Last week, Brittany and a good friend boarded a plane headed for New Jersey to visit their best (and boy-crazy) friends. They've been spending their days and nights in the family's RV -- can you begin to imagine how much fun that is for a bunch of teenage girls?!? Brittany calls home every night, and I can't hear a word she is saying because there is so much laughter and goofiness in the background. She'll most definitely be updating her blog with all the details once she returns home. I'm praying I don't have to listen to stories about Prince Caspian, the Jonas Brothers (who are they, anyway????), etc. for weeks and weeks to come. Yikes!



We finally wrapped up our 2007-2008 school year on 8-08-08. Thankfully, because you'll note that is also the date of the opening of the Olympic Games. Our family (like yours, I'm sure) has been up L A T E each night watching the latest Olympic events. It's been fun to share and discuss all the happenings with the kids. Brittany and Brant have been very "into" this Olympics. It's also been great seeing it all take place in Brock Ji Hao's and Brielle's home land!

Brock Ji Hao is aware that the Olympics are being held in China and points to the TV and says "Zhong guo" ("China" in Mandarin). He has especially enjoyed watching the swimming (I guess he takes after his Aunt Michele and Grandma T. :o) ) The last few times I've had him out in the pool, he has made HUGE advances in his swimming. Today, I realized that it is most likely from watching the Olympic swimming. He is now swimming around the pool with water wings on, and today he swam with his face under water. He also asked for goggles and even went under water (in the shallow end) to pick up quarters and diving rings. Thank you, Michael Phelps!

Brock continues to be doing fantastically! We truly could not imagine a better adjustment. As a matter of fact, there really doesn't seem to have been an adjustment - for any of us. He slid beautifully and perfectly into our family.

I've been working a little with him on some basic learning like letters, letter sounds, numbers, etc. I've ordered his "curriculum" for this school year, and it'll be so much fun teaching him. He picks up on things very fast. He continues to speak more and more English and is even stringing words together. Today, he caught on to the phrase, "How are you?" after saying, "Hi!", so he continually (over and over again) said to each of us, "Hi! How are you?" So cute! Older child adoption has been so much fun!

Brielle continues to adore her new big brother. One morning, at breakfast, they were chit-chatting in their own special way of communicating, and I asked Brielle: "Brielle, what do you think of your big brother Brock Ji Hao?" She smiled shyly and answered, "He's soooo cute!". The first thing she asks when I go into her room in the morning is, "Where's Hao?" (she still calls him "Hao" alot...that is what we called him before bringing him home). She follows him around, and the two of them play and laugh together all day long. Brock Ji Hao has been such a blessing to our little Brielle. I often stop and watch or listen to them and wonder why I was so blessed to be given the privilege of raising these two precious Chinese children.