Fort Worth Zoo

We love that we live close to an amazing zoo. So much so, that we bought a membership last year. It is great to go to the zoo whenever the mood strikes us. Katie loves seeing all the animals. Her favorites are all the different monkeys. Our good friends also have memberships so we go with them often. It is great to make fun memories with them. Here are pictures from some recent trips.

From a trip with just me and my girl:

She likes the gorillas but not the loud waterfall in their enclosure.

 This guy was playing hide-and-seek. (Anyone else think the picture below is creepy?)

This guy paces back and forth all day long.

Feeding the birds for the first time. She LOVED it!

"Different Trips to the Same Place"

I really liked this analogy so I wanted to share it.  We are so grateful for the journey we took that lead us to K and Katie! We are on our second journey now and we can't wait to see who we are lead too.

Taken from Families Supporting Adoption

(funny side note: K is from Australia)

Deciding to have a baby is like planning a trip to Australia. You've heard it's a wonderful place, you've read many guidebooks and feel certain you're ready to go. Everyone you know has traveled there by plane. They say it can be a turbulent flight with occasional rough landings, but you can look forward to being pampered on the trip.

So you go to the airport and ask the ticket agent for a ticket to Australia. All around you, excited people are boarding planes for Australia. It seems there is no seat for you; you'll have to wait for the next flight. Impatient, but anticipating a wonderful trip, you wait--and wait--and wait.

Flights to Australia continue to come and go. People say silly things like, "Relax. You'll get on a flight soon." Other people actually get on a plane and then cancel their trip, to which you cry, "It's not fair!"

After a long time the ticket agent tells you, "I'm sorry, we're not going to be able to get you on a plane to Australia. Perhaps you should think about going by boat."

"By BOAT!" you say. "Going by boat will take a very long time and it costs a great deal of money. I really had my heart set on going by plane." So you go home and think about not going to Australia at all. You wonder if Australia will be as beautiful if you approach it by sea rather than air. But you have long dreamed of this wonderful place, and finally you decide to travel by boat.

It is a long trip, many months over many rough seas. No one pampers you. You wonder if you will ever see Australia. Meanwhile, your friends have flown back and forth to Australia two or three more times, marveling about each trip.

Then one glorious day, the boat docks in Australia. It is more exquisite than you ever imagined, and the beauty is magnified by your long days at sea. You have made many wonderful friends during your voyage, and you find yourself comparing stories with other who also traveled by sea rather then by air.

People continue to fly to Australia as often as they like, but you are about to travel only once, perhaps twice. Some say things like, "Oh, be glad you didn't fly. My flight was horrible; traveling by sea is so easy."

You will always wonder what it would have been like to fly to Australia. Still, you know God blessed you with a special appreciation of Australia, and the beauty of Australia is not in the way you get there, but in the place itself.

By Diane Armitage printed in the April 21, 1995 "Dear Abby" column.

Birth Mother's Day

Explanation of Birthmother's day: (taken from www.birthmombuds.com)
Birthmother's day is a day to celebrate and honor our birthmotherhood.  Its a day to reflect on the choice we made and the life we gave.  Its a day to recognize, that we are good mothers who made the ultimate sacrifice for our children.  This is a day to give gifts to birthmoms to show how much she is truly appreciated.


History on Birthmother's Day:
Birthmother's Day is celebrated the Saturday before Mother's Day.  It originated in 1990 by a group of birthmothers in Seattle, Washington.  Most birthmothers will agree that Mother's Day is a very painful holiday and these women wanted to create something that would honor their birthmotherhood.


While searching for ideas for a Birth Mom's gift for K this year I came across a great idea, a pedant made from the fingerprint of the adopted child. I loved this idea and I thought K would as well. It was a great way to give her back a physical part of Katie.


Thankfully my sister is very talented and can make almost any type of jewelry. So while she was visiting in January she made several molds of Katie's finger to take back home with her to figure out how to make the pedant.

Katie had so much fun making her fingerprints

Here is what my sister came up with. We sure hope K liked it!

(Sorry about my horrible pictures. It's really hard to capture the tiny lines.)

Last years photo shoot

At the end of last year we had a photo shoot with Eng from E. Smith Photography. We love how all the pictures turned out! Our favorite picture is the one that we use for the header of our blog. (I can't believe that I didn't post any of these pictures until now.)

Changes

Ken and I have been working on sprucing up our home. First up was painting the whole down stairs. This was quite the undertaking! It took longer than we thought but we are happy with the results. We still have to paint the stair way and the walls that go all the way up to the second story. We aren't sure how we are going to reach those walls hence why we haven't done them yet. Plus we are REALLY tired of painting!

Once the new paint was on the wall it became clear to me that we needed to change some furniture around and bring in new decorations. We have all dark furniture and solar screens which make the house seem really dark so I wanted to try to brighten up the place with light accessories. (I was so glad my Mom was visiting and could help with this...thanks Mom!) We really like how everything turned out.

(Sorry if the "after" pictures are a bit fuzzy. My camera is having issues.)

Before

After

Before

 

After

Before

After

Once we find a big rustic red Texas star we will hang it to the left of the T.V.

Our t.v. stand has always been a source of aggravation for me. With a toddler and dog in the house the glass on it always looked dirty. There were finger prints on the inside and out and it was really hard to get clean. Like  I said it always looked dirty. Here was my easy and inexpensive fix. But 8 sheets of 12x12 scrapbook paper of a subtle design. Then cut them to fit each pane of glass and use double sided tape to attach it. Now you can no longer see any fingerprints (or anything else) on the glass.  I love how it turned out! In fact, this might just be my favorite change in our house. 

Before (well I had already started the project)

Some baskets to help with organization

After

Happy Easter Bunny

Well that is what Katie went around saying anyway.

Easter weekend we went with the singles branch to Fossil Rim. We had a great time like always but this time was a little different because we got to go on one of their big buses and have a guided tour. It was really cool to hear all the facts about the place and the animals. Katie loved being able to run around on the bus. ;)

Katie loves Bonnie (bottom right) from the branch. She gets so excited whenever she sees her.

After we parted ways with the singles branch we headed over to the Dinosaur Valley State Park. We were so excited to see actual dinosaur prints. It is pretty amazing to know that we were standing where dinosaurs once did.

Easter day was beautiful. Katie enjoyed her basket, bike, going to church to see all her friends, and celebrate Christ resurrection. Unfortunately, I woke up with a huge headache and wasn't able to join them at church. All in all, it was a great day. We are so thankful for all Jesus did for us!

 We hope you all had a wonderful Easter. Happy Easter Bunny from our family to yours!

Here we go again

This morning Katie had a friend over to play and it was so much fun watching the two of them run around together. It makes me really excited for the day when another baby will join our family. Katie will make such a wonderful big sister.

Speaking about adding another member to our family....Ken and I recently re-listed our adoption profile on itsaboutlove.org. We feel that we have been able to heal from our failed placement and we are excited to "start" over again. We waited to re-list until we felt ready to start a new relationship with a perspective birth mom/dad and we are now completely ready and excited for this!

Thanks again for all the prayers and support that you have sent our way!