This Girl, This Beautiful Girl...

Seven years ago today in a little room in the Baby House #2 in Uralsk, Kazakhstan we met this little girl for the first time. We had imagined the moment. In our dreams we always just KNEW our daughter immediately. In our dreams it was LOVE at first sight. (By way of explanation, we traveled without a referral and met children available for adoption and chose which child we wanted to adopt)

Our first official family visit photos.

Reality? We just KNEW our daughter immediately and it was LOVE at first sight. Only she was so much more beautiful and amazing than we had dared to dream! She only had a tiny bit of whispy blond hair and the biggest brown eyes! I like to tell her that she was the most beautiful baby in the whole world, and I know because I've pretty much flown the whole way around the world!

One of the first pictures we sent to family and friends

Annika with Kate, our facilitator. She did everything for us! We called her "the in-country team".

This girl, this beautiful girl has only become more precious to us as the years have rolled by. Today we celebrate her in every way.

She is still beautiful, but she is so much more than beautiful! She is independent and confident, I envy her ability to make new friends! She is a born leader (her brothers may occasionally say bossy), she is smart and is an eager student. She has a tender little heart that can't stand to see humans or animals suffer. She loves to be a girly girl and dress up and wear pink and all of the girly things. She is also brave and not to be left behind when her brothers are climbing trees and play football.

Her favorite things to do (according to her):

Climb trees
Art
Play with Timber and Bella (dog and cat)
Read
Make things with beads

Her eighth birthday will be while I'm in China, so we are celebrating early. With friends, and cake, and gifts...

We are so thankful you are a Martin, sweet girl!