First Father's Day

I remember before the boys came experiencing grief over all the "firsts" I would miss having meet them 4 and 6 years into life. Now, I realize we just get to experience a lot of "firsts" in a different way! Our first year is quickly coming to a close so I am soaking every single "first" for all it's worth! Our first Father's Day was such a sweet time to let Jeff know just how much we love and appreciate him! The boys each decorated a home made card with this sweet saying, "You are the worlds best dad...hands down!" with their sweet little hands traced inside. I don't claim any of the ideas here as my own...Thank God for the Internet!

I also had each boy tell me what kinds of things they would want to do/places they would go with him if they could plan their own one on one day with Dad. I thought it was a good thing for Jeff because his favorite love language to receive is quality time.

"J" chose to go to Chick-Fila and enjoy some time outside. So, I planned a picnic in the park with a kite, bubbles, a catch game, and a gift card for ice cream as a finale!
"A" knew right away that he wanted to go to TGI Fridays and the movies. I threw in a few of Jeff's favorite candies and popcorn to tie it all together!
I also made Jeff some brownies with chocolate icing and decorated them with cream cheese icing. It is his favorite kind-as in eat it right out of the can with a spoon with absolutely no shame! :) Now, I think that is one proud poppa if I do say so myself!
We also got to spend some time with my sweet daddy and their Poppa D today which is always fun!

We had hamburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, baked beans, and deviled eggs! SO yummy! I love to see my sweet dad loving on my boys and I can't imagine two better examples for them to follow than he and my amazing husband! Thank God for these men that love the Lord teaching my boys how to be a man of character!

The Long Awaited Update

That may seem like a strange title to those of you that are frequent readers. Though I'm guessing there aren't many of you left since a lot of the joy of reading blogs is looking at pictures and ours are all of the backs of our kids' heads. So silly looking!

Anyway my posts, though still not daily, are more consistent lately and for that I am proud. However, I have provided very little information updating you on the adoption process. That will come in this very post, but I am going to build some anticipation by making you wait....I know, not fair, but oh so fun!

I always stress majorly over teachers' gifts!! I just love our boys' teachers dearly and appreciate their dedication to our kiddos even more! So, nothing, particularly that I can afford, seems like enough! This year I polled my teacher friends for ideas and they recommended gift cards. I didn't want to just give a gift card in an envelope so I made a "welcome to your relaxing summer vacation kit". I found a similar idea here. Our version had a pretty beach towel rolled up and tied with ribbon and a travel size bottle of sun screen, in a small beach bag I got at Target for the cost of a plain old gift bag, and a sweet thank you card complete with a Sonic gift card! I went for the "if I were a teacher this is what I would want" factor. Hopefully they liked it, but if not I heard there is some sort of gift card swap teachers do. I'm pretty sure it is somewhat secretive, but I just put it on my blog so I guess it isn't a secret any longer! ;) Anyway, here's a picture of the finished product.

Today is the first full day of summer vacation and we celebrated by having a donut breakfast and playing outside with sidewalk chalk and the sand box. Looks like it will be a frequent occurrence this summer! Not the donuts...that is a VERY rare treat at our house with 2 extremely energetic boys. But the chalk and outdoor play is here to stay though we may have to do most of it in the shade with this crazy Houston heat!
Now on to the adoption update. We are still doing back of the head pictures so I'm sure you have guessed the adoption is not finalized and this is true. In fact it seems it will be a few more months still. I have had a lot of questions and I know it seems like it is taking forever so thanks for continuing to show interest. It has not been an easy road, though I will argue with anyone that thinks periods of waiting are ever easy. We finished up 2009 with some certainty that we would be able to adopt the boys, but the new year brought a giant road bump that looked like a closed door. It was one of the most difficult times of our lives made even more difficult by the inability to share our situation in it's entirety with you, our sweet friends and family. However, in March the apparent closed door swung wide open in a way that only God could have orchestrated. PRAISE GOD who is the Author and Perfecter of our Faith and Sovereign over every aspect of our lives! We were notified that we are in fact the family that has been chosen by the state to adopt the boys and we are over joyed! The waiting isn't over though.

The next step is for us to read the boys' file with all the information that the state has regarding their history. We can't do this until the file is redacted. This is some sort of legal process of taking out aspects of the wording before it can be released. Anyway, it has been taking on average of 5 1/2 months in our county for this process to be completed!! And, it couldn't start until we were chosen to adopt the boys so....If you do the math it will still be 2 or 3 months before we can read the file! Ridiculous I know, but bureaucracy is by nature slower than Christmas! Though we know in our hearts that we are a complete family and the name change is a formality, we truly are so eager to complete this process. We want to go on with life as a family of 4 minus all the extra people and scrutiny! At the same time, we recognize that our wait is very short and has been filled with much less uncertainty in comparison to most people that chose to adopt through the foster care system. On that note, we have experienced such joy in witnessing 3 families who have deeply touched our lives and encouraged us in our adoption process finalize adoptions over the last couple of months! We have seen God work through the beautiful process of adoption to change these lives forever! Therefore, we are encouraged to wait on Him to move in our situation as well because He is so very good to us! Thank you all for your love, encouragement, and most of all your prayers!

P.S.: This clearly should have been 2 separate posts so thanks for hanging in there with me!