Summer Adventures (photo dump)

I'm home sick with hand foot and mouth that Ruby lovingly passed onto me after catching it at daycare. I swear, our family cannot get a break in the sickness department. So, what better thing to do than update the very neglected blog....

SUMMER ADVENTURES!

We had a really, really great summer. I don't think I can stress enough how grateful I am to have had the chance to spend 6 weeks with my girl. Even if we did absolutely nothing it would have been fabulous, but, we did have a few adventures. 

We started out the summer with a visit from Andrew's parents. Ruby got extra spoiled when Dano and DD bought her a new swing/play set for our backyard. Ruby LOVES to swing, and we have used it almost every day since it's been set up (which was quite the labor of love, I might add). 

Before summer break technically began, it was already summer, so that's why I'm counting our fun trip to Alabama! I took off work early on a Thursday afternoon and we jumped in the car and made the 3 hour drive to Gulf Shores. We had a great time celebrating our friend's marriage (Andrew did the ceremony....and did a wonderful job!), and got to spend a little time at the beach. Ruby LOVED playing on the hotel bed, but wasn't a huge fan of the beach. The waves freaked her out, and she wasn't crazy about the feeling of sand between her toes. Her favorite part was waving to people while we dried off at the gazebo...crazy girl!

We then celebrated Andrew's first Father's Day (with a baby outside of the womb), and we actually had TWO kiddos. Our sweet foster-son T helped us celebrate how great of a daddy Andrew is. We're so lucky that he's ours. 

 Ruby and I took a whirlwind trip to Texas right after I got out of school for my Grandad's 80th birthday and my cousin's baby shower. We saw a lot of people and had a lot of fun, but missed Andrew way too much!

The rest of our summer was spent at home, in humid, sticky, hot New Orleans. We received the placement call about T while we were in Alabama, and he came to live with us the day after we got back. We had such a sweet summer with him, and fell in love with him so hard. Andrew text me about 30 minutes after he arrived (I was still at work) "this one is going to be rough...", but he actually ended up being the sweetest, funniest, most adorable 3 year old boy there ever was. 

We had a really fun fourth of July. Our friends came over, we grilled hotdogs and ate way too many chips. We tried to catch the firework show over the Mississippi (does anyone else still have to spell out m-i-s-s-i-s-s-i-p-p-i  in your head when typing Mississippi?? Hopefully I'm not the only one) River, but there was a wreck on the interstate and we weren't able to park in time. We saw bits and pieces of the show from the car, and rolled down the windows while we were driving to be able to hear the fireworks, which was basically the coolest thing in the world to T.  He stretched his neck as far as he could to see out the window and watched with amazement. I loved getting to experience that with him, his face was absolutely priceless. Ruby slept the entire time, even through T screaming "oooohh that's a BIG one!!" 

We spent a lot of time this summer playing at home in our pjs, going to the zoo, aquarium and park, and watched a few too many episodes of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. 

T went back to be with his family after about 2 months with us. It was heart-wrenching, even more so than seeing Bug (our first placement) go. T was very sad to leave us, and driving away without him in our backseat was enough to make this mama bawl. We are hopeful for a continued relationship with him, even though we aren't really sure what that means for us yet. We're giving him and his family some time and space to adjust to being together again, and will hopefully get to see him sometime this month. 

So, there you have it. Our summer in a nutshell. It's fun to look back on it (at least the parts I decided to capture). Now that I'm back at work it's especially meaningful to remember all the sweet times I was able to have with the babies this summer. 

Our First Placement

We got the call that we have been eagerly waiting for on Thursday afternoon. The voice on the other end told me a brief story about a two year old boy who was removed from his home for neglect. A few hours later, Andrew and I were rushing around trying to prepare for this little life that would soon be joining ours. We saw the minivan pull into our driveway and went out to greet him with Ruby bouncing and sucking on a frozen peach on my hip. Out of the van pops a little boy with straight blonde hair and pretty blue eyes.

He was visibly scared a confused, and had just been awaken from his nap in the car. The social worker walked inside with us and gave us some paperwork to sign, then left as quickly as she had come. Suddenly, our lives had changed. I looked at Andrew and said "we have two kids", he came back with "TADA!".

Turns out that the little guy (we'll call him Bug here....mostly because I was calling him Bud one day and he turned to me with a concerned face "BUG??") was 3, not 2. He was tall, his sweet little face was covered in dirt,and his fingernails long with black dirt underneath them. We talk some about trucks, and show him his room with his big boy bed and stuffed animals waiting for him. That night was rough for all of us. He cried a lot, and we did a lot of comforting. We all fell in love.

Fast forward 5 days later. He's constantly hugging us, asking for "kiss" and saying "I lub you". We have little games we play, and things we say, like when we buckle him in his car seat "Bug has 1 leg" and he corrects us "NO! TWO LEG!", ect.. He's apart of us already. He calls Ruby "bebe" and Banjo "puppy". He is enamored with them and constantly says "look at that bebe!" "look at that puppy!!". He loves "gofish" and says ouch in the cutest way possible "OUSH". He loves bath-time, in fact when we got home from a BBQ at a friend's house last night the first thing he said was "BATH? Take a bath?!". We were told he didn't have running water at his house, so I'm sure he was just so excited to be ABLE to take a bath. He makes us laugh and smile, and truly has brought our house so much joy. He's affectionate and lapping up the love that we are dishing out. We've committed our hearts to loving this little guy 100%, no matter what.

I got a call this morning shortly after getting to work from his social worker, she told me that Bug had court and had to be there in an hour. She apologized for the late notice, and said that someone would be picking him up in 30 minutes. A million things ran through my mind. I'm mostly worried about how today will go for him, I know he's scared and confused in yet another new, unfamiliar place. I hope they have toys for him to play with, and that someone nice and patient is watching him. I wish I could be there to tell him that everything is okay, and make sure he knows how much we love him. I'm letting my thoughts run on, and think about if the judge says he can go home today. We wont even get to hug and kiss him goodbye, or tell him one more time that he is SO loved. My eyes keep welling up with tears and I keep pushing them back down.

I take a deep breath and remember who is in control. I remember that God has already written Bug's story, and that He will never leave or forsake Bug. "I will never leave you, or forsake you. Know that I am with you, you will never be alone" are words to a sweet song that I would lightly sing to Bug when he was nervous about going to bed. Those words are ringing in my ears today, I need them too, I need to know that Bug will never be alone, even if we can't be with him.

I guess going into foster care, I didn't anticipate loving as much as I do. I mean, I knew we were going to be committed to loving the kids that came into our home (for however brief or long-term), but I guess I'm just surprised that I love THIS much. I guess we wouldn't be doing it right if we didn't love Bug as much as we do. We are 100% in, and loving at 100% as well. I think (and hope) that Bug felt that.

I don't know what will happen today with Bug. This morning when I hugged him tight and kissed his sweet little face over and over again might have been the last time I will ever see him. That's surreal to me. To love someone so hard for such a short amount of time and then never see them again? It's a strange feeling. It's a feeling that I'm willing to embrace, though. I know we are going to grieve when Bug leaves us, but I also know our hearts are capable of so much more love. I'm excited to see where God takes us, and who he brings to us to love.

We're in this 100%.

Saturday in the Park

Who is singing that song now? 

I am. 

In fact, I just pulled it up on youtube to listen to while I type this...Chicago had some rad hair and beards. 

We had a nice (& hot) Saturday in the park that is close to our house on Saturday. We went with the intention of feeding the ducks. Unfortunately, I don't think we were the first ones with that idea so the ducks already had full bellies and were not interested in our bread.

We still had fun though! We let Banjo run around the dog park and meet some new friends, walked around and looked at the water and sleeping ducks, and then ended the trip with our first snow-ball of the summer. We let Ruby have a taste and she LOVED it. She was bouncing up and down grunting for more. 

We love weekends! 

"Hi Dada!"

More interested in eating the bread than feeding it to the ducks 

Hot dog! 

Sweet, happy girl

The boys

YUM!

A New Chapter

I mentioned a few posts back that I might have some exciting news to share soon.
It's true.
About a week ago I accepted a new job as a school nurse! I am incredibly excited about this opportunity, I really cannot wait to get started! I gave my two week notice this past Monday, which means my last day at my current job will be this Friday. It's bittersweet, as most new chapters in life are. I have built so many meaningful relationships and learned so much at Emeritus. It will always hold a special place in my heart, and I will definitely be going back at least monthly to visit my sweet residents who are so very special to me. While it's hard to leave, I also know that I am going to love my new job. I am so excited to get to work with kids, and get more time with my Ruby girl. I'm thankful for the blessing of change, even though it can be hard.
We've been casually looking at houses, which is pretty fun! It's so fun to walk through places and imagine our family growing there, as well as imagining what history the walls of all those rooms hold. We keep going back and forth on "are we really ready for this?", which most likely means we're not. It's still fun to dream, nonetheless. Ruby likes looking at houses, too. Our real estate agent keeps telling us that she is the best house hunting baby she's ever met. She enjoys testing the acoustics in the houses by squealing in each room.
We had our final home visit for our (never-ending) foster care certification (we started in November 2011). Our case-worker said that she thinks that we should be certified by the second week of April. We definitely aren't holding our breath, seeing as though it could take much longer, but are hopeful and excited for that change as well!
Andrew has some neat and exciting things going on at his job as well. He moved into a new office where Ruby loves to visit and help him send emails. Andrew is still enjoying his ministry with our boys, and is starting to work on connecting them with families in our church. It's neat to see his ministry grow and change, and I feel grateful to get to be apart of it.

So, there you have it. That's all of our news in a nutshell.

And here are some Ruby pictures for those of you who come to this blog strictly for that reason.

2012 in Pictures

It's become a tradition around these parts to do a recap of our year in pictures. It's fun for me to look back on all the years I've been doing this, and I'm glad to continue the tradition this year.
What a year it has been! I can say with 100% certainty that this has been the best year Andrew and I have ever had. We grew so much together, and then grew our family by 1 (2 if you count Banjo, which we totally do).
Without further adieu, 2012 in pictures:
(see 2009 here, 2010 here, and 2011 here)

January:
Juju visited and I thought that I was "showing". If only I would have known that my belly still wouldn't look that good 4 months postpartum...

February:

Our (wonderfully) weird friends dressed up and went to see Star Wars. We gladly babysat Nolan while they went. He's so little in these pictures! Sigh, they grow up so fast. 

Taylor's face looks so strange through that mask...

March:
Andrew got to pray at the Hornets game. They happened to be playing the Mavs that night which meant I got to watch Dirk warm up from the side of the court, oh and Jason Terry smiled and waved back at me when I said hi to him. This was also Nolan's first NBA game. What a night!

April:

Easter with our crew and Ruby's first concert (in-utero) at Jazz Fest. 

May:

We met this three crazy pups and chose our boy. 

June:
Celebrated one year of marriage with a baby in my belly, a pup on my hip, and my love by my side.

July:

The boys ended their most successful baseball season to date. We are so proud of the progress (not only in sports) that they have made this year. 

August:

Nothing important happened this month.

JK. We had a baby. Our beautiful, wonderful, sweet, precious, darling girl! 

September:
We spent a lot of time staring at Ruby in awe. Ruby mastered her famous "oh face".

October:

The only pictures I have from this month are random ones of Ruby and Halloween. Halloween was really fun.

November:

Ruby's (and Banjo's) first Thanksgiving and LOTS of sweet smiles. Mama also had her first day back at work and Ruby had her first day of school (saddest day EVER, for me at least). 

December:

Sweetest, most special Christmas ever. 

2012 was a year full of new adventures for us. We feel so very blessed and have full hearts reflecting back on such a special year for our family. We thank God for his faithfulness, provisions and unending love and are looking forward to what 2013 has in store for us. 

"The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 'The Lord if my portion,' says my soul, 'therefore I will hope in him.' The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him." -Lamentations 3:22-26