About Our Family

El Paso, Texas, United States
We are James, Lisa, Patrick, Christian, Carson, and Ella Payne a military family serving our country via service in the U.S. Army. Jim and I have been married for 18 years and have 3 wonderful home grown sons -Patrick, Christian and Carson. We recently adopted our beautiful daughter Ella Grace Ana from Donets'k, Ukraine in September. Jim and I began our Army life together at Fort Bliss, El Paso, Texas and every assignment thus far has extended unique opportunities and challenges for our family to grow and learn; to become a stronger, committed, and a prepared Army family. Having recently lived abroad for six amazing years, we cannot express how thankful we are for the opportunity to have represented our great country and to discover the cultures and customs of other countries; to become close to the people and learn from them; to open our hearts and minds to the unfamiliar languages and way of life in other countries. Having now moved back to the United States, we are looking forward to discovering what new adventures await our family. Rest assured, wherever the Army sends us we will continue to serve you and our country proudly. Army life, we wouldn’t trade it!

June 20, 2008

Our house....

Here's the floor plan...


Off the MB you will see a "living room" - this will be converted into a bedroom for Ella. The bedroom across from the MB is Patrick's and the remaining one will belong to Christian & Carson.

Now that I have physically seen the inside of the house, I have started to process where everything will go.

Thanks to the wonderful people at Balfour Beatty Communities we will have color! We are ready to start turning our house into our home!

We also have a basement and a large yard!

7 comments:

Kevin and Tammy said...

Looks great. I know you will be glad to get everything in it's proper place. Good Luck.

... said...

Hi Tammy! Yes we sure are ready to set up our home. Going shoppping today stuff we need, like a washer and dryer!

ArtworkByRuth said...

Wow Lisa, things sure ARE bigger in Texas, your own living room off the MB? Congrats on your new place, don't forget to take the updates with you to Ukraine, along with some true Western souvenirs!
May God bles your new abode!

The Flying Eagle said...

I love your house! I too am feeling your panic!!! We too just bought a new house (new to us, very old to others) and have only finished about a third of the home remodeling projects that we expected to have done before our travel date! I am excited you got the tickets - ours came in the mail yesterday and I felt like framing them!!! I can not believe we are actually going - and soon! We fly in the afternoon of the 20th to Kiev. I am guessing you will be traveling that day unless your children are in a Kiev orphanage. But I am sure if we dont meet you at the start of our trip we will cross paths sometime during our many visit to government offices!!! Best of luck to you :-)

Anonymous said...

House looks great! A lot of opportunities to decorate! :) Most fun for you would be decorating little Ella's room. Are decorating now or waiting for her get home and decorating together: double fun!

Natalia

Anonymous said...

Lisa,
Your floor plan looks great. The best part I think is the basement. I don't know what they were thinking here when they didn't put those in. I miss a basement bad. Don't get me wrong, I'm very grateful for what I have been given. One part of your journey is almost complete and then starts another more exciting chapter in the lives of the Payne family.

Love you lots,
Rachel

... said...

Thank you to all!

Monica, we have the tickets on hold but the $$$ is right. I am sure we will cross paths in Ukraine - we fly the 15th!

This is our "spot" we began at the beginning of our journey in May 2007, to adopt a child from Ukraine. In August 2008, we traveled to Ukraine to bring our daughter/sister Ella Grace Ana home; and on September 12, 2008 we did just that.

While our journey to bring her home is complete, our journey together is just beginning. We will continue to keep our spot here, posting as frequently as we can; and keeping you updated on our next journey in life...maybe a second adoption is in our future.

Please join us by following us by clicking on the "Follow" link to the left and posting your notes at the bottom of any post we have made.

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