Hope's Birthday

We celebrated Hope's 2nd birthday in January. I was surprised by how emotional I felt on her birthday. I kept thinking about her birth mother and more than anything I wanted her to be able to see a glimpse Hope and to see that everything had turned out OK. Only a small percentage of orphans make it out of China and the chances of Hope getting out were very slim. I wish Hope's birth mother could know that she got out and that she has a family who loves her so much.

We had three birthday celebrations for Hope. The first was a party at my sister's house. Her son, James, was born 4 days before Hope so we had a double party for them. It's amazing to me that I will always know what I was doing the week Hope was born. I was helping take care of my sister's kids after she had her 7th baby (yes, she and her husband have 7 kiddos). Here are some pictures from that party:






The next day we celebrated with Mike's family. Hope loves princesses, so we had a Snow White theme. We had the family over for Chinese food and cake and ice cream. Here are some pictures from that gathering:










Finally, we took the kids to an indoor water park for a night on Hope's actual birthday. Hope loves water and we had a lot of fun. Here are a few more pictures:






Happy Birthday, Hope. We love you!