A Full House Part Two - Unexpected Blessings

So in my last blog post I told you all that while we are waiting and preparing to travel (because that leaves so much time on our hands, haha) our family has taken on something (or someones) that have become very unexpected blessings.

This is Elise

 

And this is Emma.

 

They are sisters who came to California with a group for a sort of summer camp from Taiwan. They are also orphans...

 

 

While I was on my trip to China and Taiwan several weeks ago (can't believe it's been that long!) the leader of my group told me about a program her organization has done the past four summers where they bring over six orphaned children from Taiwan, all between the ages of six and ten, and have them stay in host families for two weeks to get to experience family life as well as life in America but the biggest reason they come is to meet lots of people, hoping that one family would step forward and say that they would like to take this child/ren. Well when she told me about it of course I was interested but it sounded like everything was all set up, they had all the host families they needed...etc so I didn't think to much about it after that. Well a couple days after I came home I saw on my group leaders Facebook that she needed a host family for two sisters, something happened to where the other host family wasn't able to take them. I'm pretty sure I still wasn't fully awake and aware but as soon as I saw the post I quickly casually walked over to my mom and said "Hey, I know we have a lot going on here but these girls are coming next week and they need a family for two weeks, can we host them?" Of course my mom instantly replied yes! So we got the rest of the family together and everyone was in agreement.We have enough room, we have enough love, they should stay with us.   

 

My mom, Bella, and I went to the airport to pick them up. This was our first glimpse of them coming in with the other children they traveled with.

 

 You could tell by looking into their eyes that they have had to go through hard things, but they both were very brave and came up to meet us (Emma was very shy at first though ^^)

 

And then we were off! These three hit it off very quickly! They loved each other from the minute they laid eyes on one another :)

 

 We went camping last week with our church and were able to have them come along with us! We all had a lot of fun but oh did we get dirty!

 

We also took them swimming the other day at my grandparents house. Oh man did those girls have a blast!

 

 

 

Maida also loves the water :) 

 

 

Snuggling with Kadeeja Jiejie :) Both girls were so tired after all that swimming that they tuckered out pretty quickly after dinner (which they ate a ton of!). 

 

Yesterday they got to experience the beach for the first time. It was such an awesome sight to see, they were so thrilled.

The three musketeers!

 

Tomorrow is their last day with us, Saturday they will return home. We have loved, loved having them here with us and our house will be so quiet without them. We are praying that the Lord would open doors for them and that they would be blessed in their life with a great family and that they will come to know Christ.

 

We fell in love with them the moment we laid eyes on them. They are such sweet girls!

 

We will miss them so much!

 

Gabby