Thanksgiving con't

Ok these are all the pics I wanted to include in my Thanksgiving post, but had technical difficulties. Brian saved the day so I could share the cuteness some more.

Love the look on her face here. 

She was such a good poser for once!

Don't you want to eat him up?!

Love this picture of the kids with Grandma and Grandpa. The kids have funny looks on their faces but at least they were looking!!

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving 2013

This year Thanksgiving was spent with Brian's side of the family. It was a beautiful Thanksgiving weekend to be in the woods at his dad's house. The table was set beautifully with tons of delicious food. Brian's dad is a really good cook and did a fabulous job!

My brother-in-law, Lance, took the turkey frying job and what a job he did! We all commented on it being the best fried turkey we have had. Oh I can still taste it! So moist and yummy.

Natalie had a wonderful time because there were dogs! This child is obsessed, people.  She asked 101 times to go outside to see the puppies. Amos and Patton (sister-in-law's dogs) just loved all the attention though! She kept telling me to take a picture of her with each puppy. Some were more cooperative than others=)

She also enjoyed Daddy pulling her around in the wagon.

My father-in-law has a new pond at his place and Natalie thoroughly enjoyed going down to feed the fish or throw rocks in the water. I think she had the most fun watching the dogs swim in the ice cold water!

When we weren't outside, we were finding ways to entertain inside since they were still sick kids.  A nice big box did the trick for awhile. These are always more fun than what came in it anyway, right?

Aunt Michelle got Natalie a bracelet to decorate for her birthday so we saved it for a Thanksgiving project they could do together. Too fun!

As you learned in the post about Joaquin's 10 month pictures, he doesn't sit still or cooperate AT ALL when it comes to pictures so we have quite the collage of bloopers=)  Natalie was finally posing so well with a nice big smile AND was looking at us but the little stink just wouldn't.

Poor girl just has her hands full with her little brother! ha! I love her annoyed looks in these photos.  She tried so hard to contain him.

This is a great pic of Brian and his mom with the kids aside from JZ. Poor thing just wasn't feeling well at all. None of us slept well over this "break"

My sweet pea! She was in a rare" pose for the camera" mood this day!

I have a few more pics but my computer is not allowing me to download them correctly so maybe they will come later. 

We had a wonderful time with family this year. Brian and I were most thankful for the date night they allowed us Friday to eat at my favorite Hibachi place, Fujis! Oh how wonderful it was. I was also thankful for the day of shopping with Michelle. It was a much needed day out for me. And we got a lot of shopping done which is also much needed!

10 month pics

Oh my! This boy is a fun-loving 10 month old, but he is wearing me out. Just taking these monthly pictures stresses me out lately. He will not sit still for any millisecond of time as you can see. He is either eating the plate, pushing it off, pulling off his sticker, eating his sticker, rolling over or just plain leaping off the couch. I mean seriously. It's comically frustrating. I finally decided I didn't care if I got one picture with the plate & shirt showing AND him looking at me. And just forget trying to get him to show off his teeth.  He has 7 of them, by the way! At this point, NJ had 2=)

Look how nicely she is holding her plate and looking at mommy. Girls are so calm. Boys are so not!

This month he has had a lot of new personality traits come out. He loves to play peek-a-boo and hide behind curtains or blankets draped over something. He will get behind it and wait on me to say, "Where's Joaquin?"  Then he will peek out from behind it grinning so big. It's quite precious!  He will even try to put a blanket over his face to play. 

He is walking behind his little push car and stroller very nicely now. He wasn't real interested at first, but now he feels so free!  He is getting a little more brave when he lets go of something and can stand unassisted for a couple seconds or more.

When Joaquin gets tired he brings his arm up by his nose and rubs it ever-so-lightly. Or he just holds it there by his nose for a bit. When I'm rocking him he does the same. It's like he is saying, "Whew what a day."  What he doesn't know is that I am saying the same thing!

Sleep. He fights it hard still. I feel like I'm in a wrestling match most times. The newest thing is putting him down. He will be asleep until he touches the bed and then, BAM!, eyes wide open and crying. I will do this at least 3 times for nap or bedtime and it is maddening! I've shed a few (or many) tears over this taking so long and me not having ANY time to do anything.

He still loves to eat and has tried a few table foods like bananas, avocados, mashed potatoes and carrots.  He still throws a fit every time he is put in his high chair but adding Cheerios to our repertoire has helped immensely.  The boy just loves to eat.

Unfortunately for me and all others trying to care for him, he is still "momma clingy."  The other night he screamed and screamed while he was in the kitchen with me (I was trying to fix dinner). The minute second I picked him up he stopped. Ugh!

Thank goodness for that sweet face and bashful smile he gives so freely! Love this precious gift, but he is giving me a run for my money=)

Holiday Happenings

While with family this weekend, my sister-in-law asked me what traditions we were starting with our kids, and that got me to thinking about my list I made last year. I haven't shared this year's (hopeful) Holiday Happenings so here goes!

1. Brian's work party at a local restaurant

2. Christmas Concert Date Night at Verizon Theatre to see 'The Tour' with Christian artists. I'm super excited about this!  Each year I want to do something "Christmasy." We've done The Nutcracker, Trans-Siberian Orchestra & the Dallas Symphony. Did I mention FREE babysitting thanks to my folks?!

3. Loading the family up to hunt down our favorite Christmas tree at the local farm. My folks will be helping us out with this one since I have a gimp hubby this year. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

4. Helping out at a local church ministry for Foster Families

5. Making 3 dozen Christmas cookies for our adoption agency to deliver to Pregnancy Resource Centers they partner with

6. Local high school Christmas Band concert for Natalie to enjoy (and maybe JZ).

7. Another date night thanks to our wonderful church for providing FREE childcare for 3 hours for our Sunday School class. We will be using FREE movie tickets earned by my husband for his hard work as an engineer. Thank you, L-3!

8. Visiting The North Pole of Texas in a city nearby. We wanted to go last year and never put it on the calendar so it never happened. This year it is scheduled! Check it out. www.northpoleoftexas.com

9. Christmas light looking around the area with cookies and milk!

10. Possibly a day of Christmas crafting with a sweet friend and her two precious kiddos.

11. Christmas Baking Day Tradition with friends.

12. New Year's Eve will be spent with friends and 7 kids! 

How will you be spending your holidays?

Fall cuteness

I was trying to snap some super cute backyard photos of my precious little ones. That proved to be more difficult than I initially thought. I mean I expected some resistance but good heavens! Between JZ eating the pumpkin, grabbing at the scarecrow, crawling away and looking randomly to the skies the whole time, I was a bit annoyed. Then there was the wind knocking the scarecrow over and the dogs playing tag right in front of us that nearly sent me over the edge. So this is what I got, folks. At least they were smiling=) I had to get Natalie to tickle him because the boy was giving me nothing.

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em right? I figured I would toss the dogs in for a photo. Ha! You know how that goes....

Birth Family

We were so blessed this year at Natalie's birthday to have her birth family join us! I couldn't believe how much fun Natalie had with them, especially the twins. They played and played together and were so sad to have to quit.  All the girls were snuggled up in similar blankets and we were trying to snag a good picture. However, trying to get this many silly girls to look at the same time with normal smiles was not next to impossible, it WAS impossible! We captured the moment anyway.

We were not about to let them leave without getting some good pictures. I have one more hole to fill in a frame of Natalie's upstairs so we were making this happen! Misty noted that this was the first good picture we've had in awhile. The last few have been after a day at the water park=/ That's not good for anyone!

This picture will be the one I put in Natalie's frame. We always want her to know she is loved by us both.

And this one is just priceless! This was the first time our families got to meet Misty and her girls. I was thrilled that both sides were there so, again, we had to capture this moment too.

How neat is this? What a memory!

Thanks for making the effort to be there, Misty. We love you guys!

The Doc Is In

The Party!

On October 27th my sweet baby girl turned 3 years old! I cannot believe she has already been in our lives for 3 years but what a blessing she has been. She's my helper, my buddy, my clown, my smarty-pants, and my first long-awaited gift from the Lord.  We celebrated her birthday the day before and had a great time. Last year she received a $5 consignment store doctor set and it was the beginning of an obsession. One year later, we still play with it at least 100x every.single.day. Therefore..........the Doc is IN! Thank you, Disney, Jr. for the precious little show Doc McStuffins! I'm going to break this party down for you because we only took a few (hundred) photos. Sheesh....

This is when she received her dress up gift and Doc shoes. We finally got a reaction from her and she was SO excited!

The Decorations

Adults had breakfast burritos & blueberry muffins and the kiddos had a cup of purple m&ms with a chocolate muffin on top.  It was a morning party so I went with a breakfast theme. Plus, NJ is not big on cake and icing, but she is on chocolate chip muffins! 

 As a side item they also had 'band-aids' make from sugar wafers and icing!

The Activities

When the guests arrived, they went to the red paper to make a door sign out of popsicle sticks that showed the doc in her clinic on one side and out on the other.  While that was happening, mom was giving the girls a check-up, getting their weight and height.  "Doc McNatalie" was of course there to assist her with some stethoscope work of her own! They each received a stat sheet to put in their "file."

Next up was the game! 

I paired a big kid up with a little kid for this one. Each team had a character from the show to operate on.  In their bags they had doctor supplies and the outside of the bag had instructions on what to do with those supplies (hence the big kids being a buddy)! 

1. Put a stethoscope on Stuffy's neck.

2. Put a bandaid on Doc's leg

3. Put cotton balls on Hallie's ears.

I explained the game and made sure the big kids knew to let the little kids do as much of the work as possible.

This is when NJ shut down on me. She wanted nothing to do with this game. Therefore, we snapped a whole lot of pictures of her friends having fun with the game!

They all worked really well with their buddies. I was so impressed. I do think little Miss Audrey had the most fun though=)

The Birthday

The Gifts

Natalie got such a wide variety of gifts; it was so much fun!  I think her favorite of the day was one of her cards, not a gift! She opened it and it sang, "Bow wow wow yippee yo yippy yay" She didn't want to put it down. We all got a good laugh from her reaction!

She got her gifts from Grandma and Grandpa once the party died down and folks were gone.....a bag of new books, new clothes, new boots and a game for her computer!

The Friends

Really wish we could have gotten one big group photo of the kids, but it was way too chaotic for that.  Once the gifts had been opened the kids had a blast outside between the trampoline, dogs, tractor, sand box, etc. It was fun to watch them all enjoy themselves. We were so very thankful that the Lord held off the rain. It was perfect weather.

The Party Favors
The party ended with favors for all! Since we had such a wide range of ages at her party I had two separate favors for the bigs and littles.

The littles got a bag with a big book of boo boos, a red pen, doctor stickers, and a doctor set.  Along with that they received their files complete with their check up sheet, Doc McStuffins coloring sheets, and a checkup sheet for their stuffed animals.

The big kids received a purple journal and special matching pen.

The party was a big hit and we are so blessed to call all of these people friends! 

The best part of her party this year was that her birth family got to be there for the first time. Looking forward to posting those pics soon......

Pumpkin Patch 2013

Look at these babies growing up!

And then I uncovered this picture and realized NJ hasn't grown much in a year! At least in height anyway, but look at that hair. Wow it has gotten long!

This year we went out to the Pumpkin Patch in Flower Mound. I had heard from a few different friends that this one was really nice and fairly large so I wanted to check it out.  But I should warn you that there is a knock-off PP right next to the real one is Flower Mound and we were tricked! We turned in and paid our $5 for parking before we realized they weren't connected and we turned into the wrong one! I was furious. We stayed about 5 minutes, then loaded up and went a few yards down and got to the good one.

Fortunately we did capture a couple of good pics in that 5 minutes. Natalie was smiling AND looking at the camera.  We will work on JZ later!

The weather was 20 degrees cooler in Flower Mound than Royse City. We were not 100% prepared but I was thankful I randomly tossed in a blanket. I couldn't complain because it was perfect pumpkin pickin' weather!

This place had a ton (seriously, a ton) of cartoon cut-outs! I spared you and just showcased the best three. Your welcome.  Unfortunately for us, Barney has made a resurgence at our house and she wants to watch the same episode over and over and over, so she was thrilled to see him at the Pumpkin Patch. Can't you tell?

And this cutie just warms my heart with that little squishy face!

After our walk through the cutouts we set out to play in the hay maze, pumpkin field, hay ride and train ride. I told you this place was fun. Made me feel like a kid again!

Natalie really liked the pumpkin house.  We told her she could look around and pick one pumpkin, the perfect pumpkin. It took 5 seconds. She walked in, grabbed one and said here. Ha! Cracked me up.  Funny enough she picked a really nice one.  

Once Joaquin got to stand up in front of Brian on the little train ride, he was all smiles. The ladies standing to the side were having a fit over him.

And how could you not have a fit over this?! Gosh, he's cute.

We attempted a few family shots because we really needed an updated photo, but as you can see they weren't perfect. Not sure what the kids were looking at in that middle photo. Natalie was trying to be helpful and get Joaquin to look, but that irritated him and then she wasn't looking.  And the pic in front of the pumpkin house was great except that she was leaning over with a hand near her face. Oh well!

The 2013 Pumpkin Patch was a success and I would definitely go back to this one!

MOSAIC Update

It has been so neat to see God's hand in this ministry.  We have two very exciting events coming up in the next couple of months. On October 13th we are hosting Kim Brown, Director of House of Love. The House of Love is a home for the women and children of Thailand affected by HIV/AIDS.  Many of these were sold into prostitution, orphaned or otherwise ostracized by the Thai government. She is only in Texas for a week, and we are thrilled to be able to have her with us for an afternoon.

Our next event is on Orphan Sunday, November 3rd!  We have two incredible guest speakers coming to share more about foster care and how we, as believers, are called to care for them.  We have had several families express interest in learning more about foster care, but none of our Mosaic leadership members have much experience with it so we have set it aside up until now.  Through a series of really random connections (that only God could weave together) between two of my friends (who don't even know each other), I was led to two ladies:  Emma Casselton and Lauren Hudgeons.

Emma Casselton is currently the Administrator of James 1 Ministry out of FBC Greenville.  She is a retired Foster Adoption Specialist from the state of Texas and is a wealth of knowledge! 

 Lauren Hudgeons (http://webpages.charter.net/adoptionsforhisglory) is a local prosecuting attorney and practices law in the areas of adoption, wills, and probate administration.  Both ladies are passionate about their jobs and the care of orphans.  They will be teaming up to share their experiences and answer questions about Foster Care.  But above all, they are believers using their God-given talents to care for "the least of these."  I am more than excited about this event as I have seen God's hand directly moving!  I will begin praying now for the Lord to move in the hearts of our church members to join us in finding out how we can help care for those that need it.

7/8 months

I just realized that I never posted Joaquin's 7 month pics and stats and here it is 8 months (nearing 9). Guess I'd better get with it.

When I was looking back at pictures I remembered why I never posted these.......I was taking these with only the help of my trusty assistant....Natalie. She was about as much help as the Tazmanian Devil, and Joaquin was a royal pain. I was frustrated because he wouldn't leave the darn plate alone and kept lunging off the couch so this is the best we got. Oh, and the whole number on the shirt thing: it doesn't even cover the picture behind it.  That's just ghetto. But I was determined to get the pics before too much time had passed. We were a hot mess=/

 Can ya feel me?

Let's move on to 8 months.

In the last two months this boy has changed so much. Maybe not with his looks, but definitely in his skills! At the middle of 7 months Joaquin started Army crawling. You know, arms dragging the body along while the feet help lunge you forward. That's him! He will get up on all fours, but the most steps from there has only been 1 or 2.  Well, that led promptly to him pulling up on things to his knees and boy did he feel big!

 






I was a tiny bit worried at how quiet he was, but was also trying not to compare him to my motor mouth girl! This month he finally started really babbling and talking to us and I love it! He is just the happiest little thing. He says ba-ba-ba, du-du-du, and ma-ma-ma all the time. No real words, but he smiles big when you talk back to him!

Eight months rolled around and he started pulling up now to his feet. This is scary because he hasn't mastered sitting back down without a crash. We've had some scares with the head=/

 

 JZ has started holding his bottle on his own which is glorious! He weighs just under 19 lbs making it very painful to hold him for a long period of time. He is now at the weight Natalie was at 1 year!
In the car he is able to see Natalie better and I love it when he laughs at her. He thinks she is the funniest, and Natalie, of course, eats it up. A little glimpse, I hope, into their relationship over the next lifetime!

I'm going to need a frame for this one!