New Charm

In my last post, I mentioned the new charm that Jeremy gave me last week. You adoptive mommas will love it and might want to snag one for yourself. Here is the charm: And here is how the insert card reads:
Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift. 2 Corinthians 9:15

For a child you prayed
He heard the request
And that of the birth Mother
who wanted the best
The prayers of each other
He merged together
Directing our paths
He brought us together
From His own hand into yours
God created me
Then you chose to take me
A parents love birth deep
in your heart
Our lives are now blessed
thanks be to God
for knowing what's best

For the Mighty One has done great things for me, and Holy is His name. Luke 1:49

If you're interested you can purchase the charm at http://www.sterlinggracejewelry.com/.

Oh Jeremy! You already know how I love this gift. It means so much to me. Thank you dear!

Good Good Week!

Last week was just a really good week. To capture the details, this may be a long one. Bear with me. I was in Dallas last Saturday for this girl's baby shower. What fun to celebrate with friends over Josh and Amanda’s little miracle! My mom rode back with me Saturday afternoon and spent the week at our house. Just for fun! And it was a lot of fun. We did a little shopping and relaxed. And she was delighted to be covered in kisses by Holden. He would just kiss her and kiss her and kiss her all day long. It became pretty entertaining.
Thursday was my birthday. I am officially the BIG 29! And so proud of that! Mom treated me to lunch at The Cheesecake Factory and gave me some shopping money that I have yet to spend. Jeremy got me some wonderful gifts that he thought up all by himself. No help from me. I love surprises! He gave me a red KitchenAid tea kettle. This is so wonderful because for Christmas my sister had given me a French Press for my morning coffee. And the tea kettle will make it a little easier. I love it! He also got me some of my favorite perfume. Ok. Normally I am a cheap-o. I can’t justify paying full price for most things. I have no problem buying things used, on clearance or often times with coupons. But perfume is normally a splurge for me. Anyways, I was all out and that just can’t be. So he got me my lovely smelling perfume (that apparently they are no longer making). So sad. And my last and most favorite gift this year was a charm for my charm bracelet. Same sister also bought me a charm bracelet for Christmas. What a great idea, huh! She added to it a cross and a charm that says “little sister”. Then she gave me cash to add a charm to represent my Holden, which I have yet to do. Sorry sister. I think I will get an H or his birthstone very very soon. I haven’t decided yet. But Jeremy got me a charm called “The Chosen Hand”. And instead of making this blog longer than necessary, I will do an entirely different post on it because some of you out there might want to get you one! He got the idea off of Molly’s blog some time ago. And I am so glad he did. It is a special, special gift to me. Probably the one that cost the least, but meant absolutely the most. And then Holden got me a Starbucks gift card since he had been waking me up all week. Sweet little boy! I do have to say that the addition of Holden this year made the day that much more special! Holden was pretty fussy last week during all of this. He decided he would have no more pureed baby food and he didn’t enjoy being spoon fed. He was waking up at some point EVERY night! He was fighting taking his bottle. He was on the tale end of a cold and so I thought maybe it had gone to his ears. We went and had them checked at the doctor. Ears were perfect! As much as I didn’t want him to have an ear infection, it would have brought me a little peace. No one wants to think that their sweet little baby is turning into quite a mess. But she (the doctor) did check his teeth and perhaps the big ones are on their way. She said his back gums were swollen and that could be the cause of mister's attitude. The past few days we have gotten back into our schedule of staying home and taking regular naps. And the attitude is better. Still not caring for the spoon to be fed but he is taking his entire bottle with no meltdowns.
Anyways, this was my good, good week. A week with mom and a great 29th birthday!

Walking (with assistance)

He loves it! He loves to walk with his little walker or holding someone's hands. Thanks aunt Phee Phee for the walker. We are getting great use out of it these days.

Nana's here!

My mom has come to visit for the week. Holden is completely enjoying time with his nana. They have been kissing and reading, and kissing and chasing one another, and kissing and cuddling, and kissing and shopping. It should be a fun week!

Fancy-shmancy Rose Cake

Okay, finally cake class is completed. I passed! I learned alot. I will be posting my newly learned "tips" in the next week or so. But I was tired of making icing and icing cakes on a weekly basis. So I am not moving on to course 2. I need a little break. We were required to do roses on our cake yesterday. And so, here she is. All dressed up in the yellow roses of Texas. :)

Promote Oklahoma Adoption!!

To anyone that has any inkling of an interest in domestic adoption here in Oklahoma, please go here and read. Show support, get involved. These girls are fighting to make a difference in our state laws. I will confess to you now that I broke Lent and skimmed the bog when Molly informed me about it. Now, I don't know much about the differing adoption laws from state to state. Through our experience, Jeremy and I quickly realized that there were differences between Oklahoma and Colorado, where both of my nieces were adopted. But we were fortunate that our experience was smooth and the process flowed without a hitch. But that is not the case for every story, as many of you already know. BUT, on the same note, we can't live in fear of taking the step to adopt because of the unknowns of what might possibly happen. Jeremy said to me just this week something like: I know adoption can be scary to people. Just the fear of the unknown and uncertainty of the journey. But once you do it, it just changes your life. I think Molly said it best in the most recent post. So again, go here and read. And if you are interested in adopting, but a little fearful and need a push, I am pretty positive that I can convince you. :) So let me give it a try. Feel free to email me (melodie1980@gmail.com). And if I can't convince you, maybe this face can.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Cute boy, huh?!

We had a ball!

On Monday Holden and I spent some time with our friends Daysha and Lyndon. We actually got to see them 3 different times on Monday! Holden and Lyndon are becoming inseparable. They just can’t get enough play time with one another and that works out well for Daysha and I! We spent the morning playing at Dynamogym. Such a fun place! The boys probably spent an hour playing in the balls. If you know Holden very well, then you may know this was probably a dream come true for him. Surrounded by colorful, round balls! He loved it!

Lyndon quickly became a bit more interested in the pretty, gymnast girls.
I love my sweet boy!
And here is sweet Lyndon.


So thirsty and tuckered out from a hard day of playing!

Clown Cake

So this is cake #2 for my class. I thought the clowns would be so difficult but they were actually pretty simple. My biggest challenge so far is just getting the cake iced neatly. And I hope by May 1st I am mastering the technique a bit better. This one came out a little topsy turvy, though you probably won't notice in the picture as much. I think when I added the second layer, things just went south. I didn't get it on evenly and it just made icing it all very difficult. So the clown cake . . . here it is. Kind of cute, I think. And so now I am wondering if Holden's birthday might need a clown theme. The clown heads are plastic, but the bodies are made of icing and that is the part that we learned in class today. Only one more class to go. Stay tuned for next week's Rose Cake. Chocolate cake and chocolate icing has been requested by Jeremy's co-worker. So chocolate on chocolate it will be!

the shirt.

After 2 requests on the shirt, here goes. I first saw Silas wearing the cute shirt. And I believe his momma found it through a friend. So I googled "My entire life is being blogged shirt" and found it at here. They have yellow, blue, pink and white. So cute and perfect for my boy since each and every moment is documented.

19 seconds

The statistic is that every 19 seconds a child in Ethiopia becomes an orphan due to Aids. I’ve heard this statistic before and was reminded of it last week. It seems unimaginable to me. Every 19 seconds. That’s huge! That doesn’t include the children that become orphans because of other deadly diseases or poverty that the poorest of Americans can’t even fathom. Just so you can see a rough number (that is if I did my math correctly); it’s

4547

Roughly 4,547 children are orphaned daily due to Aids in the relatively small country of Ethiopia. On a map, Ethiopia looks only a bit larger than Texas. So it makes this statistic even more unbelievable to me. How do they even keep up with well over 4,000 new orphans a day? I don’t pretend to know much about Ethiopia. But I would assume that they can’t keep up with numbers like those. How would America keep up with a number like that? I can’t eve imagine it. And so I would assume many many many children die.
And so I wonder if one day in our future Jeremy and I will be making a trip to Ethiopia to pick up one or two little ones. It’s been a thought for me for a while. I’m not sure if I can sit with that statistic and not do something. Even if it’s just 1 or 2 little lives that are changed.
I know that with adoption the need truly is everywhere. I don’t think that you can choose the wrong path. There was a real need to find a family for Holden last May. And I know that God purposed us for one another. There is a real need through the state where children are being neglected and abused. And obviously there is a need internationally, outside of what we are able to see each day, where it’s just an entirely different world for those children.

Yay for Adoption Friends!

Today we got to play with this fun family. It was our second little playdate with these guys. But the first did not include Miss Sadie. Unbeknownst to her family, she was busy being born the day that we met back in September. So Holden finally got to meet the lovely Sadie whom he has only seen through blog pictures. And here is the cute little couple! It’s so hard to get a picture of 2 babies looking at the camera. So this is the best that I have! Here you can see that Holden is about done with the pictures. But he was really into Sadie's pink bow.
And here are cutie big brothers Owen and Cooper. They were a little more into the french fries than having their picture taken by the stranger (me). Super momma, huh! She’s got 3 that are 3 and under. And it really looks like so much fun!
I want Holden to grow up around other adoptive families and have adopted friends. It’s just something that both Jeremy and I feel is important. So it’s been nice to spend some time with these guys. We look forward to future playdates!

Friday night at POPS!

Jeremy and I went on a little date Friday night to a place just north of the city. Someone described it to us as a really big convenience store. But that description is way off! Sure you can pull up to the pump, get gas, run in grab a POP and a snack; but there is much more to this place. The inside really is a huge convenience store, but also a restaurant. A fairly popular one at that, as we had a little bit of a wait for our table. The walls of the place are lined with bottled soda. They carry over 500 types! They have your regulars, such as Coca-Cola Classic seen here. But then also the things you have never seen of or heard; such as Lenninade. Much to my surprise it did not taste like pink lemonade. And speaking from my personal Lenninade experience, I would suggest another option if you choose to pay a visit to POPS.
Jeremy had fun trying out the fancy camera. So here is my plug for POPS. A new place for all of you in this area to try out.

Watch Out Martha Stewart!

Okay, not really. In fact, I am nowhere close to Martha. I like to be crafty and I had been thinking that I wanted to take a cake decorating class. So me and my friend Allison started last week. I had to make my first cake this weekend and then we did the decorating during class. Let me just say, this is absolutely the messiest hobby I have ever done! And thus far, I am not feeling too optimistic about it. I'm not so sure that cake decorating will be my forte. I hope to be able to make my kids birthday cakes. But I don't think it will go any further than that. So I will just stick with card making and scrapbooking. Paper crafts don't make quite the mess that icing and food coloring do. So here is my first masterpiece.

10 Months Old!

Well, today is 10 months and so it is time for the monthly update on our boy. Another fun month! I’m sure I sound like a broken record by now, but it’s just so true. I could sit and play and talk to Holden for an hour. And sometimes I do. He plays just fine all alone and does well to entertain himself. But he lights up when Jeremy or I get on the floor and talk to him and play. He loves it when we identify objects and he tries to imitate the sound – like ball, duck, boat, car . . . Normally when I start singing the pat-a-cake song, he begins to clap his hands. But today I said “clap” and he started clapping with a big grin on his face. Which reminds me that he learns so much; even when we are unaware of what all he is picking up on. He can also identify his belly now; but only with his shirt off. It’s kind of like - out of sight, out of mind. If the belly is covered with a shirt, he sort of looks down, but is unsure of where that belly has gone. He’ll eventually get it.

I have been trying to be diligent with the baby signing, but as of right now he’s still not joining in. I am probably not as consistent with it as I should be. He also still refuses to hold his bottle. I have accepted the fact that I will most likely be holding his bottle for the next 2 months. And so I will just relish in the fact that I get an extra 10 minutes of cuddle time 4 times a day. I have come to terms that he is probably not going to do it at this point. He has taken his sippy cup by the handles by himself. He more often likes to sling water everywhere than to drink from it. But I believe that we are making progress. :) He has done a lot more self feeding this month, which is great. But it does have it’s drawbacks. 1) It takes forever for him to eat a portion of peas. Especially since he picks them up on at a time to place them in his mouth. It would be so much easier to puree them and spoon feed him. 2) Often times his hands get messy with bananas, toast, peaches. Which is not a problem to me. But it never fails that every single meal time, at some point his hands go to his head and hair. What a mess! Just consider his beautiful curls and agree with me on this. What a mess!! But I know the self feeding is important. So I wait patiently for my slow eater to finish. And I take a wet washcloth and kind of wipe down all the crumbs and banana mush that sits among those curls. And we go on with our day.

He crawls all over the place and loves to touch everything. He is very clear what the word “no” means. And most of the time he is obedient. When it’s getting close to nap time or Holden’s bed time, that no word can make the bottom lip turn under really quickly. At our house, he knows what is off limits and now he completely avoids those things. At other’s homes, it’s a whole new world to explore. Just this past week when Jeremy came home from work, Holden got really excited and reached out his arms for him. He wanted out of my hands and into his daddy’s. That made Jeremy really happy. Before Holden came along, I was deep in desire for a baby. And Jeremy was also, but this is the part I remember him talking about and looking forward to. Jeremy coming home from work to a child that was so excited to see his daddy. And now it is happening. Holden loves his daddy!

Some things that he loves to do daily are: peek-a-boo, giving kisses (sometimes these 2 go hand in hand. When he turns towards me during peek-a-boo he kisses my lips. I love it!), pat-a-cake, talking, bouncing on his knees, rolling the ball with me and chasing the dog. Sometimes the days feel long, but they are all sorts of fun! We are trying to absorb these sweet moments because they truly are passing us by quickly!