This is HUGE - It's Official!

I just want to shout it as loud as I can:

We got our

Probably most of you are wondering, like Brad,

what the heck do those letters mean again?

This means we have received our 

Letter of Acceptance from China!

They have officially reviewed our dossier 

and said that we can adopt Hannah.

See why I'm a little excited?

This step is HUGE, can take a short while or ages, 

and means that we are now in the home stretch!!!!

My best guess is that we will get our baby girl

in maybe 12-14 weeks.

That is not that long, people!

I am hoping we will be traveling to China

in February (though it could possibly be the end of January)

and the END IS IN SIGHT!

Which is just wonderful, because I decided just this week

that my little one needs to be in my arms ASAP :)

(the video we received on Tuesday may have had a little

something to do with this!)

We're ready, let's do this!

Celebrating How Far We've Come

It has been so long.  I almost can't believe it.  It has been literally months and months since this little guy has been sick.  It's November and he has just come down with his first bug of the Fall.

So we're back to the breathing treatments.

But you know what?  I am celebrating!

No, I'm not celebrating that my boy is miserable.  What I am celebrating is how amazing it is that he has gone this long without being sick!  How far we have come!

Last September he got sick, and literally he was sick until about March with just a few days, sometimes a week in between sicknesses.  We were up at night all the time.  He was on medicine all the time.  We went to the doctor almost weekly.

But that's not our life anymore, and I am so thankful!  Since Matthew had his tonsils out in February, he has been doing so much better.  There is really no comparison, it is a night and day difference.  We figured out so many things about his health this year and finally, after more than 2 1/2 years of almost constant sickness, he is one healthy little dude!

I'm hoping he can kick this cough without a trip to the doctor's office.  I guess we'll see!

And Finally They Share a Room!!!

It has been a long road, people, but we made it!  Two little boys sleeping WELL in the same room!  I wasn't sure we'd ever get there.  But we're on about week four and it has gone remarkably well, so I feel like I can blog about it now without worrying that tomorrow I'll be posting that Nathan is back in our bed :)

I have to say, I had never thought that we would co-sleep.  In fact, I was pretty adamantly against the whole thing.  But I'm learning along the way never say never!  Sometimes the best thing for your kids may not be what you would prefer to do.  A child sleeping with us for a year...not what I would have picked.  Truthfully though I am so glad we went this route with Nathan.  He needed it, plain and simple.  With Matthew being so sick for so long, up at night so many times, and Nathan being hysterical if he was sleeping alone...well, it was the right choice for our family.

After our Korea trip, we knew it was time.  We have a few more months until Hannah comes home, and we wanted Nathan and Matthew settled in their room (and hopefully sleeping well!) before that time.  So a few weeks back, we made the move!

After a fun trip to Ikea, we set up the boys' new beds!

We had two toddler beds for the boys before but we knew we needed to have a twin bed so that we could lie down with Nathan as needed.  Their room is small...so these low bunks were the perfect option for us!

The boys absolutely L.O.V.E their new beds!

A friend of mine had a great suggestion after a rough first night with Nathan and said maybe hanging a blanket over the side would make it more fun (he was pretty jealous of Matthew's fun top bunk).  It totally did the trick!  The boys are not allowed to go up to the top bunk during the day so the bottom bunk became their new favorite place to play.  It's so fun, like a little fort, and that night Nathan climbed right in and snuggled down without a fuss.  Amazing!

I'm so thankful we were able to make this happen and that it's gone so well.  Nathan still needs one of us to lie down with him at bedtime, and he still wakes up in the night, but sometimes he sleeps 7-8 hours before waking up and calling for us.  Big progress!  I love that the beds make a bit more space in their little bedroom, too!

And in case you're wondering...I have no idea where Hannah is going to go just yet!  There is room for a bed or a crib in their room, but three kids under four years old in one room kind of sounds like a nightmare to me :)  We might set up the crib in our room, she might sleep with us...who the heck knows!  It's all part of the adventure I guess!

{Beautiful Girl}

We were blessed to receive new pictures of our beautiful girl yesterday!  It was such a surprise and totally made my day.  Here is our sweet girl looking at the photo book our family sent her!  She is seeing pictures of her forever family for the first time :)

We got a short update as well, saying that her foster mother says that Hannah understands everything she says to her!  It also said she is very skinny, and that she is not walking yet and prefers to stand holding onto things rather than standing alone.  Part of me (selfishly!) hopes that we may get to see her take her first steps.

We are so thankful to have these precious pictures of Hannah with her foster mother.  We can tell she is cared for and loved!  What a blessing.  My heart is heavy today and the wait seems unending as it stretches out before us.  I know our time will come, but today...well, I just wish she was in my arms.

Busy

It's been a busy, busy week.  And I am tired.  The boys just spent over an hour playing in their room (making a surprisingly small mess, too!) and I was flat on my back on the couch trying to get up the energy to do something.  

Look, it worked - I'm blogging!

Earlier this week, Nathan had a CT scan scheduled, so he and I were up  at 5:30am to head to the hospital.  This was my first time going it alone for a procedure like this and I was a little nervous about it, but Nathan was such a trooper and did really well.  He had to be sedated (since he can't sit still for 10 seconds, let alone an hour!) and he had as can done of his inner/middle ears and also his right eye.  We are looking into the possibility of surgery to improve or maybe even restore his hearing, and this is the first step!  Also, he has a dermoid cyst on his right eye that his eye doc wanted a picture of if he was ever having a scan done (this is not anything we're worried about).  

Nathan had a bit of a difficult time before he got his happy juice, but bubbles did help :)

Everything went well and as soon as he woke up he wanted to eat, eat, eat!  We were home by about 10:30am and he was fine the rest of the day.

What else have I been up to...well, I've been busy in the kitchen!  

Every single day, without fail, I think to myself, "Dinner again?  Seriously, do I really have to make dinner again?".  I kind of got in a bit of a funk and let's just say we weren't eating very well.  

I had the idea that maybe making freezer meals in large batches would be good for me to try, so I got organized, made a list of meals I was going to make, bought my groceries, asked Brad to take the kids outside for a couple of hours, and voila!

I was able to make 15 freezer meals in just under 2.5 hours!  Some of these are complete meals and some of them are just the main dish and I will just have to make a side dish (for example, I made meatloaf and will just make some potatoes and a vegetable at dinner time).  A lot of them just thaw in the fridge for a day and then I will pop them in the crock pot.  I'm pretty excited about not having to think too much about dinner for the next two weeks!  I will definitely be doing this again.

I'm loving Pintrest these days and getting some great ideas.  The best part - I'm actually doing them instead of just thinking what good ideas they are!  I'm looking forward to sharing some more projects soon!

Fun Fall Memories!

It's a beautiful day in our corner of the world!  The boys have transitioned down to no naps (boo!) but honestly I am finding this really opens up the day and seems to give us a ton more time to do fun things.  Today after lunch we made some colored rice, and the boys have been happily playing with it for over an hour!

Every Fall I look forward to our trip to the local apple orchard, and yesterday we had absolutely perfect weather so we decided to spend the afternoon outside.  My sister and a friend joined us and it was just lovely!

Nathan's favorite part - the goats!

Matthew's favorite part - his very first pony ride!  I thought he would be scared but when I said I'd be just behind the rope waiting with Daddy he shouted, "Alright, Mom!" and then he was off with a big smile on his face!

After all this excitement we snagged a table and enjoyed some apples and freshly made donuts.  Yum!  I made Matthew some homemade donuts and he and Nathan both devoured those.  Then the kids all ran around like crazy with a sugar high :)

Then we attempted a family picture...which is always fun with two toddlers!

We got some apple cider to bring home and Nathan insisted on carrying it!

Brad and I have been going to this same apple orchard since before we had kids and every year I find myself thinking about past years and marveling at how our lives have changed in the last few years.  It's hard to believe next year there will be another little one running around, too!