More Open House and Family

These pictures are of several cousins Kyle, Ryan, Brigette, and Sheena along with one with Aunt Joyce. Also you will see a pic of cousin Jaxon who thought obviously that Kassidy was getting a little more attention than he was and he needed to do something about that soooooo he decided he would dump the plate of melted chocolate from the chocolate fountain on top of his head. Well...he succeeded with this strategy. He got laughs and pics taken of him for a very long time and there was absolutely no way that mommy and daddy could do any type of discipline with that cute grin on his face and with everyone acting as if he had done the best trick in the whole wide world.

Alum Creek WV Open House for Kassidy

While we live in NC, we both consider our home sweet home as WV. This is where we grew up and a lot of our friends and family live there. So we were so excited to get there to have Kassidy meet people that have loved her and anticipated her arrival for a long, long time. As you can see, they had an all out party fest for her arrival. We decided to have an open house instead of an official shower because we wanted men and children to come and to not have such a formal setting so that we could do more socializing than setting around and watching Nikki open gifts for hours, which is fun also but since we do not get to see everyone in WV that often and since it was Kassidy's first "showing" (hehe) we definitely wanted to spend more time with talk and hugs. The pics above are of the decorations, cake (made by Billy's aunt Debbie who lives in WV) and friends, family and church family in WV. We could not be more blessed to have all these people in our lives and now in Kassidy's life as I think I do not have to emphasize too much because the pics says it all. She is already so loved!

Meeting Cousins in WV for First Time

So sorry to all of you who have been checking the blog site for updates. Since getting home we have been on the go a lot traveling out of state to introduce Kassidy to her family and friends that unfortunately do not live so close. Also, we have been blessed with so many friends and church families that have been giving us showers/open houses that we have been quite busy with those too. While it has been a little very busy at times it has been so much fun and we have enjoyed it and appreciated it more than can be expressed in words and we thank all of you for all the work and time that you have put into making these events in our lives so special.

All these cuties above in the pictures are Kassidy's cousins, Reece, Bobbi Raeann, Ayden and Jaxon in WV who she was meeting for the first time. As you can see, they were all so happy to FINALLY be holding her and playing with her after not only waiting 3.5 years for the adoption but also to have to wait two weeks after we got home to the US for us to finally be rested up enough to travel to see them. I think that two weeks for them was harder than the 3.5 year wait, which I know I would be out of my mind crazy too if it had been me to be so close yet not be able to see her yet. While her cousin Jaxon is only a couple months older than she is, he is all boy and when picking her up and then picking him up, he is like one big muscle and so heavy compared to her. I wish I had got a picture of their hands together because his hands are so much bigger than hers it is just so funny. At first, he was ready to get to her and play (which is a little too aggressive as far as she was concerned). The first few days she cried every time she even saw him in the same room. She was like "Oh no...not him again." BUT after a few days she was holding her own. She got brave and would put her hand in his face and pull his hair before he would have the chance to get to her which he more or less thought was funny. I don't think she intimidated him at all but we will see how that goes in the years to come! hehe

Helen Street Baby Shower

Can anyone say baby shower???? Well I can because that is what we had today. My good friend Amy along with several other ladies from church put together a magnificent baby shower for both Kassidy and Gilead Rain who is another recently adopted little girl from Africa whose proud parents are Tim and Tiffany with two proud big brothers. Amy had decorated her living room area in a African-themed setting and the food/dining area into a Chinese-themed setting. It was very nice. We had a lot of the ladies from church who came and celebrated our beautiful baby girls with us and flooded us with many gifts that Kassidy loved tearing into but most importantly flooded us with much love. We are full of gratitude for being surrounded by so many caring and Godly people as we are and are very blessed to have them in our lives. We have included some pics of the shower including some cutie shots of Kassidy and Gilead. One pic is of Kassidy plopped in the middle of the floor after exerting herself so much in opening all of her gifts. This coming weekend we will be having an open house for Kassidy in WV to meet many family and nd life long friends for the first time. It has been very hard to hold off on going as soon as we got back from China but we needed our rest but am counting the days down until we pack the car up and head up to WV.

First Day At Church

Here are some pics of Kassidy with mommy and daddy right before we walked into her first day at church services. We wondered how she would do and we came to the conclusion that there would not be as many peaceful Sunday mornings spent sitting and actually being able to listen intently on the sermons. We will have to take turns. She seems to think if she is to sit still then she should have something in her mouth (preferably gerber finger food puffs). However, we can only feed her so much and then we have to take it away and she of course thinks that it is the most terrible thing in the world and then having a nursery at the church building really comes in handy. I'm hoping before too long we can make some improvements in this but it all comes with time like everything else.

Pics with Family

We were able to get a few pics with some of the first visiting family members. Billy's mom and dad (mimi and pop-pop) were here when we arrived back from China. Kassidy made up to them quickly. She is really a friendly baby unless she sees that you have food and are not giving her any. We also have added some pics of her cousins, Amanda, Kristen and Marissa. Even though they live close, because of their new schedule of being back to school when we got back and our sleeping schedule being messed up still, they had to wait about a week until we could get together with them but as you can see....I'm sure they would say the same as we said...it was well worth the wait. Cousin Scott and new wife Cassie stopped in on the way back from their honeymoon in Myrtle Beach to take a quick glance at Kassidy and to be able to rub it into everyone back home that was having to wait to see her. We failed to catch any pics of them together but as I remember they got some so if you guys send them our way we can put them up on the blog. Can't wait until we get to introduce her to her many family and friends back in good ole WV later this week. We can't wait!!!!!!!

Kassidy Playing

Hello All. So sorry for no updates but it has been quite hectic around here since we got back. The first two days Kassidy and mom was still on China time and then we started to try to slowly change her over to EST which did not go very well. While mom and dad changed over to EST Kassidy still stayed on China time so that has been very challenging to say the least. Aside from the horrible side effect of being on a plane for over 20 hours and the time change, Kassidy is also cutting teeth. She has two bottom teeth which have already came in but her two top teeth are coming in also. As we speak, she is gnawing away on a teething biscuit very happily, but before the teething biscuit...well...not so happy. With all the factors that she is having to face, her behavior is nothing out of the ordinary and is to be expected. She really is a good baby but any good baby would be having a hard time considering everything going on in her life now. This morning she got us up at 5 AM and was in such a happy mood that we had to take a video clip to show you guys. She is getting a little upset now because her biscuit is now becoming obsolete so I better get off of here and find out some other way to please her. I think she is getting tired. Will try to post something here before too long. Again, sorry for the delay in post but I have been a little preoccupied as of late.