1st Haircut & Rainy Days

Addy is so excited about turning three next week. We decided to let her get her first haircut as she turns 3, mainly to help make her hair appear thicker. Poor girl has straight, thin, thin hair. She sat so still and looked in a hand held mirror the entire time.





Rain, Rain Go Away! We have had rain in the forecast the past 3 days and the next 7 days show rain also. I am having my garage sale the next 2 days and the forecast doesn't look very promising. I really need to unload some things so I hope the weather doesn't effect people coming out. Jaidyn and Addy put on their rubber boots and jumped around in the puddles today while Wes and I carried up boxes from the basement (actually he carried them up from the basement and I met him at the door and carried them to the carport). Aren't they so cute in their tie-dyed t-shirts? They made these at their Mama LaLa's and Papa J.R.'s house last week.

Philippines Program Update

Feeling a little down about the wait for our referral, I emailed Kristine with Holt just asking for any general Philippines program updates. Just wanted to share part of her email back to me. I do appreciate everyone's thoughts, prayers and kind words throughout our wait.


"Hello Jenny,

I know that it is really hard to wait, especially as you get past a year, but we are pretty sure that the time frames are creeping up quickly, and now we do not know how long it is going to take for families to get a match. We still have the 2 families (including yours) from 2007, and a few weeks ago, we heard from Eva that there are a total of 35 families on the ICAB Roster left from 2007, so it is going to take awhile to work through those. The sibling group of boys that you are referring to were matched by our WCP with a WCP family, not a family who was already waiting on the Roster, so it was not the other Holt December 2007 family who was matched with them, they are still waiting. None of our families approved after you have been matched either, so no one skipped ahead or anything, it is just taking a long time for everyone. The eligibility guidelines for new families are changing in June, because ICAB is receiving too many Dossiers for the amount of children who need homes each year, and so they have to slow it down, or the wait will get outrageous. We have a single applicant who will be traveling to pick up her little girl in a couple weeks, so that is good news. We also have a few families matched with waiting children, a relative adoption of a sibling group of 4, and one other pending case that we are working on right now, but they all will not be able to travel for several more months. When people keep asking, just let them know that right now the amount of families approved and waiting greatly exceeds the number of children that are currently legally free for adoption in the Philippines, and so that is why there is a "wait". It doesn't mean that the need is not there, there are SO MANY orphans, it is just that not all of them are legally free yet, and also some get adopted domestically, in the Philippines too. I hope that we will get some news soon, but there is no way to know until it happens, as we do not get notice when a family is being "considered", but only once they are officially "selected/matched". I'll contact you as soon as I hear any news about your case, I promise, and in the meantime, it is no problem at all to give you updates about other things going on in the program. Have a great weekend!
Kristine Daniels"

Dirtball & a Surprise

Everytime Addy goes outside to play it almost never fails that she looks like this...

We ask her if she has been eating dirt and she just grins and says, "Yeeessss".

Earlier this week when I got back from my run, Jaidyn grabbed me at the door telling me she had a surprise for me. She made me close my eyes and walked me in to the kitchen.


I opened my eyes to see this...

Guess who??? She said that is is a picture of her baby brother and what he is going to look like. I am glad that she told me as I was going to guess it was a caterpillar crawling out of a cocoon. I just love the 3 strands of spikey black hair. Jaidyn can hardly stand the wait for a referral of her sibling. I think she dreams of him like I do. :)

~ Friendly Pirates ~

Until this week, most kids probably thought of pirates as silly, crazy people sporting their eye patches and parrots. At preschool, the overall learning theme for the month has been a pirate theme. Today, Jaidyn and Addy used maps at preschool to find hidden treasure and were able to dress-up as pirates. They are really loving this thematic unit and enjoying the fun activities throughout the month it has provided. Unfortunately, it is a shame that the well-deserved publicity that the Somali Pirates are getting may give kids a whole new outlook on pirates. It is sad to think that there may be no more Captain Feathersword and friendly crew from the Wiggles. And what about all of the "Pirate of the Caribbean" movies, "Peter Pan", and one of my childhood favorites, "The Goonies"? The fate of these kid themed pirates is yet to be known. :(

Here are some pictures of some "Super Friendly" Pirates from preschool this week.

I had this cute little pirate costume in my Halloween Costume box. I love all of the little accessories.


Arggghhh!!!!


Jaidyn and one of her preschool buddies.


Poor Addy had to wear a makeshift pirate costume. She wore one of my t-shirts and we tied a bandana belt around her waist and let her wear a bandana on her head with some beaded jewelry. She added the sunglasses as we went outside and I think she went from being a pirate to a bad-*** biker chick.


Wes made a quick loop back home so he could check out his little pirate princess before going back to work.

Finally...Easter Pictures

Finally I have had a chance to post some pictures of Easter weekend and the days leading up to it. It has been a very busy week (as if all of them aren't super busy).

Jaidyn and Addy had lots of fun with some of their friends at the Library Easter Egg Hunt. The even got to meet the Easter Bunny. (Jaidyn asked me after Easter was over how come they never got to meet the REAL Easter Bunny and only the FAKE ones.) The weather was cold and the ground was wet from the night before so the egg hunt was indoors.














Addy acting like she doesn't know how to use scissors. I know from a haircut that she gave me a couple of weeks ago that she does indeed know how to use them.


We tie-dyed the eggs at Nana's house. Jaidyn was very proud of her egg that looked like "the earth". We ended up eating it first as she cracked it while showing it off. Next year I am wearing gloves as I had stained finger tips for a couple of days from holding the kleenex over Addy's eggs while she poured different colors of dye over them.






The Easter Bunny visited our house the day before Easter. I think he knows that our schedule on Sunday morning is very hectic so he decided to help us out by visiting a day early.





Can you tell the girls are a little groggy? They were up all night with a horrible cough. Poor girls! I think Jaidyn's cheeks are still rosy red in this picture.


Don't think that they voluntarily posed like this, I had to ask them to do this. :)


Wes was the switch-over car so he worked until the wee hours in the morning and then had to work early today in the afternoon and didn't get to participate in the Easter Sunday activities with us. I did make him get up for a minute to take this picture of the girls and I before we headed to church.

Easter egg hunt at Grandma Velma's house. Next year I am bringing bunny ears along for Aunt Cheryl. She plays a great Easter bunny!

16 Months & Still Waiting

Today, we have been officially waiting 16 months to receive our referral as we were approved by the ICAB of the Philippines on December 11th, 2007 and placed on their roster of approved families. Will month 17 be the one? Still waiting and hoping!

Sorry no exciting news on the adoption home front, but I will have some cute Easter pics of the girls to share early next week. This reminds me, I need to make sure their dresses are ironed and that I have little socks or white tights for them wear tomorrow. I always forget about those little accessories and am scrambling for something at the last minute. Happy Easter!

~ Mercy Me 5K & Easter Egg Hunt ~

Today's temperatures are supposed to reach almost 70 degrees, but it sure didn't start out that way. Wes and I ran in the Mercy Me Hospital 5K run this morning. I only had a heavy jacket over my tank top, so I made him take off his long sleeve shirt and let me wear it. My mom thought that she missed getting pictures of me as she saw Wes running, but didn't know that I had put on his shirt and was right beside him. In fact, Jaidyn and Addy were yelling at some other girl who they thought was me to hurry up and catch daddy. We ran together the entire time until right at the end, when he had a lot more juice left than I did. We don't have our official times yet, but Wes finished right at 25 minutes and I was about 10 seconds behind him. We had set a goal of trying to finish in 26-27 minutes so I am pretty proud of our times...not to shabby.

ETA: Here is the link to the race results. We are thrilled with our performances!
http://www.ridgerunnersports.com/race/2009MERCYME.HTM


That's me in the gray shirt chasing Wes up the hospital hill at the start of the run.


Waving at the girls and Nana as we passed by.


Yea, we are done!


I loved the way the annual Easter egg hunt at the park was ran. After every kid had a chance to scramble after eggs, they took them to a table where they turned them in for special prizes. It didn't matter how many eggs they actually picked up as every child received the same prizes. Addy's age group received candy, an egg-shaped water bottle, and a stuffed animal. Jaidyn's age group received candy, bubbles, and sidewalk chalk. We had two extremely happy girls after the egg hunt. I am glad it was run this way because there was this one mom in particular that had a baby that was maybe 1 year old that was in the carrying-age 3 group. The mom was carrying the baby and at the same time scurrying around in front of all the other kids picking up eggs just as fast as she could. Her poor child's head was being slung in every direction and she was darting up and down so fast for as many eggs as she could gather. I would have normally felt sorry for her as every time she bent down her booty showed, but honestly I felt like she kind of deserved it. It was quite the scene and I almost lost track of Addy because I was so appalled by her actions. I mean, seriously...did she honestly think that she was being competitive up against children who are under the age of 3?


Playing at the park while waiting for the egg hunt to begin.


You should have seen her look at the starting line. She is soooo competitive and her serious facial expressions were so funny. Thankfully, she picked up enough eggs to satisfy herself and she came away happy.

~ Haircuts by Addy ~

Tonight while I finished up some work on the computer, the girls stood on each side of me on little stools brushing my hair and styling it with bows and hair ties. Even though I was battling hair tugs, I still managed to stay completely focused on sending some invoices and emailing ship date messages. So focused, that I was oblivious to the fact that Addy had hopped down from her stool, disappeared to her room only to return with a pair of scissors in hand. Yep, I heard the snip of scissors just above my ear and an immediate burst of nausea set in. I am guessing that the look I gave Addy as I pulled out a chunk of freshly snipped hair must have been pretty good as she immediately started crying and screaming, "I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to! I want to go to Nana and Papa's house!"

~ Memory Loss Prevention ~

To prevent memory loss, experts suggest exercising the brain on a daily basis...work a challenging game, such as a number activity or crossword puzzle.

Almost weekly, Papa gets to exercise his brain with Jaidyn. One of Jaidyn's favorite games to play with her Papa Dave is Memory. Here she is counting her matches and then counting his. She truly won, 12-7. Yikes! And this isn't the first time she has beat him. Good thing Papa gets regular exercise, maintains a healthy diet and participates in social activities because if we went on game play alone, his memory outlook isn't very promising. Come on dad, you are going to have to step it up a little. She's only 4! :)

Farm Festival & Birthdays

Jaidyn and Addy ended the month of March participating in a "Farm Festival" at preschool. They loved the play center props this month of stick horses, a FurReal pony, feeding bottles and having little chicks brought in to visit their class. One day they made their own cream to eat on crackers for snack time. They loved this unit! In April, they will find out if a Pirate's life is for them as they will hunt for treasure working on map reading skills, walk the plank while working on counting skills, and sail out on high sea adventures in the play center. Arrr, Matey!





She is sooo ornery!

Showing a little sass!

The month of March is filled with birthdays for our family. Papa J.R., Unlce Bear, Papa Dave and Nana all have a March birthday and my sister Jill turns 29 tomorrow.
We celebrated Nana's birthday last Friday at our house with a shrimp boil and ice cream. Nana was serenaded with the "Happy Birthday" song had great help blowing out the candles.



Jaidyn and Addy on Papa's lap helping him blow out the candles. We celebrated Papa's birthday earlier in the month.