Maybe Baby's Christmas

Even though our 'Maybe Baby' has not joined our family yet or even scheduled an arrival, our future baby received their own Christmas gifts this year.  With the work we have done in recent months to put the nursery together many of our family members gave us Christmas gifts specifically for the babies room and the future child.

My brother Caleb made us a one-of-a-kind Polar Bear rocker. You can see the step by step process here.

Nathan's cousin Adam and his wife Candace gave us the print of Christ that is now hung in the nursery.

Santa gave us the toy polar bear mom and cub.

And my Mother found the wonderful book 'Forever' by Emma Dodd.   I would like to share the words of this book with you.

Forever

When you're happy, having fun, I feel happy, too.

When you giggle, play, and run, I laugh along with you.

I do my best to cheer you up when you are feeling down...

to see if I can make you smile and smooth away your frown.

If you're ever feeling scared, I'll be right beside you.

If you're ever feeling lost, know that I will find you.

When you share your hopes and wishes, I'll keep them safe for you...

and promise to do all I can to make those dreams come true.

And no matter what may come as we journey on together...

know that deep within my heart, I will love you...

forever.

by, Emma Dodd

Merry Christmas to our future 'Maybe Baby. 

We will love you Forever.

Christmas Review

This year for the first time since Nathan and I have been married neither of us was required to work.  It was so nice to be able to celebrate with both of our families without the stress of work or adjusting everyone's holiday schedule.

We spent Christmas Eve with Nathan's family and Christmas morning with my family.

 

Little T loved his new wheels, especially because
 they seemed to come with cruise control powered
by Uncle Austin.  They zipped around at full speed
with T laughing and smiling the entire time.

My Sister-in-law Jen and I in our matching
hooded and footy pajamas.

All the girls in our PJ's.

J in his pajamas and hooded blanket.

Jen teasing Nathan (as usual).

It was so fun to watch all the little nieces and nephews eagerly open their gifts and happily play.  All their antics kept the adults pleasantly occupied and laughing all night long.

I forgot to take my camera down to my parents house for Christmas morning so I have no photographic proof of the fun we had there, but it was fun.  A mellow-er party then the night before noting the absence of any little kids to entertain but we sufficed with laughing at each other and the cats.

As far as Nathan a I go, we had a great Christmas.  We both commented that we were more excited to be giving gifts then the anticipation of receiving any but we felt blessed on both accounts.
Nathan wins the award for best gift given in the cousin gift exchange (we participate by adding Jasper's name to the draw) by giving little J a toy bulldozer.  No matter what other gifts J opened or received he kept going back to his new bulldozer.  He even got mad at his dad when they had loaded the gifts into the car to drive home because he wanted to hold the bulldozer all the way home (all 8 housed up the street).

Nathan and I received many wonderful gifts as well.  Most of which are hunting themed.  Nathan gave me a new 30.30 rifle (since I had commandeered his for my last two hunts), a new pair of gloves and my in-laws gave me a new hunting pack.  I gave Nathan a new bow, and a pair of binocular chest straps.  From his parents he received a scope for his 30.30 (I shoot open-sights).
We also received many other wonderful gifts from friends, neighbors and family.  We are grateful for all the wonderful people in our lives and the love that we share with them all. 
It was a very Merry Christmas.

Happy Sunday!

Merry Christmas!

 

 

Love, Jasper

Family Pictures 2013

Now that I have sent out all of my Christmas cards I can share some of our latest family pictures with you all.
Early in November we had a great time driving up a canyon close to our home with a very talented young photographer from our neighborhood.  Zach is amazing.  You should check out his other work here.

*If you look close you might be able to find our stuffed rock-chuck Phil peeking up in some of the photos. :-)

This one was just for fun.  Nathan was off camera calling Jasper and
holding a treat in order to get him to lunge  like that.

 

Happy Monday Ya'll

Feild of Dreams Update #3

We have been hard at work putting our 'Field of Dreams' Polar bear nursery together.  Here is the latest update:

I have completed re-finishing the changing table my mother-in-law found for us. 



After

Before

I love it!

I have also finished painting all the trim and bead board.  All I have left is a bit of touch-up painting to do, and the room will be ready for us to put all the furniture in.

It is really starting to come together.

Happy Sunday!!!





Puppy Cousins

Jasper has some new puppy cousins.  Harley the Pomeranian and Roxy the Husky.

 

My Sister-in-Law Jen is planning on breeding them when they are older and hopefully getting little Pomsky puppies(look like a husky, size of a Pomeranian). 

Since Harley joined the family last month he and Jasper have had a few play dates. 



Jasper sharing.

Harley chewing on Jasper's nylabone.

 

Big dog has little bone and little dog has the big bone.

 

So cute together.

 

 

It takes a few minutes for them to get used to each other but once they do they like to play, wrestle and chase each other around the house till they both get so tired they take a nap. 

It is fun to have puppy cousins to play with.

Happy Saturday

Friday the 13th

Happy Friday the 13th to you all.  It was almost two years ago on another Friday the 13th that we received to news that all our hopes of conceiving a child would not come true.  On that day after very invasive medical testing and hours of waiting for results the final word came in.  The doctor we had been seeing was very kind and was able to go over all the results and options available to us.  We are thankful for the time that he spent with us and his caring and thoughtful words.  As you can expect we were devastated. 
That day, that Friday the 13th changed our lives forever.  All that we had dreamed of and expected for our lives from the time that we had been children ourselves had to now be shifted. What would we do?  What could we do?  What would we choose?  These are questions that we spent weeks thinking about, praying about, and discussing.  Finally we found our answer.  We could still have the life we wanted filled with the blessing of children, they would just have to come to our family by other means.  We chose to pursue adoption.  The last two years have not been easy.  There have been times that we have been overwhelmed, frustrated, and doubted that we had made the correct choice.  There have been days that we have lost faith.  Each and every time those feelings came something happened to strengthen us, to buoy us up.  Many times it has been a kind word from a friend or a lead on a potential expectant mother.  Sometimes it has simply been the reassurance of the Holy Spirit comforting us to let us know that we are doing the right thing and that all will work out in the end.
Many times we have been asked if there is any progress on our hopes to adopt.  The answer is always that we are still waiting and hoping.  We have had a few of what I call 'Maybe Babies' over the last few months.  Children or expectant mothers that we have learned about and in one way or another. We have pursued getting in touch with and even had one expectant mother (that we know of) go through our itsaboutlove.org profile to see if she felt that we would be the right choice for her son.  In each of those cases the babies have found other forever homes to go to.  It is hard to not get our hopes up then we learn of these babies, especially when each time they have been crushed with the news that it has not been us who has been chosen.  We know that our Heavenly Father loves us.  We know that He has a plan for us, and We know that someday one of the "Maybe Babies" will be the one He has chosen to come to our home.  We will continue to wait and to hope.  We will continue to work on the nursery that we are preparing so that it will be ready when the time comes for our baby to come home. 
On this Friday the 13th we have hope.

Happy Friday

It's begining to look a lot like Christmas....

We put our Christmas tree up on Saturday.  You can
barely see it but that is snow outside the window.

Puppy and I all geared up to go shovel the
driveway.  Complete with His 'sausage' suit and
 my snowpants and boots.

Hard at work.

That's right, We had 8 inches of snow when I shoveled.
And it just kept on going.

It only took about 45 minutes to do the entire driveway. 
Thank goodness for Pandora music to keep me sane during it all.

We had cub scouts at my house today and after they
 finished the project I let them go out and play in the
backyard for the last 10 minutes

G and W having a snowball fight.  E was too busy shoveling
 a path through the grass.  Evidently it was to be a
 highway because the snow was so deep.

Happy Snowed ALL DAY Tuesday!!!