ADOPTION: A Family Choice

You can reach me at adoptn@yahoo.com

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Here is my page on Hair and Skin Care for children who are AA.
AA Children's Hair
& Skin Care

Finally!! A current family picture!! The only one missing is the photographer, my son Erin. Oh yes, and Jay isn't here...he was at a Special Olympics practice that day. This picture actually includes my daughter, K. and my two grandchildren. We had such a great time at the coast. We visited a favorite beach, which has the neatest tide pools, and is reatively easy to get to. We did have to carry Moria down to the beach, but she is pretty light. The sand was great for building sand castles, and there were shells and rocks to collect. The weather was warm enough for the kids to wade in the water, but that did NOT include me!! I get my feet a bit wet, and within about 3 minutes, my toes are numb. I sure don't understand how the kids stay in so long, LOL. This picture was taken in August of 2007.


I am a mom and I will share with you experiences our Christian, family has had, some hilarious, some sad, but all real. Most of our children are adopted, so we hope to inspire others to adopt...a child or two...maybe a child with handicaps, or older, or just plain unique. Several of our children have handicaps, such as blindness, Cerebral Palsy, Downs Syndrome, Amniotic Band Syndrome, Tuberous Sclerosis, etc.

We now have 8 children (under the age of 18) at home. The youngest at home is our 3 year old son, Markeen (he just turned 3 in January 2008). There are also 5 kids over the age of 18. Martha, who is now 24 years old, has transferred to a state college, and just moved into her first rental type situation. She is rooming with a good friend, and they live only about 10 minutes from us.

NEW Christmas 2007 Newsletter
I really need to take a website design class. My page looks fine, until I change the size of the page. So, those of you who have different sized monitors will get a page that looks totally different from what I meant it to look like. Anyway, I just put together part of our Christmas Letter for 2007. Some of it isn't complete yet, but it will give you an idea of what I sent to people.


This is Sandy, who is now 10 years old, and is in the 5th grade. She has grown up way too fast, LOL.

I'M A GRANDMA AGAIN!!! Dorothy and her husband gave birth to an absolutely darling, gorgeous little boy on Sunday, December 30, 2007. His name is Waylon. He weighed 6 pounds 10 ounces, and was 18 1/2 inches long. He is soooo cute, as you can see from these pictures:

I started a journal (personal blog I guess), on April 24, 2007. Most of my website has not been updated in ages. It is fun for me to read back about the kids, but I do need to let you know how they are doing now. I'll start with this journal, and I'll add pictures to the main page later. The first entry will be the latest entry.

June 30, 2007. A brand new clothes washer was given to us, anonymously!!!

On the left is Rita, 13, with her hair O'natural, "big hair." I can't believe how much hair she has, and I wish I had even half of it!! On the right is the After picture. She loves her hair straight. I think she is absolutely beautiful, either way, but now her hair is so much easier to manage. Rita is in the 7th grade, and is a member of a soccer club & is also in basketball. It is tougher this year, as more is expected, but it is good preparation for highschool. Oh my, did I just say highschool? She is an A student, and is happy most of the time, with some stubborn streaks in between.

EXTREME HOME MAKEOVER- No, not us, we haven't even applied. But, we were able to see the house of a family in Corvallis, Oregon, as it was being built by Extreme Home Makeover.

NEW!! Pictures added July 17, 2007.

Kathy is now 6 years old, and absolutely loves to dress up. She is my girly girl (so fun). She has several princess dresses, and this is one of her favorites (whichever one she is wearing is her favorite one). I shop at places like Value Village and Goodwill, weekly, and find some wonderful dress-up clothes, toys, and school clothes for the kids. She just lost her first front tooth a few minutes before I took this picture. Kathy loves her kindergarten class, and has many friends. She is most excited about learning to read. It is an all day kindergarten class, and she loves going to school with 3 of her other siblings (the school goes from Kindergarten through 8th grade).

These pictures are about 1 1/2 years old. Markeen, is now a delightful, healthy almost 3 year old bundle of joy and curiousity.

Old news, LOL: Introducing our son, Markeen. He is the 1/2 sibling to our 5 little ones (10 sibings all together, and we now have 6...other 4 are adopted by 2 relative families in our area, so they can grow up knowing and loving each other). Markeen is currently on a heart/breathing monitor, for apnea. He stopped breathing and I couldn't hear a heartbeat, so I started infant CPR. He was in the hospital for 2 days, where they found he had bradycardia (low heart rate). He also had some tacycardia (high heart rate), once while I was gone they had to also give him some oxygen. He is doing great, and already, at 2 weeks, weighs slightly more then his birth weight. And, he already smiles!! Then at about 8 weeks he developed RSV, a dangerous respiratory infection, and was in the hospital for 5 days because they couldn't keep his oxygen levels up. They also found he had a heart murmur. About 2 days after coming home, he was diagnosed with Pyloric Stenosis. I feel lots of these "problems" were due to drugs used by the birthmom while pregnant with Markeen...an avoidable handicap for sure!!

Ok, now he is 3 years old!! The picture on the left is Markeen reaching out for our daughter, Bea (28 years old, Down Syndrome). The one on the right is Markeen's version of "Hide & Seek." He was pretty happy with his hiding spot, LOL.

Mostly Markeen's pictures More pictures, including a picture of our finished addition to our home. You just gotta see the cute smile on Markeen!!!



Left: Kathy was 2 1/2, and loves our dog, Princess.

Right: Joel was 5 years old. His half brother, Roger is 8, and they are so happy to be with each other.

In June 2004, two sibs to our 3 little ones were placed with us for adoption. Joel was 5, autistic, and the cutest thing ever. Kathy was 2 1/2 (now 6 years old) and also a darling. Sometimes, siblings can't be placed together, and it is always sad when this cannot be done. So, we have 6 of the 10 siblings!!



Here We Are!! More Pictures and Stories About Most of Us.







Left: Our three little ones, (2000), Sandy (left, then 2 1/2 years old), Rita (then 5 years old), and Roger (then 4 years old).

Right: This picture of my husband and me was taken during Christmas time, 2003.











Our daughter, Moriah, is now 13 years old. She is delightful, intelligent, beautiful, a bit spoiled, & determined to make a mark on this world in spite of having Cerebral Palsy. She arrived home in June of 2002.


Moriah went with us in a 2 mile race, and "rolled" along, by herself for the last few blocks.

* Note: My family pages have a lot of graphics/pictures. If you have a slow computer, it will take awhile to load. The text, loads quickly, so you can read first, then by the time you are done reading, the pictures should be available.

Adoption. Great sites.	Relative Adoption, Info. sites.
Interracial Children. Cultures, history, etc.

Our Family.
There will be several pages, one for each child.


1998: picture of some of my kids on my first page. This is Janice, 9, Rita,3, Roger, 2, and Marc, 4 1/2. This has gotta be the "REAL" Santa, don't you think?


Our Family Pages:

Partial copy of our Year 2000 Family Christmas Newsletter .

Our Family Activities & our Home. There are several pictures of our home. I'm also starting to describe our home and all the wonderous things for kids to explore and play on.

Here are some of our Family Pictures Here is another page of family photos.
NEW I just made a page with pictures of our yard and beautiful flowers.

Rita and Roger are now 8 and 10 years old.

Sandy is now 7 years old, and is Rita and Roger's birth sister.

Marc is now 12 years old, born in Korea, and has Tuberous Sclerosis, and a brain tumor. Read my notes; I share my fears, my frustrations, my anger, my faith, my hope, my joy. It's a long page, though!! Then, please pray for this precious little boy who brightens up everyone's life. Marc had surgery in April 1999. He had emergency surgery 4 days later, and again in August, 1999. A MRI in 1/2000, showed that the piece of tumor that couldn't be removed had grown, and the small cyst was huge. April, 2000: Surgery. The tumor had grown twice the size it was in January (about 4 cm), and the cyst was huge...almost 6 cm!! August, 2000: brain tissue filled in the areas where the cyst & tumor were, but there are still several tiny pieces of the tumor left. He's doing great for now.

This page is about Martha who is 21 years old, born in Korea and is now a collge Sophomore at a Christian University. She has Cerebral Palsy.

Korean Trip Martha, my husband and I were blessed with a trip to Korea. We met Grandma Holt In Korea also, what a wonderful experience!!

Janice now 16 years old, is blind and wants to be a singer. Janice had facial surgery in January, 2000.

NEW!! The Mayor of our town, personally asked Janice to sing and speak at his State of the City Speech. I was so proud of her, so I'm putting Janice's speech on my website.

George from the Phillipines, 24 years old, has a shunt for hydrocephalas.

Jay, is 23 years old, has Down's Syndrome, and heart surgery.

Bea is 24 years old, has Down's Syndrome and repaired cleft palate & lip.

Some of the Adult Kids who are now "On Their Own":

Dorothy's Journey Home from Viet Nam. She is now 29 years old.

Karla is now 20 years old and was born weighing only 1 pound 4 ounces!! She has a part time job at a jewelry making store, and is living in a wonderful Adult Group Home. She is getting more independent, and even has a boyfriend!!

This page is about Tom, our 17 year old son. We adopted him when he was 3 1/2 years old, and he had many handicaps such as: totally blind and deaf, profoundly retarded, and he had hydrocephalus, seizures and Cerebral Palsy. He had the face of an angel. The icon was custom made by BilyBear Graphics.

I have a page on various subjects, written by Me/Mom. Some of the things are: What to do when you have a child in the hospital, How to help the transition from foster home to your home, Experiences with prejudice, etc.

We were awarded the Honorary Child Advocate Award by an adoption agency. I/Mom spoke for a few minutes, and Janice sang a song. I posted my "speech" on my Award Speech Page.

Disabilities: information on disabilities, such as IEP sites, Medical sites, and Parent Support groups.

Blindness	Downs Syndrome	Other Disabilities Amniotic Bands,Tuberous Sclerosis Cerebral Palsy, Deafness Speech Disorders	Attachment Disorder	A Poem by Carly

Music Education, Music Therapy and Christian Sites.

Locks of Love Janice, 13, donated 12 inches of her beautiful, blond hair to the Locks of Love organization. They make real hair wigs for children who have long term hair loss. They are located in Palm Springs, Florida. This is the second time Janice has done this. Her sister, Martha, 18, also did a donation. Hair needs to be 10 inches in length (end to end), and in a pony tail or braid.

Many people have asked how they can donate something, or offer to do something for us. In the past, I have not posted suggestions, but since I so often get those types of questions, I have now started a page on our family "wants."

Please sign my new guestbook. I love to hear how you like my site, and I try to answer any questions you might have about adoption.

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