Josh's AWANA Award

Tonight was award's night for AWANA at church. Josh has been in AWANA for the past four years, since it started at our church. I was a leader the last three years, but took this year off. Kevin has worked in AWANA for the past four years.

Tonight Josh got a book award for finishing the first T&T book. He is pretty far along in the second book and we are hopeful he will feel the need to work on it over the summer so he can start the new year (his last) nearly finished and ready to start book three.

Here are some photos of him receiving his award.

I have to preface this picture by saying, he really wanted me to get this picture quick because they were about to dismiss for cookies/punch and he always likes to be at the beginning of the line -- thus, the silly look. Check out the hair -- he cut it HIMSELF this week. Needless to say, we have an appointment for a real haircut on Wednesday. *smile* At least he's not a dull kid, huh? It's one of the things I love the very most about him!!

After the awards ceremonies, there was a punch and cookie reception. We thought it funny that Ellie's hair flower matched the centerpieces on the tables.

Eons ago, I posted a picture of me with "my girls" from AWANA at our baby shower for Ellie. Well several of "my girls" (Michaela, Rebecca and Mikayla) were serving at the reception tonight and I got to take pictures of them with Ellie. Because they couldn't agree on a photo, we took one of each of them holding Ellie and I'm posting all three. You can decide which you like best. LOVE my girls!!! Watching them grow into the young women they are becoming has been a beautiful process and I'm so glad I've gotten to be a small part of their lives.

And, last, but not least, here is Ellie with her balloon. It was her favorite thing all night!

Huh???

I love reading how people come to find my blog (using Feedjit), but this one has me confused and struck me as funny.

Someone searched for: "baseball oreos 1st home game" and ended up on a post I wrote about Josh's first baseball game this year.

Now... do you think they were looking for the ORIOLES? or maybe a team that served OREOS at their games? I'm just confused. Feel free to enlighten me with your ideas.

Makes You Wonder ...

Let me start by saying that as a rule we don't eat white bread at our house. We gave up white bread a LONG time ago, so I'm not sure how we came about having a loaf of B*nny Bre*d in the house. To be honest, the few times I've bought white bread, I've bought the 35 calorie "healthy" kind. But, regardless, we had a loaf. Today, I finally threw the last of the loaf away and I realized that I've had that loaf for weeks and weeks (no joke, probably three weeks) and it STILL hadn't molded. I know that no one has eaten any of it for a while -- probably the last person was me as I'm really fond of PB&J on white bread.

So... it just made me wonder exactly what kinds of preservatives they are using in that stuff and if maybe I could get some to help stop my gray hair and wrinkles -- it seems to work to stop mold. I'm just saying . . .

Church Dress & Mommy's Helper

Ellie had the cutest little dress on for church today. I wanted to capture how cute she was here. I took a bazillion of pictures but she was in NO MOOD to have her picture made. I found two that were acceptable.

Shortly after this, we took her clothes off and she ate and as I started to clean the kitchen, I thought she was going to bruise her knees she was crawling so fast to come "help" with the dishes in the dishwasher. It was so funny I had to take a picture. She just climbed right on up!

Sunday Nap

Sundays are a great time for naps, aren't they? I've been busy, busy, busy today getting housework caught up and Kevin said he would sit and hold Ellie while she napped because everytime he put her down she screamed bloody murder. I was putting Ellie's winter clothes away and getting her spring/summer clothes hung up and generally cleaning her room so I guess I lost track of time. I came downstairs to find this pile of sweetness on the couch.

Let's not tell Kevin that I posted these of him sleeping with his remote control in his hand, ok? *smile*

Water Fun!!

It was 80+ degrees here yesterday and Josh was again working on his "fort" (more photos of the finished product to come -- maybe tomorrow) and was getting pretty hot. Ellie and I were in the yard, she crawling, me just sitting and resting, when Josh came up and said, "Can I go put on my swim trunks and put on Ellie's bathing suit and you could spray us with the hose pipe?" Too many times in his life I have to (or choose to, I suppose) say no, so this seemed like a nice time to get to say yes. I thought of several reasons why I shouldn't (Ellie might get too cold, it would make a muddy mess in the yard, blah, blah), but it actually sounded like it might be fun!

So we went in, got them changed and headed out for the water hose. At first Ellie wasn't too sure about it, but when I turned the hose on the "mist" setting, she really liked it. She didn't really like the water dripping from her hair into her eyes (much like her mama). She cackled laughing when Josh would sling water from his hair on her or wring his shirt out on her. It didn't take long though before she got tired, rubbing her eyes and ready for her afternoon 45 minute siesta.

Here are some cutie pix from yesterday.

Sweet Moment

Yesterday we were in the car and Ellie was in the backseat with her books and toys. I heard her sneeze and then she giggled. It was the funniest thing. I turned to look at her and she was just giggling. I suppose sneezing was funny to her.

Then, a few minutes later I heard her babbling. She had a book in her lap, was leaned over close to it pointing at something and was alternating between babbling and giggling. It was the sweetest thing and I just wanted to record it here to remember it one day.

One Year Ago Today

... we saw this little face for the first time.

That little bundle of sweetness has metamorphosized into a sweet bundle of energy that we all love. I still remember getting the call while I was on my way to Atlanta to work and turning around and driving all the way back home because we promised to all be together when we got the referral. To see that post, go here and here. What a difference a year can make!

And, to be honest, I think being back a year ago might not be so bad considering the fact that the transmission blew up in my car today as I was driving down the interstate. More on that later, but suffice it to say, it has not been the best day. *unhappy face*

My Day

This is a perfect photo to describe my day (work related anyway). There was a lot of this going on with me today related to work. Sometimes I love my job -- sometimes, I really don't like it. Today was one of those days.

And Ellie's new nickname? Drama mama. The above photo represents what we've been seeing a lot of lately. I'm hopeful it's a short "phase". Her favorite thing to do is to get on the floor, put her booty in the air, lay her head on her hands and just sob. It's so pitiful that it's almost funny. Everything hurts her feelings, but mostly it's when she wants you to pick her up and you don't. This is not quite the pose, but she's getting ready to be there. The prostrate pose is followed by sitting back on her legs and bouncing up and down while crying. Oh, the drama of it all. I'll try to catch it on video. I want to use it to show her one day.

Busted!

Maybe these should be my Wordless Wednesday photos?

Working Boy

Josh has just amazed me at his ability to "build". Now, I've known since he was small that his strongest abilities lay in hands-on things. From the time he was little he was building dams to divert water -- things a child his age shouldn't have been able to comprehend, let alone do. Now, he has decided to build him a "fort" for the ditch where the kids play. He took lots of scrap lumber we had from shelves we took down and he has taken them apart, sawed them, hammered them, painted them and continues to build on our back deck. He has no plan to go by, pretty much no help (although DeeDee helped him saw on Mother's Day and Kevin has helped him hammer some) and has come up with this all by himself. He is still working on it, so I don't have a photo of the finished product, but I will soon. Here are some of him in process. I am so amazed by this boy. I can't imagine what his future holds, but I know it will be really cool to watch!

Mother's Day and Ellie's Dedication

I'm WAY PAST DUE on this post, but Kevin is finally home and I can do something other than hold sweet Ellie. She is feeling much better and has slept better and ate better the last few days. Today is day 5, so I suspect we are at the end of this round. Hopefully, she can have a good long run of good health for a while now.

On to the fun...

Mother's Day was wonderful. We had Ellie's dedication at church and despite being sick, she was a really good (albeit wiggly) baby. MeeMee and DeeDee had her dress made for the day, and she was just beautiful. It was a sweet ceremony and such a wonderful time to be at church celebrating the One who gave her to us.

And here are some "close-ups" of her trying on her dress the day before. Josh would ask you to ignore him in these. *smile* He was our "make sure she doesn't fall" guy.

One shoe on; one shoe off

This dress and hat reminded me so much of the kids we saw in Flamingo Park while we were in Kyrgyzstan. I remember taking pictures of them wearing their little crocheted hats. Here is one of them. I kept thinking how excited I was to bring Ellie home and have a little hat like that for her. And, here we are.

The day before Mother's Day, we went to visit Grandmother at her Mother's Day Social at the nursing home. We had a nice time there as well. Ellie had already begun to feel poorly though and I hope she didn't share her "love" with Grandmother. I don't think so as I haven't heard any reports that she is feeling poorly. My understanding is that this is primarily a "little kids" issue and that most adults have already had it, therefore developing immunity to it. They took a wonderful picture of all of us together so when I get it, I'll post it here. I think it's the first picture we've had of all four of us (Grandmother, Mama, Me and Ellie) together so I'm excited to get it.

MeeMee and Ellie

Grandmother opening her gifts

Nana and Ellie

Poor Ellie

I know some of you were expecting a post on Ellie's dedication at church yesterday and a lovely Mother's Day post -- ha! Well, I would rather be posting that, and I will post it but not soon.

Saturday Ellie got a fever and was kind of lethargic. Sunday night she started crying and was inconsolable. I was on the phone with the doc's office four times through the night, thinking it was her ears again, but getting pretty much no help other than, "Motrin and Tylenol and make an appointment tomorrow". *sigh*

So, today, we were off to the doc's office again (you'll remember we were just there Friday and got an "all clear" on Ellie's ears). Turns out she doesn't have an ear infection this time -- thank goodness.

Instead, she has a viral infection that causes blisters in her mouth and throat. Poor baby is in pain!! Of course, since it's viral, we can only alternate Motrin/Tylenol every three hours and feed her cold things and make sure she gets plenty of liquid.

Kevin is working out of town and last night Ellie and I got about 2-3 hours of sleep the entire night as she spent the rest of the night screaming. I'm hopeful tonight will be better, but doc indicates this is a 5-6 day virus. Yay. I feel so bad for her -- I wish I could make it better for her.

Looking Back . . .

I spent a little time this morning looking back over the posts from the first part of May. In particular I was looking for a Mother's Day post that talked about how I felt on Mother's Day last year. I thought I had written a post indicating how hard it was for me to be in church on Mother's Day and how I had really, really wanted our referral before then, but that even if I never had another child, I would be satisfied with the one I had and consider him a blessing.

Interestingly enough, as much as I remember those feelings vividly, I didn't find such a post. My Mother's Day post was pretty bland and the posts surrounding adoption talk were pretty factual. I'm sad, now, that I didn't write was I was really feeling during that day. I still remember it though, it was so powerful.

However, I look backward from a year's perspective and see that God had that referral ready and it came, instead of before Mother's Day, a sweet three days later. And now, a year later, we get to celebrate the sweetest Mother's Day by knowing that tomorrow Ellie's life will be dedicated and that we will promise in front of our church family and God to raise her to know Jesus. What a sweet blessing to get to do that on a day that only one year ago was so emotionally hard.

I think the lesson here for me (and maybe others who choose to embrace it) is that no matter how low we feel like our lives are, how far into despair we feel we have been cast, God is sitting from a place where he can see the whole picture and not just one day. If He has, like in our case, made a promise to you, He will fulfill it -- in His time, not ours. His blessings are rich, and we are an impatient lot. I'm sure He gets as frustrated with us as I do my kids sometimes. *smile* I am so thankful that He continues to love me in my sin and impatience, and that He has entrusted me with the lives of two children who are so very, very special to me.

Faces

This afternoon, as Josh and Kevin were throwing the ball in the yard I took some pix of them. When I was looking through them I was struck at all the crazy faces Josh was making. Check them out:

And, just for good measure, here is one of Kevin:

And, last, but not least, the "Big Lug", Bear, who came out to supervise: