Here's to you...Jenny and Ana!

HAPPY AUGUST BIRTHDAYS!

Well, I am a month behind, but I don't want to skip important family details.  It is part of our ever growing family!  We are so blessed to have 2 beautiful, wonderful women for our sons!  And proud to call them our daughters and celebrate their lives!  

HAPPY 20TH YEAR, JENNY!  

Beautiful day for a BBQ and birthday celebration for Ana. 

 Ana has a LAPFUL of help!

 HAPPY 26TH BIRTHDAY, DEAR ANA!

Two beautiful flowers in our Lyman Garden!

Hi from CHINA!

Hello Everyone!

Have you missed us?  We've missed you grately!!  Are you anxious to hear our story thus far?  Well, we are so excited to tell you all about it!  Come catch up at our other blog site...our site dedicated to our journey to Levi:

http://lymans2levi.blogspot.com/

We have so much to tell you about...so much to rejoice in...please come and take a peek!  

Much love and thanksgiving,

Paul, Beth, Levi and Aunt Faith

A BIG bed for Amie

Amie has graduated from the crib.  The crib went... to the rummage sale. Yes folks...no more babies.  I hope I am safe in saying that!  (Except for ALL those grandbabies that will be coming.  I did save the playpen!)  I know I wrote last August to a group of the parents we went to China with in the past, and said the Lyman's were done adopting, but that we were looking forward to maybe doing some mission trips to orphanages and helping out that way.  Then November rolled around...and now look where we are...headed back to China for another adoption!

Anyway...about Amie being in a bid bed...

The girls are using beds passed down through the ages.  They have quite a family history in the Balsbaugh family.  Uncle George had them when he was a teenager, Sarah and I used them as we grew up, Tyler and Travis used them, Aunt Carol's girls used them and they got a color change from stained brown to white, Emma used one,  and now Sophie and Amie are enjoying them!

Amie is quite the mover at night, and aside from falling off the bed when they are playing around, before they drop off, she slides off in the middle of the night.  Several nights I have found her in a heap on the floor beside her bed!     

This morning, I went in her room to find her bed empty!  

Then I thought maybe she joined Sophie, who had spent the night with Lindsey in her bed. Nope, not there...well, maybe she was one of those heaps on the floor with the toys....No!  Kinda freaky

Then I checked UNDER her bed and there she slept! FAR under !  Yep, she is a MOVER and a shaker!

Happy Birthday Dad...Grandpa...Papa

Still got that same great smile....a few years down the road!  Dad, you're the best. - Love you, Beth!

Dad, you are a great husband father and a true man of God. Thank you for your Godly examples, and we pray the next year brings you great blessings from our heavenly father. - Paul

Shortest EVER!

OK...so this is supposed to be low maintenance and quick, a good thing for travel to China.   I took a picture just in case I can't get it to look like this again, by myself.

Coffee out back

I was blessed to have 4 children around yesterday morning.  We enjoyed coffee/hot chocolate in the warm early morning air, surrounded by those beautiful tall ponderosa's.  Thank you, Lord for the blessings of children.  Every activity in my thoughts now is punctuated with a smile that one day soon, there will be another Lyman around our table!  

Freedom...isn't Free

Freedom comes at a cost....a sacrifice!

Freedom is maintained at a cost....a sacrifice!

Freedom isn't FREE!

This celebration of freedom on the birthday of our nation...brings me to reflect on the Freedom we experience in Christ!  Purchased with a price...his death on the cross!  

John 8:31-32

"...if you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."  

Our obligation is to CONTINUE IN HIS WORD, and to know THE TRUTH!  The only way to know is to be IN HIS WORD!

Galatians 5:7

You were running well, who hindered you from obeying the truth?

Slackin' off/ Getting sidelined/Disobedience

Galatians 5:13-14

For  you were called to freedom, brethren, only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.  For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Cost associated with our freedom? Love for one another...that shows itself in service to one another!

Loving as I love myself!  Big sacrifice!

FREEDOM COMES AT A COST...A SACRIFICE!

FREEDOM IS MAINTAINED AT A COST....A SACRIFICE!

FREEDOM ISN'T FREE!