Merry Christmas!!!!

Merry Christmas!!!!!

Hello to all our dear friends and Family;

This year brought us a lot of joy and heartache this time I write to you all. I know it has been a long time maybe a few years since you last heard from us. We start off with the head of the household. John is still working at Semitool here in Kalispell, Montana. He continues to work on our 100 year old house here and there seems to be a never ending tasks on that list for him. But he is doing a wonderful job. He has started the chore of stripping the outside of the house down to barewood which is a feat all it’s own with 100 years of paint on it. We will probably be writing you about this next year too as it is a huge job!!!! I am a working mom now and am enjoying my job at Target. It is flexible with our schedules with the girls and John can fill in with his shift in the afternoon.

The kids:

Rebecca age 24 married on July 24, 2005 to Claude Chew age 24. He is an adorable young man who loves our daughter very much. It is so cool to see it in his eyes when you talk with him about her. She also loves him very much and they live in Scarsdale NY. Claude graduated from Julliard Music School last spring and they both are working now at Starbucks coffee and they seem to like it. They do their music on the side and play in a local symphony there. They are enjoying their life in NYC and we will visit them this summer hopefully.

Johnny-(or Paco as he is known) He is doing well he has an apartment here in Kalispell and he is working at Target also at night. He likes his job and the people her works with there. He had to have surgery yesterday on his shoulder her tore the muscle that holds the ball in the socket off the bone playing softball. He still loves his sports at 23 he is quite the character. We get the biggest kick out of him and his sense of humor.

James is 21 and has still had a struggle with growing up and decisions in his life. He is serving time in the state prison here and will be locked up for anywhere between 6 months to 23 months. It all depends on the parole board there. He is having a difficult time with this but at times shows us he is trying to adjust to his life. I guess you take the little glimmers of hope when you get them. We pray for him daily and see him about 1X a month. It is a 3 hour drive for us one way so it is a long day when we go with the girls. He is also the proud father to our beautiful grand daughter.

Hope( or Elizabeth) is 11 years old now. My has that gone by fast. We celebrated 9 years since our family day in 1997. She has made so much progress and come a long way with her medical since that time. When I look at her pictures from 1997 and now when you see her she is a beauty and hard to believe it is the same child. She has had 10 surgeries and 2 oral surgeries( tooth removals 9 in all). She attend the Children’s Hospital in Seattle and this year she had 2 surgeries. The first was a lip revision in March and the Rhinoplasty( nose job) done in July. Her nose has changed her look so much. She is a tough girl and goes thru all this wonderfully. She has a good outlook on life and a great attitude. She works very diligent and hard . She is a A&B student and is very proud of her school work and the job she does. She loves to sing and has a beautiful voice.

AnnaGrayce is our little firecracker. She is a very intelligent and active child. She loves everyone and everyone loves her. When we walk into a place she is always seen by others and told how beautiful she is. She is a beautiful, loving and rambunctious little package. She loves you with all her heart and she is very inquisitive and wants to know so many things all at once. But boy does she have her daddy pegged he loves her dearly and she knows that. She is in Kindergarten this year and loves to let the teacher know how to run things. Her teacher is fabulous with her and loves her very much. She is a very good student and loves her school.

Now onto our wonderful little princess of a grand daughter!! She was born on August 2, 2006. She missed Hope’s birthday by only 41 minutes. Hope was not thrilled she wanted her little niece born on her birthday!!! Her name. Aroura Roze is as beautiful as she is. She looks exactly like our James did when he was little. We get to have her for several days at least once a month. And grandpa and I really enjoy that time with her. It is so much fun. We spoil her pretty good. The girls cannot keep their hands off her and enjoy feeding her. We hope to take her at Christmas to visit her daddy for the first time. It will be a special meeting. Her mom is a young mom but doing great with it. We have kinda’ taken her in and helped guide her. She is a very lucky young gal who has been blessed with a Christian couple who don’t have kids to take in her and Aroura. From them they have taken her to their church and she has been saved!!! God is Good to us all.!!!! Through Aroura we have seen the goodness of God and we do know that He will save our James also and James will return to Him.

We have so many blessings this holiday season and want you all to feel them also. We are hoping you will take the time to see your kids and family for who they are and thank God for their Health. Through our daughter Hope we have come to realize that not all kids have health and even with problems we are truly blessed to be part of this story.

Enjoy your holiday!!!

The Valentino’s

John, Tami, Hope and Anna Grayce

Halloweeny!!!

Tami's birthday 40??? something

Here it is my 4??? birthday. Yes i will let you all in on a secret. I am 47.

We started the weekend off with a trip to Libby, MT to get our grand daughter and her mom, Coral and bring them back to Kalispell. It is a 3 hour trip of driving time.

She is just a doll as you can see. We had a great time babysitting while Coral went to visit some friends. It is too much fun being a grandma and spoinling her and sending her back. As you can see from the photo she is definitely a James baby. I will post his photo from when he was born also so you can see. It is hard at times to call her a 'SHE' because she looks just like her daddy. She is now 1 month old and doing great. She has gained over 2 lbs in 1 month. Loves to eat!!!

We are just thrilled!!!

John threw me a party on Sunday evening with Salmon dinner. It was very cool!! He did good. Usually he forgets until the very last moment so i am a happy girl.

We took Aroura and Coral back home on Monday and enjoyed our weekend so much we are going to do this regularly with them.

On Tuesday which was my real birthday i went and got a pedicure done first one ever for me! Whoo-hoo!!! I love these. I also had acrylic nails put on and i am feeling quite pampered. That was my gift. Thanks for visiting and stay tuned for future bragging photo's.

School begins

Today was the first day of school. Both girls were thrilled beyond belief!!!They could hardly sleep last night. Last year the night before school Hope was only able to sleep for about 2 hours she was so worked up, so i almost threatened her within an inch of her life because i wanted sleep. She did sleep but was up extra early today and ready by 7:15 am and did not need to leave until 8:00am for school. Grayce on the other hand started K today and even though it was only the orientation today she told her dad,"You can go home now!!!" and he said no today you go home with us and she had the hardest time understanding that she could not stay in school today. She was not a happy camper. She is so thrilled to be going to school finally all 5 days like sissy Hope.
Hope is in the 5th grade this year and loves school. If it were up to her she would be in school all the time . Either that or at Borders reading. She is tall and skinny and is turning into a very remarkablely beautiful and elegant looking young lady. Grayce is in Kindergarten and loving it. She is very eager about everything and charms the pants off everyone.

Hope's Surgery updates

Hope has gone thru several surgeries at Children's Hospital in Seattle ,WA. and they have done a remarkable job on her. When we received her in China she could not swallow her own spit. I had to teach her to do that she drooled constantly but i think this was because of neglect in the orphanage. She had to learn how to chew food as she did not know how to do this. We ate with impressioned forms of teeth at the table every mealtime to teach her the chewing motion inside our mouths when we eat food. Most of her food came out her nose when we put it in her mouth. Over time and after her first surgery here in Montana it god a little better but she dealt with severe sinusitus caused from food contamination. She spent the first 5 years on Antibiotics most of that time. She started Speeh when we got home from China in 1997 and graduated from it in 2002. She still slurs some of her words when she is in a hurry but her speech is very legible. It has always been good. She did not talk or say her first word until she was probably 3.5 The first word was Mama and Baba (which means daddy in Chinese)What a great sound for me.
She is a very strong and brave little girl and handles all the procedures, surgeries and many doctor appointments with ease. She is used to it now but at times asks me why she has to do this. She is older and realizing that most kids don't have to go thru this. But i tell her this is her package and God is there with her all the way.And when you are done you will be the most gorgeous Chinese girl. She is very happy with her new look of her lip and nose and loves her nose. She was worried she would have a big Italian nose like her dad.
In December of 1997 she had her hard palate repair. The only procedure done thus far was the lip repair at age 1 year in China. We had the hard palate repair done in Kalispell, MT and by March of 1998 they were doing her soft palate repair. During this procedure they closed her esofagus (sp?) too small about the size of a small green pea. In the next year she went for a sleep apnea test in Spokane and was confirmed that she stopped breathing 275 times that night while sleeping. We had to put her on a Apnea Monitor at home every night when she was sleeping. She would take it off at night and for a while we had very restless nights and i slept on her floor. She wore this for a year or so. I felt we needed to go to a hospital that was a teaching hospital that did more up to date procedures so i got on the internet and searched out hospitals in L.A. area and Seattle because we had family and friends in those areas. I found the Cleft Palate Foundation web site and searched on that for those 2 areas and found Children's Hospital in Seattle. I call and made appointments then. When we arrived in March of 1999 for our first visit the head doctor Dr. Cunningham asked me how i found them from Montana and i told him how i searched for them on the internet. He said "Oh! I was not aware we were on there."We then stayed in the hospital that night for a sleep test. It confirmed what they thought. In the last procedure in Kalispell the doctor got the esofogus too small and it was obstructing her breathing so in they go to fix it. We went back by November of 1999 to do this procedure. It helped her breathing at night and we could stop the Apnea Monitor at night which she was thrilled about. Our next visit to Children's was in March-April of 2000, we were leaving for China in June and had to wait on the next step for her for a while. So in 2001 we went back and we had her speech analized and it was assumed that she needed a scope put down her throat to see the air flow thru her nasal while speaking. they put this tube up and down her nostrils and it had a camera on it and it taped her while speaking words with this in there. It hurt me watching this but i had to keep her calm during this. They figured out that she needed the Pharyngal flap surgery (November 2001)for this which we did and they also undid one of the surgeries done in Kalispell so her muscles in the palate could work together for her speech. In November of 2004 Hope underwent her bone grafting surgery. They took bone from her left hip and placed it in her cleft area on both sides. This was very painful and we were in the hospital for 3 days. Once she was walking she did good but hated me for making her do the walking. Her thrill was the day she could ride in the wheelchair.We had a bit of a break for surgeries until this year where they did the lip revision on March 28th and then the rhinoplasty (nose) surgery in July 18th,2006. So total so far she has had 10 surgeries or procedures as they call them. We are not finished yet as she is not done growing yet. As things grow on her her jawline also grows and changes. But for a while this stage is done now onto the pulling of teeth and orthodontics. They have alot of work to do there and she will have severalteeth removed as soon as we can.....Until next time... Well here we go again...Not much time has passed wince i wrote this. She produced 2 Fistulas in her palate front that have to be closed as they are causing some problems. She is a bit scared this time and the procedures they need to do at this part of the game is not good. They are talking about a tissue graft possibly from the tongue. Ouch!!!! We are hoping to do this by Thanksgiving or Christmas.

grand parents- the next generation!!

On August 2,2006 we became the proud grand parents of a beautiful littl princess
Aroura Roze
Born August 2,2006
12:41 am
20.5 inches long

Our son James and his girlfriend Coral are the proud parents and she is the light of their lives. James is currently serving time in prison here for poor choices in his life and missing out on all the firsts. But with Gods help will be done before too long. He is thrilled to be a new Daddy and Coral is doing great as the new mom.

We on the other hand are so happy for them and Aroura looks just like James did at birth. The genetics is amazing to me. She has been blessed with Coral big cheeks but the rest is Valentino definitely.

AnnaGrayce JiCaiQian

In July 2000 we decided to adopt again. We had heard that China was passing a new law that we now qualified for a healthy child. We filed our application and decided to change agencies here in the US. CCAI would not work with us on the law that says we need to earn $10,000 per person living in the household plus the new child. At this time Rebecca, Johnny, James were all living at home and even though Rebecca was living in Arizona at school 10 months out of the year her primary residence was here. So we started looking for other agencies we decided to go with Great Wall Adoption in Houston TX. They were wonderful and worked with us on this issue and interviewed Rebecca and decided that she was independent of us. YEAH!!! We went ahead with the other reems of paperwork and by October 2000 we were DTC. In April of 2002 we received our call. She said she was absolutely beautiful. Her name is Ji CaiQian born on October 18,2000 and living at Huazhou, SWI Huazhou, Guangdong Province. She was16 months old. We had asked for a 3-5 yr old to be closer to Hope's age but was referred a 16 month old. In China they referred us a baby because they flet bad things took so long as an apology to us. I was not prepared for a baby and had nothing no crib,car seat, etc...I had gotten rid of it not knowing we would do this again. In the legnth of 1 week we had enough stuff for an army of baby girls. Thanks to our friends at church. We left for China on May 28th,2002 with our dear friend Joe and Brenda from our church, James, and Hope, John and I. We arrived inBeijing did the tourist stuff for 2 days and were off the Guangzhou, White Swan Hotel where we stayed for 2 weeks. What a beautiful place!!! On June 3rd we loaded the bus with the 11 other families and went to the Guangdong Province Child Welfare office building. It was 103 deg. and 95 percent humidity. Very Hot Hot Hot. We were all crammed into this one room waiting for the director of the orphanage to come. we then started filling out the last paperwork to take the babies to the hotel with us that evening. Pretty soon we heard the babies crying. and in came the antourage of babies.We of course were called in alphabetical order and were the 3rd to last to be called. She was so placid and content with us. She had the most peaceful look on her face. I remember holding her and she was just staring at me intently almost like she wanted to ask me something. Within 1 hour you could just watch her relax and accept me as her new mom. She had made the adjustment by the time we left the building to load the bus. We waited outside with our group of other families and i watched this young girl walk right thru the croud and was looking at all of us moms holding our new babies. She had such a sad look on her face. I so wanted to go up to her and ask her something but I couldn't. I watched her walk around the corner still looking back at us. It was absolutley like watching a movie. Her face is still in my mind, 'Was she looking for the baby she left?', Did she or someone in her family do this?, so many questions come to mind.
We are so blessed to be chosen yet again for the responsibility of raising another ChinaDoll. Each one of these children have a story to tell and some of us may not know what it is competely but some of us are lucky enough to know bits and pieces. AnnaGrayce ended up having a sister who also was adopted. Our DNA tests shows that they are somehow related with 3 out of 10 matching markers most likely twins or 1/2 sisters or cousins. At any rate we are sure blessed to know this and have a bit of info for her. We feel it answers some issues on her behavior the first few onths home. Out of respect for the other family i will mention nothing about them but this is part of AnnaGrayce's story to tell. God Bless you Grayce
She is now 5 and starting Kindergarten on August 30th. She loves school attended Pre-K this past year and wanted to be in school every day. She loves life, people, is very inquisitive, has a bundle of energy and never stops until she drops. We say around here she has 2 speeds full throttle and sleeping. She loves you with gusto, does everything with gusto and is a very smart little girl.
Thank you China for 2 of your girls and the time we have with them. We appreciate them and their country.

Elizabeth Hope Guan Juan

In 1995 we decided to adopte a little girl from china. I looked into all kinds of adoption and kept coming back to 'China'. We then found out about a little girl in Yunnan Province PRC named Hope. She was abandoned at 9 days of age and was very malnourished, and sick. She was almost at deaths door when she was found at the orhphanage gate on the right hand side under a bench. She was wrapped in a blanket and laid on the ground. She was born with a bi-lateral cleft palate and lip. Back then China was not using stages to describe the severity of the palate or lip but it would have been classified as a stage 3 (severe case). She had such a adoring look to her eyes. We got the missionaries FAX number and we faxed him that we were interested in this little girl. He was shocked because she was now 13 months old and had been praying for an american home for her to get the medical attention she needed. His prayers were answered and God chose us to be her parents. We felt doubly blessed because at that time China did not like to be told which child we wanted by name. We waited for 2 years through all the red tape on our side of government and still were told from our American agency that we may not be approved for Guan Juan at the end.
Hope has gone thru several surgeries at Children's Hospital in Seattle ,WA. and they have done a remarkable job on her. When we received her in China she could not swallow her own spit. I had to teach her to do that she drooled constantly but i think this was because of neglect in the orphanage. She had to learn how to chew food as she did not know how to do this. We ate with impressioned forms of teeth at the table every mealtime to teach her the chewing motion inside our mouths when we eat food. Most of her food came out her nose when we put it in her mouth. Over time and after her first surgery here in Montana it god a little better but she dealt with severe sinusitus caused from food contamination. She spent the first 5 years on Antibiotics most of that time. She started Speeh when we got home from China in 1997 and graduated from it in 2002. She still slurs some of her words when she is in a hurry but her speech is very legible. It has always been good. She did not talk or say her first word until she was probably 3.5 The first word was Mama and Baba (which means daddy in Chinese)What a great sound for me.
She is a very strong and brave little girl and handles all the procedures, surgeries and many doctor appointments with ease. She is used to it now but at times asks me why she has to do this. She is older and realizing that most kids don't have to go thru this. But i tell her this is her package and God is there with her all the way.And when you are done you will be the most gorgeous Chinese girl. She is very happy with her new look of her lip and nose and loves her nose. She was worried she would have a big Italian nose like her dad.

Our Bio-Kids

We are so blessed to have been the parents to 3 beautiful and wonderful kids.On March15,1982 our first born Rebecca Lynn was born, a very talented violin player and loving, sensitive, and caring daughter. She is so compassionate for her faith and husband.She married Claude Cer Yoong Chew on August 24,2005. He is a Chinese/Australian and such a great fit into our family.
On May5,1983 we were honored to have been blessed with this little son. He is John Clifford, named after my husband and his grandpa Tino. He is a charming, and smart little guy. He loves sports, family and friends and just knows how to enjoy life.

On July 5,1985 was our last bio-child he was born with curly hair and was a loving and caring person. Even as a little guy he was wanting to please everyone and smiled all the time.James Christopher is very passionate about things he likes. He is now the proud daddy of a daughter Aroura Roze.

About us

We are John and Tamara Valentino. We live in Kaispell, Montana. Beautiful place to live by the way. We just celebrated our 25th Anniversary this year and are still in love with one another.
We are the proud parents of 5 (yes i can't believe we have 5!!!) wonder ful children, 1 son in law who is charming and a new Grand daughter who is so beautiful!!!
We have lived in Montana for 13 years and love it here. We were the very blessed parents of not one but 2 wonderful China dolls . More on those tales under our kids.
Sincerely
John and Tami Valentino
Welcome!!!