Monday, September 5, 2011

All about our baby girl!


Song LiQin ~ Song is her last name and is pronounced as it is spelled... Song

Her name, LiQin is pronounced LeeCheen

We will call her  Ivy Joy

She is in a fabulous orphanage,

We have been blessed with many photos and even video from people who have visited there recently

This is Little Miss Ivy when she was 4 months old! She was abandoned about 1 month before this photo was taken. You can see she was very well fed!
She can even make a sweater vest look cute!

A nurse involved in a program that trains the nannies at this orphanage blessed us with these very early photos of our little chunk! We are so grateful for both her ministry and her gift of these photos!

And just these past few weeks, 2 wonderful families took these photos of Ivy while they were visiting the orphanage. These are photos are what Ivy looks like today.



Ivy's Health

You can see that our little one has lost her chub....
Ivy has a serious heart defect and her little body is working very hard as she waits to come home and have a life saving surgery that should have happened in her first week of life. Her orphanage has tried 2 times to get it done in China however they have been told that due to the high mortality rate for this particular surgery, they will not perform it in China~ever.

I will be honest with you
Because we all learn from each other not by making everything look rosy and wonderful, but by our honesty.

I was not quite ready to start our second adoption. I planned on Lexi being at least 3 when we began paper chasing.

I never ever wanted to be matched with a child before we were logged in with China, never wanted a child to have to wait longer because of me.

I wanted to adopt a preschool aged child, maybe even a boy!

I did not want to do diapers or bottles or cribs.

Yep, I wanted easy street :)

But..... God had other plans

Because God is so much smarter than me and he knows me so much better than I know myself!

And this little girl was waiting. Even though she is young, she was waiting a long time.

Many people fell in love with her gorgeous eyes and cherub face.


But when it came time to make  the big decision, they were afraid of her tiny broken heart, and she was left without a family once again.


I was advocating for this LiQin and learned that she was in great need of surgery. I have families emailing me regularly asking me to help them find a child that matches their SN list. I was emailing with a few families, she was too young for one of them and the other was not approved for a heart baby, nor interested in one.
She was on my mind, in my heart, I knew God was telling me she already had a family. At the moment I was unaware that is was us.
I prayed for her daily, I visited her photo, memorized her little face, asked God to continue the miracle and keep her healthy until her family came.
Then after an email to the agency that had her file, and learning some new info about her and the care she is in. After asking God to tell me straight up what to do and make it loud and clear, after a meeting with the kids and much support from all 5 of my darling angels, after one last review of the info from the cardiologist who reviewed her file, after some texting with my precious sister who was truly a ROCK for me that morning, after a final conversation with my Darling Husband who was 100% on board with this from the first time he laid eyes on Ivy Joy, we locked her file and sent LOI.  
And we knew from that moment on that this was right.
That she was ours.
That God would not give us more than we could handle and that we could handle more than we gave ourselves credit for.
And suddenly bottles and diapers and cribs sounded just fine.
We would be blessed with more than we deserve once again.



And Ivy will have the family she has been waiting so long for.
And both Ivy and Lexi will have a same age sister to go through life with. 









14 comments:

  1. Tears streaming down my face!!! I am just so happy for you guys. she is beautiful and precious. It is amazing how God works in our lives isn't it?
    When did you start doing the advocating etc for SN's children and with whom? I so want another one..... I look at lists and my heart skips beats seeing the precious children waiting.

    Big hugs my friend! I miss hearing from you!!
    Jody

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  2. I am once again amazed how God works and SO thankful He has chosen your precious family for this baby doll!!! SO SO SO adorable and know God is protecting her heart while she waits. LOVE her name and SO happy for you!!! Can't wait to follow your journey!
    Blessings and love!!! XO

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  3. So very happy for your family. I SO understand how it just works out different than you think, we are going through all that right now:) Praying for your sweet girl!

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  4. What a great story....I so admire you ladies and hope one day I'm walking in your same shoes.

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  5. What a sweet baby! Congratulations to your family! I love the name you have chosen as well. Hope you have a speedy journey to your newest family member.

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  6. Mary and Brian and Family!
    CONGRATULATIONS on your very beautiful baby girl! She is PERFECT!!!! And, we can not wait to pray you through this journey! Every step of it!!!! We will be praying for God's protection for Ivy Joy, and for expedited everything!!!! So thankful to know that she is in loving hands until you can get to her!!!! Thank you for sharing your wonderful news. The girls will be so excited to see her tomorrow!!!! And, they will be excited to pray for your little sweetie too!!! By they way, you can ask Jeff, but Ivy has always been on the top of my list. LOVE her name!

    Hugs from MN,
    The "R" Family

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  7. She is so beautiful! Oh my, I am so excited for you and jealous at the same time, just kidding. We are too old to adopt.

    Thank you for loving her enough to bring her home. If you are doing a quilt for her, please let me know. Blessings, Debbie

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  8. Oh my gosh, Mary ~ I can barely type through my tears! I am SO happy for your family and especially for precious Ivy Joy! Her name suits her adorable cherub self just perfectly. And her new family suits her just perfectly, as well!

    I am adding Ivy Joy to the top of my prayer list and cannot wait to follow you back to China for your precious little girl. I will never forget your journey to China the first time. I was so touched by your strength and faith through all the struggles, and then to watch God bless you with the perfect daughter for you! And now He's done it again!! You proved how strong you were before, and I have NO DOUBT you have the strength for whatever is in store for your precious new daughter. Praying His hedge of protection over her until you can get her home and praying for divine favor and a speedy process to your baby girl!

    CONGRATULATIONS and God bless!! <><

    More Hugs from Minnesota!
    OXO,
    Tanya

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  9. Congratulations!!!! Your Ivy is precious and such a gift from the Lord!! She is in my prayers!

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  10. Congratulations, once again! I sent you an e-mail as I had adopted a child with unrepaired TGA from China. Just wanted to thank you for sharing your blog!

    The wait will be hard knowing how badly your child's heart needs surgery. I just wanted to share that our surgeon told us that our little ones learn to survive on limited oxygen; therefore, their bodies are able to sustain themselves and thrive as they have never known 100% oxygen that our bodies have known since birth.

    Our little guy was adopted at 23 months and weighed 23 pounds. He was very small at adoption. He has grown since his surgery, but he remains small compared to other children his age.

    I wish you the very best and cannot wait to see Ivy home with her family with pink fingernails!!

    Blessings,

    Carey
    Tennessee

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  11. AMAZING, inspiring, exciting!!! We will be praying for all of you as you make this awesome journey toward each other.

    Amy

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  12. yeah I just knew this news was coming up. She is adorable. I Love that another heart baby will be given a home and a chance at life. We are coming to AZ next month for the together for adoption conference and would LOVE to get together. I know quite a bit about heart babies if you have any questions and hannah's doc is chinese and goes out to China to teach and do surgeries often. So thrilled for you guys and can't wait to follow.

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  13. Congratulations to you all, this is going to be one loved little girl! Can't wait to see Lexi with her new baby sister. Can't wait to see all the S's with this beautiful little girl. Love, the C's

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  14. Praying for your beautiful girl. God is good, all the time. He knows exactly what we need and when we need it.

    Blessings,
    Jill

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