thanks

So I am too GRATEFUL this year and had to write it all down here. . . I'll try to keep it concise. ;)

First. . . Miley. Ok, I'm crying already, this was a bad idea. No, it needs to be said so I'm going to battle through. We love her so much. She has changed our lives and has been such a miracle for us. . . even when she's cranky. She is beautiful and perfect and we are truly blessed to get to share in her life.

Of course we wouldn't have such a blessing if it wasn't for our angel, Kristel. I can't express how much we adore her. It still amazes me to think that she found us, picked us, and after meeting us still liked us enough to trust us with our amazing little girl. I know I've said it a billion times, but we love you and you still amaze me. Thank you. Those words seem too small for all that I'm feeling, maybe if I put them in bold it will help. Thank you. You have a permanent place in my heart and our family.

In the same vein there are many other people that I am grateful for. . . Dave and I so appreciate the support and love that we feel from both Kristel and Justin's families. I know this wasn't an easy thing to do and yet, you've accepted us and supported us so much. Each family has shown us so much kindness we are so lucky, in fact, we probably don't deserve all of you. We were truly blessed this year to add so many wonderful people to our family. We definitely consider you all family. Thank you for giving us that chance. That's the amazing thing about adoption and even though that's FSA's slogan (It's about love), I didn't expect to feel so much of it from so many people. We're overwhelmed with gratitude for such a blessing.

My parents need to be on this big list of gratitude as well. I am grateful that you couldn't contain your excitement all year long, and still can't actually, for our little Miley. I know it seems that I'm only grateful for things pertaining to our adoption, but that's been the center of our universe this year and affected everything we did so thus the common thread. Thank you for sharing in our joy and supporting us in our hardships as well. It has made a world of difference.

A thank you to the Dalbys for kindly taking us in and keeping us sane for that week this year. It really meant so much for us to know that you were watching our girls with so much care. And then providing so much support for us when we were probably the worst company to have around. Thank you for understanding and helping us. It was another one of those things that confirmed to me that this was where we were supposed to be and what we were supposed to be doing. Thank you for that.

A few more adoption related thanks. . . the Lotts, you guys are great and we appreciate you. . . the Bishop and his wife, though they don't read this everyone should know that they are amazing with huge hearts and we love them. . . and Thomas, thank you for believing in us and I loved the bracelet too. ;)

OK, I'm all congested now and I haven't even made a dent in my gratitude list.

We are way too lucky to have too many people in our lives that deserve to be mentioned here. Unfortunately I've reached my crying limit and so to all the rest of you (and you know who you are, and if you don't then you can ask me anytime if you were to be included in this general thanks. . . I'll let you know) thank you for your love this year. It was felt by us in heaping quantities and we want you all to know that we love you and hope you can feel that too.

Happy Thanksgiving!

eight

It's November, so that means four things (that I can think of right now). . .

1. Holding Dave off on the Christmas music and movies until at least the day after Thanksgiving, preferably the 1st of December, but that's a long shot.

2. Planning for Thanksgiving and hosting a house full of crazies. ;) We really are excited to see you guys, and Tiff.

3. Taking family photos because. . .

4. It's our anniversary! . . . and a tradition.

I need to gush for a minute, so if you have a weak constitution feel free to skip the next paragraphs. I'll let you know when it's safe to read again. . .

I love my husband. It's true. He's perfect for me, perfectly annoying, challenging, caring, and balancing for my extreme personality. Thanks baby for picking me. I'm so lucky and these past eight years have been my best, even the hard ones.

An example of his perfectness. . . I was sick for a month recently and couldn't do all the things that in my mind HAVE to get done. I can't stand my house being dirty (ok, it's not always clean and by no means perfect, just a disclaimer) or cluttered, Dave constantly challenges me in the latter, but while I was sick he took up my house chores and kept his clutter to a miraculous minimum. He cleaned, that in itself is amazing enough, but he did it without me asking, that's two miracles. Don't you only need three for sainthood? Well he's my angel and this is just one example.

I love you baby! Happy Anniversary!

Ok, you can read again. . . but now I don't have much else to say. Sorry. Happy November to everyone!

one more thing

The other day I noticed that Miley plays with her hair. How cute is that?

3 Months

Miley is 3 months old! I guess we've reached what they deem the 'golden age' since she's more fun now and still immobile, the perfect combo.

A little about her at this age. . .

Morning person, I can hear her talking and laughing in her room
Still gets the hiccups all the time
Likes to pull bows out of her hair
Likes to stand up, does not like to be on her belly
Loves to talk
Has blue green eyes, the left one is more green
The bald spot on back of head has finally happened, sad.
Gets really excited when it's time to eat
Getting more interested in toys slowly, but loves her mirror already
LOVES her bath
Cannot eat if the TV is on or the dogs are playing, or she can hear daddy doing something. . . she has to see what's going on.
Goes to bed at night really easily and willingly. . . does not get willingly into her jammies however.
Sleeps all night! She goes to bed by 8pm and then Daddy wakes her up to feed her around 10:30-11pm and then I wake her up or she wakes me up at 7-7:30am for breakfast. It's been heaven!
Super active and independent, not so cuddly
Still has the grumps after her bath every night. I can't figure this one out. I think she's just de-stressing, because it doesn't matter what I do or change she still wants to scream for awhile and then she's fine.
Loves to laugh out loud
Spitting is still fun
Holds onto her chain links, but not interested in holding anything else really.
Constantly tries to eat her burp cloth and then makes a yucky face, apparently it doesn't taste good but she keeps going back for more.
Loves watching the dogs
Rarely spits up, but drools constantly
Sides are ticklish
Has a temper and screams loudly
Can scoot around on her back
Tries to pull herself up into a sitting position all the time and is now trying to roll over too.
Will strain her head all the way around to see if the TV is on. I let her watch Tinkerbell (totally cute movie) last week when she was particularly grouchy with her head cold and she loved it. Mesmerized her.
Sucks on her fist/fingers. The binky totally lost that battle.

And now for some pics. . .

They're coming to take us away. . . .

HA HA, HO HO, HEE HEE

Happy Halloween!

We spent ours at home. We decided we needed to at least dress up. . . that much we could do in our sickened condition. The straight jacket was only mildly claustrophobic. OK, I didn't keep mine done all the way up. I would not do well in a crazy ward. I would freak out if I had to be in those jackets for very long. Dave, however, did fine in his for quite awhile. ;) Our cute little nurse made her costume hers by adding copious amounts of drool. It was part of the character she was going for I guess.

We carved a couple pumpkins and then crashed and watched a movie. No pics of the pumpkins, sad. I was sick, and I think this was the scariest pumpkin I've ever done, sad again. Sickness brings out my dark side. Well actually, Miley thought I looked funny in my costume and laughed at me, bummer. . . not that I wanted my baby to be afraid of me, but it did mean my costume was a failure for the whole point of Halloween (in my book anyway). . .Dave was another story. I think it was his hair that was unsettling to her. Once she got over the initial shock of him all was well again.

We were visited by Siegfried and Roy as well as their baby tiger that night, (thanks for stopping by guys. You looked great!) . . . as well as a number of trick-or-treaters despite the NO CANDY HERE, HIGHLY CONTAGIOUS sign I posted at the door. I guess kids can't read. Oh well.

I think we adequately salvaged this Halloween, but just wait until next year. . . I can't!