Our Baby Boy Gavin Pan

Hello family & friends,

We have news! Many of you know that we went on the waiting list again for our second adoption back in April 2008. We just emailed our home-study last Friday to Ted (the orphanage owner) in Taiwan. This is the same orphanage that Lyndlee is from. We got called Saturday morning, saying they had a baby boy for us! His Chinese name is Ding-Dong Pan. Yes you read that right. Many of the workers at the orphanage call him "hostess" Janna's mom & dad even bought us some ding dongs as a silly congrats gift!
So we are calling him Gavin Pan Conklin. He was born June 9th, just turned 4 months old.

We are so overjoyed & are experiencing all the same emotions as we went through for Lyndlee's adoption. We melt at every picture the orphanage sends us, we didn't know you could stare at a photo for so long. Lyndlee thinks he is cute although we know she doesn't understand everything! And we check our email all the time & can't wait to call international for updates about our baby boy!
Please be keeping our family in your prayers as we begin to make our appointments for our adoption process. Also please be keeping our baby boy in your prayers, as some of know he has a heart condition. He has a small hole in his heart, we know it can heal on its own but also are aware surgery may be needed. Currently he is in the hospital for pneumonia & is on a feeding tube but we are praying he can be back at the orphanage with his sweet Mama Bev, she misses him! Also they are trying to fatten him up as he only weighs 11 pounds right now.
We know our God is a faithful God & we trust in Him. We know our baby boy is safe in the arms of Mama Bev & the arms of our Heavenly Father. He is getting so loved & taken care of & we find so much peace in that while we are apart.
So enjoy the pictures.
We love you all!

Janna, Brennan & Lyndlee Jya-Ying

Painting Pumpkins & Final Homestudy!

Busy weekend we had! Brennan went to a men's retreat so Lyndlee & I took a very short trip to Joplin to stay with my family & to also pick up our homestudy papers. My mom is always so cute with party ideas/games when all the grandkids are over. So it was time for painting pumpkins & bonfire. The kids all had a blast. Lyndlee was super funny as she decided to paint her pumpkin blue & would not finish until it was all blue.

Than I was able to meet with our social worker & get our final copy of our homestudy. We are very excited & emailed it to Ted in Taiwan. We know that waiting & praying is what we do now until we get that phone call. After the phone call, all the appointments & stress start and I can't wait! So please keep praying for us as we wait for our precious child. We are anxious to see all that the Lord has in store for our family.

We are staying busy with youth/church events.

I love it how our calendar fills up so quickly & we are really loving being in Branson.

We sure do miss Haiti, our students & fellow teachers.

We pray for them daily & keep them on our hearts & minds.

Until next time, enjoy the pictures!

Branson, Life, Adoption

Well I realize it has been awhile since I posted. Seems like we have been so busy since we have moved. The Lord provided a job, at just the perfect time. Brennan is the student minister at Tri-Lakes Christian Church in Branson, Mo. I never thought I would live in Branson, vacation here yes of course! But we love it here. We love our church family, our youth kids, and our new home.

Lyndlee is doing great, talking a lot more each day. She really enjoys being at church & seeing her new friends. Although I know she misses her dear friend Naiyah in Haiti so much. But we talk about Naiyah & her family all the time & pray for them each night. They are wonderful people & wonderful friends.

Sept 3rd we had our first homestudy for our second adoption! Of course I was super nervous, cleaned the house all day but everything went great. We are hoping to email our homestudy 1st of Oct to Ted in Taiwan. We went on the waiting list April 2008 but realized nothing could happen while we were living in Haiti. So now we are back in the states & ready! We realize that more waiting is ahead of us, but we are excited for God's plans!

My heart sometimes just aches to have/hold a newborn baby. I have been praying about it & the Lord has taken care of my heart ache, He is such a wonderful provider! So I have started watching babies to help pay for our adoption. So Lyndlee & I play with 4 babies, all under the age of 1! One baby was just born this Monday. I watch them part time & they come on different days but we are still busy. Lyndlee had a hard time at first learning to share toys & share her mommy. But now is doing great & is such a little helper. I am excited to watch her with these precious babies & can't wait to watch her with her baby sister or brother one day.

Enjoy the pictures!

America

We are back in America now, has been 10 days now.  It has been such a blessing seeing all our friends & family.  We sure did miss them while we were in Haiti.  We have been busy with some traveling & also some ministry job hunting.  We have made it to St. Louis, Columbia, Joplin, Dallas & will be headed to Branson in a few days.  So it has been crazy.  

Please be keeping us in your prayers as we will have some church interviews this week.  Also keep praying as we adjust to being back. Lyndlee is doing great, although has had some trouble adjusting to sleeping at night with all the changes.  But we are confident she will be fine with it soon.  She sure has loved being with all her family & friends here & acts like she has never been away from them!  We had her birthday party celebration last week, scooby doo theme so that was fun!  But we also received some sad news regarding her birth mother.  We find out she passed away last week from heart failure so please pray for Lyndlee's older sister & family back in Taiwan.  Bev from the orphanage did write to tell us they were able to give a Bible to the family, give them pictures of Lyndlee & take pictures for Lyndlee to have.  So we are praising God for putting Bev & Ted into their lives & praying they come to know Jesus!  

We are doing well, but sure do miss our students. Somedays it feels like we are just on break & will be back soon.  Today at Hobby Lobby it really hit me as I was looking at these statues, it was reminding me of our friends in Haiti & I just lost it in the store.  I just missed Haiti so much at that moment & am so thankful the Lord let us be there.

God bless you!

Tomorrow is the Day

What a great month we have had here at our home in Haiti.  What a busy time it has been!

These last few weeks have consisted of cleaning our classrooms, closing down our homes, graduations, saying lots of goodbyes, packing, etc!

Sonlight Academy's graduation was on Sunday & went so well.  We have gotten very close to the senior class so it was hard to say goodbye to them.  Brennan was asked to speak at the ceremony which was a great honor for him.  Wednesday night was the first graduation for the Bible College & that went great as well!

Yesterday we had class parties in our room, they were so much fun!  It was hard to say goodbye to my students but I know we will be back to visit!  We spent all afternoon packing our classrooms up, covering everything & putting things away.  Then we had a goodbye lunch with all our teacher aides.  Yesterday afternoon we had to say goodbye to our good friend Elose, but we are hoping she can come visit us in December to spend a few weeks with us & to look at possible colleges she wants to attend.  And tonight we have our last staff dinner to say goodbye, like I said earlier, lots of goodbyes.

But tomorrow is the day.  We will start our journey back to the states early morning, hoping to arrive in St. Louis late evening.  Please be praying for us & all the families here as we begin our journeys.  Pray for safe travel & that Lyndlee does well.

We want to say thank you for all that you have done for us while we have been ministering here in Haiti.  What a great, challenging & yet rewarding year it has been for our family.  We are honored to be apart of the Lord's ministry & work here.  We thank for all your support, love, & prayers.  We can't wait to see you soon!

God bless!

Last Month

We can't believe we are in our last month here in Haiti.  We have 18 more days of teaching & being with our students.  Please keep keeping all the students & teachers in your prayers as we are coming close to the end of the school year.  

We wanted to include some photos of the past few weeks.  This past Friday was a sad one as we said goodbye to Amanda & Naiyah.  We are glad they are back in the states now & can get some rest before their next baby comes! Lyndlee sure does miss her Naiyah!  Good thing we will be close to each other over the summer & can get the girls together!  

We have really enjoyed having the senior class over for movie day on Saturdays.  Lyndlee too loves having them over & usually is laughing with them, playing with their cell phones or in their laps!

Lyndlee loves taxi rides so Miss Emily took this picture for us the other day.  Either Lyndlee falls asleep on the ride, or she will point to the ocean, animals, you name it!  She makes the rides really fun.  The last picture is taken at a restaurant at a hotel.  It was great food & fellowship with other teachers.

We thank you for all you do for us & we can't wait to see some of you all soon. God bless.