creative movie. The only bad thing is that they cussed twice in it which was totally unnecessary. It really irks me that they do that! And when you are in a theater with a huge screen and the volume turned up loud there is no way to avoid those cuss word moments. We just have to tell our children those aren't good words to say and hope they don't repeat them. I guess they didn't want the movie to be rated G so they stuck a few cuss words in it to bump it up to PG. I better stop now.......the issue of movie content for kids really annoys me and I could talk about it for hours but I'll spare you.

School is almost over and we go back to Savannah for a few days at the beginning of June. Hopefully the weather will cooperate this time and we'll be able to go to the beach and go to the pool and swim in warmer water.

Hope every one had a safe and wonderful Memorial Day!

A Weekend of Camping

Elisabeth couldn't quite reach...
Taking a break from our bike ride to feed the ducks

Our home away from home

The duck that came to visit our campsite and wouldn't leave. It just followed us around.

Looking for some treasure

Some of Ansley's treasures from gem mining
Some of Elisabeth's treasures from gem mining

Ansley looking hard for treasure!

John helping Elisabeth sort through her sand

Playing on the playground

Aren't they cute?

He is huge!

Waiting for the train

We went camping again this past weekend. We went close to home this time to Salisbury, NC. It's about an hour and a half from here. We camped at Dan Nicholas park which is a Rowan County park. It's big and pretty nice. The campsite we had was by the lake and was nice and roomy and private. It's a very wooded campground so most of the sites had a good deal of privacy. We got everything set up and settled on Friday night, slept in a little on Saturday morning then headed out to explore the park. They have a nice lake with pedal boats, splash park, little animal reserve, petting barn, gem mining, train ride, carousel and a large playground. We did everything except the pedal boats and miniature golf. We arrived at the splash area just as it was closing on Saturday evening so we didn't get to do that either. Maybe next time. The nice thing about that campground is that checkout time isn't until 4 pm so we were able to get up on Sunday and take our time getting out of there. We would have explored more on Sunday morning but it was raining so we decided to call it a weekend and pack up and head home. Good thing I brought movies with us to watch in case it rained......we did a lot of movie watching. But that's OK. It was nice and relaxing and there wasn't any laundry or yardwork to do! We could just sit and enjoy each other.

It rained (actually poured would be a better word) quite a bit on Saturday but in between the rain we went out riding bikes around the lake and to all the different activities around the park. The girls had a blast as usual and they really liked the gem mining. The buckets are seeded with rather large stones and jewels as the girls call them. They had a blast sifting through the buckets of sand to see what treasures they could find. Since we've been home they've washed their jewels several times to get them sparkly clean and have sorted them and looked at them over and over. They are so proud of what they found!

We are getting a little better and a little faster at setting up and taking down the pop-up. It still takes us a while but we're getting there. This was the first time we weren't connected to sewer though so we had to go to the dump station on our way out of the campground. The smell that comes from that hole in the ground is enough to make you sick. Nasty. And I had to touch the tube which is gross in itself and promptly had to go wash my hands and santize them. John calls me a princess. I am and I know it. The girls are too. John just shakes his head. It's hard living with 3 princesses. :-)

Oh yeah...on a side note.....I took my van to be repaired today. You know from when the lady rear ended me several weeks ago while I sat innocently at a red light. Well, guess what they gave me as a rental car? A silver mustang. I feel so sporty...especially since I usually drive a van which people call the loser cruiser. I'll enjoy the sportiness for the 2 short days that I have it. Ansley will be so excited to see it when I pick her up from school today. I'm sure the 1st thing she will ask me is "does the top come down?" No, sorry........the top doesn't come down like Grandaddy and Nana's did! It's too cold today for a convertible anyway. It feels more like a Fall day here instead of a Spring day! Brrrrr.....

Enjoy the pictures!

Happy Gotcha Day Elisabeth!

In the Beijing Airport on May 8, 2006. On our way to Changsha to meet Elisabeth! There she is! We are waiting for our names to be called and for them to check our passports, etc. Oh yeah....give her to me!
She never cried when we took her away from the orphanage staff but she definitely wasn't sure what to make of everything that was going on.

Looking into her eyes
John holding her for the first time

All of this excitement makes a girl tired!
Our first family photo on the bus ride back to the hotel. We are now a family of 4!
Elisabeth after going back to the hotel with us and getting a bath and fresh new clothes
Wow.....look at her now. She's grown so much!

The girls 3 years later......(l-r) Jenny, Elisabeth, Katherine, Olivia and Kimli

3 years ago today we arrived in Changsha China and were taken to meet Elisabeth for the first time! What a day! We had been waiting for that day for 1 1/2 years! Then 2 days later we were able to celebrate Mother's Day together as one big family. What a Mother's Day present!

We are celebrating tomorrow night with some friends that we traveled to China with. They are celebrating their daughter's Gotcha Day too. We are all going out to the local Asian Bistro for dinner. Elisabeth can't wait to eat some Chinese dumplings! She loves them!

Happy Gotcha Day Elisabeth! We love you!

(P.S. Happy Gotcha day to Kimli, Katherine, Olivia, Charley and Jenny too!)

Visit http://www.ourjourneytoelisabeth.com/ to take a walk down memory lane

James Island County Park

Getting ready to climb

John is on the left at the top of the wallAnsley is almost to the top of the wall
She made it to the top of the 50 ft wall!!

Ansley making her way to the top

She tried the medium wall first but didn't make it to the top. It was a little too hard for her first try.

The splash park

We went camping this past weekend for the first time in our new pop-up camper. Woohoo! We went to our favorite place: Charleston, SC. We stayed at James Island County Park and had a wonderful time. The weather was perfect and it never rained the whole weekend.....thank goodness! We rode bikes, went to the water park (the water was a little too cold for me though), Ansley and John climbed the rock wall, we went to the dock in the marsh and watched people catch blue crabs and a stingray and of course we roasted marshmallows. It just wouldn't be camping if we didn't roast marshmallows! It was our trial run with the new camper and everything went smoothly. We spent a good bit of time once we got there trying to organize everything inside the camper and making sure we knew how the potty and shower worked. We didn't want to recreate any scenes from the movie RV with Steve Martin. Funny funny movie if you've never seen it. But it's only funny because all the stuff happened to him. Poop exploding in OUR faces wouldn't have been so funny.

It was nice having the option to take a shower and go potty in our own camper and not having to go to the bath house if we didn't want to. The shower is small....very small... so it takes some getting used to but it wasn't too bad.

Ansley had been begging to go to the Rock Climbing Center they have there and climb the wall. She climbed all the way to the top of the 50 foot wall (twice) all by herself. She was so proud and so were we! From the top of the wall you can look straight out over the trees and see the big new bridge in Charleston. The bridge is about 7 miles away. Pretty neat. John climbed too and reached the top also. I am afraid of heights and had no desire to climb to the top whatsoever. People think I'm missing out on so much because I don't like roller coasters, ferris wheels and climbing to the top of walls.......but honestly I hate heights and all 3 of the above involve being high off the ground so I really don't feel the least bit like I'm missing out on anything. I can find other ways to get an adrenaline rush. :-) I'm content just staying at the bottom and being the photographer. (Oh yeah....I forgot to pack the camera on this trip so we don't have many more pictures than what you see above. Thank goodness our phone takes pictures.)

We ate lunch at Folly beach one day which is always nice. I love Folly Beach and Sullivans Island. I could seriously live there or at least have a condo there so I can go visit on the weekends. Love it, love it, love it. We didn't make it to the Citadel this time around but that's OK (we've been there alot) so we'll have to make sure we go by there next time.

We can't wait to back to Charleston in September to camp during Labor Day weekend. We are planning another camping trip in 1 1/2 weeks but we are sticking close to home this time. We are trying out some local campgrounds that we've never been to before. If anyone knows of any really good ones please let us know. We're always looking for new places to try!

Spring Yard Sale

Ansley's teacher stopped by to get a drink and a cookie. She owed $.75 for her purchase and gave Ansley a 5 dollar bill. In this picture Ansley is working hard to figure out how much she owes Mrs. Wright. They just finished a chapter on money so Mrs. Wright gave Ansley a 5 dollar bill on purpose to make her do some work! Ansley finally figured out how much to give her back -- Mrs. Wright gave her a tip for making her work so hard on a Saturday!

Our neighborhood recently had its community yard sale and once again we participated in an effort to clear our house of more junk. Our junk is someone else's treasure right? I talked the girls into getting rid of some of their stuffed animals. We have WAY too many. I promised them that if they could put some toys and stuffed animals in the sell pile then they could keep the money they earned from them. That perked them up! They put quite a bit in the sell pile! Yay! I also decided it would be fun for them to sell drinks and cookies to those driving around the neighborhood for the yard sale. It was 85 degrees that day so I figured by noon people would be hungry and thirsty. We loaded down the cooler with lemonade, coke, diet coke and water and had chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin and frosted sugar cookies on hand. I wish I could say I made them but there was just no time for that. Walmart made them instead.

We had an OK turnout for the sale. It definitely wasn't as good as in past years. We still made OK money and used it to help re-stock our new camper. The girls did really well and made $34 dollars or so by selling drinks, cookies and stuffed animals. They did well! Everything that didn't sell was hauled off to Goodwill later that afternoon. I am so glad that is over with. Yard sales are not my favorite thing to do. They are alot of work!