WOW

All I can say today is Wow! We are currently at day 39 in our long wait for LOA. There were many LOA's that were recieved today and they had come in at days 67, 71 and 75!! It seems as if for now, things are picking up! We possibly could have our LOA in 28 more days EEKK!!
That moves our entire time table up that is for sure! We are just thrilled to be bringing home our son, dont get me wrong...I was just all set to wait my 90-100 days! Great news for sure...Gods Timing is always perfect, so I am just going to trust in that!

We are having a great Spring Break week with the kids (well 2 of them atleast)

Monsters vs Aliens was first on their list, so we headed over on Friday (opening day) It was cute and they really enjoyed it! Saturday was more soccer, haircuts and then we went up to Black Pines Animal Park. This is an animal sanctuary for retired circus animals and displaced exotic pets. We have a wonderful childrens zoo, but they dont have the "big" animals.

We were up close and personal with Lions, Tigers and Bears OH MY! Not to mention the bobcats, and lepoards. Since it was their first day open and rather cold it wasy pretty empty. We had a wonderful tour given by one of the workers and it was amazingly educational for us as well as the kids! It is a nonprofit group that has provided wonderful habitats for these animals that would otherwise be destroyed. All the big cats (tigers) would come when she called them by name and rub up against the cages to be petted...Amazing!! We got to see some more big cats in their winter habitats and we were really close enough to touch them! Not that we did of course
:-) They have a wonderful feeding tour in the summer that we cant wait to go back for, but Tim and I did get a bit of experience feeding the Ostrich there!!

Just so Sammy doesnt feel left out....

A new hobby...Kind of

Ok,
I like to scrapbook. Really I do, however I dont have time for it. I dont have time to crop each picture just so, to make multiple trips to the craft store or to clean up all the mess....But I LOVE the finished project! I have even managed to scrapbook 1 full album sucessfully and was thrilled with the result!

I have thought about digitally scrapbooking alot, even had photoshop until my puter crashed, but never have had the time to play with it.

Well tonight I downloaded the free sampler of photoshop elements and boy did I have some fun!! I created 2 pages in just a little while! Best of all..NO MESS! Woo Hoo!

This first one is just a simple one of Taylor since I am really missing her already...



This one is the kids as the weather got nice...to remind us to enjoy the simple things...



Neither of the pages are incredible, but hey I am just starting out! I just used free kits that I googled online. Unfortunately the choice of pictures I have is very slim since my puter crashed..but hope to rectify that by becoming quite a camera happy mommy for a while :-)

I would love to figure out how to make a header or background for my blog so any suggestions would be great!

Wordless Wednesday

2 more days

Just 2 more days and I am going to have to do something that is very difficult for me.

Taylor is my oldest daughter, my first baby and she is growing up! In 2 days I have to let her have her wings and go fly. She is off for spring break to H*lton Head Is. with a very good friends family. Tim and I know the family from church so we arent worried in that respect, but still. SHE. WILL. BE. GONE.

She is thrilled and I am excited for her, I certainly didnt have friends that wanted me to go on vacation with them when I was her age. She will be safe and have a wonderful time but I just worry.

Oh, I am trying not to, trying to put on a brave face and tell her how much fun she will have, take her shopping for a new swimsuit so she can soak up the rays ect...
It is just different, and hard...but will be a great experience for her!

Just say a prayer for both of us if you have time...I think I need it more than her.

Blessings
Amy

A favor please....

I need help from all you creative sorts out there. I have a plan for a new fundraiser that is coming together nicely! It will be a large raffle for many chances to win various brand new Vera Bradley bags. I have a great friend who happens to work for Vera and has offered the bags to me at her cost...So it is a great opportunity. I just need help from those of you who are tech savy enough to create me one of those cute buttons for others to put on their website. My poor family can only buy so many tickets..I need to get the word out somehow to make the raffle sucessful! Any creative people out there who are willing to help me...or just tell me how in very small easy to understand words ????


Also, I did get my 'puter back today..What a blessing that extended warranty was! I am now sporting a brand new harddrive that didnt cost me a penny! The downside is that it is quite empty as I cant even find our microsoft office program disk not to mention any of our pics! No spreadsheets for me..

Our weekend was great..the weather was gorgeous! The kiddos are really excited since Spring break starts on Friday! Tay is off to Hilton Head with a friends family and Tim, the younger 2 and I are still deciding what we will do (Tim and I have Thursday and Friday off) We had a busy day on Saturday with Y soccer for Zach...


and ISSMA for Taylor...



I had a meeting after church Sat night, so we were running most of our day. Sunday was a great..what a beautiful relaxing day. Enjoy the pics..

Having issues

Just wanted to write a quick post and whine to all of you!!

My computer crashed. I mean crashed, totally, completely...couldnt log in at ALL! I am currently sitting really low in my daughters papasan chair (her idea of a desk chair:-) using her computer. Not convienent..especially since she is NEEDING ?? to get on her f*cebook LOL.

If that wasnt so bad, I tried to fix it...I googled my problem and they told me to reinstall the original operating system. Ok, located the disks no problem, followed the instructions and got it going...well atleast it did something...However I must have missed the part that in doing that I would wipe away all my stuff!

My stuff like my PICTURES...my FILES...my SPREADSHEETS (even the one I keep for Rumor Queen) All that...GONE! Poof! I could just cry! All my pictures of Sammy, the kids birthdays ect....gone. I did have most of them developed, but still...
And to all of you who are asking...didnt you save them to disk??? Sadly the answer is NO! Dummy me, I even have a portable hard drive. Nope too lazy/busy to do all that work.

So the only bright side is that I bought the extended warranty on the laptop when I bought it....I dropped it off at best b*y to be fixed and it should be done soon so I wont have to compete with F*cebook time any more...not to mention I can get out of the chair easier....

Blessings,
Amy (lost my cute signature too.....:-()

Wordless Wednesday (kind of)

BOYS!!

Hmmm...Do any of you already know that I grew up with 2 sisters? Only 2 sisters? and that my first 2 children were girls right? Now the thing with girls is that I UNDERSTAND them. I can deal with high pitched shrieks, dress up clothes, nail polish, make up, Hannah Montana, craft projects, Diva theatrics and tea parties. I can also deal with tears, hurt feelings, meltdowns over not having the "right" accessory, or too many zits. All of those things I have no problem with. I understand cramps, pms, the NEED to go shopping, cravings for chocolate and general moodiness....I was a girl once upon a LONG time ago, and basically I GET IT! No problem.

HOWEVER, I learned something this weekend. Something very, very, important...

BOYS ARE DIFFERENT!


You would think that I would have figured this out by now. Now dont get me wrong... I LOVE Zach with all my heart, and boys are oh so special in their special snuggle time and what a great heart he has! I dont have the fuss over the clothes ect...it is great, he is such an awsome little dude. But...then I let him have his buddie spend the night!

Can I just say here, honestly I was a bit scared. Zach started off first thing in the morning jumping on the couch (NOT allowed) going "B is coming over B is coming over" As soon as he got here, they were off...wrestling, playing video games, playing army ect. I escaped with some Mom and Em time and instructed Tim to take them to the Y to wear the boys out so that they would go to sleep tonight. They were seriously wired!!

Came back and they had been swimming for over an hour and it was time to go to church...as they are totally running down the sidewalk and into the church :-) Pizza and Pop (caffeine free of course) was afterward and they wanted to watch ELF? Ok, thought christmas was over but.... hey it works for me

They totally picked up on every gross or slightly funny comment in the movie and parroted it through out. They had settled down though and I thought I was going to survive. You cannot imagine the mass chaos 2 little boys can make in a room!

Then the movie ended and somehow, they ended up wrestling with my hubby. Now I love my hubby very much but he is a 8 year old boy in a 6'2" body for sure. I swear they were swinging pillows, and "pummeling" my hubby and just wrestling with him and he was eating it up! I on the other hand was alternating between covering my eyes and going "Oh no!!" I did have to confiscate the 5 lb medicine ball that someone wanted to throw....Evidently, I learned that this is how boys play. Young/old doesnt matter...it has to be physical, loud, or sports orientated. This is what my hubby told me...along with "relax Amy"

This morning I awoke to 2 little boys weighted down with backpacks full of light sabers and nerf guns launching an attack....the corner by the tv was to be their base I heard!! I just pulled the covers over my head!

I smile as I write this since it really was cute. Were the boys out of control? Yes... Was I a bit stressed? Of course...but all in all....no one ended up with any broken bones or blood and they all had a ball (hubby included) This is what memories are made of...and I love to watch him play. I guess I didnt realize how different they are.

I learned ALOT this weekend. Yes Boys are different, and different can be scary...but also the difference taught me that I needed to relax and enjoy this stage..as chaotic as it is!! When we dropped off his friend Zach was beaming!! And later that day Zach still crawled into my lap for our special snuggle time and thanked me for letting his friend come over! So sweet and innocent and MUCH calmer.

I love my little boy and cant wait to bring home our other one soon. Different is good....besides, I have had quite enough of Hannah Montana anyway

Blessings

WOO HOO

We finally have a Logged in Date....Our LID is 2/19/09. We have officially been waiting for our LOA (letter of acceptance) for a whole 11 days so far! Only approximately 79 to go LOL....

Vickie emailed me on Friday to tell us and so of course we had to celebrate. Tim, Zach and I (the girls had other plans) went to Great Wall Chinese Buffet for dinner and then off to babys R us to start our shopping for necessities! I had so much fun looking at all the baby/toddler stuff and Tim and Zach had fun goofing off and teasing me :-)

I also worked on my packing list this weekend. Tim helped me set up a very detailed excel spreadsheet that I am very excited about! I figure I have to find all sorts of things to keep busy with while I wait!

I am also excited about being part of a new ministry at church! I have felt that we really needed to start an adoption ministry at church and Tim and I had been praying about it and had planned on moving forward with it after we got home with Sammy and I was off of work. The Lord obviously had other plans for me because our pastor's wife contacted me last week about being involved in a new orphan and adoption ministry at church!! I am so very excited to be a part of this and have our prayers for direction be answered!

Blessings