A little about our little Mia

We are getting so close! I wanted to take a few minutes to tell you a little bit about our sweet girl before we leave.

Mia was born March 27th, 2008 and currently resides at the Heshan City SWI (social welfare institute) in Heshan, China. Heshan is in southeast China, outside of Guangzhou in the Guangdong province. Guangzhou is also known Canton (where Cantonese food comes from).

Her given name is He Fu Jia. He (pronounce "huh") is her surname and means "crane", named after He Shan, or crane mountain. Fu means "excellent" and Jia "good fortune". Jia is pronounced "jyah". We have been told that she is called Jia Jia as a nickname. We have given her the name Mia Fujia Jennings. We loved the name Mia, because it means "hoped for."

In the paperwork we received, it states that she is "active, has a ready smile, loves to play with toys in bright color and sound, is gregarious and full of curiosity. She has formed close bonds with her caretakers and will walk fast and reach for cuddle upon seeing them." :)

We have been very blessed to connect with a few other families that have adopted from Heshan. I look forward to meeting them all one day. Our children started their lives together. They were family before we were. One of the little girls, Kaylie, came home this time last year and she remembered Mia when her mom showed her pictures. She is excited that Mia is getting a forever family too. Isn't that sooo sweet! :)

We are officially on the countdown. Just one more day of school, two more night times, a few errands to run, and a Bachelor finale to watch! :)

Counting Down!

In all of the hustle and bustle the last couple of weeks, I forgot to post our travel dates. :) We are boarding the plane next Tuesday, March 2nd! We are so excited! It seems like yesterday that we received our travel approval. Every day has been filled with something. Booking tickets, hotel arrangements, sight seeing plans, setting up Skype and other ways to communicate back home. Oh, and some major nesting. I have redone the pantry, finished Mia's room, decorated the master, cleaned the playroom and started packing. Nuts, I know. :)

The boys are super excited. Last night I had them help me open and put Mia's toys out for her. Some of the things we have been looking at in boxes for over a year. They were so stinking cute! They kept saying, "Oh, look. She will love this one!" and "I want to play this with her." Just jumping up and down, running around everywhere. Too sweet!

Things have been a little nuts around here. Keith is swamped with work and we have just been go, go, go. I am really looking forward to getting on the plane and spending some quality time with the boys next week. I think we are going to have a blast. We leave Tuesday and land in Beijing Wednesday. It is about a 18 hour trip. Thursday is the Summer Palace and an acrobatics show. Friday we hit The Great Wall and Hutong village. Saturday is orientation, The Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. Sunday we fly to Guangzhou in the morning and have a day to rest and prepare for Mia.

Gotcha is Monday, March 8th!

Stay tuned - more coming in the next couple of days about Mia. I would love to tell you all about her now, but I do need to sleep a little. :)

Snow Much Fun!

Who knew 3 inches of snow could be so much fun! The snow began to fall a little after lunch on Friday and by 4:00 the ground was covered and we were ready to play! Thanks to the Richoux family for a very fast sledding hill!

On Saturday we spent 2 hours sledding in our backyard, building snowmen, and having snowball fights. Add a nap and the Winter Olympics and you have a perfect Saturday! Sunday we celebrated the 12th anniversary of our engagement and Chinese New Year!

Enjoy the pics!

We Are Going to China!

Yep! We got our Travel Approval today! We are so excited! We will have final travel plans by the end of the week! I can't believe I just wrote that. Really? We are finally here. It just doesn't seem real.

In a few short weeks, our sweet Mia will be in my arms. :)

Fun times

No new updates on travel to China. I just wanted to let you all know about some fun happenings in the Jennings' household the past couple of weeks.

Last Friday, Tate's class led chapel for the preschool children. It was precious. The program was about love and each child had a Bible verse to memorize and say in front of everyone. They did a great job! They had also drawn a picture of something they love and were able to tell everyone about it. Tate drew a picture that said, " I love my sister's birthday party" and he said very proudly,"I love Mia." So sweet.

Last Saturday, Tucker participated in his second Pine Wood Derby. He had a great time and had a fast car this year! He placed 3rd out of the entire pack. Very exciting considering our first showing last year wasn't so good. :) He was very proud of his Batmobile.