When Eric and I married 31 years ago, we had a difficult time getting pregnant. We went through various processes and ended up having four biological children. Later we decided to adopt as a way to thank the good Lord for enabling us to have a family. We started out thinking we would adopt from India, but then we heard about WACAP’s China adoptions. Eventually we chose a 6-year-old girl named Gui Hua from Zhejiang Province.

Eric traveled alone to China to pick up our new daughter. At the time, there was a moratorium on new Chinese adoptions, and we were afraid there might be some difficulties, even though our adoption had already been approved. Eric ended up spending five weeks in China trying to get our little girl out.

Finally Eric was allowed to see Gui. She weighed only 25 pounds and was missing her right arm above the elbow. Eric was told she would cry for several hours and then stop—and that’s exactly what she did. Even though she lived in an orphanage in far-from-ideal conditions, Gui had a razor-sharp sense of humor right from the start. At their second meeting, she hid from Eric when he left the room for a moment. He nearly tore the place apart looking for her! Finally a giggle from underneath a table revealed her location.

Our youngest biological child was a teenager when we brought Gui home. The kids had no trouble accepting Gui as one of their own, and she proved amazingly adaptive as well. We don’t even use the term "disability" for her arm—it has never held her back from anything. She’s had only two complaints that I can think of: she couldn’t scratch mosquito bites on one side of her body, and she couldn’t use the pencil sharpener at school! Her arm has a nickname—"Mr. No-Knuckles."

Now age 14, Gui is an exceptionally bright, accomplished, confident scholar and athlete. She plays on three different soccer teams, hopes to earn a soccer scholarship to college and wants to be a professional player like her heroine, Mia Hamm. She’s also a star basketball player at both shooting guard and point guard, and has a black belt in karate.

On top of her other activities, Gui has become a big sister. This wonderful girl has added so much to our lives that we’ve adopted three more children from China. Gui still remembers her life in the orphanage, and she knows how to help her new siblings. We’re now the proud parents of eight children—and you never know, we haven’t ruled out adopting another!