Buddy Walk

The second day we were in Minnesota we were lucky enough to be able to go to the Buddy Walk!  Our family does it every year in honor of Emma, and this was the first year Laura and I were able to attend.  I was so happy to finally go!  It was awesome.

 

Here's my cousin Evan (he's a year younger than Cooper and Ben).

 

 And the lady of the hour, Emma!

Emma with her buddy!

 Evan with his buddy! 

 There were sorts of activities for the kids to do, and then we all lined up to walk.  Here's a small part of Team Emma!

 More of Team Emma!

 Emma with her mommy (my Aunt Amy!)

 This is a newscaster in MN...not sure who :)

 The kids had a variety of options for the walk...the stroller, a bike stroller...

 or walking of course!

 We walked around a beautiful lake surrounded by trees with gorgeous fall leaves.  Did I take any pictures of that?  No!  I don't know what I was thinking!  We ended the walk by the band where Emma showed us some of her dance moves.

 Then we had lunch before Laura and I had to head to the airport.  Here's Emma eating with her daddy!

 What a cute family-Amy, Jim, Evan, and Emma.

SO glad we were able to attend!  Amy, I'll send you all these pictures (and more!) ASAP!

A Baby Shower

A few weeks ago Laura and I were very lucky to travel to Minnesota for our cousin Lisa's baby shower!  My mom and Aunt Sue hosted the shower, so Laura and I just helped with the decorations/crafting the night before the party.

 

On our way out there was the most beautiful sunrise!  (this picture doesn't even remotely capture how beautiful it was!)

 

Laura decorated the cute wreath. 

The theme was "books" and everyone who attended brought Lisa a book for her baby's room.  My mom had book plates specially made so everyone could put their name in the book they brought. 

 Laura made this cute banner for baby Jack.

 Everyone signed a special book for Lisa.

 His nursery pillow has those trees on it so I made a canvas for his nursery wall. 

 Aunt Sue and my mom had so many cute decorations!

 Laura, my Grandma, Lisa, and me.  Lisa didn't know any of us were going to come so she was very surprised! 

 Grandma and Aunt Sue.

 Lisa and Diane (her sister-in-law)

 We had one game to play-Laura thought of some questions about popular children's books and it was fun to see how many people knew them!  There were a few teachers in the room so it was quite the competition.

 Lisa opened lots of great presents-here's the quilt for baby Jack's room.

 Some of the ladies at the shower. 

We had such a wonderful time and were so happy to celebrate with Lisa!

We are Logged In!

I realized I never reported this VERY important bit of news with our adoption...we are officially logged in!  Our log-in date (LID) is September 3.  What this means is that we could receive a referral at any time!  Our agency told us it could be anywhere from 1-9 months, but to most likely expect 9 months due to the age we're requesting for our daughter. Most people request small children, and since we'd like her to be younger than Jackson in order to stay in birth-order, she's going to be fairly young.  Anyway, that's where we now are with our adoption, anxiously awaiting a phone call! Once we receive a call we'll have 72 hours to accept or deny the referral (which would be based on her medical history-if we feel like the condition(s) she has would be something we felt we could handle or not).  I'll for sure keep you all posted! 

Catching Up

I have gotten behind on blogging so I'm going to try to catch up!  I realized when going through my pictures that they're going to be very Jackson heavy now that Cooper is in school.  When he gets home from school we don't do a lot that is "photo worthy."  Just playing a bit, homework, dinner, and bedtime routine!

 

Lately we've been doing some playdates.. I don't have my camera out much when we go places, but I was able to get some photos of the kids playing at home.

 

Cutie pie Jackson-we just had his 3 year appointment and surprise surprise..he's in the 100% for height and weight! 

 

 We've been seeing a lot of Holly lately because her sister is in kinder just like Cooper, so my friend Heather and I (her mom) trade off watching the little kids so we can volunteer up at school.  It's been so fun!

 A sneak-peek to the boys' new room! They are sharing a room and it's been going really well.  I got them these reading lamps and they both hopped in bed and started reading.  Then I read on the tag attached to their cord that it contains lead and to wash hands if we touch the cord, so off they came!  I even took the time to spray-paint the darn things!  Oh well, next time I'll read the tag. :)

 While babysitting Holly I realized she could write a few of the letters of her name!! (and she's not even three!) so while Cooper was doing homework I had Jackson trace his dot-to-dot name.   I was so impressed at how well he did.  He really enjoys coloring whereas Cooper does NOT.

 Playdate with Henry.  They both got in bed and then asked me to leave the room and shut the door.  They kept pretending to sleep and then getting up and racing around the room.  Crazy boys.

Buddies! 

 I bribed Henry and J to take a few pictures for me for m and ms.  It worked!

 We love moon sand around here.

Cooper has been playing tball and it took him some practice, but now is doing really well.  He loves it and has a great time so that's all I care about!

 

 Jackson and Cooper were invited to a birthday party at the firestation but we were babysitting E and B at the same time so I only took Jackson.  Who's that kid ruining the group shot by crying??  His mom should really do something about that!  :)  (he was having a shy time the first 20 minutes of the party)

 

The pinata really opened him up.

 By the time the firestation tour came he was all smiles and loving every minute of it.

 Whew, no tears this time!  (look at the baby-birthday boy's brother-he's a dalmation!! Isn't that adorable??)

 E and B spent the night.  Notice what Cooper's doing? 

 Another playdate with Holly, I just thought this picture was so cute!

 The many faces of Jackson...

 We had a dance party and Holly taught Jackson some moves.

 This is Jackson's idea of dancing...running!