Sesame street live!

So, we get to take all the little people to watch sesame street live. I remember watching sesame street while my mom taught Trey. I loved it because I knew that when it was over it was snack time =) Yes, I love to eat! A little fun to celebrate a great first month of school....pics to follow!

Let the adventures begin!

My Sweet Baby Boys!

So, tomorrow we start a new adventure with these two little men! How can they be 5 and going into kindergarten!?!? I am so blessed to be able to stay home with my kids and home school them. I'm not going to lie, I'm a little scared, but I'm super excited too. I was homeschooled from 3rd to 12th grade, and though it may not be a great fit for everyone, I LOVED it and know that it was fundemental in forming me into the person I am today. As Clay and I embarq on this journey with our little zoo I pray that we would be worthy of this high calling. I know that this adventure will "educate" me more than my kids, and by the end of this my hope and prayer is that, above all, we are more like Jesus. Pray for us as we start...we'll keep you posted on how things go =)

I love how my boys love each other and I am so excited they get to go on this journey together!

The Library and Adventures

So one of these days I'll get around to blogging about Jude's birthday in June and Cole's birthday on August 1...one day =) But today I'm going to blog about our afternoon. I have been promising the kids a trip to the library (you can walk to it from our house) for a few days, but since it has stormed every afternoon we haven't been able to go. Today when everyone got up from "rest time" I told the kids we could go to the library if we hurried because it looked like it was about to rain. I was praying it would hold off long enough for our little outing...it didn't! Torrential downpour just as we pulled in.  I told the kids that we were going to wait in the car for a few minutes and see if the storm would pass. Currently, we are driving in a car with no A/C...long story =) so as I sat in our steamy car grumbling in my head about the rain, my car full of crazy, noisy kids and wondering why we didn't just stay home...it would have been much easier for me! But the Lord gently reminded me of how I constantly scold the kids about complaining and tell them to "change their face" to reflect a "happy heart". Clearly I was not obeying the family rules =) So, with a quick prayer for patience I told the kids to get ready for an adventure! We all ran into the rain, got soaked, and went to the library as promised. We read books, played some computer games and picked out our books for the week. As we were walking back out to the car it started pouring again, and by the time we got to our house the flood gates opened. We ran, screamed and giggled through the rain, got inside, put on our warm, dry pajamas and looked through our loot. As they were sitting reading Cole said, "mom, that was a great day, I love you!" Makes all the work, mess, and chaos worth it! Though my afternoon didn't go quite as planned the Lord is so gracious to remind me that I am what my children watch and learn from. I'm so grateful He is patient with me as I am slow to learn. What a treasure my little people are and I'm so blessed and grateful for the adventures i get to have with them each day.

 Jude making a run for it!

Reading through out new books in our dry pj's (BK wanted to wear one of my shirts with her frilly pink skirt...crazy girl! And apparently Jude is doing yoga with his bear =)

Vacation!

So we went on our first family vacation this past week! We had a great time! We went to a close family friends wedding in Virginia, headed to Williamsburg and Yorktown, then headed to one of my best friends house to stay for 5 days. We ended the trip with Clay running a crazy trail marathon. We packed tons in and had a great time! Here are some highlights! Thanks Christa and Darrell for the great time at your house and your wonderful hospitality!

First family hike!

 BK carrying her baby on the WHOLE hike =)

Strong girl. That baby didn't leave her sight! (Thanks Nina!)

 Learning how to pull apart the wool to make a tool

 Learning to make bricks

 My little colonial princess

 Best friends, Bailey Kate and Kezia (Christa and I have known each other our whole lives and our girls have known each other there whole life =)

 We took the metro to DC and spent over 12 hours sight seeing. The kids were amazing and we had so much fun!

 We had yummy cupcakes in Georgetown

 Pizza overlooking the river in Georgetown

 Future husband and wife =) Jude and Kaelyn, just 3 weeks apart =)

Daddy getting to run his race

 Waiting for daddy to finish his marathon

 silly baby

 passed our from an amazing vacation

our last stint was 5 hours without stopping...this is how we made it =)

Bailey Kate turns 3!!!

 She is so fun...and ALL girl!

So, for Bailey Kate turned 3 on May 15. Since she LOVES all things princesses we decided to go to Disney and meet the princesses instead of having a big party. So, Nina, Mimi, Jude, Mommy and Bailey Kate packed up and headed to meet all the princesses. I got her a sleeping beauty dress from Target (I couldn't bring myself to spend 65.00 on a dress at disney.) She dressed up, did her hair and make up and we were on our way! It was a really busy day, but we ended up in the fast pass lane by accident and luckily the attendendent was super nice and let us through. It took all of 10 minutes!!! We headed into the room and as soon as she saw the princesses she kept saying, "it's not peetend (pretend), they is not peetend!" She was in awe!!! As mom and I video taped and took pictures Bailey Kate danced, chatted, and generally worshipped each of the princesses. It was a forever memory!!! As I watched my little princess in her own little heaven and marveled at how much I love that little girl, I realized how much my Father in Heaven must loves me. My heart was so full it almost brought me to tears. At that moment I got it! He loves me so much that He would send His only son for me! John Pipers quote, "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him," kept repeating in my head, making that day even more special.

If that had been all we did that day it would have been just fine, but we still had lots to do. Bailey Kate danced around the whole park, rode a few rides, saw the castle, and then we ended the day with tea with the princesses. She had SO much fun (but probabley not as much fun as the Grandmas and me =)
It was the perfect birthday for my sweet girl

3!!!

 

Family party at home...homemade pizza and pink cupcakes...All the princesses requests! (don't mind the bandaid, it's just for looks =)

Yum!

Diva!

It's exhausting being a princess!

(the rest of the princess pictures are on a different camera, I'll post them eventually)

10 and 11 months

 Easter 2012...Almost 10 months old!

 Jude loves his "Bubbas"

Practice cupcake for BK's birthday

Stuck in the toy basket...i love those chunky thighs =)

So, by the time I got around to posting about Jude being 10 months he was almost 11 months, so i decided to combine them. I can't believe that in a few short months my baby will be one. The more babies I have the more aware I am of how fast this all goes by, and the more I savor every minute. Here are some stats for the last 2 months

-he is a master crawler...super fast!
-LOVES to climb the stairs (the gates are in full effect!) a few weeks ago I brought him downstairs to start making dinner and the next thing I knew he was at the very top of the stairs. 
-He cruises on all the furniture (and any human around)
-he could walk if he wanted to, but he is my cautious child (we'll see how long that lasts) so when he realizes he is standing by himself he slowly lowers himself to the ground
-can stand for a really long time by himself
-LOVES to wrestle....he thinks he is one of the big kids and gets right in the middle of the chaos
-he can say bye bye, mama, dada, pop pop, papa, Mimi, bubba (what he calls the boys) 
-waves bye bye to everyone
-is developing a bit of a temper (oh dear)
-smacks his tongue when he wants more to eat...or more of anything 
-weighs about 23 pounds and wears 12-18 month clothes.
-is sooooo easy and laid back
-LOVES daddy so much...when clay walks in the room Jude lights up, calls his name and waves. It is so precious!
-eats everything in site and is down to nursing 4 times a day
I'm so blessed to be his mommy and can't imagine my life without him. 

Our Foster Care story

So, May is Foster Care Awareness Month. A sweet friend, who has adopted 3 children from the foster care system, asked me to post a little something about our journey. A few months ago I posted an abridged version of Cooper's story. To see that post you can go to gotcha day. So as I pondered and prayed about what to post...here's what I came up with.
     I have always known I wanted to adopt. I LOVE children! When I was growing up a family who went to our dance school were foster parents. I watched as this mom (of i think 3 biological children and 2 or 3 adopted children) walked into the studio with precious little babies every week. Some were tiny, some were toddlers, I'm sure they had some with "issues", but as a child I remember watching this family and knowing I wanted to be like them. I remember watching the children, the adopted and biological kids, love on their foster brothers and sisters as if they were their own. I remember thinking what amazing missionaries these people were, they were willing to sacrifice ease and comfort to love and provide for these children who had no one.
    So fast forward 10ish years. Clay and I had talked before we were married that we wanted to adopt. I had gone to, and completed nursing school, was working on a pediatric unit. Clay was in seminary and I wanted a family SO badly! I got pregnant and miscarried. I was devastated. As a struggled through the next few months watching, what felt like, everyone around me getting pregnant I thought maybe this was God's way of showing us we needed to be foster parents and adopt before we had biological children. We signed up for the classes, jumped through all of the hoops and became licensed. During that time I got pregnant again, miscarried again, was able to diagnose why I was miscarrying and got pregnant with Cole. We were over the moon excited about having a baby, but Clay and I felt like just because we were going to have a biological child didn't mean God didn't want us to continue with foster care and adoption. We continued to move forward. When I was about 4 months pregnant, Susanne (my sweet friend who was also Cooper's foster mom) called and said she had a baby she thought would be going up for adoption, would we be interested? We prayed about it and decided we did. We went and met Romeo, a 3 month old sweet, chubby, beautiful Hispanic baby. We fell in love immediately. Long story short, after months of caring for him, the system decided we weren't the best choice for him. It broke our hearts. We weren't sure why God would bring this sweet baby into our lives only to take him away. Clay and I prayed and grieved, and trusted that God had a bigger plan for this sweet baby.
      So, after an emergency C-section and surgery to remove my gallbladder 5 weeks later it was time for re-licensure with the foster care system. We decided with a new baby and 2 major surgeries we should not get re-licenced until things settled down a bit. As it turned out, the sadness over losing Romeo (who we were going to name Logan), all the work we put into becoming foster parents, and only fostering 2 children, paved the way for us to adopt Cooper, the perfect addition to our family.
     Now, with all of that said, I want to be clear. When we were presented with the opportunity to adopt Cooper we had to do some serious praying. On paper Cooper had a lot of issues. Clay and I had to accept that their could be some challenges ahead. In God's great sovereignty I was blessed to be in a family that had some "strugglers". The prospect of a child with some "struggles" didn't scare me to much because i was able to watch my parents raise some amazing children despite their struggles. But I also wasn't entering this new stage of life lightly. We were ready! We felt like God had led us on this journey to that point, and just because it may not be easy, that was no reason to throw in the towel. We were confident Cooper, just the way he was made, was meant to be ours. I tell people often that if they are called to foster care or adoption, their may be heart ache and frustration, but the child God has for you will be yours. We have been able to watch God do a mighty work in Cooper's life. Cooper is a perfectly healthy, spunky, brilliant, sweet, gentle, caring little boy. The funny thing is when people ask us which one of our children are adopted all of them raise their hands and scream, "I'm the adopted one!" We are so blessed God called us to be a part of growing his kingdom this way and are so excited to adopt a few more children one day soon.....yes, I know, we are crazy!