August 2019

Dayton Pool/water park

Kayaking fun

How many ice cream runs?

Happy 12th Birthday Isaac!

When you don't wear a helmet on the hoverboard...

Group ride

We can pretend to be an athletic family

Girls morning out

Enjoying some shopping 

Their happy place

Cousin fun

They were both really good on this kayak!

Forest Kindergarten Big Adventure Day- catching fish

Nolbi and Naomi

First day of school

-August was fun! We helped Grandpa/Grandma J move into their house in Zeeland. Then the 3 boys went to stay at Uncle Ben/Aunt Steph's house for a couple days. They went on bike rides, swam, ate ice cream, kayaked, played games, and Stephen had some stomach issues one night- too much junk food! They all had a great time.
-We celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary! So wonderful.
-We celebrated Isaac's 12th birthday and then drove to Charlevoix for the Jongsma family vacation. Isaac was very excited to get a hoverboard (that we had found a great deal on). He is 5 ft 3 in and 108 pounds. Isaac is the sibling glue. He brings fun to any situation. He is also adept at annoying his siblings. Isaac enjoys playing soccer, basketball and baseball. He is talented at piano and French horn and he is having a great 6th grade year. We love you Isaac!
-The Jongsma family rented a house in Charlevoix and the weekend was wonderful. We played yard games, went to the beach and used our waverunners. We also went on a group bike ride, and slowly we all dropped out and had Jenny pick us up. Ben, Steph, Isaac and Tim went the full 18 miles! (Nate and Caleb couldn't come til later in the weekend because of high school soccer tryouts.)
-The week before school started, Lexi and Nate went on the Forest Kindergarten Big Adventure Day in northern MI. She got to spend time with her classmates, explore and catch fish. She brought home a monarch caterpillar with milkweed which we fed and watched it turn into a chrysalis. Unfortunately the curious 5 year old poked it too much and we didn't get to see the butterfly emerge. Next time.
-Enedina's baby- Naomi- made her appearance 5 weeks early. She was so tiny, but she was healthy and went home in a couple days. Santos, Nolbi (5) and 10 month old Ruth were excited to welcome Naomi!
-The kids began a new school year; Caleb- 9th, Isaac- 6th, Julia- 5th, Stephen- Forest 1st, Lexi- Forest Kindergarten. For the first time in 14 years, all of our kids are in school every day!
-Caleb made the Freshman soccer team- he was pumped!

July 2019

Cottage life

Lexi and Isaac watching the fireworks

Driving Aunt Beth's boat

Boat ride to the ferry for ice cream, Great Grandma came along

Blew a tire on our way home

Jee and Julia

Badlands

Peyto Lake

View of Jasper

Many rainy hikes. And Julia didn't want to be in this picture

This doesn't happen at home

Bull moose on the trail

Cliff jumping at Horseshoe Lake

-I went in for allergy shots and had an anaphylactic response to the dust mite shot. They had to give an epi pen, etc and call Nate to pick me up. Once home I broke out in full body hives, had to go to urgent care and get a steroid shot and take more oral steroids.  It was a scary experience and I am no longer doing the dust mite allergy shot, still doing the other 4 allergy shots.
-We went to the cottage on Lake Wisconsin. Grandpa/Grandma J and Steph/Ben were also there along with some extended family. It was a wonderful weekend. The weather was beautiful, kids swam non-stop, we did water sports, watched fireworks around the lake, and enjoyed time with family. On our way home the waverunner trailer tire blew out. Thankfully we were near Jee's family so they picked us up while Nate and the older boys fixed the tire.
-Julia spent a night with Jee's family in Indiana.
-Nate has been working on the kids bathroom. Took out the old vanity, the tile floor and tile on the walls. The bathroom is almost finished!
-Our family went to Glacier, Banff, and Jasper July 13-27. It was about 4,000 miles total and we pulled the pop up camper. We have a separate photo book for the trip. Many memories were made!

June 2019

Caleb, Gavin, Eli, Jacob, Nathan, Ashton

Heritage Camp

Parade of Nations

Dolphin and her counselors Scrappy, Lottie, and Dobbie

Bucket, Megalodon, Danger

Isaac, Luke, Levi, Isaac L., and Efeson

-We celebrated Caleb finishing 8th grade! We had a party with the families of his friends. The Melcher's hosted the party at their cottage on Lake MI.
-Nate was installed as an elder and will serve for 3 years.
-Caleb has a summer job- doing yard work for a couple from our church. He works 1-2 times/wk for about 2 hours each time. He is paid well and they are flexible as to when he works- a great first job.
-Caleb finished driver's training and now has his driver's permit.
-Lexi took swimming lessons for the first time and learned alot! It was an outdoor pool and the weather was chilly, thankfully the pool water was warmish. Stephen was supposed to take swimming lessons too, but came down with croup. In June. What?
-Julia attended Maranatha's Praise Days VBS and made/decorated a beautiful cake. Stephen wanted to attend and make the rocket ship, but croup.
-We celebrated Nate on Father's Day- made his favorite foods and kids wrote notes for him.
-Caleb went backpacking on Isle Royale for a week with 7 other boys and 2 men. We made a separate photo book of his trip, but the weather was great, he enjoyed backpacking and he had fun with friends. Unfortunately he and 2 other kids came down with the stomach flu on the drive back, so he spent the 10 hr van ride throwing up. Yuck. But he loved the trip!
-Julia, Stephen, Lexi and I attended Heritage Camp in Grand Rapids. It's a day camp for internationally adopted kids and their siblings. Julia was in Korea camp and the littles and I were in China Camp. Stephen thought camp was great. Lexi was a little wary, but still enjoyed the week.
-Isaac and Julia attended Camp Kesem for a week. This was Julia's first time sleeping away at camp. We were a little nervous sending them as we did not know a whole lot about the camp and staff, etc. And that it is a camp for kids whose parents have had cancer made Isaac a little unsure- like are we talking about cancer all the time? The kids had a blast at camp! The counselors were high energy and there were non-stop fun activities. Everyone at camp has a made up name. Isaac was Megalodon and Julia was Dolphin. Whenever a counselor called someone by the wrong name they had to eat a bite of baby food. Julia and Isaac both said they would enjoy going to Camp Kesem again.

May 2019

Caleb drew this portrait of Lecrae in art class!

Tulip Time 5k (and fun run for Stephen)

Last minute photo of the Kinderparade costume

Lacrosse 5th-8th grade

Grandparents Day- Forest School style

Stephen's kindergarten class

Mother's Day Spectacular

Front page of a Jinan newspaper

Aunt Steph brought the fun

With Lexi's finder

Yes- pandas! 

Feel the love

One of Lexi's nannies

Our searcher, Miss Jane

Last day of school

Mrs. VanRees and Mrs. Meckley

Mrs. Bosch and Mr. Harig

Master shower demo

 -We started the month out with Tulip Time. Caleb marched in all of the parades and Julia was our only child dressed in a costume for the kinderparade this year.
-Forest Kindergarten had a Mother's Day Spectacular- basically songs sung by adorable kindergarteners. For the last song each child stood alone on the stage while their mom stood up in the audience and sang, "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living my mommy you'll be." Yes, I was a crying mess along with every other mom that evening. Adorable.
-Lexi, Steph and myself went to China May 18-26. We have the trip documented in depth elsewhere so this will be some highlights. Lexi had been asking questions about finding her birth parents, so we decided to try. Unfortunately we did not find any of her birth family. But the media response was beyond what we expected- our story ran daily and even national news outlets ran our story. And we were able to meet Lexi's finder and learn more details about where she had been found. We left Lexi's DNA in the national system so her birth family could come forward anywhere in China and be matched. We also left our searcher's cell number. We are beyond grateful for our searcher, Miss Jane and all of the 'helpers' we met in China who care about Lexi and want to assist her in finding her birth family. And we saw 8 pandas while in China- Lexi was thrilled! Lexi is an amazing traveller, I can see world traveling in her future. And Steph was Lexi's person on this trip- she kept the energy up and kept Lexi entertained- we couldn't have done this trip without her.
-The kids finished the school year- 8th, 5th,4th, kindergarten and 4 year old preschool are done! The kids teachers this year were fantastic.
-We tore out the master shower and had new tile put in- always some kind of project here.