New Doors

Nine years ago, God led two broken & hurting hearts, and their faithful pup, out to Oregon to begin a time of healing and growth.  I remember it so clearly--Like it was just yesterday, and yet so much has happened since that day.  God knew exactly what He was doing, and while I had no idea all He had in mind, we followed His lead & He has done wonderful & amazing things!  Much needed healing took place, & soon our hurting hearts became mended & peaceful hearts.  Three years after coming to Oregon, God revealed part of His plan & He grew those two hearts into a family of three.  A few years even further down our journey, God led our family of three to become a family of four through adoption, & we watched God move mountains to keep His promise for us to bring home a precious girl in China to be our daughter.  We've now been home 5 weeks & He is continuing to lead & guide us as He grows our family of four closer each day.  What an exciting story God is writing with our lives!
With just having done so much, our family assumed we would begin a slow period of life when we got home from China. (LOL-"slow" not really meaning slow, but rather meaning a time of internal busy within our family by helping our new daughter adjust to life in the USA and our family, teaching her English and working on our Mandarin, keeping up with Dr. & therapy appointments on top of our normal homeschooling and working our small family farm verses external busy of life. :)   Instead, God surprised us by asking us to make an unexpected cross-country trip--84+ hours in just a little over seven days!  It was a whirlwind, but very much surprise blessing.  At the time of our trip, our family had only been home from China for exactly two weeks.  We packed pillows & blankets so the girls could sleep in the car, since we were planning to drive straight through. I made some snacks & tossed those along with  yogurt (an essential for life in the eyes of our new daughter!) into the cooler, threw our school stuff in a backpack, tossed it into the car, a friend volunteered to take care of our nearly 40 animals & off we went.  I was able to share a lot of the scenery, smiles and fun memories on Facebook while on our road trip.  It was a good time of further bonding for all of us--tons of singing together!  (I'm pretty sure we sang every song I've ever heard!)  At the same time, God used it as an opportunity to give Jim and I a nudge that He was about to do something else big with our family.

On the return drive of our cross country trip, as we neared Oregon, the girls needed a break from the car & Jim and I were exhausted, so we decided to call Crystal Peaks Youth Ranch on the rare chance that they happened to have any available sessions that day.  This ranch is actually what God used to lead us out to Oregon nine years ago, so it holds a special place in our hearts.  Sessions are usually booked solid well in advance, but God arranged it so that there were two sessions open, one for each of our girls!  What a precious surprise blessing!  The girls both had a chance to ride a horse & loved their visit!  As if that weren't enough, God also allowed us stop to enjoy dinner with three beloved friends who were also a huge part of our story here in Oregon from the very beginning.  We were able to spent a little time with these dear friends & had the opportunity to introduce our newest addition of the Reese family.  It was a precious, precious blessing that God allowed us these visits.  It brought our time here in Oregon full circle.  

One week after our crazy cross-country trip, Jim received a phone call offering him a job in Tennessee.  Our feeling that God was planning something big for our family was definitely true!  Jim and I had been praying about new employment for him for a long time.  While we were far enough away from traveling to China that we would still have time to update our home study without compromising her adoption,  we'd felt so burdened to change employers that he'd even applied to several of the opportunities he'd found were hiring.  He didn't hear back from a single one though--actually he even saw the same positions re-posted at later times.  God knew it wasn't the right time then.   This offer however came from one of the businesses Jim had applied for way back then (one of the ones he's seen re-post the open position multiple times).  He'd had no contact since then, but unlike before, God is making it clear that now IS the time.

Jim accepted the offer, so the Reese family will be saying "until later" to Oregon & heading east this coming Sunday morning (Oct. 29th) to Tennessee.   Jim will now be working as manager at Cook Out Restaurant and after years of missing family, we will now only be 5.5 hours away from most of our family.  So many of the things he and I had prayed about will be immediately answered by this new position.  We will miss all the dear friends we've made in Oregon, but trust God's leading & look forward to coming back for visits.

Nine years ago, we crossed into Oregon broken hearted, but Sunday we will cross the border again, this time full of joy, peace and excited anticipation as we head east for the next stop in this great adventure God is leading us on, called life.

Because it is such a quick & unanticipated move we unfortunately will not have a chance to see everyone we wish we could before we leave.  We are planning to meet in the parking lot of Green Community Church at 9:30 for a time of prayer on our way out of town this Sunday though & we'd love to see anyone who would like to join us.

We are so thankful for every single person God has allowed us to share our lives with during our time in Oregon and look forward to sharing blog posts and photos of our continue adventures as a Reese family of four!

Never a Dull Moment in China

I'm sitting here in the quiet hours of the morning, looking at a closed door to a room in which now holds not one, but two precious daughters and my mind jumps back to just a little over three weeks ago to the beginning moments of our family of three growing to a family of four.  So much has happened in such a short amount of time.  I did my best to post our journey while in China, but there were two quick memories that didn't easily fit into a photo for a post that are just too funny not to share.  (Plus, I don't want to forget those funny moments of our time in China!)

Of All the Things We Didn't Think Of . . .
There are so many things to consider when adopting an older child.  We tried to be as absolutely prepared as possible, however our daughter especially surprised us with one scenario in which we were completely taken by surprise.  We had thoughtfully considered language barrier, however this particular scenario never crossed our minds until it happened.  What a hoot!  We were sitting down eating a meal and the server came to check on us.  We all nodded and smiled to show our contentment, while Ella-Mae, being her normal friendly self, chatted away in Mandarin to our server. Our translator wasn't able to keep up with what she was saying, but she chatted away to everyone, all the time, so we didn't think twice about it until, a few minutes later new food and drink arrived.  You can imagine our surprise when after questioning (through language barrier!) why the extra food, it was explained to us that our sweet, new daughter had taken it upon herself to order additional menu items while talking with the server!  Our chatty & apparently VERY hungry teenager had nearly double our bill!  Thankfully in China, we were easily able to feed our family of four, to completely full and then some for around $11, so our surprise orders from our daughter still only brought our bill to around $20 which would still be impressive in the states to be able to feed a family of 4 out to eat (non-fast food) for that amount, but still!  Of all the things we didn't think of . . . this was definitely one of funniest!

Pandas & Tones . . .
For those who don't already know, the mandarin language, is made of sounds for words along with four basic tones--The change of a tone completely changes the word.  I play multiple instruments so I really should get tones, right?  Ha!--Apparently not!  Having taught english to high school and middle schoolers for a few years now, I am extremely familiar with tone influctions to change a declarative sentence to an interrogative or when beginning a sentence with an interjection, etc.  But mandarin tones and I--Oh my that is another story!!! (Understatement!!!)  I shared photos of the day our family went to see the pandas, but I haven't yet told one of the funniest parts of that memory.  We were all very excited to see the pandas.  They are so cute and fuzzy!  We had only just gotten Ella-Mae the day before, so I really wanted to be able to talk with her and wanted to share about our plans for the next day.  I'd played and replayed "panda" through our translator until I finally got it! (or so I thought!)  So we were driving home from signing our official papers to make her ours when I decided to give my practice a try.  Thank goodness I picked that day b/c since it was a paperwork day we were together with our guide! I begin talking with Ella-Mae about going to see the pandas, using my newly learned mandarin word for "panda."  I thought she would be all excited and instead she looked at me like I was nuts.  I was beginning to be worried that she would not enjoy our trip at all, when I realized our guide was beside herself in laughter.  After her laughter subsided, she informed me that while I'd used the correct sounds, I was using the wrong tone. The reason Ella-Mae was not sharing my excitement was b/c, despite my enthusiasm, I'd just repeatedly asked our daughter if she was excited to come with us to look at . . . not pandas, like I'd thought, but rather had told her were we going to to see "the hairy chest"!!  Oh my!!!--My poor girl!  No wonder she looked absolutely confused! I tried a few more times and it turns out that using yet another improper tone says a very not-so-nice word in mandarin!--Of course I only found that out after saying it!!!   To say the least, I recognize the word when someone else says "panda", but I don't see myself trying it again, any time soon!

Well, there are plenty more to share, but that's all for now. . .