BIG News

So I have big news to share that isn't really my news. It's my sister's news and she's made me keep it a secret for a LONG time! But now the secret's out...

SHE'S ADOPTING A BABY!!!!

She has always known that her path to motherhood would be through adoption. EIGHTEEN months ago, she started her journey. She worked with an adoption agency that specialized in special needs children, mainly those with Down's Syndrome. She wanted a baby with Down's. She had one heartache after another in the beginning (actually, pretty much through the whole process!). They would contact her about a baby, pass along her profile to the birth family, she would wait (sometimes for WEEKS!), and ultimately the baby would go to someone else. At one point, she gave her notice at work, went home and packed a suitcase, and headed to the airport. They told her there was a baby waiting for her in California, but due to a mistake, he ultimately went to someone else, too. She was heartbroken.


She decided to increase the parameters of what she was willing to take- basically any child under the age of 8 that wasn't terminally ill. And still she experienced heartache. Nothing seemed to work out for her. The weeks of waiting, child after child, really took a toll on her. Dealing with the foster care system was a nightmare! After FIFTEEN broken hearts over a year and a half of waiting in agony, she was at the point of reevaluating how she wanted to proceed. She was still determined to adopt, but thought she needed a break for the anxiety for a while.

That all changed last week...

On Monday she got the call that would forever change her life. There was a mother waiting to deliver a baby that needed a home and she had chosen Melanie! God had heard our pleas and answered our prayers!

Sunday, at 8:50, my precious nephew entered the world weighing 6 lbs, 8 oz. He had a little fluid on his lung and a medical condition they're watching, so he's hanging out in the nicu for a while, but he's doing good!

Welcome to the world baby boy! We love you so much, more than you will ever know!

I obviously can't post any pictures yet, but how sweet are those fingers!?

Goofy Amie

See this cute little monkey? She is the silliest little girl you will ever meet. For the past few weeks she has been trying to "play jokes" on me. She will do things like sneak up on me and and poke me or pull my hair or something and then say, "Mama, Papa did that to you!" She thinks it is SO funny and until recently, I thought she really believed she was tricking me. That was until she started pulling off some pretty good pranks.

Last Saturday the dog started barking while I was in my room. I stuck my head out and asked what he was barking at? Amie said, "Catie's here. She just ran upstairs." I couldn't imagine what Catie was doing up and back at my house at 8:30 on a Saturday, so I started up the stairs to ask her. I was about half way up the stairs when Amie yelled, "I fooled you!" I laughed so hard! I couldn't believe she pulled that off so good!

Then today in the middle of wrestling around with Leah she stops and rubs Leah's head and says, "Oh, no Leah! What happened to your head? You have something red right here!" Leah goes running off to check out the damage and Amie actually waited for her to look in the mirror before yelling "fooled you!" Not bad for a 4 year old!

Ok, this last story isn't of her trying to be funny, but it's a hilarious story and I want to always remember it. It happened a few months ago. Leah brings books home from school each night to practice her reading. They are patterned books with picture cues. Leah reads them first, then Amie has to have a turn reading them. She brought one home called "This is my mom". It was structured "This is my mom. She is a _____ ." The picture cues help with the blank. She'd brought it home a few times, so Amie was familiar with it. It was sitting on the table so Amie picked it up and started reading it. She reads "This is my mom. She is a..." and looks at the picture and says "teacher".  Next page has a picture of a woman with a stethescope and some animals and she reads "This is my mom. She is a vet." right on cue. She turns the page to a picture of a judge in a long black robe and without missing a beat reads "This is my mom. She is a vampire." and continues right on reading. I laugh until tears stream down my face every time I think about how seriously she read it! It was so funny! I'd give anything to have recorded it.

I love that little girl! She always makes me laugh! I just have to be careful how I laugh because her feelings get hurt if she thinks I'm laughing at her.

Leah's a girl scout!

One of the first things Leah asked to do after she started kindergarten was to join the girl scouts. I had always thought it would be a good idea for all the girls, so we went down to the school on recruitment night and signed up. She joined a troop that meets twice a month. It's kind of neat how they have it set up. The girls range in age from kindergarten to early teenage years. They all meet together as one big group in the beginning of the meeting then break off into their smaller groups- daisy's, brownies, etc. And it is CHAOS!!! These girls get together and it is complete madness! But they have SO MUCH FUN! I just love watching how Leah smiles ear to ear the whole time she is there. We walk in the door and the bigger girls swoop up both of the girls and I don't see them the whole night. I just sit back and watch them enjoy themselves- it's great! Last night Leah had her investiture ceremony so she is now "official" and they had a party afterwards. I think the pictures speak for themselves as to the fun the girls had!

during the ceremony

An "official" daisy!

One of the little girls that takes over Amie while we're there

Amie dancing

a little blurry, but it captures her joy!

dance party!

the crazy crew

eventually, the just start running crazy

Amie joined the picture- she's an honorary girl scout

party!

It's really a lot of fun! I highly recommend it to anyone with young daughters. Also, we are now selling cookies until January 22. They are $4/box. Let me know if you are interested!


btw... 2 posts in 2 days! How about that?!

2013!

Wow, I am a really horrible blogger! I didn't do a single blog post in 2012. Part of the problem is I don't know how to easily post pictures onto the blog and I don't like to do a post without pictures. But I am really going to give it some effort this year- call it a New Year's resolution. I really enjoy reading other people's blogs, so I'm going to try to do at least one post a month on here. Baby steps, right? Here is a quick year-in-review from 2012. It has to be brief because I still haven't figured out the picture thing!

Leah STILL sucks her thumb and carries her blankie and string around.

Amie's still a goofy girl!

We went to the circus.

Leah turned 5!

We had a great Spring!

We spent a lot of time outside.

We had our annual Easter Egg hunt at Grandma's

Amie played soccer last spring...

but she spent more time sitting and pouting than she did playing.

Leah played soccer, too!

Buddy got his first haircut.

We spent a very cold weekend at the beach.

Amie finished her first year of preschool.

Leah GRADUATED from preschool!

She had her first sleepover with her BFF from preschool

Leah learned to swim!

My baby started kindergarten!

Amie started the 3's class at preschool.

Leah rode the bus for the 1st time.

Papa built the girls and tree house AND let them paint it!

AND he hung a tire swing!

We went to trunk-or-treat.

We celebrated Daddy's birthday.

Amie was in the Thanksgiving program at preschool.

Leah's GS troop was in the Christmas parade and we ALL got to ride on the float!

We saw Santa at Christmas VBS!

Amie turned 4!

She had a Princess and the Frog cake.

We had a Christmas party at Paw Paw Freddie's.

And had a nice, quiet Christmas at home.

Catie turned 15!

She partied all day for her birthday!

Ok, so it was more than a few pictures, but I think I finally got the hang of it! I just need to figure out how to move the pictures around now. Happy New Year everybody! Keep checking back for more updates!

Happy Birthday Amie! (a week late)

Can you believe our sweet baby girl is now THREE years old?! I seriously have no idea how that happened? We did a lot of celebrating for her special day. We had a family party and dinner at Chili's. I took cookies in to school (and forgot the camera!). We had some of her little classmates over for a party/play date (which she LOVED!), and we had a "party" at Grandma and Papa's house (where I also forgot the camera!). It was a week long celebration of Amie!

Sharing birthday ice cream at Chili's with Leah,

Birthday cone cakes at home.

Birthday party play date

I just love this sweet, silly girl. She makes me smile a million times a day. Here are three of the 10 million things I love about my sweet girl:

She has the BEST imagination! She will play with her toys and make different voices for all of them. Usually there's a mama and a baby and the baby always needs to be rescued. For example, a shark will say in a big, low voice, "I'm going to eat you!" Then the baby fish will cry in a little baby voice, "Mama! Help me! Help me!" Then the mama says, "I'm coming! I'll save you!" It's really so funny to watch!

I love how caring and sweet she is. She really is my sweetheart! She will scream "Mom!" on the top of her lungs and then follow it with a sweet "I love you!" that just melts my heart. I love that when she's done something wrong or gets in trouble, she will ALWAYS come say, "I'm beary sorry" to whoever she's offended.

As much as it makes me crazy, I love how sneaky she is. She will often disappear into the dog room or the bathroom and get really quiet. When we go looking for her, we find her with a cookie or some candy or some other treat she isn't supposed to have. Then all she'll say is "Hi!" It makes me crazy but it's hilarious!

This is my new favorite picture of the girls. It captures their personalities SO WELL (as well as the fashion sense!) I just love these babies!

My sweet Kate

 I really didn't want to use this blog for anything other than happy and fun things that happen in our family, but I can't NOT blog about my sweet dog. I got Kate when I was a freshman in college and she was 8 weeks old. She was my first baby and spoiled rotten. There are a million cute stories I could tell you about her, but right now they just make me too sad to think about. We had to put Kate down on Thursday night. She started going down hill a few weeks ago and we didn't want her to suffer. She would have been 12 in January. I thought I was prepared, but I am so overwhelmingly sad. I can't believe we had to it so fast. She will be so missed forever!

Here's the one funny story I can manage right now. Kate LOVED to open presents! She was just about as excited as any kid you'd ever see on Christmas morning. She'd stick her nose right into the present and start digging and shaking like crazy. It was really something to see! It didn't matter what was in the present, she just liked to open it. It's going to be a hard Christmas without her this year.