4 Months ago today...

It's hard to believe that four months ago today we were meeting our daughter for the first time. So much has changed since we received that quiet little baby girl in our arms. It's hard to believe she's the same little girl.

I remember Dimple ( our guide ) telling us " babies be different babies by Friday no worry." I have to tell you I didnt for one minute believe my baby girl would be changing that much especially after her meltdown with her nannies. But she did.

Time has just been flying by since we got home. Reese is doing great. She's had the major surgery, palate repair, and we are just waiting on the day the retainer can be removed from her mouth. It was a little over two weeks ago, and she has finally started to feel like her old self again. ( We sure had been missing the laughter she brings into our home. ) We are praising the Lord for her healing and her adjustment into our home in the USA. We know she's the daughter God had for us and we cant thank Him enough for this blessing...

Check her out then and now...

What a difference a couple of days make....

It has been five days since Reese had her palate repaired and boy has it been a tough couple of days. I hope we never have to put her through anything like this again. She did great and her doctors think everything went well but it's very hard to see your child hurting and scared. Reese went in Tuesday to have a 2 hour procedure and it turned out to take about 40 minutes.


She sure looked cute before the surgery didnt she?


Here she is right after the surgery. It took me and Mark taking turns holding her all night long to get her to rest and relax enough to let the pain medicine work.

And here she is today. It's great to see her active and herself again.

Twas the night before surgery and all through my house....

Well the palate repair surgery date has arrived. Tomorrow is the day Reese will finally have a roof in her mouth. To say we are a little anxious and scared is an understatement, but we know that the Lord will be right there with us... He tells us in His word that He goes before us and makes all the crooked paths straight. We are trusting in His word tonight as we watch our daughter sleep peacefully.

She cant have any solid food after midnight and only liquids in the morning so we let her pig out tonight. She had all her favorites like mashed potatos with gravy, mac & cheese, corn , chicken, and a banana for dessert.

We are running about the house tonight getting everything together for tomorrow. Please join my family in praying for a successful surgery, a speedy recovery, and a strong mom & dad.

Happy Happy birthday Lola Reese

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY GIRL..... my baby girl is two today. We partied hard Saturday for Reese. She was scared to begin with but it didnt take her long to get into the party mood.

Tubes... Tubes... Tubes

Reese got ear tubes yesterday and we are hoping she's hearing a whole new world today. The ENT said she had so much fluid on her ears, she was hearing like on a mountain top. She seems to be feeling pretty good and considering the two meltdowns she had yesterday, the Denton household is doing pretty good too.

She sure looks cute in yellow and sticker....

Dedication Day.....

We joyfully dedicated our little Lola Reese today. It was a great day for us. The Lord has saw us through three long years of waiting but what a wonderful blessing He has entrusted with us. I pray the Lord helps us raise this little girl to know how wonderful the Lord is and how much He loves her...

Baby Girl's Shower

Today was the long anticipated shower/welcome home party for Lola Reese. We can't thank everyone enough for all the beautiful gift you gave our little girl. We are so blessed to have such wonderful and loving family and friends.
Reese couldn't wait to tear into the baby grand piano, the wooden puzzles and the leap frog book when we got home. And mommy and daddy couldn't wait to reopen each gift again and touch each piece given to her with love. Thank you all again from our hearts. You are all so special to us.
I want to personally thank all the church ladies and my aunts for all the hard work you did in decorating the church and preparing all those wonderful treats. It was so beautiful and the food was great. I also want to personally thank my special friends... Pam Mimbs, Charity Wallace, Phyillis Prather, and Nila Coley for working so hard. I love you all so much. Thanks for making Reese's welcome home so special. I will never forget it.

Our first week back is gone...

Well we can hardly believe we have been home a week & a half. America your the best.

I told Mark this morning it was hard to believe our first full week is gone by. It's kinda sad. One more week all together at home before we are both back off to work and Reese goes off to daycare.

Reese is doing great. She's such a joy. We have nicknamed her our little monkey. If your met her already you know why. She's a card. We are so blessed. She takes a nap each day and goes down for night night time around 9:00 or 9:30 and sleeps all night long until around 7:00 or 7:30. Now you cant ask for much better than that. She's a great little eater and maybe one day soon she will love the doggies. ( We've still praying for that...) Please pray for her to adjust to daycare. She didnt seem to care to much for it today. We are going to try and go several times next week for a couple of hours so she can get used to it.

We want to send out a special thank you to all those who have been feeding us some terrific food. Thanks so much. I dont care if I ever see Chinese food again. Good old southern cooking is good enough for me.

Well I better go check on the monkey right now....

Home at last....Home at last... Thank God we're home at last!

Hello Cedartown,

It's great to be home. I knew I would miss my home. I just didnt know how much. I have to admit I shed a couple of happy tears... tears of joy to be home.

We survived the long 15 hour flight home from Hong Kong and missing over connecting flight in Newark to Atlanta. It's a shame our luggage made it back to Atlanta before we did. But hey it made it so I'm glad. We got home but not until about 11:00pm last night.

Thank you to everyone who surprised us at the airport. It was a pleasant surprise to see familiar smiling faces there to welcome us home. And thank you to everyone who came by the house and left us welcome home presents of balloons and banners. It was a great welcome home present .

And Sharon, thank you for doing such a great job house sitting and watching our babies. It was such a peace of mind not to have to worry about anything back here.

Well we are about to start day one of home with Reese.... so far so good. We did sleep to 5:00am hopeful it will be better once she get adjusted to her new home. Mark's off to the grocey store for some food... good ole country southern food.

Love you all,
Renee

We are coming home!! PTL, we're Georgia Bound!

Hello Everyone,

Praise The Lord, our paperwork is done, our little girl belong to us officially, and we are coming home. We are in the Hong Kong international airport awaiting to board our plane and begin our journey home. We are tired, mentally and physically but God is good and will give us strength to finish our journey. We look foward to seeing everyone again and can't wait to introduce Lola Reese to everyone.

Please continue to pray for our safe return.

Got to go, Reese is wound up and full of energy.

Mark, Renee, & Reese

Consulate Appointment..Final

Today was our consulate appointment. All is good and finally final. It is hard to believe only a couple more days and we will be on our way home with Reese.

Reese is coming out of her shell more and more. She still does not like being in crowds but we are making progress. She is very head strong.

We are headed down stairs to take group photos. Then we will be leaving for Hong Kong soon. Please keep us in your prayers for the 3.5 hour bus trip. Then on to our flights home.

Love from China,
Mark, Renee, & Reese

Prayer Request Needed!

Everyone,

Please pray for us as we were down to finalizing the last pieces of paperwork in order to come home and discovered that an important document has Reese's birthdate wrong. The Chinese document is correct but the English translation is wrong, pray for us that this is easily corrected. This document is crucial to us coming home. They are going to try and get the Chinese document translated again tomorrow with the correct date of birth.

We will keep you all posted as to what progress we have made as it takes place.

In the mean time:

Please pray that this error can be easily fixed and quickly.

Please pray that this will not delay our consulate appointment.

Please pray that this will not delay our return trip home.

We love you all,

Mark, Renee & Reese

Hi from Guangzhou!!

It's been a long day. Our flight got in last night around 9:30pm but we had to wait a couple of hours for some more families flights to come in. I think we checked in around 12:00 and then we had to get up early to be ready to leave again by 8:30am for medical exams. We are pretty tired and ill tonight. I cant wait to get home. We are awaiting on room service and I hope it's something eatable. I am over C Food for life. We did eat at Mcdonalds for lunch and that was nice. I taste of home.

I think all the babies got good medical reports and I'm glad. I know that the older children will have to wait for the results of their tb tests and I hope for their sakes all goes well.

We have been trying to find a weather channel to check out the storm heading over way. Please pray for us. We want the storm to be gone before it's time to fly out. We do want to leave on time. Wed should be a long but happy day.

I think Mark found out tonight at the paperwork meeting that our bus trip tuesday night is going to be about 3.5 hours to hong kong. That should be interesting with a baby. Then it will be a flight home. Yeah....

Love to All,

Mark, Renee, & Reese

One more Day in Hunan..then off to Guangzhou

It's noon here on Thursday. We have one more day in Hunan and then it's off to Guangzhou tomorrow afternoon. We have late flight out around 8:30pm and it will take about 1 hr. We are curious to see how Reese will take her first flight.

We have had a slow day today. Just one outing to the embroidery plant. It was pretty neat. I think since it's so hot here, we just get one outing a day usually in the morning. The remainer of the the day we just spend in the hotel room playing with Yuan Yuan Reese. We found out the nannies had nicknamed Yong Ningyuan.. Yuan Yuan. So we have been calling her Yuan Yuan Reese hoping this will be a good transition to her English name.
We did hear her say one word yesterday. She must have been watching Mark phone home and she took her toy phone put it to her ear and said hello. Then of course it flew across the room. I believe her favorite pass time is throwing things. I told Mark we better put the wooden blocks we bought up for a while. I am fearing the damage this little one is going to be doing. But she's a good baby it's just going to take her some time to trust us and us to learn how to take care of her.

Renee, Mark & Reese

PS. Enjoy the pictures