Married 8 Great Years!

I can't believe we have been married for 8 years! The time has flown by. I want to tell Aaron I love him so much and proud that he is my husband. He is a great husband and father and I knew when we only knew each other for a few weeks that I wanted to grow old with him. Our relationship brings me great comfort in my life and I know that we are meant to be Eternal companions.

Since we got married in 2000 there wasn't much digital cameras back then. So I had to pull out the wedding album and scan some pictures. Which I need to do anyway, its nice having them on my computer.

Ok, go ahead and laugh. Yes, Aaron had blonde hair....I get asked about that a lot when people see our wedding picutres. Right before we met he bleached his hair. While we dated and got engaged he always had it that way. Before our wedding he asked me if he should change it back to normal. I told him I have never seen him with brown hair and I liked him the way he was so I told him not to worry about it and leave it as is. Well, a year later he let is go back and I liked it better and now wish I would have had him make it brown because he doesn't look like himself in our wedding pictures. Ooh well, I can't change it. But the funniest thing someone has ever said about his hair is a friend of ours saw our wedding picture and asked if Aaron was into the Flock of Seagulls (the band.) I died laughing thinking someone would do that and Aaron didn't even know who the Flock of Seagulls were. So no, Aaron wasn't a die hard Flock of Seagulls fan and wasn't trying to look like one of the singers.

September 30th, 2000

Me dancing with my Grandpa Morris that just passed away.

Me sticking out of the limo roof, I was excited to be in a limo (and just married!)

Here is a few other pictures I found from around our wedding time. This is me at my bridal shower.

Lisa, Cinda and aunt Shirley threw me a great Bridal shower!

On our Honeymoon in Hawaii.

Soccer

Hayden just started to play soccer with some kids his age from our neighborhood. A women who lives in our neighborhood (who is also in our ward) put together a soccer team for people in our neighborhood who want their kids to play but not have to join a city league and pay the higher prices. Every season the kids get to play a new sport too. Last season it was T-ball and now it is soccer. Its also a nice way for each kid to play each sport to see what they really like. So for a very low price the kids get to play each Saturday for a few months and get a shirt. Coaches volunteer for each team and Aaron decide to volunteer. He doesn't know a lot about soccer but he knows enough to teach these 3-4 year olds. We had 2 weeks of practice now and Hayden just loves it. It will be fun to see how the games will turn out, we have a few more weeks of practice before we play other teams.

1st Practice

2nd week of practice

Hayden playing around with the ball

I can can!

Every year my friend Leah sends out an email asking if anyone wants a box of peaches from Utah. I always say no to the offer because I have no clue how to can or what I would do with that many peaches. But thanks to a blog I have been reading http://www.youcancan.blogspot.com/ it got me more motivated to try it. So when I got her email this year about the peaches I said yes and decided to try it. So after I got the peaches I started to freak. I felt like I couldn't handle this for some reason. The site made it sound so easy but it sounded so easy I couldn't believe it and thought I would do it wrong. Well, I know my dad has canned before so I asked him to come help me. He talked me into making a batch of peach Jam and the rest I put in jars. It was so easy and I can't believe I let this scare me and keep me from doing it for all these year and using it to build my year supply. I regret putting off learning this but now I am excited to try more things. I love that blog so I might try it all!

Update on Emmie and her room

This Thursday Aaron and I will attend a meeting for Emmie. They said we will get to adopt her in their last meeting but now we are just following the process steps. At this meeting we find out more about Emmie's case and get to ask questions about the process. One question I am asking is when does she get to move in! It should be soon.

So this last week we had a tax client come over and do some painting in our house. He painted the playroom, kids bathroom and most wanted....Emmie's room. He did a good job and I am happy with the way it turned out. I saw it online on Pottery Barn kids and one reason I like it is because it has the 2 colors and where they meet those scallops blend it together without needing to add something to it like a border or chair railing. So it saves some money and gives it a fun look. Once her furniture is placed where we want it I might add some knobs on some of the scallops so we can hang things from them. Here is her room after being painted.

Best Shirt Ever!

We bought Hayden a really cool shirt, probably the best shirt ever! Start 'Em Young and Raise 'Em Right!

Being an Adoptive Mother

Someone sent this to me and I just loved it. It made me want to cry thinking of Hayden and Emmie and what a blessing they are in our lives. This sums it all up.

Being an Adoptive Mother…

Being an adoptive mother is not for every woman. She must possess not only the natural mother instinct but an understanding and appreciation of the situation that brought a child into her arms making her a mother. The adoptive family came to be by choices made, choices made by the first parents and by the adoptive parents. This bond the adoptive mother has with her child grows over time, like the child did within his first mother’s womb. Day by day, touch by touch, with each tear, kiss, and memory made they became a family. Adoptive mothers have that special knack to let love grow.

Adoptive mothers know that she’s a mender of wounds, not just of the physical skinned knees with a band-aid and a kiss, but of the heart. She gives love, acceptance, and permission to ask and talk about the day he was born and of his first parents.

Adoptive mothers are embracers, not only of the child with many hugs and kisses, but of the child’s heritage and history. She embraces the facts of her child’s past with strength for herself and the child.

She’s not only a memory maker planning family vacations, activities, and birthday parties, but also a memory keeper. Details of a birth, photos of the hospital, and of the parents who brought her into the world are kept along side the newspaper clipping that announced it all. All these things are kept in a special book that tells the whole story.

She’s a tier of shoelaces and of hearts. She weaves lives together into a tapestry of a new family, with many different brightly, colored threads showcasing their individuality's and family origins. Together they create one unit attached to each other.

Adoptive mothers are experts at finding lost objects, but understand and validate the profound, deep loss left by adoption. She allows the tears to fall and grief to be felt, allowing the mourning of the mom not there. She is secure in knowing that she’s not a replacement, but a finisher of a race for someone who, for whatever reason, could not run any longer.

This role is not for the weak of spirit, or the easily wounded. Loving a child not born to her but calling him her own, but this is what she does, it is her calling. She is a mother.

Popcorn Popping

Hayden came home from church yesterday singing the Popcorn Popping song over and over. He sings it so cute and funny. He sings about half the versus and not even in order. My favorite part is when he says " I can take a hand full and make a treat" instead of arm full. I told him the correct way but I guess he is happy with a hand full.

Dave and Busters

Saturday we went to Dave and Busters in Tempe with Eric and Leah Lowe and their kids. We had lots of fun and this was our first time going to the Tempe Marketplace. It was a very cool outdoor mall. We didn't walk around that much but the parts we saw were pretty cool. Outside of Dave and Busters they had the ASU game playing on a big screen TV and a band was playing.

This is the best photos I could take with my camera phone

In Dave and Busters we ate and played lots of games!


Hayden won lots of tickets and one thing I really liked was you could get some good stuff with the tickets. Unlike a Peter Piper they have a gift shop of prizes to choose from. When we saw this big Phoenix Suns ball I thought there is no way we have enough tickets for it. But we were only a few short so Aaron went and won some in minutes so we could get this cool ball. So you can get some good stuff with out spending a lot of money to get these tickets. Hayden liked this Spiderman that was bigger then him but we weren't that close at all to getting it.

Thanks Eric and Leah for inviting us! We had lots of fun and Hayden loved playing with the kids!

Libby Lou

We finally named our puppy. Her name is Libby and we also have been calling her Libby Lou. We also just found out from the breeder that her birthday is July 27th. We forgot to ask that while picking her up. Libby is so cute and sweet and we are having lots of fun with her.

Our New Puppy

Our female Chihuahua (Petri) passed away last December. She was almost 11 years old and she was my baby. When Christmas came around Aaron got me a new puppy. He got me a Rat Terrier that we named Marlie. We have had her since December but just recently gave her back to my aunt. She was a great dog that we really enjoyed but she was destroying everything she got a hold of. She couldn't be in our house and she was ruining our back yard. We weren't even thinking of getting a new dog but someone on coupon sense listed Chihuahua puppies. Well, that got our attention especially when I heard how cheap they were. We thought this wasn't necessarily the perfect time to get a new puppy but we couldn't beat the price and was willing to take on the change of a new puppy. So we went and got her on Tuesday. She is so little its unreal. You would have to see it in person. So far she is a good like puppy, she loves to snuggle and is so cute. Hayden's been really good with her too. The only problem is picking her name. We have several we like but can't decide.

Picking up our new puppy and taking her home






At home