Merry Christmas

I hope that everyone had a blessed Christmas! It's 11:00pm Christmas night. We had a wonderful day. We spent the morning with my mom, sisters, and their families. They made a very special point to "include" Anne Marie in our Christmas day celebration with some sweet gifts for her. Her dad (funny to call him dad instead of Mike) - even made sure that he bought her a special gift just from him. We also spent part of our day serving Christmas dinner to our local community at our Church. The rest of the afternoon was spent with Mike's family. His parents got us a tote-bag and coffee mug with Anne's referral picture on it. We'll have to post pictures of the tote and mug when we get the pictures downloaded -- they are too cute!

Our special wish and prayer this Christmas is that God creates a miracle by delivering us a much needed form from the US Immigration Office. At this point it seems to be MIA. As most of you know, we've been trying this past week to get someone to help us find out where it might be, or if we can even have another copy sent to us, since it seems to be lost in the mail. The USCIS is not the easiest agency to get a hold of. We're just praying that somehow this week God will answer our prayers, and through prayer, some great friends, and hopefully the help of our agency we can find this form, or at least someone to help us!

I hope each of you felt God's blessings this Christmas - and I will keep everyone up to date on any news we get regarding our quest to find our paper from the USCIS!

Mike and Melissa

More Information About Anne Marie !

Someone I work with had her husband (who's family is from China) translate our biography for us about Anne. We found out that she has been taken care of just wonderfully !! She seems to love her foster-mother and her foster-mother seems to care about her. The bio told us that she was given to her the day after she was found, so she has been taken care of by one foster mother most of her little life. She seems to be doing very well. She seems very strong and healthy and loves to play, laugh, and be held. It does say that she loves her sleep -- and her food!! It also said that she can be quite suborn and is not happy when she doesn't get enough sleep -- but food calms her down. (Just like her dad!!) Mike and I thank God every day that our daughter has had such a wonderful woman to take care of our sweet little girl. We know when we go to get her it will be hard to leave this caring foster-mother, but we can not wait to love, care, and play with her ourselves. I just hope and pray that God will be with us and Anne Marie during this transition.

We also found out exactly how to pronounce her name and what it means. Her first name is actually Ke Xiang (both names together are the 1st name). This will now be her middle name. It means cute flower. (Isn't that just too cute!!)

We also found out what her favorite toy was -- so we are hoping to find one when we get to China to give her some comfort with things she's used to.

We still have not heard anything about travel. We have just filled out a TON of paperwork for our travel approval and our visa's so, we should hopefully hear something within the next few weeks.

We will keep everyone up to date!

Mike and Melissa :o)

******** PICTURES ! ********

This is Anne Marie & We are already in LOVE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They are all pictures of her - the same day - but different backgrounds.

I'm still looking at each picture about every 2 minutes. I love the picture of her with the red background. I told Mike that I think I can almost see a smile on her face!! Mike loves the one w/ her in the green - Hello Kitty chair.. how funny is that chair?! We have both decided that in the baby walker pictures she just looks like she's no longer happy that they keep taking her picture. (haa haa)

We had paperwork that already had to be finished today and sent back. Mostly it was letters stating that we were going to accept he referral -- well I don't think that's a question @ this point!!!

With her paperwork we found out a few more things about her & we thought that we'd share a little - just note these are all things about her @ 6 months old as well as the pictures are at 6 months -- these pictures & medical exam were all done on 9/26/06:

1. She loves music

2. She loves to play with toys

3. She's what they call a "moderate sleeper" (Mike is a little scared about this)

4. They also claim she is "sometimes obstinate" (Mike is REALLY scared about this)

5. She can roll over & hold her head up

6. She knows her name

7. She likes to laugh out loud

There was a longer biography that came with her package, but it is not yet translated, so we should know more about her in a week to a week and 1/2!! We'll keep everyone posted on EVERYTHING that we find out about her!

Mom & Dad Hartzler

This is just a test picture to make sure that I will be able to upload (or whatever it's called) Anne's picture today!!

We have talked to so many people & thank you all for your wonderful thoughts & prayers.

We did learn that friends of ours that are adopting as well & in our group will be adopting a girl from the same area as ours & our girls are only 7 days apart!! They are from around the Blacksburg area and we're so happy that we'll actually be traveling with them, and staying with them for most of the 2 week trip to China!! We're very excited about that!!


I have somewhat translated her name this morning..

Feng (pronounced : FUNG -- or very close)
Ke (pronounced: KU not long U - short U)
Xiang (pronounced: Scheung -- I may have to say it outloud to
make it sound right!!)

Ok -- well we're looking forward to seeing her face today!! I feel like I have not slept in days!! I will post her picture on here as soon as we can.

Melissa & Mike