Happy Valentine's Day!!!

Jan. 31- Feb.4 we were in Gastonia, NC leading worship for a city wide youth event. Libby was an EXCELLENT traveler! And the church that hosted the event had EXCELLENT care givers for Libby. I was incredibly impressed and blessed. I felt so secure in leaving Libby with Jada and Tami. We are grateful that the church took the care of Libby seriously.

Libby saw her first snow when we were in NC. And... she had her first visit to the ER. On Friday night Libby was walking around the hotel room as we were getting ready for bed and she fell. Billy was closest to her and I heard himself "Oh my gosh, she's bleeding BAD." I rushed over to her and her mouth was gushing blood everywhere. Libby's top two front teeth had gone all the way through her bottom lip. We didn't know if she needed stitches. We arrived at the ER at 9:30 pm. To make a long story short we arrived back at the hotel at 5 AM after the doctor said she didn't need stitches or medicine. Why they couldn't tell us that before we waited 7 1/2 hours I'll never know. Anyway - we have some pics below of her injury. But now her lip is almost completely healed and her teeth are just fine. Billy and I feel like official parents now that we've been to the ER.

My dear friend Carrera and her mom came to visit us in NC. It was their first time to see Libby. And I forgot to get Libby's picture with them. I wanted to kick myself when I realized that!!! We had a great time with Carrera and Donna. Love you Friends!

In the late part of Jan. and early part of Feb. we tried to get Libby to take only one nap a day. That just didn't work and we're back to two naps. Libby's finally back on a normal schedule.  And that makes mommy happy!

Monday night I had the chance to speak at my church about adoption. The women at our church gather once a month for "Heart to Heart" and have dinner and then a speaker shares. Feb. was my turn. And it was also a night focused on evangelism. So as I shared about Libby's adoption I paralleled that to Christ's adoption of us. I was nervous. I'm not a speaker - and yes, speaking and singing are two VERY different things, but I think it went well. Hopefully the Spirit used Libby's story to save souls.

Libby is now playing pretend. She pretends she's putting something in our hands and she pretends while she plays with her kitchenette. She continues to enjoy making up little games to play with Billy and I. She'll randomly giggle at something we do and then we make it into a game. Her laugh is so precious. Libby is now running. She's down to only two bottles a day. She drinks out of sippy the rest of the day and she's entirely off formula. She is trying her best to feed herself with her spoon. But she just can't figure out how to get the food on the spoon. She pats the spoon in the food and then puts and empty spoon to her mouth. But she doesn't want mommy to help, so eating time is a LONG time.

Next month we will start Libby's 6 month post placement work. China requires a social worker to check in on us 2 times - after being home 6 months and after being home 12 months. I can't believe we've been back from China that long. Hopefully the post placement paperwork won't be too difficult. I've been putting it off, but it's time to dig in.

There will probably be a part 2 to the month of Feb. But for now that's all!

Love and blessings,

Cindy