Sending Christmas Kisses

Merry Christmas from our family to yours.

Christmas 2007 Family update

David and Janalee- Busy, tired parents to five wonderful kids.

David was recently put in as Bishop of our ward, which is basically like the priest or preacher for those of you who are not LDS. It is an unpaid call of service, but our family recieves many blessings for the hours he spends away from home. He is still enjoying work and has begun some new adventures there and he also found the time to coach Tanner's soccer team and Jake's little league team this year. Busy, busy guy, but wonderful husband and father.

Janalee tries to keep up with everyone and everything that needs to be done, but mostly chases the very busy and mischievous Maya around all day. In her spare time--ha ha what's that? she loves to scrapbook and she started up a new adventure selling the fabulous lia sophia jewelry line which is off to a great start. Her favorite thing is to sit on the couch when the kids are in bed and enjoy the silence!

Spencer- Sophomore in high school, involved in student government, great student, responsible teenager, gets up to go to early morning seminary (starts at 6:30 am) everyday without complaining at all, great kid.

Tanner- 8th grade, soccer fanatic, hard working student, still the best story teller around when he's in trouble, involved in scouting, plays piano, great athlete, great kid, recently ran the mile in under 6 minutes, ran 23 miles one day at school for a special project, and just got his top braces off a couple days ago!

Matthew- 6th grade, straight A student, best Maya sitter around, baseball all star, plays piano, tolerates Jake better each day, loves soccer, learning to ride a unicycle, always happy, loves to please his mom, good friend, great kid!

Jake- 2nd grade, youngest boy, great reader and speller, LOVES math, started piano lessons this year, loves soccer and baseball, and basketball, and dodge ball, and tether ball...anything with a ball, is doing much better with Maya and his place in the family, loves to help Maya a little too much, awesome kid!

Maya- almost 2 (Dec. 24th), all girl in pink with a matchbox car in one hand and a doll in the other, thinks she is Queen, sweet, sassy, stinkin cute, LOUD, busy, busy, busy, loves to go to the church nursery class, loves her brothers, has her dad wrapped around her pinky very tightly, mom's little side kick.

That is us in a nutshell, life is crazy busy but for the most part fun.

We want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2008. May it be full of referrals and travel dates for all of our adoption friends, and full of health and happiness for all of us.

Tahoe, Thanksgiving, and TERRIBLE TWO'S!!!

I am going to try to be better about posting, it seems there are not enough hours in my day anymore, especially when I spend most of the day chasing, cleaning up after, or playing with Maya!


So, Thanksgiving found us once again at beautiful Lake Tahoe. This time is was not just our little family, but with a big group of great people. The boys were in their element being outside in the freezing cold skateboarding or inside with Nintendo or Guitar Hero to keep them busy. Maya loved all the attention (suprised?) and quickly learned to wrap everyone around her pinky finger to give her what she wanted, if it wasn't her cute little please with a big smile, it was her head hanging down after she was told no that got everyone...not her momma though, I am used to her manipulation skills!



Spencer celebrated his 15th birthday not long after Thanksgiving. I look at him and can still remember holding him for the first time! It seems quite impossible that I have a fifteen YO.





So far we are sailing through his dreaded teenage years without much of a problem. He is a huge help to me and only occasionally rolls his eyes and thinks outloud that he has the meanest mom in the world. He puts up with a lot, rolls with the punches, gets awesome grades at school, and is for the most part very dependable. I remember telling him when he was just a newborn that we would be figuring this mom/son thing out together, and boy was I right! With each new phase of life we go through, I figure it out with Spencer. I try new things and some work and others fail miserably! But through it all he is patient as can be with me, and we get through it together.
Love you Spence!


And at last a Maya update....





Much to my dismay, the terrible two's are here to stay for awhile. I have been told by several who see this child in action that her activity level is a good thing, that I would not want her to sit still for too long because an active, energetic, curious child is a smart child. While I agree with you all, I have one question. Can you babysit?

Halloween fun

I am so glad that blogger will finally let me post picutres again! Here we are in all our halloween glory, sorry it took so long to get these posted!

Here is Miss Maya-cutest witch in the west

Here is Jake the wizard

Matthew the werewolf

Tanner the soliderAnd the scariest of all Spencer dressed as "moody teenager!"

Chung Yi BFF'S

Here they are Miss Emi and Miss Maya together again! It is so much fun to be able to visit with the Emi's family when we go home to Utah. The girls really do seem to remember each other, or are drawn to each other at least. The two of them together this time was quite humerous--trying to get one almost two year old to sit still is hard but two of them? Lets just say there was lots of running, squealing, and hugging going on while we visited. Oh and lots of kissing too!

Most of our photos are like these, the girls would not sit still for a second! Way to much to look at and the water fountains were a huge draw. Lisa and I just gave up and joined the fun!

Again, we are so blessed to have been able to travel with the Lisa and Eric to pick our girls up in Taiwan. This is something that does not happen very often, but I know that it happened because the Gray family is supposed to be in our lives...these girls have a very special bond and need to stay in touch. Getting them together is so much fun and I can hardly wait to watch their friendship unfold!

Now if we could only get together with Laney and Miranda, life would be perfect! Someday it is going to happen, a Chung Yi BFF's reunion! And I will be just as excited to finally meet Kristen and Andrea as I am to meet Laney and Miranda! Counting the days....

Well, I have many pictures to show you all of all of the Smith Family happenings, but Blogger is not being nice to me and will NOT let me upload pictures! The nerve! I will work on this a bit later (as i have used up Maya's nap time trying to figure this out) and hopefully you can see Maya in all of her cutest witch in the west Halloween glory soon.

11-7-07 So everytime I have tried to upload pictures since Halloween, I get this bx-6tj0s5
error that comes up after I have waited forever for the picture to upload. Anyone know what this is? I looked it up at blogger help and they say they are fixing it, but not fast enough for me!

CATCHING FROGS (and catching up!)

Wow! It has been over a month since posted. I do not know where the time has gone...actually I do, it was spent chasing an almost 2 year old, wrangling her four older brothers, getting our oldest son Spencer through Homecoming week at his high school with his many responsibilities in Student Government, sitting through many soccer games and practices, playing with my girlfriends in Utah, clearing 6 tons of dirt our of the backyard for Dave's new project of building a huge shed, helping Dave after his back went out after shoveling said dirt, enjoying my sister Jill and her sweet family while they visited for a few days and starting my new adventure of a home based business. WHEW! My life is pretty chaotic, but most of the time it is controlled chaos, so it is not that bad and I know plenty of people who are just as crazy/busy as I am.

So, while my sister Jill was here with her family, we ventured out to show the kids the Sacramento LDS Temple. While we were there I showed my nephew Parker where we could catch some frogs and boy oh boy did I make his day! I am in the eyes of my nephew Parker the coolest California aunt that he has! And his dad Justin is even cooler for catching the slimy little buggers. We enjoyed our time catching and releasing these poor frogs and managed not to hurt them in the process. Maya did not know what to think at first and shuddered when they got next to her, but quickly caught on that the other kids thought it was way cool and decided to join the fun. She would not let us pass a sprinkler control cover with out checking for a "rog"! Quite the adventure.

Speaking of Miss Maya, she is doing so well. I think back to this time last year and I am amazed. Of course this time last year I was walking around in a jet-lag induced stupor, but I had a scared little baby girl clinging to me 24-7. Now I wish she would let me hold her more instead of wiggling to get out of my arms to run away from me as fast as she can, giggling the whole way. She is so much fun right now! She makes us laugh all day long. She is still our stubborn little girl who rules the house with her thumb. She has started this whole fake cry thing when she does not get what she wants and it is really hard for her momma to not laugh! Oh the drama! She just might get best supporting actress in a dramatic film someday. I am not kidding! But we can't imagine life without our little drama princess, and still marvel that our Father in Heaven has blessed us so much with the gift of each of our children.

Life is chaotic, but oh so good. Many fun things coming up for us, so I will try to be a little better about posting.

A quick note to all my adopting cyber-friends waiting for their referrals and for their children- I just want you all to know I am still thinking of you all and keeping you all in my thoughts and prayers. Waiting is hard, but so worth it in the end. Keep on smiling and know that in time it will all happen for you.

Happy Gotcha Day!!!

Wow. When I think of this past year I am flooded with emotions. The past couple of days I have been saying thing like "a year ago we were just leaving, a year ago we were trying hard not to go stalk Chung Yi, a year ago I watched my baby girl walk into the room in the arms of her caregiver and my world stood still....". Actually, right now in Taiwan a good Internet friend of ours just experienced what did exactly one year ago today. She is in Taiwan picking her sweet little Miranda up, a darling baby I got to see while we were there picking Maya up. As I looked at the pictures she posted on her site I got tears in my eyes as all of the emotions I had came back. I have been very mindful of Maya's birth family this week. I know that over in Taiwan at this moment there is a mother and a father who have heavy hearts. I have been keeping them in my thoughts and prayers that they will have peace. I remember so vividly the pain in their eyes as they told her goodbye, I wanted to give her right back and make everything better for them. But I also knew in my heart that this was how it was supposed to be. I know we will reunite someday, but until we do I will do my best to make sure that my little girl understands the love her birth family has for her. That is the least I can do.

To say this year has been a piece of cake would be lying. We have had our ups and downs and while I have not posted a lot of the downs here on the blog, know that they do exist. The first few weeks when Maya completely rejected Dave were so hard on us that at times I wondered what I was thinking to bring this baby into our family and I wondered what I had done to the children I already had at home. It seemed like a series of small baby steps forward followed by several huge steps backwards. I was sad and frustrated much of those first few weeks. I know now that it was a small case of post adoption depression and a very large case of exhaustion.

After we made it through those first few weeks, things got much better. It was still hard, but Maya had attached to us both enough to finally begin to feel safe. We still took many baby steps forward only to get knocked down again, but this was different. She trusted me now and the steps back were not a big and more easily corrected. She bonded with her brothers. She began to really smile and the happy girl we have today began to give a little bit more of herself to us each day.

Watching her "layers" come off was amazing. She changed right before our eyes and settled into her new world. It is most evident in pictures. Her smile became genuine, her eyes light up, she became softer and gentler. She let us in to love her.

Today, it is as if she has been here from the beginning. The boys rarely talk about their adopted sister from Taiwan, she is simply their sister. And except the occasional person commenting on our family when we are out in the public we almost forget that she is adopted. Funny thing is that when she is with the whole family people tell us how much she looks like us, I raise my eyebrow a tad, but I think I understand what they mean. She has changed so much in the past year it amazes me.

Right now she runs through the house squealing and laughing. One year ago she was squealing in the taxi cab on the way back to the hotel after picking her up. Right now she lays her head on my shoulder and pats my back. One year ago she snuggled up on my shoulder and fell asleep after a day of sightseeing in her birth country. Right now she is patting me on the knees calling out momma. One year ago she was placed in my arms for the very first time and my whole world stood still.

We are so blessed.

Summer no more


The boys started school yesterday. This is good and bad. Bad because I really do love to be lazy and carefree during the summertime, and good because we have been way to lazy and carefree this summer and getting back to a routine and a schedule makes my chaotic world a little less chaotic!

Our summer was packed with lots of fun and lots of company, the boys loved doing this

and this

and lots of this

The pool will still be used a lot until October rolls around, but it is not the same as a summer afternoon swim topped off with a cold popcicle!

So another busy school year begins and that means schedules, soccer practice, homework (YUCK!), and alarm clocks. Check out the fab five while they are still a bit excited about a new school year beginning-

Spencer (sophomore)

Tanner (8th grade)

Matthew (6th grade)

Jake (2nd grade)

Maya (sad to see her brothers go)

It is hard to believe that this time last year I was packing to go pick Miss Maya up---but you will see more on that on the 28th.

EVERYTHING IS UNDER CONTROL........NOTHING A LITTLE DUCT TAPE AND ROPE CAN'T HANDLE!!!





This is what happens when Auntie Jan is asked to baby sit while her sister and husband steal away to San Francisco....

ps: no children, duct tape or rope was hurt during this photo shoot

pictured above are: Ashley, Emily, Haley, Tanner, Matthew, Jake, Maya, Gracie, Max and Chase....WHEW! And to ease some minds out there, everyone was very willing to pose for this shot, infact the kids helped dream it up!

Summer time craziness!

Summer is in full swing around here and we are as busy as ever! I am hoping things will slow down a bit soon, but with this crew of mine I do not see that happening. I have neglected updating the blog for far to long, so you get four updates all at once. Be sure to scroll down to see everything that is going on...we have been busy having some serious fun!

Update number four:

Happy 4th of July!

What a fun time we had helping Maya celebrate her first big all American holiday. She loved the pancake breakfast at the church and walking in our small neighborhood parade with her dad. She really loved the swimming (to escape the 106* heat!) and the homemade peach and strawberry ice cream. She was not really sure about the fireworks and kept pretty close to mom with her hands over her eyes for the ones that made a lot of noise. It was a great HOT day.

above: The Gang ready to walk our neighborhood parade and Jake on his decorated scooter

below: All American Matthew and the teens and tweens

Water games galore for the hot afternoon sun...above the old guys take on the young guys in a serious game of Water Basketball

Below: Maya and Bekka enjoy the pool

Maya thought corn on the cob was the best ever

All tuckered out after the parade. I love this picture of my all American sweetie pie!