You Know You're An Adoptive Parent When...

1. The fact that there are 143 million children without a parent to kiss them goodnight has made you lose sleep.
2. You know DNA has nothing to do with love and family.
3. You spend free time surfing blogs about families who have experienced the miracle of adoption.
4. If drives you crazy when people ask you about your child's 'real' parents.
5. You've been 'pregnant' with your adoptive child longer than it takes an elephant to give birth (2 years!).
6. You have taken an airplane ride half-way around the world to meet your child whom you've only seen in photos.
7. You believe God's heart is for adoption.
8. You know what the word 'Dossier' means and can actually pronounce it!!!
9. You realize that welcoming a child into your heart and family is one of the most important legacies you could ever leave.
10. You have welcomed a social worker into the most intimate, personal and private parts of your lift.
11. You shutter when people say your child is so lucky that you adopted them, knowing full well you are the blessed one to have him or her in your life.
-Author Unknown-

Jami's Photography!!

Jami is a photographer, did I forget to mention that?? I have a few of the pictures she took of us but she will be sending me more. I will post them and the one's of Kate's family. They turned out really good. If you need some good pictures taken and you're in the Houston area, let me know and I will give you her contact information!! She's fabulous and I love the candid pictures and getting them outside instead of sitting in some studio with a staged smile!! She's coming back to see us when we get Laila and taking all of her pictures, I can't wait!!
Here's one she took of us with Gabbi, I love the smiles, not staged, just genuine happiness!! Can't wait to show you the rest of them...

Fun weekend with Jami and family

We had a GREAT weekend!! My best friend Jami, her hubby Nathan and their little girl Gabbi came for a visit!! Jami and I grew up together in Boulder but she now lives outside of Houston and I miss her tons. It was great to see her and Nathan again and see how much Gabbi has grown and how smart she is!! They got here on Thursday but Scott and I were working so my SIL Kate met them at the airport, they needed our carseat!! They spent the rest of the day Thursday visiting friends in Boulder. Jami's sweet mom Barb passed away last September and Jami has spread Barb's ashes at different places that had special meaning to Barb. Boulder is one of them. Friday morning Jami, Nathan and Gabbi went to Boulder to spread some of the ashes. They chose a beautiful area up Flagstaff Mountain, it's got beautiful views of Boulder.

Later Friday afternoon we all headed downtown and had dinner with my dad. Jami lived with my family for a year during high school so she's like a sister to me and a daughter to my dad.

Here's the family at Maggiano's in Denver.
Here's Miss Gabbi... she's such a cutie and sweet!! This is Gabriella Ann and my niece is Gabrielle Anna!! Good thing we call her Gabbi!! On Saturday we also went to the Rocky Mountain Balloon Festival at Chatfield Lake but I didn't take my camera and I forgot to get some off Jami's camera. I will add those later. They left for home Sunday morning. We were sad to see them go but we're already looking forward to our visit when we get Laila!!

Royal Gorge, good times and SNOW!!!

Hi everyone!! We had a great weekend!! Kate, Guy, Nick, Gabrielle, Scott and I left on Friday for the Royal Gorge. We had a cabin at the Jellystone Park in Canon City, just down the road from the Royal Gorge. This is a great place for kids!! There are hay rides with Yogi although it rained the whole weekend so we couldn't take advantage of this. They do have a kid movie every night, they had a clown doing face painting and a little carnival. This was the view from our cabin, not too shabby!!Here's Scott and Gabs outside the cabin. We got there mid-day on Friday and just explored around the campground, grilled dinner and lit our campfire and had smores.


Kate and Guy, you can't tell from the picture but this is outside around the campfire. Nick standing on a big rock while it rains.

Me and my very handsome nephew. The next day it was on to the Royal Gorge. Let me explain to you that I am scared of heights. Maybe terrified is a better word. I do go across the bridge but it's in the middle, I look just in front of me, walk very fast and don't move out of the way for anyone. I probably appear very rude but if I move out of the middle and see how high I am I would puke. Here are some pictures of the others actually enjoying the bridge... (Kate had my camera)

As you can tell, it was cold and rainy.
This is looking down at the Arkansas River under the bridge. We were able to see some buffaloes, elk and big horn sheep, of course they were behind a fence.The rain stopped and the clouds cleared long enough for Scott and Guy to ride the Sky Coaster. Kate and I did make sure their life insurance policies were paid up to date!!Here they are strapped in and getting raised up. They then released themselves and flew out across the gorge!!! They reach speeds of 50mph doing this crazy thing!!
Yes, that's them!! INSANE!!!!


We then took the vertical train down the side of the mountain and that's the bridge up above us. Amazing!! We also went thru their old west town, rode the carousel and train and just had a great time. We went back to the cabin and went to the carnival, had dinner and had another fire. The fire didn't last long, it started pouring again and it was cold!! Sunday morning we had breakfast and packed up. We decided to go up Pikes Peak mountain on the way home. Well, we couldn't go all the way up, there was too much snow, the road was closed at mile 13. We went up as high as we could and there was SNOW!! I love Colorado, where else do you see snow in August???The view on the way up... beautiful!!Scott and I on the way up Pikes Peak.Nick and I in the SNOW!! Hope you all had a great weekend, we sure did!! Next weekend will be another great one!! My BFF from junior high, Jami, her husband Nathan and daughter Gabbi are coming to visit!! We can't wait to see them!! Come on Thursday!!!

How to leave a comment...

I've had alot of people ask me how to leave a comment on the blog so I'm gonna tell you!! Under each blog posting it says "comments", click on this. You will now be on a different page. In the "Leave your Comments" box, leave your comments!! Next it says "word verification", type the letters or word in the box that are above the box. Then you need to "choose an identity". If you have a blogger or google (gmail) account click on Google/Blogger and enter your username and password. Otherwise click on "Open ID". Leave the top part on OpenID and under that leave your name. Then click on "Publish your Post". If you have any other questions about how to do this please e-mail me!!

Can you handle the cuteness??

We've had Laila's room painted and the furniture for quite a while, we wanted to show our social worker we were serious about adopting so we wanted a nursery. Well, I've been wanting to do things a little differently and my sister in law, Kate, was just the kick in the butt I needed. I said I didn't think we had time to finish it and she said, "oh yeah we do" and she was right!! 2 days of work and this is the result... it's beautiful and and we LOVE it!!
That's Kate, tapeing and measuring the stripes. The nursery is a light lilac and we did stripes of a darker lilac and light yellow.These are the stripes, we added new white baseboards and a white chair rail and it's ADORABLE!!! We learned how to make mitered corners also!! The final product... I'm in love. We have her dresser with the cute lamp, her crib with her stuffed bear waiting for her, a changing table with the diaper genie and her glider where mommy and daddy will rock her to sleep. We still have a few finishing touches... I have letters that spell her name that I will paint and hang from the wall with ribbon, I have her special quilt that I will hang and I'm getting some sheers that will go over the wood blinds on her window. I will post pictures when it's entirely finished but this is pretty close!! And how can I have a post about cuteness and not show off Nick and Gabrielle, these are recent pictures of them. Please excuse the TV show in the background of Gabs picture, I'm addicted to What Not to Wear!! Hope you have a great week, we're heading for the mountains and Royal Gorge Friday!!

Pops

This blog is about my Pops... I'm so fortunate that he's my dad!! My biological dad died when I was 5 in a car accident. We lived in Colorado Springs at the time and about a year after the death my mom joined PWP, Parents Without Partners. At one of their social gatherings she met Dennis (Pops) and they married about 9 months later. Pops lived in Boulder, CO, so we moved to Boulder and he adopted my brother and I. I grew up with a wonderful family, a protective big brother and parents who loved my unconditionally and showed that love every day. Now Pops is retired and living in a high-rise condo in downtown Denver. He has a great life and really enjoys himself. Last week Pops' best friend from 2nd grade, Bert, came to visit. Bert lived in San Diego for many many years and recently moved to Scottsdale, Az. Bert came up for a class reunion for Boulder High School last Friday. They had a great time!! They have done various things around town and just really enjoy each others company. One night last week Scott and I went downtown and had dinner with Pops and Bert. I took a few pictures which I will share with you.

This is my Pops!! He is so excited for Laila!! He has grandchildren from his 1st marriage but they live in Germany and he doesn't get to see them as often as he'd like. Laila will be his 1st grandchild he can see on a daily basis and really be part of her childhood and we are so happy about that!! She's gonna have a fabulous grandpa and be one lucky little girl!!

This is Bert. He's really funny and we love him!! Now that he lives in Scottsdale we won't need to stay at a hotel when we go to baseball's Spring Training. Get the spare room ready Bert, we'll be there in March, hopefully with Laila!!

Here's Pops and Bert. They are now in Scottsdale for a few days then will go to San Diego and stay with Bert's daughter for a few more days before Pops flys back home on Thursday. He is then staying at our house and watching his furry granddaughters while Scott and I go to the Royal Gorge with Kate, Guy, Nick and Gabrielle.

Did anyone watch the Opening Ceremonies for the Olympics?? It was magical and so impressive, I was awe-struck!! It's so neat to see all of this happening in Laila's home country and will be fun to see it when we go to China!!

Take care everyone and we'll talk again. Thanks for visiting our blog and don't forget to leave a message, we love to read them!!

I love this blogging stuff!!

I can tell I will become addicted to this!! The hardest part is actually deciding what to write... alot of people will be reading this and I don't want to be a dork!! This post will have alot of different things in it, a hodge-podge if you will. The question we get asked the most is, "When will you get Laila?" That's a good question and I wish we knew. We THINK we will have our referral for Laila by Christmas, possibly sooner. What a great Christmas present that would be!! We will travel to China about 2 months after our referral for 2 weeks and come home with our daughter!! A friend of ours who I work with, Sandra, made this quilt for Laila and we think it's beautiful!! My mom-in-law, Norma, helped me pick out the fabrics and I'm very grateful for her help. We love our quilt. Luckily we have many blankets and another quilt for Laila to actually use so this will probably be a pretty and eventually end up in a chest.

Last summer our brother-in-law, Guy got a job here, yeah!! That means Scott's sister, Kate, Guy and the kids, Nick age 9 and Gabrielle, age 2 moved here and we are so happy!! They lived with us for about 9 months and then in May bought a house only a few blocks from us. We are really enjoying watching the kids grow and just being close to family. Last Thursday Gabrielle turned the big 2. She's a ham and absolutely adorable. She's talking more and more everyday and I love watching her vocabulary expand, reminds me to watch my vocabulary. :o) Here are a few pictures from her birthday party last Friday.

This picture doesn't do justice, she looks mad or something but she's actually saying cheese for the camera. Whenever she sees a camera she says cheese so this is the look for the pictures.

Here she is again, I'm gonna post another picture from before she said cheese all the time cause she is a cutie!!

Go Avs!!

Here she is, what a cutie!!

Here's my nephew Nick and my hubby Scott. Nick is going to be taking guitar lessons and was showing off his new guitar. It's very nice and he's excited. Nick is the sweetest little boy and he's wicked funny. He's letting his hair grow a little longer because it's a girl magnet!! What a ladies man!! His dad is proud, so is his uncle!!

I just think this picture is so cute of Nick!! He had just lost his 2 front teeth and was so proud!!

Gus, on the left, is our nephew pug and Cassie, on the right, is our niece pug. We love them.

One more thing... I need to give a HUGE thank you to my friend Kelsey. She helped me put together our blog and I couldn't have done it without her help!! Thank you Kelsey!! Her blog is on the left and it's really cute! She and her husband Mike, my work husband, have 3 year old twin boys and a 5 year old girl so it's always fun to keep up with their family.

There's tons more I could add but I will save it for another day. Check back often, I will be adding more!!

Here it is... our blog!!

Welcome to our blog!! We are excited you're following along on our journey to Laila. We thought we'd do a quick update on those you know and love and will be hearing alot about!!

Here we are, the parents to be!! We've been happily married for 7 years and not an itch in sight!! We are thrilled that we will be blessed with our beautiful little girl from China and can't wait to meet her!! We are already head over heels in love with Laila!!

This is Mia, our crazzzy puppy!! She's hysterical!! We've never met a dog with a personality like hers. She is excited for her little sister, it will mean more faces to lick and more toys to chew on. Mom and Dad can hardly wait!!

This is Zoey, our sweet doggie. She's a big lover and if you're anywhere around her you will somehow end up petting her. It's amazing how she makes that happen, maybe with your foot, leg, whatever, she doesn't care but you will pet her, she makes sure of that!! She is daddy's girl so it will be interesting when daddy has a new girl!!