Want to have a HAPPY HEART today??

I got a notice in my mailbox Saturday...they had a package for me at the post office...an EXPRESS package!! Yesterday I got my bootie to the post office RIGHT away...ok, it was 1:30 in the afternoon, but I have a problem getting out the door!  When the lady handed me the EXPRESS envelope I wanted to jump and scream right there in the post office but I had to act all nice and normal because I was buying stamps and sending some packages out.  I didn't want to get myself on a "no fly" list or have my picture posted around other post offices with a warning under my face!  So anywhoooooo, this is what I saw:

 It's from CHINA!!!!!

For you newbies, we (we being:  my wonderful readers, etsy artists, my mom and myself)sent a donation of over 50 hats to China for the little kids in one of the many orphanages.  I had included a single use camera and some cash (for postage) HOPING they would understand and return some pictures to us!

A picture is worth a 1,000 words and even though I'm sure I could write that many, the pictures are so touching my heart is swelling with joy!

 LOVE these pictures....those little faces!!!  I just love these kids!

 Do you see the giant smile on the little guy (below) in the front?  So happy with his pink and purple hat!  One thing about China, they aren't as concerned about girls in pink and boys in blue.  When you have so little, your joy is so big... isn't that true?

 Now how in the world are those 2 sleeping?  My mom made a ton of newborn hats, I think we should have sent more toddler sizes :)  The newborn size seems to be stretched quite a bit...

 Oh, those babies!!!!! 

 There is that sweet smiley boy again... don't you want to adopt them all? I DO!!

 Anyone want to add a precious child to your family?? Go see my friends at GWCA:

go HERE!

 In this last picture you'll notice the "split pants" which are traditional pants for babies/kids in China.  They're split in the middle so they can hold them over the potty.  When I adopted my daughter she was wearing these, I still have them in a little baggie.

To all who donated: Thank you, thank you, thank you!!  My heart is beyond happy knowing 50 little kids have warm heads!  Giving truly does fill your heart more than receiving ever will!  I will definitely be doing this again next fall.  If you didn't participate last year, feel free to send me a hat (store bought or handmade) any time during the year.  I'll collect them and ship a big box out in the fall.

You can always send them to:

David Shellenbarger

c/o chinamommy

146 East Main Street

Caledonia, MI 49316

(this is my Mister's work address...)

Hat Donation Info...

a little plug about my BABY/KID HAT DRIVE

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat 

(you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. Send to:

David Shellenbarger

c/o chinamommy

146 E Main

Caledonia, MI 49316

3. I need them in my hot little hands BY Oct 31, 2010.

4. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA this fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

chinamommy@yahoo.com

Baby Hat Drive for children in China...

a little plug about my BABY/KID HAT DRIVE

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat 

(you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. Send to:

David Shellenbarger

c/o chinamommy

146 E Main

Caledonia, MI 49316

3. I need them in my hot little hands BY Oct 31, 2010.

4. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA this fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

chinamommy@yahoo.com

a little plug about my 

BABY HAT DRIVE

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China but there are thousands of children left behind, that will never get their forever-family.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat (you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one... if you must)

2. email me at: chinamommy_04@yahoo.com for my address.

3. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA next fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

4. I will need the hats in my hand NO later than

Oct. 31st (boo!)

Check out GWCA 

Great Wall China Adoption to find out more about adopting from China!!

http://www.gwca.org/

Baby Hat Drive!

a little plug about my BABY HAT DRIVE 

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat (you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. email me at: chinamommy_04@yahoo.com for my address.

3. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA next fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

Whewww, I thought I'd lost you!

So yesterday I popped in ( I read that twice to make sure it didn't say POOPED) and ALL the blogs in my reader were GONE!!!   I thought, "well, I'm sure it's just some glitch" so I got ready to post and... NONE of my pictures would download... I spent the entire night tossing and turning believing that all had been lost, my reason for being was gone, my computer had a virus, the end of the world was coming and I had the swine flu... Have I mentioned that I'm the daughter of "An Extreme Thinker", this is NOT to be confused with "Extreme Sports", although in my family it is kind of a sport....

And as long as I'm sharing, I just went potty (cause it's the morning and I drink 1 cup of coffee which equals 927 pee-pees, yeah, "pee-pee", I have a 7 year old), so anyway, I went to the bathroom and what do you know... I wore my undies inside out since yesterday morning.  When I get dressed this morning (around noonish), I will be having darling daughter carefully check for me!  Darling is on my lap reading this and just asked why it said she had to check, so I showed her the evidence and she says "are you KIDDING?", it's hard to be the mother of a genius!

Let me give you a quick re-cap of my uber exciting celebrity-like weekend (not celebrity-like, as in: I spent time in jail, celebrity-like as in: exciting and glittery).

Had breakfast as this ADORABLE place that had "star" in it's name... Love stars so I forgot the rest of the name because the thought of a glittery star got me all distracted.

Went to an antique store and tried to keep this soul from escaping the painting so she couldn't come steal MY soul in the night!  I warned her I had the swine flu!

Went to the MOST ADORABLE kids store and DEMANDED the Mister bring me another baby immediately so I could dress it up in ruffles to the sky!  When he refused to bring me the child, we (Darling and I) demanded he build this in our back yard!  Don't feel sorry for the Mister, he can hold his own with his 2 girls!!

Went to a Brew Pub and talked more about the fact he did NOT bring me the baby I demanded!

See my "crazy bands", how fancy am I in my rubber bracelets?! Oh, the Mister has a bunny one on, for a second... it was a little TIGHT!

Saw 2 men in skirts... some call them kilts, we called them skirts.

See how my weekend was all fancy and celebrity-like?

Me either...

Tune in tomorrow... some exciting news!! No, I didn't get my White Range Rover with camel leather trimmed in black, but still... it's exciting, I think?!
**don't forget about my Crochet Today give-away- go to last Friday's post to enter, enter THERE, NOT here!!**

and...

a little plug about my BABY HAT DRIVE 

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat (you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. email me at: chinamommy_04@yahoo.com for my address.

3. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA this fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

A wet t-shirt contest at Church is never a good idea...

My darling daughter was baptized yesterday, this is a big deal.  She's 6, she gets it.  When she was 2 1/2 or 3, I remember her calling to me from the back seat of the car.  "Mama, Mama... I have Jesus in my heart and it feels like angel's wings".  Out of the mouth of babes!

Yep, that's me on the right in my basketball shorts and grey shirt (or is it gray?).  I was going to wear my "I ❤ to Fart" shirt, but it's white and they warned us at the informational meeting that "due to INTENSE lighting, white clothing is NOT advised!"  Whewww...

They baptize the little kids 1st, which is nice... can you imagine how cold and DIRTY the water would be by the end?  You know me and my germ "issues"!  

We go to a big church....a huge church.  You may have heard of it, you may have heard of our pastor, Rob Bell.  I went over to youtube to grab one of his video's... boy, is there a LOT of hatin' goin' on out there!  Everyone has something to say, everyone wants to pick everything apart.  I think Rob is one of the few that gets the truth, but that's my opinion...

Anyway, give him a watch if you'd like.

After all the baptizing and lunch, it was time to get down to some good summer fun, because believe it or not... the sun is out in Michigan!!

 Whoo-hooo!  I'm going to enjoy it the next 2 weeks before the snow starts flying again! ha!

(those are shark holograms on her goggles- she doesn't have weird neon green eyes!)

and again...

a little plug about my BABY HAT DRIVE 

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat (you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. email me at: chinamommy_04@yahoo.com for my address.

3. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA next fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!

Whimsical, colorful etsy finds!!

Nothing going on today (and that is a GOOD thing!), so I want to share some really pretty finds from 

http://www.etsy.com

Each sellers store name is found BELOW their art, so please head over to etsy and check out ALL their gorgeous items!

kinchi

MEOW!  I want one in my size!!

knittingdreams

Now that is just C_U_T_E.... is it not?!

munieca

i love this necklace!

strawberryluna

lavender... I've fallen in love with this color all over again! Love her whimsical style!!

surfandsand

honestly, this necklace looks good enough to eat!

Sweetstone

again with the lavender.... aren't these cute?!

flutter

I happen to know this girl and is she a DOLL, super talented and a Michigander!

thebeadgirl

another uber talented gal from my neck of the woods!

ivoryandmoss

aren't these adorable?? and... she lets YOU choose the colors!

ellemoss

Last, but not least...another Michigander!  I LOVE this photo- the shoes, the tights, the colors!!

and don't forget (you know I won't let you...)

 a little plug about my BABY HAT DRIVE 

As most of you know, my daughter was adopted from China and I left a little piece of my heart there.  I'm collecting hats to keep the children and babies warm in the winter.  Many live in orphanages that are without heat.

1. make a baby hat, toddler hat, or kid sized hat (you can take the non-crafty way out and buy one if you must)

2. email me at: chinamommy_04@yahoo.com for my address.

3. I'll take care of shipping them to CHINA next fall.

any questions- please feel free to email me!!