Why wouldn't i

Thanks Christine!
We really can relate to this video. Can you ? Have you adopted , or want to adopt. Watch this video, it is very inspiring to watch .

Ok~Ok~ Yes,I have lots to say!!

Maggie teaching Bella to climb the stairs

Andrew and Bella dancing

Jordon laughing at Mom

Mr. Serious

Bella had her eye checkup on Tuesday and her left eye is still not doing its share of the work, so the Dr. gave her some drops to put in her good eye to make it do less work . We will have a follow up appointment in one month to see how she is progressing. We also have Bella scheduled to see a podiatrist and hopefully get fitted with ankle braces so she isn't walking on the sides of her feet, her O.T therapist thinks this is all that is holding her back from walking on her own, so hopefully they work. She is so loveable now and will actually snuggle with dad and fall asleep in his arms. We all love her so much even when she is being a little demon.

Baby Jordon is doing great, he is growing like a weed now and developing his own little personality, his only issue at this time is he is quite the mommas boy and will scream all the time if Mom isn't holding him. He started OT therapy also and gets a good workout every week even though he doesn't like it.

The rest of the kiddos are doing good, Mom is still home schooling all of them and most days they are actually learning things, we still have days when it is hard to get them going to do their work, but overall it is going well

Mara needs a family A.S.A.P.!!

Could you be her mommy and daddy !!!!

I took this from a friend's blog. Mara is a beautiful little girl. I had no idea that she was almost 10 years old. She looks as if she is 5. Without being able to say it, she seemed to say "take me...love me...".

Meet MARA
.
Mara is 9 years old and has Apert Syndrome.
She is an orphan in Eastern Europe.
Her life story is already one of heart break and a second chance.
When she was born, she was placed in a horrible institution.
It is one that has been highlighted on TV shows and internet websites as the worst of circumstances.
Mara's country has been proactive in reforming this institution and many others like it.
Mara got a second chance.
Two years ago, she was moved out of that hopeless, horrible place and placed in an orphanage for children where she could receive medical care, therapy, an education and a chance to grow and develop.
Mara has THRIVED in her new environment.
She has had surgery to begin to fix her webbed hands
(and she can use them the way that they are).
She is attending a school program for children with special needs.
She is getting love and attention and a chance to learn new skills.
Mara loves her baby doll.
She watches the care givers take care of the younger children and mimics their actions with her doll (feeding it, dressing it, rocking it, etc)
Mara still has delays, but she's making progress every day.
She understands everything that is said to her and has a calm and loving spirit.
She is tiny for her age and actually looks to be about 4 or 5.
Despite everything that she has lived through, this precious angel is still smiling.
But, her time is running out once again.
Mara has a birthday coming up in March.
She'll be 10 years old.
She can't stay in her current orphanage much longer, as it is designed for younger children.
Thankfully, she is not being sent back to an institution.
But, she IS being sent to an orphanage for older children.
An orphanage that does not usually take children with special needs.
Can you imagine this TINY girl....with her obvious special needs....
in a place with older children that have never seen a child with a disability?
MARA NEEDS A FAMILY.

From now until Valentine's Day, Reece's Rainbow is conducting an awareness campaign for the older angels with special needs.
Please join me in raising awareness for MARA and all the other angels on this page.
If you would like more information on MARA or the process of adopting from her country, you can email me via the contact information on the sidebar or by leaving a comment on this page.
Donations to MARA's adoption fund can be made by sending a check to
Reece's Rainbow
PO Box 4024
Gaithersburg, MD 20885

Happy late birthday to our grandson Camren!!

Happy Late birthday Camren!! Cam's turned 6 on Jan 08,2010. He had a birthday bash on Jan 10th. It was a awesome party. Lots of boys, the girls would say yucky boys.

Our grandson Adien playing pin the tail on the donkey. Our little granddaughter Nat's won the game. You go girl!!

This time it was Megan's turn and she quit, after she was spun around and around. I think she was pretty dizzy. All the kiddos had a great time. Happy Birthday Cam's ~ we all love you very much...

Ice skating at the rink

All the kiddos up right , on there feet. They all spent lots of time on there bottoms on the ice.

Mary giving Bella a taste of snow..

Dez,Jake, Adien and Jenna on the ice rink.

Daddy and Bella. They both had so much fun.

Mama and Jordon went also. but we spent most of the time in the Suburban.We were nice and warm, watching everybody skate.

We took the kiddos down to the park , and we have a nice ice skating rink there. The kiddos got to try out there skating abilities. They all did pretty awesome!! Bella loved riding in her sled on the ice. They all had so much fun , but they all were ready to go home after a couple hours at the rink. So they could have hot chocolate and some cookies..

Bella walking on the treadmill

Bella waiting to walk on the treadmill for the very first time.

Megan helping Bella get ready to walk.

Bella walking with mom and dad holding her hands. She loved it, she had the biggest smile on her face when she was walking. She was very proud of herself.As we are very very proud of her. Bella has worked very hard to get to where she is at today. Bella has learned so much already, we can't wait to see what she will do next.

Bella taking steps on the treadmill. All the kiddos were so happy with Bella , they all were clapping for her.

Mama and Bella , mama was so excited for Bella walking on the treadmill. We were giving each other high five. Bella didn't want to get off of the treadmill. But we think she should start out a few minutes at a time. Then she can build up to a longer time..

Bella has done so well this week. She is working really hard on potty training and walking by herself. We will see her walk by herself one day very soon. She watches all the children run and play and she wants to be right with them. So i am sure she will be up and walking and maybe running some day soon. Bella can stand by herself and hold on to things and walk along them. She is very good at that. She just is not sure of letting go yet.

Bella loves her little brother!! There for awhile we were not very sure of this. But the last few days she has really shown affection towards Jordon. We will ask her if she wants to hold her baby brother and she smiles, so we put Jordon in her lap. She gave him a kiss on his head today. How sweet is that!! Bella is really turning into a big girl now. It has been so awesome to watch her come out of her shell a little at a time and really blossom .Bella has surprised us all. Because when we went to adopt Bella it didn't matter if she could walk or talk every. She is proving all of us wrong. She also is using some of her signs, when she wants to. Bella will also feed herself if her daddy is not home. When daddy is home she wants no part of feeding herself. She has daddy wrapped around her little finger, and that is right where she wants him.

We love you Bella and are very proud of all of your accomplishments !!

Yes, we love all of our children, big and small!!!

Merry Christmas to our Serbian friends!!

We hope all of our friends in Serbia are having a very nice Christmas..We also hope and pray the little ones got a visit from grandpa Frost and just maybe a gift. Enjoy your special holiday dear friends.

Sending hugs and love~

Jordon started O.T today.& Parenting special needs children!!

Jordon started O.T therapy with Bella today. Jordon gets to do O.T after Bella , but Bella doesn't like to share Dixie our O.T. friend. So Bella keeps going back to Dixie when she is working with Jordon. Bella is starting to like being a big sister to Jordon . I try to help Bella hold him now. She will get the biggest smile on her face. She just lights up with Jordon in her arms. That really is a big change for her . Bella didn't even want to look at Jordon for the first few months of him being home. She really liked being the baby of the family. She is adjusting now very well. She is very stubborn and most things she will do on her terms only. Unless mom is working with her, she knows mom means business. That she needs to feed herself or she needs to go potty on the potty chair. Oh sweet little Bella can pull the wool over her Daddy's eyes. She acts like her arms are broken and can't feed herself for her daddy. Boy this little girl knows how to work her daddy. She knows how to get to daddy's heart. She will give her daddy big lick kisses, all the way up the side of his face. It really is cute, but my skin crawls when she tries to give me a lick kiss. They are cute , but not for mom.

Ok: The O.T.~Dixie and i were talking today about parenting special needs children. Dixie and her hubby have one adopted daughter with some special needs. So she knows how it is with the sreaming fits and forgetfulness. Anyway we were talking about how when i was younger i had 3 children that were stair steps , each 2 years apart. Now i have 6 adopted children in the house at all times, plus many grand children. Most of the time we have 10 or 12 children in the house. But as i get older i really have lots more patients than i did when i was in my twenties with just three children. God must have know i could only handle three children then. BUT I AM SO THANKFUL THAT HE SEE'S THAT WE CAN TAKE CARE OF 6 OR MORE CHILDREN AT ONE TIME. Many with special needs, but then i really think we all have some special needs .

When i was in my twenties , everything had to be perfect. The house had to be clean all the time. The dishes had to be done before i would leave the house, and the fridge had to be organized. Everything in it's special place. Yes, i was a neat freak,but now i look around and think what the heck happened to my house. It really is great , our house is so full of love and laughter . Yet, it is not so organized any more. I really do try , but it is hard to keep up with 10 or 12 people at a time. We thank God for everyone of our children !!!!!

Ok: Back to Dixie and i talking today. We talked about how most people don't understand how to parent special needs children. You really don'.t parent them the same as non~ special needs children. Every child is parented different. They all have different behavior issues and many different special needs. So each need a special way of parenting them. But nobody can really know how to parent your child unless they have walked a mile in your shoes. Dixie and i both have seen many children with many many different special needs. There are some children i could not parent either. Even though Gary and I have parented over 40 some children. Most of them we loved dearly , but there was a few that we couldn't wait for them to move on. Some children just don't fit , in every family. Some we just clash with, i remember one blonde little girl. She was so beautiful , she looked like she was one of our homemade children. Oh she loved to fight with me. She would wait until Gary and all the little ones were trying to sleep . Then she would blow up and start screaming. I really think she just liked to be moved from home to home. I was really sad that she didn't fit in with our family. I really had high hopes that she would. But by the time she left i was so glad to have my quiet house back . Most of all the stress of the fighting with her was gone. Do i or we miss her. Why yes, we miss most of the children we parented. But boy i couldn't have kept them all. We just hope and pray they learned something good and loving from us. We did foster /adopt for about eight years. Boy it was tough, my heart got ripped out many many times. Sometimes i really felt helpless and hopeless. Letting some of the children leave, but then we really didn't have a choice in the matter. But it was awesome to watch a child go to a home that they were really going to love them for who they are. That is what kept me going and the hope of helping as many children as we could. I really think this has helped make us so much stronger.

Special Angels Support Group

That is the name of our support group. Thank you to those who have joined already. If you would like to join ~please e-mail me and i will send an invite to you.. We are very hopeful we can help one another with the pains and strains of raising our adopted children.

Our group is private, so we can learn how to help each other.

If you have adopted from Foster/adopt, Domestic or International adoption , we sure would like to see you in our group.
jngcampbell9@msn.com

We would like to start a support group~`

We are trying to get moms, dads,and siblings to join us. To start a support group for families that have adopted~ Internationaly, Domestic or through foster/adopt.All our children have some kind of issues. We would love to be able to help each other and not feel we cannot say how we feel about the issues our children have. We would love to just be able to talk and not have someone say something bad about how you feel.

Adopting is awesome, but does come with issues. Just like parenting any child. But children from orphanges, come with many behaviors that are very nerve racking. To say the least. Teeth grinding i think is number one on the chart of nerve grabbers.Rocking , the children rock themselves for hours. This can destroy any play pen very fast. Plus keep you awake for many hours a night. Bitting, yes they bite everybody in the house at least once. We do warn visitors, to watch so they don't get a bite taken out of them. These behaviors do slow down, not sure if they ever stop. Maybe we just get used to them.

This behavior is hard to take, as one mom puts it diaper digging. When they play in their diapers and throw poop all over , or wipe it on things. That one is pretty hard to take. That is a no no in our house. We keep oneses on Bella all the time. Also these children can strip very fast , naked little ones very quick. You can answer the door and turn around and they can be naked for the visitor that has just come in your door. Guess what ~ most cannot dress themselves back up again. But strip in a flash.

These are just the tip of the issues~ that we families deal with. Some get very frustrating , so we feel we need to be able to talk openly to other mom's and dad's. My hope is maybe we can build some stronger bonds and help each other with the issues we deal with on a daily basis..We would also like to be able to put families together with each other so if one of us need respite care for our adopted child, just maybe someone will live close enough to help out.. Sometimes we just need a break from the children, and then we can deal with the issue at hand..

If you would like to join us , you can e-mail me~ Jody~jngcampbell9@msn.com.
We will see how many people we get and go from there. This is very important to be very positive to each other. We do not want anyone saying negative things about one an other.
It is very rewarding to parent our children, but not many people understand us. They feel we put our selves in this postition . Well yes we did, but that doesn't mean we don't need support through it.Our children are all very beautiful, but do have many many issues to deal with.People who have never adopted do not understand how we feel. Yes, we love our children just like we birthed them. But we do have to remember that we never carried them in our womb. So many children have Fetal Alcohol syndrome, or effects. Maybe even some drug exposure, that can cause many learning difficulties..
We are not bad parents, we just need other people to talk to who understand what we deal with on a daily basis..

Come join us~jngcampbell9@msn.com

Happy New Year !!!

Uncle Jim and Bella on Christmas Eve.

Daddy giving Jordon a kiss!!

Jordon wearing Bella's glasses.. He is so so cute, we just love him so much..

Jordon, he reminds me so much of a little girl at Bella's first home. They have the same skin color and chubby little faces..They could be twins...

Look at Bella really close~ What do you see, or not see. Yes, Bella lost or mama pulled her tooth.

Bella's tooth was loose and Mama didn't want Bella to swallow her tooth so she pulled it. Doesn't Bella look so adorable missing her tooth??

We want to wish all of our friends and family , a very Happy New Year!!!

We wish you all good health and wealth this new year...

We pray this year goes much smoother than last. We have had a lot of heartache this past year.

We are ready to put that all behind us and start a new ..New plans and new goals for all of us!!