Our little graduate

Lolo graduated from preschool back in May-we are so proud of her!  She worked so hard and it all paid off; she was her class Valedictorian!  Congrats my brown eyed beauty!  We love you so much!

Lolo and cousin K

Gpa Ted and Gma Sandi

Gma Net and Gpa Roger

Lolo and one of her besties.

This darling little boy is in love with Lolo-it was like pulling teeth to get them to take a picture together :)

Proud momma and poppa

Lolo and two best friends

Miss Lori-thanks for getting our kids ready for Kindergarten!!!

Prayers needed

I am attempting this post through my phone, so here goes...
There is a high school friend of mine whose daughter was in a serious ATV accident and suffered a traumatic brain injury. Her condition is still iffy and so they are asking for all the prayers they can get on their behalf. I am passing along this request as well and hopefully through all our faith and prayers this little girl will pull through and her parents can feel peace and comfort as well. I have copied her blog for all to check out and to keep updated. Thanks

Www.mckennlie.blogspot.com

Stupidity...

This was a post I wrote on Facebook:

"Have you ever met anyone that has accidentally super-glued a flower clip into her hair? Well, now you have :) I AM Awesome!"

Yes, yes I did just that...I super-glued a dang flower clip in my hair!  How did you do that? I hear you ask...
Well, first of all, I PERSONALLY feel like I am too old to wear a flower in my hair, or to at least pull off that look.  I see other ladies my age wear them and I think they look cute-but I wasn't ready for it.  Soooooo, I decided to try it, but the darn flower was broken off the clip.

I am like a female Macgyver, seriously, give me super glue and I can fix anything.  I fixed a broken cupboard door that split in half with super glue and BAM my condo sold just.like.that.  I took the glue and fixed the clip.  I let it dry for like, oh, an hour, or at least it was dry to the touch.  What I hadn't thought about was that it was still wet on the actual flower.  I popped that sucker into my hair, went to church, went to my mom's for dinner, came home and when I went to take the clip out, it WOULD NOT BUDGE!  Holy crap!

I slowly pulled individual pieces of hair out of the "stick zone" and then I thought that if I put it under hot water then maybe that would break it up a bit to get more hair out.  I was wrong-it broke my hair completely off.  It was about a 2 inch by 2 inch chunk.  Yes, CHUNK!  It was about 11:00 at night and I just looked in the mirror and shrugged.  I mean, what else could I do?

The next morning I surveyed the damage and it actually wasn't too bad-I apparently added layers to the one side of my head.  AWESOME.  Yes, I am THAT awesome.  Who else could pull off a layered look created by super-glue???? 

So now you have met someone who accidentally super-glued a flower clip into her hair. 

I <3 Adoption pt 1


I have thought about how I would approach this subject in the most gentile, loving, sensitive way, so here I go...

World, meet E.K.  She arrived on April 25, 2012, at 1:08am.  She was a whopping 7 lbs 5 oz and was 20.5 inches long.  Isn't she beautiful?!?!!

Now, let me back up 6 months earlier.  My sister dropped a bombshell, and YES it was a bombshell, that she was pregnant.  I had very mixed feelings flowing through my noggin as she explained the who, what, where, why, and how of life and this particular situation.  I felt so bad for my sister and the tough choices she was going to face in the the very near future.

Flash forward a month or so-I get a phone call from my sister asking me to contact a friend of mine,who had adopted two ADORABLE boys, to ask a few questions about adoption.  Up to this point she was wanting to keep the baby.  So I called my friend, Amanda, asked the questions and received the answers.  The entire time I was on the phone with her I just kept thinking, "please let my sister choose adoption and choose Jared and Amanda."

A week later my sister called me again and asked me to contact Amanda again to see if she and Jared would meet with my sister and her case worker-so I placed the call.  What a wonderful, tearful, joyous call I have ever made in my life.  I really didn't think I would cry but I just broke down, which caused my friend to break down as well.  Her answer, "Of course we will meet with them!"

Flash forward to April 24, 2012.  My sister was past her due date a few days and she was having contractions but nothing consistent, but I went to spend the day with her anyway.  I was rubbing her back during a contraction when her water broke!  So excited but a little nerve racking-at least for me. 

We get to the hospital, Jared and Amanda were called and labor began and continued and continued, etc, etc, etc.  Man, labor is long!

Here are the adoptive parents, me, and my mom.  We were my sister's cheerleaders the entire time.  There may have even been some dancing involved-just saying.  And there may be some pictures catching a certain blond in the act-again, just saying :)

My sister wanted all of us in the room when she began pushing so, of course, I was was totally there!  I gave birth to 4 children, but all by c-section so this was a whole new experience.  Let me just say, I have a whole new respect for women who give birth vaginally-yes, I did just type that word.  I CANNOT believe all the work my sister did to bring this beautiful little girl into the world.  I was amazed, in awe, and I just kept saying, "How the HECK are you doing this!!!!!"  And then there she was-this perfect little being, with perfect dark hair, and perfect olive skin, and perfect little fingers and toes.  Side note:  My sister was born with 12 toes, so we examined the toes right away :)

SHE.WAS.PERFECT.

The flood gates opened and cameras began to snap, and flashes began flashing.  It was so surreal to see everything going on.  My sister looked beautiful, absolutely exhausted, but beautiful.  AMAZING~

Beautiful birth mom

Proud Poppa and Momma

Even more proud Birth Grandparents

...and my favorite-This is Woody-not only was she a FANTASTIC post buddy in high school, but she is one.amazing.dr!  Yes, I grew up with this Doc, and she has some mad skills as an OB.  Love her for the way she took care of my sister.

There is so much more to come, so to be continued....

It's snowing, so it must be baseball season

I am so behind on this....There is a joke that when it is spring time and it snows then it's baseball season.  Baseball has started-Sporty is playing, Trevor is coaching and Diva is playing.  It's our typical time of year where we live in our suburban and eat out a lot :)

First Sporty-we have all ready been to St. George Utah for a tournament and have started two leagues.  His team is doing well, and he is playing well.  We are looking forward to a few more tournaments where we get to travel and stay over.  Staying over is the kids' favorite part-they look forward to the swimming more than anything.  Silly kids.

Diva-she just started playing coach pitch softball.  These girls are so cute and so very green in the the world of baseball.  But they are having fun learning to throw, catch (or at least attempting to catch) and hitting the ball.  In fact, Diva hit a nice line drive and pegged a poor girl in the eye!  Diva was so sad and started to tear up.  Fortunately the girl was fine and returned to playing almost immediately.

Now Trevor-OY!  This season, which is now over, was one big trial after another.  First, the players were not playing well, therefore, they were not winning.  OK, every coach has a not-so-great-winning-year.  Second, because they were not winning the coaches were struggling to find players to ACTUALLY play, which then caused parents to flip out (because their kid wasn't playing).  Third, attitudes were such that they felt entitled to play, to tell the coaches what to do, etc.  So they quit.  These particular players would rather play and lose every game then be used in clutch situations to either spark a rally or to even win the game....THEN, players were caught drinking so they were kicked off the team. All players and parents read and sign a policy which states, among other things, a ZERO tolerance policy on drinking.  So let me recap-we started the season with 23 athletes and finished with 13.  13!  I felt so bad for Trevor and and all the crap he has had to face-it was rough, very rough!  Fortunately, there were many positive moments in all this, one being the support he did receive outside the baseball team and even the school.  Even I got emails and Facebook messages from people who had heard what had happened and they offered their support and expressed how proud they were of my husband and his stance.  Some even expressed how they wish that when they were in school their coaches would have taken a stance and made the same hard choices.  That was really awesome to see and read. 

So, if baseball was ever considered a non-stressful, boring, uneventful game, then one should come walk in our shoes for awhile, especially during those two weeks-I seriously gained 10 lbs and now need to lose it again.  So, here's to looking forward to a new team and a new year and here's to our cute kids who are working hard to better their craft.

Easter

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter.  Our family had a fantastic Easter weekend.  We were able to have family pictures, family Easter egg hunt, dinner, baseball and fun on Saturday.  On Sunday we were able to attend Church and really reflect what Easter is all about and be reminded of what our Savior did for us.  After, we were able to have dinner with the other side of the family and enjoy some more Easter egg hunting.  Holidays are fantastic when you have family around to enjoy it with.  So with that said, here are some pictures to enjoy.  OOps, I forgot we dyed eggs on Thursday with a bunch of cousins...

WARNING:  Picture overload

Whoa, new look

I have been a non-blogger for so long that the entire format has change.  Oy!  I am back and I am working on a few posts, from trials, to a birth of a baby, to baseball, to more trials, to an adoption.  So please be patient and don't forget about us, because, truly I haven't forgot about all of you.  I actually have been on every day to read up on blogs I follow, but I haven't been typing away myself. CIAO!