Monday, March 31, 2008

Another Ladybug Tale


It's been a very snowy last day of March. Wow. Here's hoping that April brings showers and not snow.


Jadyn has been playing with a ladybug again tonight. I know I already blogged about how she enjoys ladybugs once before, but she did something tonight that I found too amusing not to share. She's been playing close by, as I've been at the computer. Suddenly she comes to me and says, "Look mom, the ladybug is riding a horse!" I thought it was so funny. I had the camera handy and I snapped a quick photo.

At the moment, we have a Barbie in a wedding dress, riding on our cat and petting her. My child makes me smile.

Friday, March 28, 2008

Friday Foto


I feel like the geese today. I'm waiting for the snow and ice to completely melt. We're so ready to have the pond out back full of water and not ice. This pair was sitting in our yard today.
I see that they are enjoying having grass in the yard too. I can understand that.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

A Trip To See Kate

The family by the dam at the lake.

Big statue, small girl

Kaitlyn and Bryan outside the wax museum

Jadyn always takes time to smell the flowers, all of them.

Kaitlyn and Jadyn at the mall.
We took an Easter weekend trip to Missouri to visit Kaitlyn. We were gone for 5 days and we had a really good time.

It was so nice to spend time with Kaitlyn. We had the opportunity to meet more of her friends from school and work.

On Saturday we took an unplanned, but fun trip down to Branson. It's a neat place and I can see why it's popular. We took a little stroll at an outdoor mall, ate some lunch and then went to the wax museum. It was fun and we took a few fun photos. Afterward, we took a look at Table Rock Lake, viewing the dam and lake. I'd camped at this lake as a teen with my parents, and I wanted to see it again. This area of Missouri is so nice, but I wonder how many times I mentioned that it probably looks so much nicer with green leaves and etc. :)

On Sunday we attended church with Kaitlyn and several of her friends. We had lunch at a Mexican food restaurant which was a favorite from a previous visit. It was a chilly day, so we didn't do an egg hunt, and where do you hide eggs in a hotel? On Sunday night we ate dinner at Applebee's and met some of Kaitlyn's friends, including Chris.

On Monday afternoon late, we spent time with Kate and Chris. We were glad for the opportunity to do so. We enjoyed playing a game, eating dinner, and visiting. We also found time to stop for ice cream too. It was a delicious but chilly experience. Some of us had jackets and some did not. :) Overall we had a wonderful trip!

Monday, March 17, 2008

Oh What a Difference


Oh what a difference a haircut makes. Look at the difference between yesterday's photo of Jadyn and today's. It's amazing how it opens up her face. We both received our haircuts at the same time today. She sat in one chair and I sat in another. What a big girl, having her hair cut without Mom looking over her shoulder.
Oh what a difference 16 years makes. Today is Bryan's birthday and it's hard to believe that the youngest of our big kids is 16! I so want to post then and now photos of him, as some of us sometimes do with photos of our adopted little ones. I won't do that and embarrass him. I did actually get out his baby photo album and look through it today. :)
Thank you so much to all of you who left comments on yesterday's post. How fun. I think maybe a little birdie told you to stop by. I appreciate the support and encouragement from all of you. I actually recognize some of your names and I've seen some of your blogs. I look forward to reading others.
I did some thinking this morning about the blessing of friends. Three and a half years ago, when we began our adoption of Jadyn, it was about giving a child a home - what an awesome blessing to have been able to do so. I never would have dreamed of the untold blessings of all of the many, many friends we have made in the adoption community. We've made so many friends far and wide as a result of our adoption. We have friends we meet with every week, friends we traveled with in China, friends through our agency, many cyber friends, met through various online groups. I never would have dreamed it was possible, but God knew. What an unexpected and special blessing!

Sunday, March 16, 2008


This is Jadyn with her ladybug. She found him and decided that he's hers. It's fun that she's still young enough not to be afraid of him or squeamish. She has no idea that she should be afraid of bugs. She's been playing with him for a while now, putting him in things, pretending to take pictures of him and etc. She said, "Him needs to be holded and petted." As I look at the ladybug now, he seems to be awfully still and hasn't moved from his spot on a toy. Hmm...I hope she didn't play with him too much. Maybe I can convince her that he's asleep??
She found another one just now and decided that they can be siblings. The new one is the sister. :)
Bryan's birthday is tomorrow, and we celebrated today with lunch at Famous Dave's. I smiled when I heard which restaurant he'd chosen. Bryan is our carnivore. Famous Dave's has the best BBQ and smoked meats we've ever had. If it's your birthday, you get a massive ice cream sundae with a massive sparking candle attached. Yum!

Thursday, March 13, 2008


A photo of Jadyn, dressed for a Chinese New Year Festival.

I'm finally feeling brave enough to start my blog.

I've decided to start a blog because everybody's doing it. Well, that's not really the reason. The true reason is that I like to communicate with family and friends and I love to share photos. I do have quite a few friends (mostly in the adoption community) who have blogs and it looks like fun.

A few months ago, I signed up for a blog but didn't really do anything with it. I was planning to eventually do a blog instead of Jadyn's website. I was planning to discontinue our Babysite in the near future, when our membership came up for renewal. Our membership is now over and the Babysite is gone. I do mean gone! I'd planned to sort of scale the site back a bit from Premium to Free. Does anyone remember when it originally had the little ads running down the side? (pre-China trip) The day after our membership expired, the site was a "great nothingness". :) Well, fine! I'll just be here, giving an occasional update and adding photos.

Family and friends, you are so important to us. I want to stay in contact with you and heaven knows I may not be the most timely person with e-mails. So please check here from time to time for updates. Please feel free to leave a comment or two. I'd love that! Please bookmark or add us to your favorites.

It may take me a bit of time to learn how Blogger works, but I'll just experiment with it in the mean time. Somehow I don't think making it look cute will be quite as easy as our Babysite was.

Hurray, the sun is shining today here in MN! Our days are getting a little warmer and having an uncloudy day is icing on the cake. I can actually see some grass in our yard and my driveway has zero snow on it. I told Lauryn a couple of days ago that I was splashing my car through the puddles with joy. Spring's on it's way, and I am thrilled beyond belief!