This past month we enjoyed time with friends, celebrated the progression of life with a family member, and were encouraged with the progress of another!  But, before I go there, a quick update on our adoption of Ashley.  Things are progressing at a normal pace, which all of you know is glacial at best!  The home study is finally complete and should be filed soon with the United States Immigration office.  They then have to go through all of our information and approve us for the adoption before all that information goes to China and they do the same.  It is a maddening process well known to any who have adopted internationally, but it is the right-of-passage, I guess, and is the bitter pill that everyone has to swallow to get to the treasure at the end!  More news, and more likely just a new blog for Ashley, as soon as things start moving forward.

Now, on to current events.  In June, Connie Davis and her two daughters came to visit us for a few days.  One of her daughters, Alyssa, grew up with Leah in China and we were able to cross paths with them when Connie adopted Alyssa as they were leaving Guangzhou and we were arriving.   If you look back on Leah’s blog you will see pictures of Alyssa sitting with Leah in her wheelchair.  Connie brought the girls on a whirlwind trip through Ohio and included us on the agenda!  We decided one night that a visit to the “K” for ice cream was in order, so we loaded up the wagon and wheel chair and went south!

Elena and Mia showed a little “attitude” as they rolled out in the swagger wagon!

We took over a table at the “K” and enjoyed Springboro’s finest ice cream (that is if you don’t consider Graeters ice cream, which is awesome but way too expensive for this size of a group!  And not near as close!)

Ice cream always seems to taste better when it is all over your face.

Zach helped keep the girls occupied with his hat!

And then took Mia on a terror filled ride all the way home!!!

We had the privilege this past month to celebrate Jacob graduating from high school and entering ROTC at Cedarville University in the fall.  Because of that, we had to honor him with a special cake from Elle (and if you don’t know what that is, you just are not living right.)

Kelly and my mom worked diligently getting all the food together that would be required for the 80-90 people we would be feeding that day!

Jake surveyed the final preparations making sure that it met his strict standards (he actually could probably care less about the party, but not everything is about him!)

And Zach put his “Party Pro” skills from his LeapFrog job to work cutting the cake to military precision (the pieces were a hodge podge of sizes and were anything but precision, but we appreciated his efforts non-the-less).

There was a 50-60% chance of rain, so we crossed our fingers really tightly and prayed really hard and the weather remained beautiful for the entire evening!

The crowd came and ate and all seemed to have a great time.  Here my father regales our pastor about something or another.  I am not sure what.

Jake enjoyed some personal time with one of his best friends, Ben McGuire.

Kelly enjoyed the time with her family, who were all in attendance (and probably represented a bulk of those 80-90 people).

Afterwards, Jake spent a few minutes opening some of the very, very thoughtful gifts that people had brought him, including the famed shower caddie that Melissa Brickner provides new college students!

So … the downside to the party didn’t come until later that week.  We are still trying to determine if it was food poisoning or the flu, but at last count over 30 people become sick.  Ooops!  Red face.  Sorry!  Nick better plan on a light turnout for his graduation party unless we promise no food!

We have been so impressed the past several months, as has our physical therapist, over the strength that Leah has been developing in her legs.  When she first came from China and started working with Sherrie at Cincinnati Children’s, she had very little muscle tone.  However, through the exercises that Sherrie has recommended and that Kelly has performed with Leah religiously, she has made just amazing strides!  To the point now that Leah rarely uses her wheelchair (the hot pink one from a previous post) and now much prefers to use her crutches to ambulate (also hot pink.  Do you sense a theme?).   During a recent PT session, Sherrie recommended that Leah attend a bicycle fitting that was being put on by AMBUCS with AmTryke bikes at Abilities First in Middletown today.  We were not sure what to expect, but Sherrie wanted her to try out some of the bikes and see if she had enough leg strength to power them.

Leah was a little unsure of the surroundings, and wasn’t really happy with the bike helmet she had to wear, but she tried out the first tricycle and did amazingly well!

She was able to power it on her own with minimal help to get started, further amazing us with what she could do with her legs after just a few short months of therapy.

We then tried her on a more “typical” bike which, unbeknownst to use, had the huge draw of a bell on the handle bars!  Leah LOVED the bell and couldn’t stop ringing it, similar to Uncle Ci Robertson when he was on the radio in one of the Duck Dynasty episodes.

She really liked this bike and it will probably be the one we ultimately get for her.  In our desire to understand how easy the bike was to operate, Kelly offered to take it for a little spin.  I am not really sure why no one made HER wear a helmet.

All in all, it has been a wonderful month with lots of fun, lots of love, and lots of hope for the future!

Cameron