Yes, This Is Another Post About My Hair

Right before I chopped it off for Locks of Love.

A week later.

I love it!

Merry Christmas!

I actually rather dislike our Christmas card so much I'm going to post many of the pictures I used. So you can see Lil A in all her squirming-hugging-pulling-ornaments-off-every-branch-she-can-reach-leaping-out-of-arms-smiling glory.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Christmas Card 2010

I know it's so tacky that I always email and post on various social websites our Christmas card but it's the best I can do. This card isn't as good as last year's (taking the pictures was a lot harder this year with a very active toddler and I didn't have as much free time this year to design the card with my very minimal skills with photoshop)

but we still wish all of you a very Merry Christmas!

With a Grateful Heart

We had so very much to be grateful for this past Thanksgiving! We were able to visit with Aurora's birth family, see some dear friends and some family for little over a week!

 

We stayed at Alyssa's 3 bedroom apartment (Thanks! You're the best!) and at any given time there was usually around 11 of us staying there!

Crazy I know, but it went really well!

 

We read lots and lots of books 

Made lots of crafts and sang songs

Played in lots of snow.

There was a forecast for a blizzard while we were there. The worst storm in a decade. 

Although it did snow and blow- it really wasn't all that bad which was really too bad.

(Here Daddy it tastes great!)

Can you believe my own husband of 9 years did this to me....

...good thing I caught it on video to show the authorities.

(Officer, please see the snowball frozen in time in the upper left hand corner in the last frame)

We also had a birthday celebration, went to the dinosaur museum and the aquarium

Aurora loved the penguins

Aurora caught the 2nd boat ashore since the 1st one was a little too crowded for her liking.

We played lots of games, some football and of course ate lots & lots of food!

Jared carved his very first turkey!

A trip to In & Out where we had burgers "animal style."

Fighting over the last bit of strawberry shake

Of course being the big Harry Potter fans that we are...saw Deathly Hallows Part I

(I usually dubb it HP7a).

Loved it! Absolutely loved it!

Also, Jared and I celebrated our 9th anniversary while we were there.

We were able to go to the temple together.

Love him! Absolutely love him!

  

Quite the week and we still didn't get to see all of the friends we wanted to...sorry dear ones!

How very blessed are we!

Aurora at 18 months

Aurora will be 19 months in a couple of days! She is getting so big!

• She goes to nursery at church now and does really well. Only crying for the first minute after separation. 
• She is starting to do a little pretend play. She will pour some pretend tea (herbal tea of course) from her tea pot and then pretend to drink from her cup...so cute! She talks to her stuffed animals and dolls.
•  She talks quite a bit in general, although probably only Jared and I understand her. She says "please" quite consistently and "thank you" quite inconsistently.  She can make pretty much all the appropriate sounds for almost any animal and tons more words. 
• She loves singing. So without further ado here she is singing her rendition of "Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam" that she has entitled "Jesus Sunbeep"

Here is the Winnie the Pooh song.

As with every stage and transition that she grows into I have a hard time keeping up at first. This week she has been into EVERYTHING.

• We have to keep the trash can turned around facing backwards toward the wall or she will get in it and eat things. So gross.
• We have to keep the bathroom door closed because she can lift the toliet seat up and loves to splash in it. Very gross.
• Recently she unrolled a whole roll of toliet paper in a record time of about 5 seconds and then proceeded to carry it around with her all day with long trails of toliet paper streaming behind her. She alternated between calling it "blanket" & cuddling with it to blowing her nose on it. (She recently had a cold). So fun.
• She won't hold still whatsoever for a diaper change and during certain diaper changes it becomes a literal, utter mess. Poo is everywhere and I most certaintly do not mean Winnie the Pooh either. Very fun and very gross. 

But as always I know I will eventually adjust and we will have a few great weeks until the next stage!  I know I will be a little sad at the passing of another stage.  For soon the crayon drawings on the front door will stop and I will miss them. A lot. 

So I try to laugh when something like the toliet paper incident happens. And I keep closing doors and washing hands a million times a day and try to smile at the same time. And I try to find new ways to help the diaper changing to go smoothly and keep the expletives in my head.

I wouldn't trade a single experience for the world!

More Catch-Up

Okay, I lied. This isn't Thanksgiving pics but a few more random ones from Oct & Nov.

We visited Aunt Tiffany & Uncle Erich and the cousins when I presented at the regional FSA adoption conference. I never take very many pictures when I'm with family & friends. It seems like I have to choose between enjoying and living the experience or documenting the experience. But here are a few from the fun 4-5 days we were there.

My friend Camille, recently moved away. I miss her and her family so part of my grieving process is to post a couple pics from one of the times we went to the zoo.

So here is what we are getting Aurora for Christmas but don't tell her!

A box

and her very own toy vacuum 

Is there a better picture in the world than a man vacuuming and holding his child? :)





November Non-Thanksgiving

November is National Adoption Awareness Month and I was contributing to the FSA blog on a weekly basis during November so that is my small excuse for neglecting this blog. (Go check out the FSA blog...there is some great stuff on there!)

The poster child for adoption:

Isn't she the cutest?! I'm not biased whatsoever of course.

Lil A loves playing outside!

We went outside everyday in the late afternoon and waited for Daddy to ride his bike up from work.

Now that it is bitter cold, when 4 o'clock comes around it is really hard to convince her that she doesn't want to go outside, or at least that Momma doesn't want to go outside.

She paticularly loved the leaf piles we made from the huge tree in our front yard. I believe it is the largest tree in the whole city.

I finally arranged a play area in the basement. Now we have somewhere to go and be when it's too cold out.  I love our home! It is truly my dream home and I feel so blessed to already in my stage of life to be living in my dream home.

So much fun, huh?!

Coming up next...our trip to visit family & friends for Thanksgiving.

Then hopefully ready for Christmas!

Edwards Family Day

One Saturday in October we celebrated the day that Aurora was sealed to us forever in the temple by having a family day.

It was a much needed day just to be together as a family and take a break from our very busy lives.  Also Jared had been away from us working out of town Mon-Fri for 2 months and he was finally home to stay. Another reason to celebrate!

The day was glorious!

It started out by making t-shirts for the special day. Jared looked at me rather disbelieving when I got out the markers and shirts but I had warned him this was going to be an "event." He's lucky the "family song" I'd been creating in my head didn't come together until the end of the day and I didn't force him to sing it! :)

Back of the shirts.

The best pic we got of the front of the shirts.

We went hiking at a nature preserve located at the local monastery.

(How often does one get to say something like that?)

We hiked around this beautiful lake.

The trees were gorgeous and the weather perfect!

There were so many interesting spots and places we discovered...this was one of my favorites.

Aurora travelled mostly by backpack but sometimes she went

by foot.

She is quite quick now and if there is space to run, she will.

We saw all kinds of wildlife too. Ducks, bullfrogs, fish, rabbits, squirrels, birds etc...

Jared pointed out all the interesting plants and trees such as spicebush which I love the way it smells.

I want to plant some in my yard.

We also collected leaves for the collage that we will make of our adventure.

Look, how cool is this?!

Here we are collecting some shells for the collage and getting a closer look at some fish.

I'm trying to keep Lil A from losing her shoes in the mud. Also, I clean up a little easier than she does.

We ate lunch at a picnic shelter at the end of the trail.

We then went to an outdoor concert (sorry no pics) and finished the day out with some ice cream.

I am so very grateful for my fabulous husband and the little ray of sunshine that is my daughter.

What a wonderful blessing it is to be a forever family!

The girls