Travel Days

On our way... saying bye to Avi Joy on Tuesday morning (Dec 30th)
NOW:
We are about two hours from Vietnam!
Tulsa-Denver, 2 hours/Layover, 2 hours
Denver- San Fran, 3 hours/Layover, 6 hours
San Fran - Hong Kong, 14 hours/Layover, 2 hours
Hong Kong - Ho Chi Minh City, VN, 2 hours
Then arrive and rest, drive on Sunday 6 hours to meet Nehemiah!

We celebrated New Year on our Hong Kong flight, Happy New Year family and friends.
(please notice the girl at the end of our row, her head was on the tray 8 of the 14 hours)
Flight attendants celebrated with us.
Hong Kong, China, airport.
"I know that when I come to you, I will come in the full measure of the blessing of Christ." Romans 15:29
Hugs,
The Perryman's

closing out the year

All new pics
December 2008

Merry Christmas! A few of my fav's...

"George's" new bazooka (my 3 yr old nephew)
"Nehemiah's" new spidey web shooter
She was excited for all her presents.

Fell asleep with her favorite gift. Her pink jewelry music box with the ballerina that flips up and spins. A childhood classic and she loves it!
College roommates. 12 yr's celebrating together... 2009 will bring each of us a new addition.

The Perryman's, three generations

This has been a wonderful year.
I challenge you to flip through your planner from the last year and see what your life was like this year. Here are some things I found:
Lots of playdates, haircuts, grocery lists, baby showers, weddings, phone calls, bible studies, food deliveries, committee meetings and various other 'life' errands. All this mixed with reading books to Avi Joy, watching her verbal skills explode, seeing families united and growing in our faith, marriage and looking forward to my 30's. We will see what 2009 will be like with two kiddos in toe.

Avi Joy funny...
My girlfriend Evie was nursing and Avi Joy asked her,
"what are you doing?"
"feeding Eli"
"but you don't have any food"
"well, God makes me have milk to feed Eli"
"does it have cereal in it?"
Oh the precious things she says daily, I could write a novel!

NEHEMIAH NEWS:
We are off to the airport tomorrow morning and heading to Vietnam.
I cannot believe the day has finally come and there is nothing left to do but journey to our son!
A few friends from church came over tonight to pray for us. The prayers were so precious to my heart, praying for health, bonding, renewal and my most favorite a 'whole heart,' meaning soon Avi Joy, Nehemiah, Adam and I will all be together.


"Be still and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth."
Psalm 46:10

Next post, Day One in Vietnam!
Love, The Perryman Family

January 6, 2009

"The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page."
Saint Augustine

We are excited to announce...

Pre-approval to travel - Dec 16, 2008

Leaving Oklahoma for Vietnam - Dec 30, 2008

Giving and Receiving Ceremony - January 6, 2009

Returning home, tentative - January 18, 2009



We are able to celebrate last night at Adam's company Christmas party. Could our smiles get any bigger?

"I will praise You forever for what You have done." Psalm 52:9

With love
Adam, Natasha, Avi Joy and Nehemiah

finding joy

Its 16 degrees in our city today. We have had a fun day staying inside!

We are not putting up a tree this year, we didn't think we would be here... so we painted one instead! Avi Joy painted all the Christmas balls (or swirls) herself. It is so precious, I think I will have to have it framed and hang it somewhere in the house every Christmas. (or year-round : )
Avi Joy got a haircut. The front does not seem to grow much at all, but that bottom layer sure does and we do not want any mullet action going on.
Made a batch of our famous chocolate chip cookies. Today we just stuck to eating the dough. The batch makes 36 cookies, we ended up baking 27. Proven fact: you always eat more dough than you would cookies.
Our LifeGroup decided to purchase a Jesus Well for Christmas this year. In this last fews weeks where my heart has just been aching over Nehemiah, this Jesus Well has brought such sweet joy to my spirit.

Avi Joy just loves playing in our bed. Can you see Adam?

Avi Joy and Kari Lynne, two precious girls placed in their mommy's hearts.

NEHEMIAH NEWS: not much to report. I will be emailing HCMC/Hanoi tomorrow to see if our paperwork has left/arrived for pre-approval. We are hoping for a G & R date no later than mid-Jan. Hopefully we will hear something soon.

"A man finds joy in giving an apt reply- and how good is a timely word!" Proverbs 15:23

The Perryman's

Most verbal, welcome to the family.

This is an email from my sweet girlfriend RK who is in Can Tho, Vietnam right now...

We held little Nehemiah Sang today. He is a true cutie, in our unbiased, honest opinion!
He seems very strong and looks healthy. He is definitely tall for his age, and seems a healthy weight; not thin or too chubby. His skin is clear, and there were no signs of bug bites or scabies. He smelled very good; kissably, perfectly baby good.

When we walked into the room where he was, he immediately started to watch us and was very interested in what was going on. When I bent down to his crib for the first time, he made eye contact and scooted closer. I stuck my finger near his fist, and he grabbed on with a firm grip and didn't let go until I moved to pick him up.

He has excellent head and neck control. When Ken and I held him, he leaned into us, and did not pull away or push from us. He was very serious for us, but he would smile for the nannies.
I sat on the floor with him and he is beginning to sit up; he was still leaning forward in a tripod style, but definitely working to sit. In his crib, he easily got onto all fours and rocked back and forth, like he was practicing to crawl. He can scoot all around his crib and turned himself around and around to keep track of all of the comings and goings in his room. He would get himself onto his knees, and then pull with both hands on the bars to get his face as close to everyone as possible.

I heard him "talking" several times, and seemed to be the most verbal one in the orphanage. His crib is next to Levi's and he really seemed to like talking to him.
All of the nannies seem to smile and talk to the babies every time they enter the room, or just walk past their crib to change another baby's diaper, or to get something. They genuinely seem to like to make them smile.
He is just precious. We told him you were coming, and that he was going to really, really like you :)

IS THAT NOT THE SWEETEST GIFT EVER!

"A friend loves at all times." Proverbs 17:17

The Perryman's

This way ------>

Steps to getting our paperwork to HCMC. Simply follow the arrows. HA : )

So what happened??
DNA date- Oct 31st
DNA received- Nov 14th, Lost by HCMC
DNA resent- Nov 25th, US Lab actually forgot to send them, oops
DNA resent again- To arrive Dec 9th
Then wait again x 3 for preapproval to travel
Then receive G & R date
We are still hoping for Dec...

We are in good spirits at the moment. A struggle between trusting God, feeling sad, mad and wanting to scream. We are thankful we feel the Lord's peace and are grateful the strong support of family and friends who remind us that he will be home very soon.

Playdate with the Homan kids, its a sure way to cheer up.

Walking through our towns Christmas lights display. Two millon lights!

"Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

Adam, Natasha, Avi Joy and Nehemiah

Hearts, Tummies and Nests

November/Thanksgiving 2008 pictures click here

NEHEMIAH NEWS
Had a meeting with the VN director today. Its tough knowing we could have left tomorrow had our DNA not been lost, but she encouraged us the best she could to make it though the next few weeks.

Our DNA was resent 11-25-08 and we are waiting for confirmation from HCMC that they received it. Once received they will take ? time to give us pre-approval. Then we will be issued a G & R date about 2-3 weeks from that. We have asked it be set quicker as we are ready to travel.
Our hope was to be there during Christmas, but now we are just waiting at their mercy to see if that is possible or if it will be after that (pray no!).
We received a copy of our DNA today. Here is our precious sons DNA picture, taken 10-31-08.

Recipe to help one make it though waiting... I am on my seventh day of it helping me : )

Pumpkin Crumble

bottom layer
1- 16oz can pumpkin
1- can sweetened condensed milk
3- eggs
1- tsp vanilla
3- tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2- tsp salt
1- cup sugar

topping:
1- yellow cake mix
1 1/2- sticks butter melted

Mix all bottom layer items together, pour into 9 x 13 baking dish. Sprinkle yellow cake mix on top, pour melted butter on top. Bake at 350 for 50-55 minutes.
Serve hot with cool whip melting on top- enjoy!

A Christmas project... our first gingerbread house. She loved decorating her house and eating the snowmen cookies.



Avi Joy strikes a pose.
She is such a ham these days.
I could list pages of funny stuff she says but here are my current two favorites.

1. We talk about where babies come from a lot. So one day in the car she said, "babies come from hearts and tummies and do not forget nests." Which is true, God does put baby birds in nests and she did not want to leave any baby out. She says she is currently carrying Nehemiah in her belly and 4 babies from Africa in her heart.

2. Listening to the Christmas song "Hear the angels sing," she belts out as loud as she can, "Hear the Asians sing." Yeah toooo funny.

"O Lord Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in You." Psalm 84:12
Love,
The Perryman Family