{Lainie, Lilly, AnnaClaire, and Mia}
There are 4 mommies who have become friends...
and daddies, too
and a joyous crew of kids who seemed like they have known eachother forever...
and 7 beautiful Chinese kiddos (with 4 more on the way!)
and some other big sisters, too
All because of 4 little girls who are the same age, and who lived in the same orphanage in China at the same time (We are fairly certain that Lilly, Lainie, and AnnaClaire actually all lived in the same room!!!) and now live in the same general area in the United States. Yes, all because of them.
We met at the park with these families today, FINALLY. It's sad that it has taken this long to finally get all of these Chenzhou sisters together, but we finally did... and boy was it precious. It is just incredible to see the girls that knew eachother before they even knew their families. And now we get to see them together again. I just love the miracle of adoption. You go into it only thinking you will be blessed with a child... which of course, you are. But you also create lifelong friendships and bonds with some amazing families that you otherwise never would've known. Truly amazing.
Here's Kate and Ellie and Lilly's big sister, Shelby! (by the way, we are pretty excited, because Shelby's family received LOA for their newest addition on the same day that Grace's LOA came... how fun it would to see their sweet family in Guangzhou!!)
Mia, Kate, and AnnaClaire riding the whale
All the little girls LOVED playing with Mia B and Lainie's big brother, Trey!
Mia L. and AC running together
Precious memories with sweet friends
And of course, all of these growing families just had to check out our bus! I think all of the girls were ready for one of their own ;) Who knew having a 15 passenger van was so cool?You can also read more about our day here: http://thebarbeebunch.blogspot.com/. I love the way she put it... "I just love the fingerprints of God in this story. Who else could have orchestrated such a story? I sometimes take for granted how incredible it is that in all of the world, these girls from so, so far away wound up still being so close together after being adopted."
10 comments:
Love all your picks and I am still wanting your "bus"!
How wonderful to have those relationships- and to have everyone in the same area!
Oh wow! What a wonderful day that must have been!
Emily, what a small world!! We were in China together with Lainie's family (the Barbees) to adopt our children from Xi'an in February 2010! How funny that you know them too!!
Love your post. It is so true. We went into our first adoption not realizing there was an entire adoption community out there in the world. Now that we know that, it is just one more bonus to our having adopted in the first place! How blessed we are to even know your family. How blessed to be a part of something so much bigger than ourselves. How blessed to have these precious children in our lives!
Hugs,
Janet, Kevin, Ted, Philip, and Elijah
I love all the pictures. It looks like everyone had such a great time. The more I looked at the pictures I realized that was the park we go and play at. Small world!!
Precious precious photos! They paint a thousand words!! :)
Hugs from Indy,
Robin
I ran across your blog looking at a persons from my travel group and teared up seeing the girls from Chenzhou. We also have a Chenzhou girl! We came home in July. She turned 2 in May. We have a blog you can connect too :-) So happy I ran into you!
Blessings!
Cara
Very sweet post and love the van picture!
Kelly
I just love this story and believe that it was orchestrated by God that these children have stayed together and your families have become friends.
BTW, I'm sorry we didn't get a chance to meet last week when we met up with Dana and her kids for the day. We had such a great time.
Kelly
It is wonderful to see girls from Chenzhou. My daughter is from there also and there is 3 other sweet girls in our town that all were adopted at the same time. God is so good!!
Blessings
Nancy
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