Happy Forever Family Day Ashlie! (for tomorrow!)

Ashlie today. Beautiful, happy, and healthy.

This picture was taken at the orphanage, probably just before she left to come meet her family (she's wearing the same outfit that she was wearing when we received her) This picture always gets me ~ she looks so alone.

In her mama's arms, at last.

& now she meets her Daddy.

Adam is also in love with her.

Sweet sweet picture of gege (big brother) and meimei (little sister) Finally together.

What an incredible day it was 5 years ago on July 20th, 2003. After all of our dreams, setbacks and heartbreak, a tiny angel was placed in my arms.

You know, I had every intention of sharing all the details of that day and evening here, but I'm not sure that I'm ready to do that. Let me just say that we were a little shocked at the condition of our baby. Missing hair (later learned that it was very brittle due to malnutrition, and as she scratched her head it broke the hair off), bites and heat rash, and lumpy swollen glands all over the back of her head and down the back of her arms. She weighed just over 12 pounds at 9 1/2 months and she needed us. As much as we needed her. Worry for our baby consumed me for our first afternoon and night until we finally got her to eat some congee. With the incredible heat in Nanchang and her refusal to drink, I was very concerned about dehydration. But she clung to me and I clunged to her and I prayed constantly for our Lord to carry us through these first days.


One story that very few of you know:


On the evening of the 20th, after having our babies for a few hours, our group told our guide that we thought we needed to make a trip to the store for some baby supplies. (I was desperate to find some Chinese bottles to see if we'd have any better luck with them - we didn't, btw) Our guide said the store was just a few blocks away and our group could easily walk there. Well, the store was about 1/2 mile away, and carrying the babies in the heat made it seem sooooo much further. We entered the store and it was instant culture shock. It was packed with people, and they were shouting announcements over the loud speaker constantly. I was completely overwhelmed and very concerned about the sweet baby that I was holding. She was just staring into space like she was in shock. She just seemed to be looking worse by the minute and I told Rick that we had to hurry. I was feeling nearly panicky and just wanted to get some food/formula into our baby. (She hadn't had a single drink since she was placed in our arms, and I knew that she'd already had a long bus ride to Nanchang from Guangchang that day and didn't know if she'd even had anything to drink all day) Our group finally was ready to leave and Rick, Adam and I started rushing ahead of the group. I was truly feeling scared for Ashlie; she just didn't look right. I wanted to feed her. I looked at her again and she looked at me, and her eyes rolled back into her head and she went completely limp. I was terrified. I wasn't even sure if she was alive at that moment. Tears were flowing as I urgently told Rick to look at her, and we broke into a run trying to get her to the hotel. I was terrified for her, and even scared for ourselves as we were carrying this baby through the night streets of Nanchang with all of the locals staring at us. As we entered the hotel Ashlie started waking up (coming to? ), and we ran to our room to try the Chinese bottles. No luck at all, but Rick talked to Eric H, who suggested we try some congee from the hotel restaurant. They brought some right up and PRAISE THE LORD she ate every drop! Thank you Lord, and thank you Eric! Congee has a lot of liquid in it so I knew that we would be okay for a while anyway.



That was how our life started with Ashlie. It took many many months for her to eat well and for her to gain weight. We had to have monthly blood work done as they monitored her thyroid activity. (She was experiencing low thyroid due to her early malnutrition, and they were watching for it to reach normal levels or we'd have to treat with medication) For several months we had to take her in for weekly weight checks to make sure she was gaining, but when I broke down in tears at one weight check when she actually had lost weight, the doctor decided that maybe I was putting too much stress on myself over it and we switched to bi-weekly checks!

& now you can see our sweet Ashlie in the top picture above!

Happy Forever Family Day, our sweet Ashlie! We could not possibly love you any more.