Happy Halloween!!!

This year, Optimis Prime (aka Eli) was the master of YELLING Trick or Treat! He would let me know what house to go to by saying, "They have their lights on, we can go to that one....why don't these people have their light on?" He was crackin' me up! I can't believe how much candy he received (mind you we only went to one street of houses but people were given him handfuls. Earlier in the day, we went to a carnival. The boys had a blast in the maze (so much that they went through the maze five times!) We also took participated in the Pumpkin Fair at the library....lots of halloween fun for The Crosby Boys. Jace wasn't too sure of his Batman outfit to the point he would only wear the cape!

Very soon, our boys will be uncles. Justin's girlfriend, Faith, is expecting a little boy any day. Christmas is going to be really crazy this year.

I have included a lot of various fall pictures. We went to Fritzler Farms where we went through a monster...Eli loved it! They also had duck races, bikes, jumping mats, sand box filled with corn, and of course a pumpkin patch. We also went to a fall festival in the rain! Eli and Jace could have stayed there forever....it was a little chilly and wet so I had to move them along. WOW! We were busy in the month of October.

Eli is enjoying STRIDE. He has a Magna Doodle in the car that he plays with whenever we were on the road. The other day, he said, "Mama and Daddy...look!" We turned around and he had written Mama, Daddy, Jace, and Eli." We were so proud of him...and his smile was from ear to ear!

Jace is a little mimic...he copies everything Eli does. He will probably have to have two surgeries to close his cleft palate...oh my! He is also receiving speech services from STRIDE. Lately, he loves to growl and say boo. He can also be a stubborn little two year old....and he hates to get in trouble. He will cry and cry. He still is a champ at going to bed and taking naps. Life with two boys is wild and crazy. They love to wrestle, play chase, and just be silly little boys :)

This post is for you Heather...lol! Anytime you want to hang around two busy boys, just let us know...haha!

Farewell Dear Friend...You Will Always Be In Our Hearts

This post is a tribute to a dear friend I met a couple months before adopting Eli. She lost her fight to breast cancer this past week; leaving two beautiful girls and an amazing husband to continue her legacy. Eli and Emma (along with Zach) were friends in the Yixing Orphange. We celebrated each other Gotcha Day's, 1st "American" birthdays, and several milestones. Hopefully I can dig through some old photos to find our make shift red couch picture that we took when our three families got the kids together. It was amazing that three kids from one orphanage were within an hour apart (then we moved to Wyoming and a year later The Fisher's moved to Kentucky to be closer to family.)

Although tears only help dull the pain, my heart is heavy. She was an amazing mom who lifted the hearts of many. Today marks her 1st birthday in heaven. My friend, Amy, you will always be an angel looking down.


SO..here is the entire post from our visit!





We were able have the 2 other West Michigan families who adopted from Emma’s orphanage over to our home this past Friday evening. It was so, so special to see the three of them together. Emma was practicing saying their names before they came over, and she did pretty good. She could say Eli, Lai-lai for Zachary, and Stacie (Zachary’s sister).




Zachary is the most recent one to come home. He has been with his forever family for about a month. He is doing well, but he was a little shy with all the new faces--and rightly so. Everything is so different and new to him. I wondered if it was weird for him to see the other two kiddos away from the orphanage. Like Sue said: If only we could know what he was thinking about it all. He did seem to like the little play kitchen in our basement though and the pretend doctor’s kit! I had the privilege of seeing some smiles and giggles when I saw him again today, and his entire face just lights up! What a sweet boy he is.




Eli is doing wonderful, and he is such a fun bundle of energy! I loved how he had to check out all of my cabinets to see what was in there. Emma helped him find the snack drawer that has conveniently had the child-proof lock broken off of it!! I think both of them love their snacks! He and Emma seemed to interact a little more as they are so close in age. Emma Mei really liked Eli’s Mama, Ann, so sometimes she would have to hold the both of them. What a handful!! I tried to get a picture, but one of them would jump down before I could capture the shot.




This was the first time that the dads have gotten together and they all seemed to enjoy their time. The women were just happy that they cleaned up the kitchen for us. They are good men, eh? Ann, that cheesecake was delicious. I need to get that recipe from you. Unfortunately for my waist-line you left the rest of it at our house!!




I can’t wait until the next time. . .