july 2012 Laurels gym camp and visit with Bray family

July was a busy and crazy wonderful month and its come to an end.
Laurel and mom flew to Idaho together this year,to Cordalean,Idaho to Gymnastics camp for a week. We both had a great time and laurel learned alot. They worked us all hard all week. Camp started each am at 8:30am and they worked out till 3pm or so,then the afternoon/eves were spent doing other fun camp activities,going to the beach,barbques and smore making,wall climbing,swiming,amusement park andso on. We were exhausted by the end of the day. Laurel starts competing August so this was a great extra bit of work out time fo her. Her biggest accomplishment was learning to like and feel more confident on the vault. She is so small and can fly so high!!

After gym camp was over,we flew to oregon,our flight was 4hrs late in leaving from Spokane to Portland,Stan and Zak had driven to Salem where our friends the Bray family live. Their two daughters are both from China as well and Lila Ann,their almost 8yr old wasZakarys foster sister in foster care before we got to him. We try to meet with them at least once a year to keep them in touch. We had a great viit,always too short and then we all drove home to California togetherarriving home last night.

July 4 2012 Laurels forever family day

Each year on July 4 we celebrate not only the independance of the US but at ou house we celebrate the adoption of our daughter Laurel Sage JiaWen Raymond,and her independance that she will experience now that she lies her in the USA. The kids and Dad marched in one parade the night before juky 4 with Laurels gym team and then the kids and i walked another parade the morning of July 4 with laurels gym team.  Ater that we were off to a july 4th/combo birthday bbq with one of our friends family from the gym. Then.....after that to Discovery Kingdom as we do each year for fireworks with another family who adoted their daughter a month after we got home with Laurel.

As many of you will recall the picture that we posted from China of Laurel as a tiny 9 month old baby girl being held for the first time by her daddy,they stared at eachother,it spoke many many words and feelings. Each year as she has grown we have retaken that pose to post,this year,at age 7.5 yrs,she should be nearly holding him but never the less,the love is still in the stare.

july 1 2012

lol i just ralized that there was a draft left from last summer about this time. Not sure how that haopend but it is somewhere in the pots now,but falls into 2012. please read and excuse the error in placement of posts.....im not so technically saavy as id like to be.

July 28th 2011

trippomg to oregon!!!
Zak and i were to fly to Portalnd this afternoon to meet dad and laurel after gym camp and to visit with his foster sister from China at their home in Salem,Oregon. Well due to unreliable airlines,over booking and very expensive tickets Zak and i have decided that we will not depend on anyone but ourselves so we will be leaving very in early Thursday am and driving....yes the two of us will drive to Salem Oregon to see Lila Ann and her family. Zak told me he was going to cry when he got to Lila Ann's house. I asked "why"? he said "happy tears of course". he just cant wait to see LA. Wish us luck and we will post pics of our trip when we get home.

July 1 2012

The kids have been out of school nearly a month now,still soooooo busy all the time.
Gymnastics and TaeKwonDo go on as usual and of course i go to work. Stan is leading a high school running club this summer 3 days a week for a couple hrs in the am. Dad and kids go swimming a couple days a week and then take Tuesdays to do a FUN DAY.... Te local theme park or something of that sort. Te weather has been good,not too hot but not cold either.
We had been in Escrow for our own new house and then at the last minute our loan professional(lol lol ha ha) totally dumped on us and haad not bothered to get the correct loan in play that we needed due to our situation and we had to aborth the purchase. We were/are FURIOUS!!!! our real estate agent is furious,the seller is put out and the list goes on. It wasjust what we needed and now we ar back to square one....... You expect to hire a professional to know the business,well all was wll till the end,then he realized,though will never admit it was hhis fault,in fact,tried to turn it back on us. GRRRRRR we will keep you posted and we start on our hunt again,for our just right forever home.

Laurel and I and two other of her gym team mates were blessed with section 123 row 17 seats for the womans gym trials in San Jose. We were even invitd to the pre event meal and drinks before hand. These three little girls were just in their elements!!! It was a super special occasionfor them,im sure a once in a life time event.Laurel and I will be flying to Idaho in about 20 days(but who is counting),for gymnastica camp. She and Stan went last year and i stayed home with zak. Laurel has made a paoer chain to keep track of how many days till take off. We are both looking forward to going,Zak not so much. He doesnt do as well without mom so dad will have to have some things planned to keep him busy. He will be going to TKD so as to keep up with his belts and testing.
The boys will drive to Oregon at the end of gym camp and laure and iwill fly to them where we will spend a few days with Zaks foster sister from China,Lila Ann and her family in Salem.

We are about to celebrate Laurels 7th anniversary of her adoption. 7 yrs ago to day we were in beijing, do you all remember how hot it was???? lol man it was hot!! we were seeing the sights and bideing our time waiting to meet laurel. I kept having to stop and slow down,tell myself "slow down,enjoy the sites,the smells,the time,before you know it it will all be behind us" it was hard but we did it.   I will post the usual pics of laurel and daddy that recounts the first pic we posted of her and daddy staring into eachothers eyes that day in China. She still is so tiny but almost too big to hold in that position.

Zakary is doing well,earning more and more stripes and belts in TaeKwonDo..and just so sweet.

Life is busy and still very rewarding...Hope you all are doing well as well.