Saturday, May 22, 2010

A Week To Remember


What a fantastic week we have had in our home! Sunday we set out for a family day touring Stone Mountain. The boys were so taken with the ropes course, they chose to take the second highest route with their fear-of-heights father in tow! We ventured to the top of the mountain via a high speed tram and then hiked down a 1.3 mile trail to the bottom....even MK enjoyed this! The weather was beautiful and our time together was priceless. Following our Stone Mountain adventure, we met up with the Gruskin family for dinner at our fav restaurant, The Cheesecake Factory. We loved catching up with them and can't wait to get together again! Visit their blog and follow along on their journey to adopt the precious baby girl who is waiting for them in China. Their site is http://www.littleboyhugsandladybugs.blogspot.com/. This family is very special to us! We met them during our fingerprinting renewal during our process to adopt MK and we have kept in touch with them since! It is amazing the threads that are woven together in adoption land.


Monday morning the children and I packed up and set out on our own to travel to see my grandmother. Following lunch with Nannie, a crowd gathered to hear Colin play the piano. They loved the entertainment as they clapped and danced and sang to some of the tunes. It was a great way to start off our week. That night, we stayed in town with my parents and indulged in some of Pop's famous burgers followed by his even more famous pancakes the next morning!

On Tuesday, we met some friends at the zoo. I am learning that the zoo is always entertaining no matter how often you go. The highlight of this particular trip would have to be feeding the Lorakeets. We were all taken with this delight!


Of course, the little girls enjoyed the birds and also spent quite a bit of time trading silly bands in their stroller or making monkey faces! These three have spent countless hours together this year during our co-op time playing house and store and picnic! So thankful for our friends!

Mason-Kate has been singing songs almost non-stop all year long in preparation for her end of the year show for preschool. She even woke up Thursday morning belting out her favorite song and declared she was so excited to sing for me and "her boys" at her school. Production time came, MK walked in holding her teacher's hand, and, well, she was so NOT excited to be singing for us after all! Our little buddy Colby took it all in stride, he did the hand motions and sang loud and just had a grand time performing.....

MK, on the other hand, spent most of her time up front like this.....following her performance, she came to me and declared, "I was just a little bit shy!" And with that, she set out to find some action in the jumpy thingies that had been rented for the end of the year bash!


Thursday afternoon, the boys finished up their homeschool tennis clinic! We have thoroughly enjoyed our year together. The friends and relationships we have established while homeschooling have been such a blessing to our lives. I LOVE that my children have had this opportunity. I LOVE that we are able to provide this for them.


*A milestone reached.....MK has started calling her big brother "Colin" more than "Col-Col"....she is growing up!

*This week our family was blessed beyond words with a special gift! We are so thankful for the people that God continues to intricately place in our lives.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

My older sister is a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit nurse. When she chose this occupation, it was all a great surprise to us due to the fact that she had never really held a baby. The one instance that I do remember her actually holding a little baby was on one Thanksgiving. I was holding a sleeping infant girl. She came over and, after observing that the baby was sleeping peacefully in my arms, she asked if she could try holding her. We traded off, she got settled with the baby and then the baby started to scream. My sister's response was to quickly hand the baby back to me.....she kept saying, "I don't know what to do! Here, you just take her!" And that was her experience with a baby. She has come a long way since then. Not only is she a NICU nurse, now she is also a mother. We were talking the other day and she told me of a baby in her care that was "pretty." She doesn't say this about too many of them but she said more than once how pretty this little one was. The unfortunate part is that this pretty little baby girl was born to a drug addicted mother and placed in the care of the state. Ultimately, the child was placed for adoption and on the day that the adoptive parents were to pick up the baby from the hospital, the birthmother appeared in their unit and pleaded to see the baby. Knowing that the baby was to be adopted, the nursing staff was all in a fix on how to handle this particular situation. In the end, the adoptive parents gave consent for the birthmother to see the baby. My sister shared with me how heartbreaking it was to watch this lady cry big tears as she cuddled the little one and bid her beautiful baby goodbye. This scene, one that I wasn't physically a part of, has been in my mind since then.