Happy Holidays!

Our days were Merry & Bright, as I hope yours have been!

We started off the holidays with a trip to see none other than Alvin & the Chipmunks, Chipwrecked! Daniel loved it!

Christmas Eve we had our annual dinner and survivor style auction! We had 21 total people, 7 of them were ages 6 and under and they were all EXCELLENT!!! We cooked a 22 pound turkey for the occasion and had all the trimmings. Good food, great family and lots of fun!

The auction was the highlight as always. I auctioned off my CVS stash from the year, instead of hoarding it like you see on Extreme Couponing!! (If you haven't check out my other blog From Dimes to Dollars - I'm sharing more hot coupons and deals this year in an effort to lower our monthly grocery budget, and maybe yours as well!!) I keep enough of the auction items to get through a few months and the rest goes to my family! You should see them outbid each other for items like toothpaste and shower gel! The funniest thing to happen - my niece's new boyfriend buying her a toothbrush because she said she needed it! The second funniest, my brother-in-law buying my father-in-law (and they are no relation) vitamins for his eye and brain health!! Always a load of fun and laughter!!

Christmas Day Daniel was in heaven. He counted his gifts this year from Santa and then woke us up!! Some of the items he received from everyone including Santa were Leapster games, a personal CD player and his first books on CD, a science lab kit, the Joker House, Star Wars items, including a clock, and a Bop It!! Awesome!!!!

We spent hours mixing colors for a food coloring experiment with his science kit! I have great photos below to share!! I also have great photos of Daniel listening to his book on CD. Santa got him a Magic Tree House Books 1-4 audio book and at first Daniel wasn't interested. Then when I said he couldn't run around with the CD player, that it was for music or books only, he sat down and gave it another try.

Within about 2 minutes he was hooked!! I couldn't have pried it out of his hands if I had wanted!! Since I love audio CD's I was thrilled that he took to it also! He's listened to the stories several times now!! I wasn't sure how he would do without having an actual book to follow since our other short CDs have books and are only one story lasting about 10 minutes. These stories last about half an hour each. I have to say again how thrilled I am that he really likes them!!

We had an awesome holiday and are looking forward to a New Year's dinner at my mom's house with a big game of Tripoly to follow (we bet with pennies) so if you lose, you lose about a buck, but you can win 4 or 5 bucks!!

I hope everyone is enjoying their holidays as well!!

What a Wonderful Christmas!!

I hope everyone had as wonderful a Christmas as we did. We started out Christmas Eve by having a lunch for everyone at our house. 22 guests, 2 tables, 4 new children from the last dinner we did (2007), and lots of homecooked goodies made for a wonderful afternoon!

We ate and ate and afterwards I held a Survivor style auction using items I've collected for free from CVS (mostly) using my Extrabucks (check out my other blog!). I gave everyone 200 bucks of fake money and let the bidding begin. I think just about everyone left with something, but the biggest surprise was my father-in-law who left with the most!

Afterwards we enjoyed more family time and then Troy had to go to work, everyone left and Daniel I had the evening to ourselves. We baked cookies and left them along with his favorite drink, tea and milk, out for Santa. Daniel even chose the dishes with the "reindeer" on them for Santa!

The next morning we opened tons of presents (well Daniel did!)!! He got lots of great stuff! Then later that evening when Troy got off work we met him up at Massanutten (for a free stay check out this post from my other blog). We stayed for 3 days, 2 nights absolutely free. While we already own a timeshare they wanted us to 'upgrade' and we said no way - but for listening to the spiel we earned a $100 gift card AND 3 tickets to the indoor waterpark! Needless to say we had a blast!

Happy Holidays!!

Christmas Joy

Wow - can we say someone got a little spoiled this year?? Actually we probably need to say we ALL got a little spoiled this year. We had a wonderful Christmas!! I think I'll try telling it in pictures to keep this post from dragging on and on!!

We started out Christmas Eve morning by explaining to Daniel what the empty stocking meant and hanging it up for Santa to fill up that night.

Next we took Daniel to day care for a half day so we could assemble the train table and train tracks we got him for Christmas. It took us forever to get the train set just right. (No picture, we were too frazzled!!)

After picking him up from day care we drove about 2 and half hours to Troy's parents for Christmas Eve dinner with the whole family. Then we opened gifts with them. Can we say Granny and Grandpa are so organized. Each of the three grandsons had tons of gifts and they were color coordinated. Daniel got green wrapping (my favorite color)! He got tons of stuff - shirts, pants, a slinky dog, Octopus paydoh set, a handmade quilt from his great grandmother Doris in FL, and the best was the safari wagon from Granny and Grandpa!! Boy that was a big hit (and still is!) We've even been informed that we are going to a zoo with Daniel's Aunt Amber, Uncle Stephen and cousin Parker in the spring because the safari wagon has to go with us! Sounds like fun to us!

After having to tie our trunk down for the drive home, we managed to fall into bed and the next morning we woke to see this...

We took Daniel out of his room and told him Santa came to fill his stocking. He knew just where to go. Doesn't he look excited?? In fact he didn't want to open anything, just hold it until I explained there might be a train or something in there he might like to play with!

After we all finished our gifts, we told Daniel we had one more gift for him from Mama and Papa. We took him into his room and Papa pulled back the white sheet (we are creative right?!). The look on his face was so worth it. Both of his hands were full and when he realized what he was seeing one hand slowly opened and toys started falling on the floor and then the other hand opened. It was like slow motion and Troy and I were so cracked up.

So, remember how long it took us to assemble the train tracks (hint: forever). It took Daniel about 3 seconds to take it all apart!!

We finished out the day with dinner with my mom (grandmom).

What a wonderful Christmas it was!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone!! Wishing you all the best!!

Decorating the Tree!

We finally put our Christmas tree up last Wednesday night and we had such a fun time decorating it! We assembled our tree (yes, it's a fake and I love it!) while Daniel was in the bath and then surprised him when he was all dressed for bed. We spent the next 45 minutes decorating the tree. Since then Daniel has decorated and re-decorated the bottom branches about a hundred times!

Christmas Eve Celebration

What a great Christmas Eve we had! 18 people, tons a great food and even better conversation! To get to that point Troy and I ran around like mad getting ready! We had to put all the leafs in our table and bring another table upstairs, borrow 5 more chairs and cook a turkey. Whew!! It was worth it!!

Troy and I also used the occassion to take family photos for our book to leave with our child in Russia! It was perfect! So, in honor of our wonderful family and one day soon (hopefully) Daniel's family, we'd like you to meet everyone!

The Future Parents - Troy and Rachel (Check out Troy's facial hair - never seen him with that much before!!)

Grandma (Rachel's mom) and Aunt Cassandra (Rachel's baby sister)







Granny and PaPa (Troy's parents)

Uncle Joe, Aunt Cathy, Caroline, Lori, and Karmen (Rachel's sister, our brother in law and nieces and grandniece)

Uncle Richard, Aunt Sandy & Ian (Troy's sister, our brother in law and nephew)

Aunt Amber, Uncle Stephen and Parker (Troy's sister, our brother-in-law and nephew)

As you can see - Daniel will have an amazing family!! Merry Christmas to all!

Merry Christmas!!

Merry, Merry Christmas to all!

Tree or No Tree – The Great Debate

And the answer is....No Tree. I know, I know, you’re probably thinking why in the world wouldn’t we put up a Christmas tree this year? So let me give you the run down on our decision.

First: We put out the outside decorations and we decorated the sideboard in our dining room all Christmassy – isn’t that enough?? If you think not, then read on!!!

Second: Animals – Jack (cat) licked up so much sap off the real tree we put up one year that we ended up at the emergency vet with a blocked kitty and a BIG bill. Elka (dog) bit all the glass balls off of our tree one year and we rose to colored piles of glass all over the living room. (Switched to wooden ornaments) Thank goodness she had been spitting them out along the way and her mouth was alright. Jerry (newest member and so timid) I really don’t want to terrify him by putting up a big, green thing in the living room or tempt him to eat the rest of the ornaments we own or have him accidentally pee on the tree thinking he’s outside. (We think his eyesight is not the greatest from past abuse.) If you still have questions see Becky and Keith’s blog about Callie, their adorable kitten jumping headfirst into the tree undecorating it as she goes!!

Third: I just don’t have time. We have our BIG adoptathon event at the SPCA this weekend where we have special prices and we schedule Santa and an Elf to deliver new pets Christmas Eve and Christmas Day and of course I’m working. There just isn’t time. If we are going to try to finish Christmas shopping, mail gifts to family and then be ready for a dinner party of 17 at our house Christmas Eve, then the tree has to go.


As for the adoption: So far I really have thrown in the towel for now. Will I make until after Christmas like I planned?? Probably not, although I am trying!!

Don’t forget to check out Michael and Carrie’s blog and say a Big congratulations to them on their Christmas miracle!

Next Christmas we’ll have a tree, a child and lots of new memories to make!! To those with new little ones celebrating your first Christmas together – ENJOY!!
Happy Holidays!!

Dreams & Happy Birthday!

First off I need to say - HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my husband Troy!!! Another good year!!

As we approach 7 months of waiting I can’t help but feel a little down. I know every day is one day closer to bringing Daniel home, but each day feels like a year has gone by. Also it seems I am slowing moving families from Waiting to Referral or Completed on the sidebar, yet we are going nowhere right now.

I’ve also been having strange dreams lately about the adoption. Just last night I dreamed I was handed a blond headed (full head of hair), green eyed little guy and he immediately arched his back and cried. Of course I just looked over to a lady and she smiled and I set him on the floor and we began playing a game of him looking through his legs on all fours upside down and me with my head on the floor looking back at him smiling and laughing. It was funny because he was young enough to crawl on all fours, but old enough to have this amazingly full head of hair. The other funny thing is that when Troy and I talk about what our son may look like we have never even considered green eyes. We always laugh and say between us, any child would fit in – I have black hair, brown eyes, he has sandy brown hair and blue eyes. How many mixtures can we get with that!!?? Not that we would mind green eyes at all – we just never thought about it!

That is one of the better dreams I’ve had. I know I am probably just facing all my worries in my sleep like with the back arching scene. I need to remember that they are just dreams and I need to worry less!!

My mom said to me a couple of nights ago to just go ahead and throw in the towel. Let myself be free of thoughts of the adoption during the holidays and focus on the last (hopefully!) Christmas, Troy and I will have alone for a long time. She said if I threw in the towel, things would start happening.

So that’s what I’m doing. I’m throwing in the towel and I am not going to expect or think about a referral until after Christmas. We have planned a big Christmas Eve dinner at my house with my family and Troy’s family. (Don’t worry Troy’s cooking – it’ll be okay!) We should have 17 family members eating Christmas Eve dinner at our house. Whew! I think I’ll be concentrating on that for now. Plus we need to get out the decorations and start, well...decorating!!

Hope everyone has a nice weekend!!