Ellis Gang

3 years!

Today marks the 3 years since we picked her up from Guatemala! Moriah is such a blessing in our lives. We love her so much. It has been a long time since we posted last. We are now living in the Oklahoma City area.

Moriah's first (REAL) hair cut!
I gave Moriah a french braid the other day and noticed how many dead ends she had and thought...ok it is time for her first hair cut. (Well, her foster mom told me that she gave her a hair cut before she came home, but I am not sure what that amounts to.) Her hair was only a couple of inches from her waist. So we went to the lady down the street who does our toenails. She adores Moriah so much and had a great time cutting her hair. Now her hair is about 3 inches below her shoulders....Lots of hair for a 24 month old!

Mommy's Birthday!
Kris, Moriah, and P Goi took me out for my birthday. Overall the day was nice. I recieved several nice cards and calls from friends and family. Mom, Dad, Kris, and Moraih all gave me some very nice gifts.....I just really can't believe how old I am now though! Yikes!!!

Misty's language tutor's birthday's!
These are Misty's language tutors and both of their b-day's are in July and they have really been wanting to learn to make cake so....they came over and we made a chocolate cake! It was great!

They had an awesome time playing with Moriah and Moriah with them. What a very fun evening! The tutor's names are A and Jiff!

A trip to the Laos border to see friends.

A couple of weeks ago we went to the country and we mean the countryside in all senses of the word! It was so far out, but we had a great time and got great lanugage practice! The purpose of the trip was a see a couple that Kris had first met in Dallas. He is Laotian (but now a US citizen), and she is Thai and they are now married trying to start churches amongst their local people group. They have a daughter Moriah's age and they had a blast together.

These pictures are taken in the nearest city about 40 km away. In the background you can see Laos. We really want to go into Laos, but as US citizens, we have to pay both to get into Laos and also to get our visas renewed to reenter Thailand. As a family this would cost us around $175. So we have not gone yet.

Moriah and her new friend!

Overall we did a poor job of taking picture of the countryside views. Here are a couple. One of the challenges of our trip was Moriah, me, and the sqatty potties. Out in the country especially there are few toilets as we Americans know them to be. Moriah began potty training right after her birthday so it was time for us to conquer the squatty potties.....Overall Moriah has done an awesome job with potty training very very few accidents etc, but let me just tell you this sqatty potty thing requires some great skill (mostly on mommies part!!!) I will not go into all the details, but let me just tell you my feet were wet and smelly most of the trip! Yuck! I am trying to find some local mom's to teach me this much needed skill. Some people say that boys are harder to raise, but with potty training and sqatties....I think boys have got it made :)

Celebrating the 4th of July on the 12th!
We had a small celebration at our supervisors house with both Thai's and other Americans. Moriah had a great time with the sparklers! It's times like these though that really make us miss our family back home!

Portriats in Thailand are not the same as in America!

Some friends recommended a studio that takes pictures in a local shopping center. We went expecting a photographer, maybe a few props and some nice backgrounds. When we got there we found lots of really busy backgrounds, tons of props, and a photographer that it was not part of his job to position the people which is especially hard with a 2 year old involved. In addition you had to choose your exact package you wanted before you even took your pictures which was so hard since we didn't even know what pics we would be taking. We chose a package that included 4 pictures. We paid a little extra to get the disk. They are semi good, but I was disappointed as this was not what I had in mind.

Cute picture, but not showing off her cute smile.

I love her smile in this picture, but you can see me in the background in the mirror and due to her holding the ball which the photographer insist she hold you can't see her pretty dress.