Very proud Daddy and big brother!!!

Jake has been so excited these past two days about his baby sister! I have to admit that as thrilled as I am about Olivia, I'm also a little sad for Jake. His whole world is about to change. He's been our entire focus his entire life and now he's going to have a baby sister to share our time with. Knowing Jake though, he'll be happy to share his Mommy and Daddy. He's an incredibly sweet boy. I know I'm a bit biased, but he really is a sweetie. He's incredibly affectionate and loving. I have no doubt that Olivia will be smothered with kisses as soon as he sees her. She's going to be a very lucky little girl to have Jake as her big brother!

Waiting, waiting and more waiting!

Things have been so wild at our house the last two days! We are all just floating on air! We also got some very exciting news today - certainly not as exciting as yesterday's news though. Kimberly Alls (our wonderful social worker) called this afternoon and after wracking her brain for the last day remembered where she had seen our Olivia before. She saw a glimpse of her in another referral video. Needless to say, she was thrilled and called us immediately. She's mailing us a copy of the video in the morning so we can make a copy of it. There's only about a second of her on it, but we can't wait to see it! Hopefully if anyone from Dillon travels to Vietnam in the next couple of months, or if some of the other adoptive parents are able to bring their children home in the coming weeks we can get current pictures and videos of Olivia. That would be such a blessing! We are optimistic that the first families to receive referrals will be able to travel within the next month or so. They are certainly in our prayers.

As difficult as the waiting has been thus far, it will no doubt be much harder now that we know our baby girl's face. We know where she is and what she looks like, yet we can't get to her. It's a feeling I can't even begin to describe. For those of you with children, just imagine what it would be like for one of your kids to be 2 years old, in a foreign country, living in an orphange and you're helpless to do anything for them. You can't see them, can't bring them home, can't even call them or send them a teddy bear. For some reason we aren't allowed to send care packages. I'm not sure why. I would very much like to send Olivia some pictures and a fuzzy blanket and teddy bear. For now all we can do is send her our love. We are so grateful that God has been taking care of her while we wait to bring her home. We are also grateful to her birthmother and the nanny's and directors of her orphanage. She looks very healthy. I just hope that someone holds her when she's hurting and loves her and gives her kisses.

We love you Olivia and will bring you home as soon as we can!

Introducing Miss Olivia Frances Thi Munn!!!!

We are absolutely elated to share our first pictures of our daughter with you! We received "THE CALL" this morning jut after nine a.m. from our angelic social worker, Kimberly Alls that we have a referral!!! After hearing about her, I woke Mike up to tell him. We are BEYOND excited!!! After reading her information, we called our social worker back to tell her YES (which we had already done in the first call, but darn protocol says we have to read her paperwork first!) Then she emailed us her pictures. This is the first time we've seen our daughter's face! She's absolutely gorgeous!!!!!! Breathtaking!!!! We are IN LOVE!!!! She was born June 22, 2004. Mike has already dubbed her his Little Junebug. Jake calls her V. I've taken to calling her Livi lately. Regardless of her name, WE LOVE HER!!!! We can't wait to bring her home. The wait for travel clearance will be 3 to 6 months. Without going into ridiculous detail, the reason for the delay is sending paperwork back and forth between the US and Vietnam and between Hanoi and her orphanage. We have been praying for months for Olivia to be home by this Christmas, so please please pray with us for her to be home soon! We so desperately want to have our little girl in our arms where she belongs. She has a Mommy, Daddy and big brother who can't wait for her to come home! I should also probably mention she has grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and countless friends who want her home ASAP, too!!!

Hurry home Olivia! We love you so much!!!

Here is a picture of Jake in his cool new Lightning McQueen car. He has been flying all over the yard the last couple of days! He's feeling much much better now and I couldn't be more thankful. Aunt Cerra also bought him a Lightning McQueen helmet which is a good thing, because he definitely thinks he's a race car driver! Could he be more adorable?!?!

P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AUNT CERRA!

On the road to recovery!!

I'm happy to say that Jake is on the road to recovery! He was admitted into St. Michael's in Texarkana on Saturday and we were able to come home Tuesday afternoon. He has been a VERY sick little boy. His breathing was much worse on Saturday and he was still running a high temperature so he had to spend several days in the hospital. After just one day of IV antibiotics his fever was gone! That was such an amazing answer to prayer! He's still on two different antibiotics and breathing treatments, but he's doing much much better. He's able to play and act like a kid again. I was just so thankful to see his smile again! I missed his sweet little grin. He was a very good boy in the hospital. The only thing that really bothered him was the IV. Being tied to a pole wasn't much fun. Especially when you were in a hurry to get to the potty! By the last day though he was going all over the place pushing the pole by himself. His favorite part of being in the hospital was the play room and the Icee's that came with lunch! I definitely recommend St. Michael's pediatric wing. They were so good to my Jakey Poo.

He's able to get up and around again but he can't play for more than a few minutes at a time and he can't get hot or he'll lose his breath. He has to take frequent rest breaks and breathing treatments when it gets very bad. He's still a million times better than he was though. His wonderful Aunt Cerra told him in the hospital that when he came home she would buy him the big Lightning McQueen car from Wal-Mart. It's the big drive in car that goes 5 miles per hour. As soon as we were in the car in the hospital parking lot, he was asking to go to Wal-Mart for his car. Aunt Cerra met us in Magnolia, and true to her word, bought Jake his very cool race car. He's been speeding all over the yard in it! Unfortunately it's been incredibly hot here this week, so he can only stay outside for a couple of minutes. I'm sure within a week or two he'll be down at the big pond in it and we'll be trying to figure out where he is!

THANK YOU so much for all of your prayers, phone calls, and emails! Jake would not be doing as well if it weren't for the prayers of the faithful! Please continue to pray for him as he recovers from pneumonia.

My Sweet Baby Boy

Jake has now been running a fever for 12 days. We took him to the doctor twice last week. They assured us (after two rounds of blood work, urine tests, etc.) that it was just a viral infection and would go away on it's own. The second time we took him, they discovered he also had an ear infection and a yucky throat. He put him on antibiotics. Still running fever. I decided sometime Monday that he has pneumonia. Of course doctor's don't work on holidays so it had to wait until today. I called this morning and the nurse told me AGAIN that it's just a viral infection and has to run it's course. I told her I thought it was pneumonia and that I was incredibly concerned about the length of time he's been running fever and how high it's been. "There's nothing you can do except wait it out but I'll ask the doctor about it and call you back." The doctor told us to come back in for MORE blood work. Once we got there, he checked his ears and throat again - all clear - and listened to his chest. Sounds good. I assured him it was pneumonia. WHY DON'T THEY JUST LISTEN TO ME??????? After a great deal of prodding on my part, they sent Jake upstairs for x-rays. As soon as we got them back I opened them up and put them up to the light. A huge spot on his left lung nearly as large as my hand. We got back down to the doctor's office and as soon as he walked in - PNEUMONIA. Imagine that. Jake's Mommy knowing what's wrong with him. Doctors drive me insane. Nurses drive me insane. I just wish that they would listen to me when I tell them what's wrong with my child. Just because I didn't go to medical school doesn't mean I don't have an understanding of the human body and how it works. Regardless, I know my son's body better than anyone else on this planet. I probably know his body better than my own.

Anyway, my baby boy has pneumonia. He gave him a strong antibiotic shot and put him on stronger twice daily antibiotics today. He also put him on breathing treatments. My poor angel has to use a nebulizer four times a day. (A great big thank you to Aunt Cerra for bringing up her extra nebulizer for Jake to use.) He's also on an expectorant. If his fever doesn't drop continuously in the next 48 hours, he's going to admit him to the hospital for 3 to 5 days for IV antibiotics. Jake has never been this sick before. It's killing me and Mike. We can't stand to see him like this. He's lost 5 pounds. In a kid that weighs 37 pounds, that's a lot. Did I mention he has diarrhea? This may be more information than you really want to know, but it's so horrible. He's been potty trained for an entire year, but he's been through 3 or 4 pairs of underwear a day for the last week because it's so terrible. On the way to Texarkana to the doctor today, we had to stop at Fred's in Stamps to buy pull-ups. We had to stop twice for accidents just on the way to the doctor. It's absolutely breaking his heart that he can't wear underwear. He takes it as meaning he's not a "big boy" anymore. I feel so sorry for him. He's so incredibly sick.

On top of all of this, today is the 5 year anniversary of my Mama's death. Pneumonia was one of her causes of death. This is NOT a good day.

Please pray pray pray for my sugarbear.

I want my daughter to come home. I was looking at pictures tonight of the children of other Dillon families who have already received their referrals from Vietnam. They are all so incredibly beautiful. I know that Olivia is alive. I know what country she's in. I know that I have loved her since I was a child. I knew one day I would have a daughter of my own and I loved her with my own little girl heart. It is incredibly difficult to know that my child is somewhere in this world and I can't touch her. I can't feel her breath on my skin as she sleeps next to me. I can't kiss her sweet lips and gingerly touch my fingertips to her cheeks. I can't be there for her when she cries. I have no idea if anyone is holding her in the way she deserves to be held. Who does she cling to when she's scared? I want my baby girl. I don't want her tomorrow or by Christmas. I want her home right now. Right this second. I want to cradle her in my arms and never let her go. Alas, God's timeline and my own aren't in alignment. I should be used to this by now, but I'm not. Not when it comes to my children.

Jake is still sick. Again, God's timeline and my own aren't aligning. Not only do I want Olivia home right this second, I want my son to be perfectly healthy right this second. He seemed a bit better this morning, but then he had fever again after his nap. It's just killing me that he's so sick and I can't seem to do anything about it. Two trips to the doctor, 4 days worth of antibiotics and he's still running a high fever and crying everytime he coughs. It's breaking my heart. There is definitely - FINALLY - a bright light at the end of this tunnel! Jake decided this afternoon he wanted to go to Wal-Mart and get a Spiderman toy! This is good! He wants to get off the couch! YAY! He picked out a Spiderman costume. It's adorable! He looks so cute in it. He loves to dress up. He also wanted a Sprite from McDonald's and decided he might try a Happy Meal. He ate 3 chicken McNuggets!!! This is HUGE progress! He also ate half of his fries! I never dreamed I'd be so excited about my son eating fast food! This is the first he's really eaten in days though so I'm thrilled.

There is a point to all of this of course. God always answers prayers. Sometimes just not when we want them answered. Sometimes he says, "wait." Jake is feeling better. A prayer answered! My daughter will be home soon. I will continue to pray that it's sooner rather than later! I know my prayer for my daughter to be home will also be answered in His time.

Jake slept with us last night and at some point in the middle of the night he woke up crying. He wanted to come watch tv, so we laid on the couch together and watched a Harry Potter movie until about 7 am. Then he wanted to go to sleep in his bed. He slept until 12:30, but woke up with 105 fever! I know that fever is just the body's way of fighting infection, but 105 is dangerous. I gave him a cool bath and Tylenol and he was better before long. We took him back to the doctor this afternoon. Since Monday he has lost 2 pounds, has an ear infection, and some spots on the back of his throat. He's on antibiotics now. We'll know the results of his blood work in the morning. I hope it's just an ear infection and sore throat. This fever is terrible. He's been laying around the house crying for 6 days now and for anyone that knows my Jakey Poo, this is highly unusual behavior. He's the happiest kid in the world!

The only bright spot in this day was getting the mail. We received our notarized background checks from the state police, so if they also arrived in Tulsa today, our dossier should be on it's way to Little Rock! At the very least it should be there tomorrow and back in the mail tomorrow afternoon. I'm so excited about that! Finally some progress!

Please remember Jake in your prayers! Right now he's asleep on the couch with his Daddy and as quiet as he's been all day. My poor baby.

This is one of my favorite pictures of Jake!

I hope he'll be feeling well enough to smile this big tomorrow!

I haven't been able to post in the past week. Jake has been sick since Saturday. He had a fever just over 100 the first two days and then woke up with 104 on Monday morning. That absolutely scares me to death. I took him to the doctor that afternoon and not finding anything visibly wrong with him (ears, nose, throat, etc. were fine) they did blood work. It was fine, too. The doctor said that he most likely has a viral infection that will go away on it's own. The only treatment for it is Tylenol and Motrin for the fever. I don't like it one bit! I hate it so much when my baby is sick. I feel completely helpless.

I wonder sometimes if Olivia is somewhere in Vietnam crying and no one is there to hold her. I try not to think of it much though. It breaks my heart that my daughter is out there somewhere needing me and I can't get to her. Speaking of Olivia, I think I mentioned last week that the only thing we were waiting on right now was for the notarized copies of our background checks to arrive in Tulsa from the Arkansas State Police. Well, they never arrived! GRRRR!!! I spoke to the wonderfully helpful woman (Trisha) from the state police that has been helping me though and she made new ones up and sent originals to both Tulsa and us. They should have gone out in the mail yesterday so I sincerely hope they'll be to Dillon by Friday. Kelley, our angelic dossier specialist, will turn them right around and send them back to Little Rock to the Secretary of State to be certified along with the rest of our dossier documents. After that they will be sent to the Vietnam Embassy in San Francisco. All of this should take around 3 weeks. Then we'll be referral ready!!!!! I still believe we'll have a referral by the end of the summer and travel by Christmas. I'm praying with faith that she will be home with us to celebrate the birth of Jesus! Please pray with me if you will! The Lord answers the prayers of the faithful and I have to believe that it's God's will for our family to be together at long last!

Speaking of answers to prayers, my sister Cerra is doing very well after her surgery. She's walking some and has cut her pain medicine down dramatically. I'm so very proud for her!!! I know that she'll be running around in circles before we know it. No doubt chasing Jake! My brother Joe (better known as Uncle Joby at our house) was having back problems last week, but he's also doing better. The Lord is always good to my family. We are so incredibly blessed!

One more just for the heck of it. This is one of Uncle Joby's favorite pictures of Jake. I just wish you could see how gorgeous his baby blue eyes are!

A few pictures of Baby Jake when he was actually still a baby! Pictures of Jake always cheer me up when I'm frustrated!

I have IMS - Irritable Mommy Syndrome

I'm a bit frustrated today. Our agency sent out an e-mail to Vietnam families this morning that they would suggest we not bring children under the age of 12 with us when we travel to Vietnam to bring our new children home. For any of you who know me very well, I hardly go anywhere without Jake! It's not that I don't think JuJu and Daddy Don aren't perfectly capable of taking care of him, I just can't be away from him for 2 to 3 weeks. Heck, I can't be away from him for 2 or 3 days! I do well just to go 2 or 3 hours without my Jakey Poo. They said they would consider it on a case by case basis, and that's definitely what they're going to have to do with us. This really isn't even an option. I absolutely will not be away from Jake for that long.

One of the things they mentioned was how important the attachment and bonding processes are with the adopted child. I certainly agree with that, but I also have the same amount of concern about Jake's feelings. How would he feel if we left him for 3 weeks and then suddenly arrived home with a new child that everyone wanted to ooh and ah over? I think that they would both be better off getting to know each other before we get home when it's just our little family and then he can show his new little sister off to everyone when we get back to Arkansas. Besides, Jake is very easy going and travels well. We drove to Illinois in one day (14 straight hours!) and he was very good. Also, I'm sure I would be a much more sane and better Mommy to Olivia if I wasn't an ocean away from my sugarbear. I would be too unhappy about being away from Jake to properly focus my attention.

Why can't everyone just cooperate with me?!?! Grrrr!

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY, DADDY!!!

Jake and I gave Mike a KJV/NKJV Parallel Bible for Father's Day. He liked it very much. He preaches at lots of different churches and the ones with older members tend to respond better to the KJV while churches with a wider age range of members seem to like the NKJV better. I'm a NIV girl myself! The easier it is to read, the better!

We went to pick my sister up from the VA in Shreveport, but they decided to keep her another night because she has a low grade fever and low blood pressure. Hopefully we'll be able to bring her home in the morning. The trip wasn't a total loss though. We got to visit with Cerra (who is doing remarkably well!) and we ate at the Olive Garden (my 2nd favorite restaurant in the world) and went shopping at the Boardwalk. This was mostly because Mike wanted to go to Bass Pro Shops. Ok. Maybe I like that store, too. We managed not to buy one single thing which is pretty amazing. I tell you what, once I finally know what size clothes Olivia will be wearing, she will own a ridiculously large wardrobe! I love going to Osh Kosh B'Gosh and Carters at the Boardwalk. It's probably for the best that I not know her size now. We might not be able to save and scrounge enough to pay for our adoption!

For those of you who finally found our blog, hello! I can't believe I sent out the wrong address. I don't know why the site is called Blogger and the address is blogspot. Very annoying. Anyway, I'm glad you're here!

My sister Cerra had surgery this past Thursday at the VA hospital in Shreveport. She had her left hip replaced. She was walking on it the very next day and is doing very well. We are going to bring her home in the morning unless something happens between now and then. Please keep her in your prayers!

Jake is spending the night with JuJu and Daddy Don since Mike and I have to go to Shreveport in the morning. I hate missing church, but I'm happy that Cerra will be coming home. I know it sounds ridiculous to most of you, but I already miss Jake and he's only been away from me for a few hours. I feel all out of sorts when he's not with me. I don't know what I'm going to do when he starts school. I just won't think about it for now!

I have some very good adoption news! Our dossier packet is ready to be mailed out from Tulsa next week to the Secretary of State for authentication. I mailed our dossier to Dillon last week and there was only one thing wrong with it. The background checks from the state police weren't notarized. Grrrr! The new notarized ones will be in Tulsa Tuesday or Wednesday and then our dossier will be on it's way! They tell me that it usually takes around 10 days to get it back and then it will go onto the Vietnam Embassy in San Francisco. After that, it will be back to Dillon and then onto VIETNAM!!! Yay! Every little step makes me so excited! I can't believe we're finally so close to bringing Olivia home. This has been such a long road, but I know the destination will be awesome!

P.S. Happy Father's Day to all you Dad's out there, especially Jake and Olivia's Daddy!

A few pictures of us on the Buffalo River! We had a great time canoeing the Buffalo and Ouachita rivers a couple of weeks ago. Most people think 5 days in a tent is 5 too many days. I think it's 5 too little! If only it had an air conditioner...

I've joined the land of bloggers! I think I'm the last one on earth to join. I actually started this blog last November, but I never seemed to have time to post. Now that things are actually moving along in our adoption, I'm much more apt to keep everyone informed about us!

For those of you who don't talk to us everyday, let me at least let you in on our family life. We currently have two dogs, Phideaux and Deacon. Deacon is our adorable new chocolate lab puppy. As you can see from the picture, Jake and Deacon are the best of friends! We also have a cat named Crookshanks that Jake calls Crookers, a beta fish named Purple Fish, a turtle named Turtle, and four ducks. Can you tell that Jake named the fish and turtle? We are also currently doggy sitting Cerra's dog Lady Bird. We're very fond of her and are considering dog napping her. I think that's all of our pets.

Jake is now 3 1/2 years old which is just unbelievable to me! He's also incredibly tall! (Get's that from me, of course.) He still has gorgeous blonde hair and the prettiest blue eyes in the world. He's an absolute angel. I realize I'm biased, but he is! I'm pretty certain he's the sweetest, most loving child ever born besides Jesus Christ. Mike and I feel so incredibly blessed that God allows us to be Jake's parents! We are the luckiest people in the universe!

Mike is now working full time at the business we started over a year ago, Arkansas Wildlife Taxidermy. You can visit our business site at www.arkansaswildlifetaxidermy.com. He also surrendered to preach this past February!!!! We were both so nervous, but knew he was being called and it has been so incredibly amazing! People ask me all the time what it's like being a preacher's wife. It's WONDERFUL! We are as happy as we have every been in our lives.

I am still staying home with Jake which is fantastic. Mike is also home full time now, so we are able to eat most all of our meals together and go everywhere together. Mike and I were both a little bit worried about all of this "together" time, but it has been great. He works a lot out in his shop of course, so we still get time away from each other occasionally! I'm also still the director of The Hannah Medical Center in Magnolia. I usually work about 10 hours per week. Jake stays home with Mike when I work on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. It's nice to still be useful out in the real world. It's frustrating and very satisfying work all at the same time. I am very grateful that God called me into this ministry.

As for our adoption, Miss Olivia is getting closer to coming home everyday! For anyone who may not know, we switched from Korea to Vietnam a few weeks ago. We spoke to our social worker at Dillon International (our adoption agency) at the end of May about how timelines were going for Korea. When we first started the process for Korea, the wait time was 8 to 10 months for referral. In May when I spoke to her, she said it would probably be at least another 18 MONTHS before we received our referral and then another 4 to 6 months for travel. I absolutely positively can't take another two years of this. I had it in my head once upon a time that I wanted to adopt 6 children for a total of 7 Munn Munchkins all together, but I don't think physically and mentally I could handle another 5 adoptions. This has been so much harder on us than I ever could have imagined. I know without a doubt that it will all have been worth it once Olivia is home, but right now, it's just miserable. It's a lot like labor. You're horribly miserable for a bit and then you have this amazing child and you sort of forget about how bad labor was. Well, normal people do anyway. I will NEVER forget my 37 hours of labor bringing Jake into this world! I suspect I will never forget these 3 plus years of labor we've spent trying to bring Olivia home either.

Anyway, we sent our dossier into Dillon last week and we expect our US paperwork to be done within the next few weeks. We could actually have a referral this summer!!!!!!!!!! Travel should be within 3 to 6 months after that. Hopefully less. I'm still praying for her to be home by Christmas. I don't care what everyone else thinks. I know that my God can bring my baby girl home in time to celebrate Jesus' birthday.

That's probably enough info for now. I'll try to do a better job of blogging from now on so that my posts won't be so long!