What Christmas Is All About

"And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.  But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.' Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rest.'" Luke 2:8-14

This, indeed, is what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.  I encourage you to take some time over the next few days to truly remember why we're all gathering together.  Think about Mary and the public struggles she went through being a virgin who was pregnant.  Think about Joseph and the choice he made to stay by Mary's side, instead of breaking off their engagement, as he so easily could have done.  Think about the birth of Jesus, God's Son, happening in a smelly, dirty, and noisy stable.  Think of the shepherds coming to see them, filled with great joy.  And think of Mary, treasuring all the little moments in her heart, and slowly realizing that the precious baby she held in her arms was the Savior of the world.

I pray that you all have a blessed and safe Christmas weekend, spending time with those you love, and remembering the birth of the Messiah, the Lord...Jesus.

Couch to 5K

Some of you exercise nuts out there may have heard of something called "Couch to 5K".  It's a running program designed to get you from the couch to a 5K in 9 weeks.  Well, today the hubs and I went from the couch to a 5K in less than 24 hours!  Here's how it all happened...

We were watching "The Biggest Loser" on Wednesday night and they were going over some health tips for the Thanksgiving weekend.  They mentioned that most cities have a 5K Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning.  We decided to look it up and see if Tulsa had one.  Sure enough, they were having the Second Annual Tulsa Turkey Trot the day after Thanksgiving!  We thought about doing it, but weren't really sure.  We decided to mention it to some friends of ours who have recently picked up running so that we would have someone to hold us accountable to it.  Once they decided they wanted to do it, there was no backing out!

Now let me tell you, I do not run.  The hubs does not run.  We both exercise, occasionally.  Nothing 100% consistent.  So I really mean it when I say we went straight from the couch to a 5K!  And the race was miserable.  And wonderful.  And really, really awful. haha!  At the very end though, there was this little hill to come down from to the finish line.  With perfect timing, as I reached the top of that hill my iPod started playing "Eye of the Tiger" (I'm serious!).  Combine that with the fact that I could see our friends who came with us yelling my name, I was able to run to the end and finish.  It was an amazing feeling.

All in all, there were a lot more hills than I had expected.  And I ran a lot less than I had expected.  And when I wasn't running, I walked a lot slower than I had expected.  And it took me a lot longer to finish than I had expected (just under 50 minutes).  But I did it.  I got off my butt, got off my couch, and on a complete whim, I completed a 5K with the hubs.  I couldn't be prouder of both of us.  It was a great time!

Our whole group at the race!  Mark, Lori, Mike, me, and Eric

The microchip on our shoes that tracked our time.

Start of the race.

My view from part of the race.

Eric crossing the finish line!

Mark crossing the finish line!

Lori crossing the finish line!

My turn to cross the finish line!

And Mike's turn to cross the finish line!  That's the look of determination right there.

Mike and I afterwards.  Phew, we were tired!

The kiddie pools full of beer and water. haha!

Eric and I enjoying some beer and carbs!

I'm an Auntie again!

My brother and sister-in-law, Michael and Ashlee, had their fourth baby on Tuesday, making me an Auntie of a newborn all over again!  No one knew the gender except for Ashlee's mom, so we all got to find out when we went to the hospital.  They had a beautiful girl making their family wonderfully complete with three girls and one boy.

Aunt Vanessa and sweet Charlotte!

She is so beautiful!

Uncle Mike and Charlotte

The biggest sister with the baby sister.

Abijah's turn with her baby sister.

Charlotte's sweet and precious toes.

I got to spend my lunch break on Wednesday just snuggling the sweet girl!

It's so much fun having another niece to love and spoil!  I, of course, love her tons already.  I am very blessed to be an auntie of so many sweet kids!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

And here's just a quick little bit of info on where we're at with adoption...  Over the past month I have been in contact with a private adoption agency a lot.  We even had a phone interview with them and went over a lot of information on getting started with their program.  But, without going into every single detail, I will just say that we are once again looking into DHS adoption or fostering-to-adopt.  It seems like we (aka, ME!) have been trying so hard to ignore this option, but God has been putting it in our paths on almost a weekly basis.  It's getting a little hard to continue to ignore. ;)  So that's where we're at.  We are praying a lot about it since, honestly, it really scares us (again, aka, just ME).  We are trying to decide between just adopting or doing foster-to-adopt.  I'll let you know anything new when we know!

Back To Square One

Well, like I said in the previous post, nothing ever seems to be 100% with adoption, and things have already changed.

We received an email from Catholic Charities today saying that our pre-application was approved when it shouldn't have been.  Apparently we do not meet the age requirements or the requirements for length of marriage.  Crushed and devestated are the first two words that come to mind to describe how I feel right now.  I was just so excited to finally have a true direction that we were taking.  And now we're back to nothing.

Please be praying for us as we try to figure out what path we are supposed to be taking.

Progress

I actually have an update to share!  We are making some progress.  It's happening slowly, but we truly are getting somewhere!

For now (because nothing is ever 100% certain with all of this in my book) we have decided to pursue our adoption through Catholic Charities.  (And no, you don't have to be Catholic to adopt through them.)  We have had several friends mention them to us, so we finally decided to check it out.  We liked everything we saw, so we decided to get started!  And the best thing about them is that their fees are based off of income, therefore they are the cheapest agency we've found.

We have already filled out their pre-application and were approved to work with them.  The next step in the process is to attend an adoption seminar that they put on.  We will go to that on October 28th.

It's so exciting to just finally have a specific direction we're taking!  This is a very long journey we have ahead of us now, so please continue to keep us in your prayers.  I will put updates on here for every step of the way!

Not Much To Say...

Well, I don't have much to say.  I desperately wish I had tons to share.  But for now, I will just give you the little progress we have.

Stressed is the theme of life right now.  I thought it was a big enough decision to finally figure out that we wanted to adopt.  But now we have to figure out how to go about adopting.  Domestic adoption, international adoption, adoption through an agency, adoption through an attorney, or adoption through DHS.  There's so many variables!

We have settled on domestic adoption through an agency or attorney, but that just brings up even more variables of actually finding someone to work with!  We have contacted a local agency and attorney, but neither one have returned any of our calls.  There's an agency about an hour and a half away from us that we have been in contact with, but then there's the issue of expenses.  Adoption is expensive enough on its own.  Not sure if we want to pile on the added cost of traveling back and forth there a lot.  Our latest pursuit has been to contact another local attorney company to talk to them about their process, fees, etc.

So that's it.  That's all there is to say...and it's driving me crazy!  My head and heart are moving forward so much faster than this process actually is!  Please continue to keep us in your prayers as we try to figure out our finances for this journey and try to find the right path to take.

I'll leave you with a video of a great song by Steven Curtis Chapman about adoption.


When Love Takes You In
Uploaded by wanzea. - Music videos, artist interviews, concerts and more.

Happy Birthday to the Hubs!

Today my wonderful husband turns 25 years-old!! I know that may sound young to some of you, but we sure do feel like we're getting old!! lol But anyway... We love birthdays here in the Thomas household! The birthday person pretty much gets to do whatever they want for an entire weekend. We gotta take advantage of stuff like this while we still don't have kids!

Yesterday we went to IHOP for breakfast, spent the afternoon in his home town, had lunch with his parents, did a little geocaching, and then we had some fro yo for dinner at Orange Leaf. Today we will be getting our traditional Target-brand birthday cupcakes (they're so yummy!!), go out to lunch together, and later go out to dinner with some great friends. Who knows what tomorrow holds, but it will be whatever he wants!

And since there's a day in the year dedicated just to the hubs (because I'm sure there's no one else with a birthday today!), I have to use just a few sentences to brag on him a little bit... This man truly, truly is my best friend. I'm just lucky enough that I also happen to be in love with him and he romances me every day. He is so dang funny and is always doing crazy things to make me laugh (as you can tell from the picture posted.) He is caring, loving, giving, and considerate. The past two years of marriage and infertility have been an emotional whirlwind. I have truly only survived it through the grace of God and the love and humor of the hubs. He is an amazing man and I am so blessed to get to walk through this life hand-in-hand with him! Happy Birthday, Hubs!

An Anniversary of Sorts

Two years ago today the hubs and I began our long and exhausting journey to try and become parents. Two stinkin' years. I get emotional if I let myself think about that for too long.

After two years of infertility I am truly amazed by the idea of deciding you want to get pregnant and then it simply happening. Or even being able to become parents for free! That is such a foreign concept to me and yet it is what's natural. That's how it's supposed to happen. Sometimes that makes me feel like a freak...that I can't accomplish what's so natural to do.

Infertility is just such a long and frustrating journey. Sometimes I feel like we're not any closer to becoming parents today than we were two years ago. We currently have about three or four different avenues we could pursue for adoption, but we haven't really felt led to any specific one. It also seems like God isn't really opening doors for any of those avenues for us to really feel certain about what direction we should be taking. We just feel stuck at a deadend and it's frustrating. So very, very frustrating.

I usually try to remain upbeat and optimistic throughout all of this. I have my hope and faith in the Lord and know that He has an amazing plan in the works for us. But right now the journey to get there is just so overwhelming and has been really getting me down. Life will carry on and eventually we will reach our intended destination, but for now I just have the "blah's".

An Update...Sorta

Well, I haven't written anything on here in 3 weeks now. There's two reasons for that. 1: We've been crazy busy lately. I can't even tell you anything specific we've been doing. But we've definitely been busy! 2: The biggest reason...I just feel like I don't have any updates to give.

We're at a frustrating standstill right now. Which is especially frustrating because really, we haven't even been able to do anything to truly get started yet. A while back I mentioned that one of the doctor's I work with adopted his daughter several years ago. He recently gave me a phone number for a local adoption attorney and encouraged me to give her a call. He did warn me, however, not to call her unless we were really ready to move forward with all of this. He said most people get a baby through her in about 2 months and he's even seen someone get a baby in 48 hours!

As you can imagine, I was thrilled to get her number! I couldn't wait for the next open opportunity I had to give her a call. But, that was about 4 weeks ago and we have yet to call her. Simply because we cannot figure out if we can afford to do this or not. We can afford to have a baby, yes. But we cannot afford to buy a baby. At 23 and 24 years-old we are trying to figure out how to spend $10,000+ and possibly go into major debt, all so we can become parents. It's a little stressful, to say the least.

So we're taking some time right now to just rest. And think. And count our pennies. And pray. It's been so, so hard to be in this stage of things. It drives me crazy feeling like I'm doing nothing proactive right now for this long journey we've been on to become parents. But I must learn to rest in the Lord and His timing. I know that everything will turn out perfectly because of Him, but the process is very frustrating right now. Prayers from all of our friends would be much appreciated.

New Mexico Vacay

Vacation was, oh, so nice! It was great to just get away with family and do whatever we wanted. I also loved spending so much time with my nieces and nephew! They're just the best!

We didn't have a lot planned for the week; just wanted to rest and relax. But really, the town my grandma lives in is what I like to call a "pass through town". If anyone is staying there it's simply because they're just needing a place to stay for the night until they move on to a bigger city the next day. So really, there's not a whole lot to do there, but we like it that way.

We did get to do a lot of geocaching though! We got 44 in all over the course of a 6-day trip. About half of those came on our ride to New Mexico when we turned an 8-hour drive into a 13-hour drive! But it was so much fun! It was really cool to do that all together as a family. Also, Mike and I and Michael and Ashlee both reached our #100 find on the trip! Definitely fun times.

I took way too many pictures from the trip to post even half of them here, so I made a slideshow out of my favorites. Enjoy!

A side note for the adoption side of things: Stay tuned and I might have some fun updates for you all soon. The hubs had an interview with a radio station here and things seemed to go really, really well! We should know something more concrete in a week or two. If he gets this job then we can start to move forward at full speed with adoption. So prayers would be very much appreciated!

Fourth of July Weekend

The hubs and I had a great Fourth of July weekend spending lots of time with each other, family, and friends. On Friday we geocached together pretty much all day. Saturday night was spent at a friends house just hanging out watching the city fireworks show while playing some games of bean bag tossing (which I was absolutely terrible at! lol). Then on Sunday night we went over to my brother and sister-in-law's house to watch their city fireworks, but the show got cancelled. We still all got together and enjoyed hanging out and shooting off our own fireworks. It rained on us all weekend long, no matter what we were doing, but it was still a great time!

This Saturday we leave with almost all of my family to go on vacation to New Mexico. I can't wait! It's going to be so nice to just get away. My grandma lives in a teeny tiny town in New Mexico and it's always great to just enjoy the simplicity of the place.

And now, here are some pictures from the weekend. Hope everyone had a great time too!

Geocaching in the rain!

Enjoying some bean bag tossing, in the rain! lol

Ryland showing me where the fireworks were coming from.

Doug and Ryland staying safe, and dry, under the umbrella.

Lots of umbrellas all around!

My niece, Ethne, with a water balloon.

My other niece, Abijah, launching her balloon!

Ethne running through the yellow smoke bomb! lol

Mike and Sol enjoying some homemade ice cream.

Me with my ice cream. So yummy!

Ashlee and her kiddos watching the fireworks from under their umbrella.

Mike made me a heart with his sparkler!

Party Time!

Yesterday we got together with family and friends to celebrate my niece, Abijah, and the wonderful event of her turning three! She had a great Dora party by the pool! It was a really fun and relaxing time. It was so nice to get to just hang out with everyone for a little bit.

Everyone hanging out and enjoying the pool.

Nana and Ethne swimming around.

Sol enjoying some juice.

Michael and Sol swimming around.

Singing "Happy Birthday" to Abijah.

Showing me how old she is now.

Hair glitter from Mike and I!

And a Minnie Mouse shopping cart!

I can hardly believe that this little girl is three now. When she was first born she had to spend 10 days in the NICU due to her lungs not being fully developed, but you would never be able to guess that about her now! This girl is so spunky and full of life. She is always on the go and is always making me laugh over the craziest, silliest things! She is so much fun and a true joy to be around. I am very blessed to get to be one of her aunts!

World Cup Madness

I know most of you check this blog for our infertility updates, but we try to make it a point to not let infertility be our lives. Therefore, we usually have a lot of other stuff going on! I plan to, hopefully, blog about all of that extra stuff while also keeping infertility updates on here whenever there's something new to tell. With that being said, onto World Cup Madness... :)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The hubs loves soccer. Plain and simple. He his very passionate about it and pretty much is always talking about it. Fortunately, pretty much all of his guy friends feel the exact same way! And as for me, well, I love sports because the hubs loves sports!

Last Friday the World Cup kicked off (no pun intended) and made most of the wives in our group of friends "World Cup Widows" for the next month! Last Saturday the US played against England. That was a pretty big and exciting game so we decided we definitely needed to have a party for it! There were even early games (6:00 am & 9:00 am) that some guys came over for! We grilled out all day, ate lots of food, relaxed, and just enjoyed watching soccer with some of our best friends. All together we had 11 adults and 4 children for the day. It was a great time and we were really happy to have everyone over!

Some yummy sauce for the wings!!

The hubs grilling the chicken wings.

Me and the Grill Master!

That would be the hubs and my brother taking the bench off our swing so they could use the frame as a goal while the guys played around outside! haha!

They just crack me up! Boys will be boys and there's just not much you can do to change that. (Not that I'd even want to!) :)

Some of the food line up!

I love baking and, of course, had to make some treats for the day! Here we have Symphony Brownies, Strawberry Cake Balls, and Butterfinger Brownies.

Game watching time!

More game watching! (And no, that flag isn't always hanging off of our fireplace mantle. That was the hubs's touch of decorating for the party! haha!)