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I am so happy being married and living with my best friend. We adopted our first child, Ari, in 2011 through a domestic adoption and our second, Jude, in 2014.

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Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Officially Ours!

Little Pirate has always been our boy ever since we laid eyes on him. But last Friday, September 21st, a judge made it so in the eyes of the law. I am officially a mommy, the hubs is officially a daddy, and Little Pirate is officially stuck with us forever! ;)

It really was altogether a great experience. Our judge was really relaxed and easy going, cracking jokes the whole time. Little Pirate was way overdue for a nap and super squirmy, but still did well.

I'm just so thankful that after nearly 14 months this process is done and we are forever a family.

Ready in court and listening to the judge.

Could we be any happier??

The moment he was officially declared ours!

With our judge.

Our official family!

With all the grandparents.

With our wonderful attorney and friend.

With his wonderful Aunt Ashlee! September 21st is her birthday and now also Little Pirate's adoption day. Love that they get to share this special day together.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Finalization

Tomorrow we will be at the court house to finalize Little Pirate's adoption. What a wonderfully exciting day! We've been waiting for this for so long. It's something that should have been done when he was 6 months old and now at almost 14 months old we've finally gotten there. Excited doesn't even being to describe my feelings.

But I am, also, having some mixed emotions. Tomorrow Little Pirate will be declared my child. He will be issued a new birth certificate with my name on it stating that I gave birth to him. I know that I'm his mom no matter what, but adoption just isn't as simple as that.

There is another woman in this picture. The woman that gave birth to him and she is so important. It seems like this new birth certificate almost erases her out of the equation.

I am his mom, but she will always be his birth mom and that is so special to me. This all just reminds me so much more that it is my job to keep her memory alive in our family, to speak of her, and to make her known to Little Pirate.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Catching Up

Oh, blogging...what a love/hate relationship we have. I can never make up my mind on if I want to continue this thing or not. Do that many people even blog anymore? Does anyone particular even actually read this blog? Who knows.

All I know is today, I feel like blogging. Next Friday, September 21st, we finally have a court date to finalize Little Pirate's adoption. There's a ton of thoughts swirling around my head about this that I need to write down, so that will be coming. But for now, I'll just play a little catch up.

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Since I was last on here our little family, of course, got to celebrate Mothers Day and Fathers Day. What wonderful firsts for us! The days were simple and blissful. We just enjoyed time set aside to celebrate parenthood and our sweet little boy who made us become parents.

We also took the time on those days to speak to Little Pirate about his birth mom, B. I want her name to be a known thing around our house. She will always be a big part of us and the reason we are a family. We are so thankful for her.

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© Jenny White Photography
On June 2nd we lost this amazing man, my grandfather. He had been sick for awhile. In and out of the hospital for several years with the doctors always saying, "We think this is it this time." But he would shock them, get better, and leave the hospital. This seriously happened over and over again. What a strong man he was. But this time, it really was it. He was ready to go home.

I never want to forget the last time I was with him, so I'm writing it down here.

I got a phone call from my mom around 5:00am saying that he was unconscious, in his last few hours, and if I wanted to say goodbye I needed to come to the hospital. I immediately threw some clothes on and headed out the door. When I got there my parents, grandmother, aunt and uncle, and two cousins were already in the room. We all sat together and cried together in almost complete silence. After a little while I decided I was ready to say goodbye. I walked over to him, held his hand, and gave him a kiss on the forehead. I then whispered to him, "You deserve this. You've waited your whole life for this and you deserve to go home now. I love you."

This is a picture I took of him and his beloved bride (as he still liked to call her) in their last few moments together. He died the day after their 58th wedding anniversary. There's something very special about that to me...I know he held on long enough to honor that. In fact, the day of their anniversary he was still conscious and called my mom to make sure she had some flowers delivered to my grandmother from him. They had a love that truly inspired everyone around them.

I am so thankful that my grandfather was able to be around for the first 10 months of Little Pirate's life. It makes me so happy that they knew each other. My grandfather loved him so much and would ask me almost on a weekly basis if the adoption was finalized yet. I so wish he could be here next week when we got to the court house. But, of course, I know he will be with us no matter what.



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In June the hubs and I participated in The Color Run with my brother and sister-in-law. We had such a great time! It truly is the happiest 5K on the planet.


And then in July we all went on a family vacation together to New Mexico. As always, family vacations are crazy, so much fun, and totally exhausting. haha! We really enjoyed being with everyone for a week and taking Little Pirate on his first vacation.


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© Jenny White Photography
On August 8th my baby boy turned 1!! How is that even possible? What a great year we've had with him. It went by faster than I could have ever imagined and I know it's not slowing down at all. I just have to hold on and savor every moment.

We had a pirate birthday party with all our great friends and family. It was fun and simple. We really appreciated everyone coming out and celebrating this time with us.


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So there's my attempt at catching up a little bit. Our life really isn't that exciting, so I just don't think about blogging much. Maybe there will be more, maybe there won't. I'll just have to try and give it some time when inspiration strikes me.

Thanks for reading, if there's anyone out there! ;)