Hyatt kids update

I'm so far behind, but I thought maybe better late than never should be my motto right now! These were pictures we took for our Christmas card!! It's still hard to get Andrew to hold still and smile, so we were really happy with our results!! I don't send out Christmas letters, and so many of my blogs and posts have been about Andrew that I decided I would do a post on everyone. (It's not all about Andrew anymore!!! lol)

Here's what's going on with everyone:

Laura

Laura is happy and busy at college. She lives in a house this year with a couple other girls and is very happy! I'm not 100 percent sure of her grade point average, but I know she makes straight A's and is on the Dean's list and every other list you can be on!! Laura is taking Chinese as her minor and is very busy with that! She's also still very active in BCM (Baptist Collegiate Ministries) and has joined a church close to her school. I think one of the biggest things happening with Laura now is that she got an internship position with Bring Me Hope! She went to China with this foundation a couple summers ago and volunteered at a camp for orphans.  She is their volunteer and advocacy coordinator right now. She works on this several hours per day and really loves it!!! This is just God sent. It is so exciting to see how the Lord is leading and directing Laura. I know she's searching and listening to His voice and it's so exciting as her mom to see how her life is forming!! We couldn't be any prouder of Laura. On a different note she is having hip surgery in March to repair a labral tear in her hip. This has caused her great discomfort and pain for years so we will hope and pray that this fixes it. As of now, I believe she's planning on going to China for a month this summer to help with the camps with Bring Me Hope! This will be her 5th time going to China!!!

Christine

Christine mainly sleeps, eats, studies and goes to High School. She gets up at 5am every day and doesn't stop until she goes to bed. These are just busy times for her, but all of her studying and hard work is paying off because she has a 3.85 grade average and she is 23rd out of 509 in her class. Last semester was really hard for her because we were in China for 2 weeks in September and she missed over 10 days of school. It took her until December to make up everything that was covered in her classes while we were gone. I think she'd say she's glad she went to China but she doesn't want to miss that much school again any time soon!!!  We are looking for a car for Christine, and that's been a slow process. Right before Christmas someone ran into Laura's car and totaled it (thankfully no one was hurt) so we had to focus on getting Laura a new car. But Christine won't get her license for a couple months, so we should be able to find one within our price range by then! Christine is in the band, but marching season is over so she has a little free time on the weekends!! Now is the time that Christine is getting tons of information about colleges, and taking tons of tests to see what she's good at, so it will be exciting to see how God leads Christine!!! She's a sweetheart!

     

Ava

Ava is our 6 year old 32 lb sassy little firecracker!! She will be 7 in March and that's SO hard to believe!! Ava went back to public school at the beginning of December! Most days she loves it, however some days she wants to stay home and have Mommy School. Homeschool was really going well until we brought Andrew home, and then I just couldn't do all the things I needed to do with her. Andrew is in Ava's face 24/7 and it made it impossible to have school with her.  So going back to school has been a good thing. We are in the process of having some tests done to make sure nothing is wrong with Ava since she's so little and hasn't gained weight for over a year. We went to a GI doctor and Ava had bloodwork done (which came back normal) However, we had a little scare this past couple weeks--Ava's stool samples came back abnormal and they wanted to do a sweat test to check for Cystic Fibrosis. She had that done a few days ago and thankfully that test was negative, so CF can be ruled out!! We still have some other things to figure out, but we'll deal with that one step at a time. For now we Praise God for the test results! Ava loves Andrew. He's been so good for her. She has learned how to play better, and she's really just all around happier and more active. It's also been a challenge for her though because Andrew is just beside her ALL.THE.TIME. If she wants a break sometimes we have to lock her in our room with her IPad just so she can have some down time!!! But we are all working through this. Having a little brother surely has its ups and downs! Thankfully it's mostly "ups" as far as Ava is concerned! Ava loves to snuggle, and she's just such a joy! 

Andrew

Our little Shuai Shuai has come a long way. He is still learning what having a family means, and still learning how to share, but he has learned so much!! He is mostly a super happy little guy, just interested in playing, and hanging out with Ava. Since Ava has gone back to school, he and I have had some wonderful bonding time. Andrew loves to read books, sing, play games and snuggle on my lap and kiss me all day long. His kisses are crazy because he takes his hands and roughly touches my cheeks while he makes this horrible squeaking sound and kisses me. We are working on this-but I love that he wants to touch me and love me. He loves to be tickled! Andrew is an AWESOME sleeper. He still will take a nap after lunch, go to bed around 8pm or even earlier sometimes and sleep until 7am or later!!! That is my saving grace!! Even when he wakes up he will stay in bed and play with his car and make motor noises for about a half hour. Then he gets up, goes potty and comes and finds me and asks for his cereal!!! He used to eat 2 eggs and a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, but now all he wants is tons and tons of Honeynut Cheerios!!! We can understand almost everything Andrew says, and I would say he speaks as clear as Ava if not even a little better!! He's learned very fast. He knows his colors and his ABC's. As far as we can tell he will be right on track developmentally. So basically, our special needs son with "delay" just needed some glasses and a family. We feel very blessed! Andrew is sweet and stubborn all at the same time. He will push us to our limit, but when he gets disciplined, or put in time out, it usually upsets him very much and he will immediately want to kiss us and do the right thing! (Unlike Ava, who is totally stubborn!) Andrew is still learning "boundaries" as far as going up to a complete stranger and wanting to hold their hand of ask for a kiss, or tell them that he loves them. He doesn't quite understand all that yet, so we are still keeping his world fairly "small."  He does great when we stick to a routine in his own environment. We have had a few people over and have gone to friends houses a couple times, and that usually ends up very hard for him. He gets overstimulated, or acts badly if he's not the center of attention. We visited family in December, and he was an angel. I think it's when he's around other kids--he gets wound up, and it's hard to calm him down. So, we just stick to routine and play outside whenever we can!! We love our little Andrew Lawrence XiaoShuai!!! God moved mountains to get him here, so we can't wait to see God's plan for our son!!

We have been home from China a little over 4 months. Tons of changes have occurred and life is so much better. Craig and I (and Christine, and Laura when she's home from college) are normally wiped out at the end of the day and VERY ready for Ava and Andrew to go to bed, but life is bearable and even enjoyable most days!!! I feel like Craig and I have been in survival mode for the past 4 months. My health (and weight) has sure suffered----so I'm making some much needed changes. Now that I can think and breathe I know it's time to take care of me!!! I'm using Essential Oils and really loving all the different ways they can be used. Everyone is benefiting from the oils!! I know that everything will get better, once I take care of ME!! Up until now it's been hard to even find time to go to the grocery store, or even make the simplest of meals....and we all know that eating healthy requires some prep time!!

We are continually thankful that God called us to have a passion for the "fatherless!" We have learned that it's not always easy to answer God's call, but it's always worth it. Adoption (just like parenting in general) is hard.....it's so fulfilling, so exhausting, so messy, so sad sometimes when we are dealing with traumatic pasts, but so so absolutely incredible!!!

I can publicly say, that the desire to adopt more children has NOT been placed on my heart, or Craig's heart!!! (haha) So we will pray for those precious children that still need families---I will advocate when I can---I will support other's who are adopting and if anyone is interested in adopting, I will GLADLY help them!!!   But my family is complete... Four is a very good number!!! (Unless we win the lotto or something and can afford a bigger house with more space to spread out........haha....I guess I'll never say never, but like I said, we are happy with four!!!)