Happy Thanksgiving and an outdoor photo shoot

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving - we did. We had both sides of the family over to our house. I don't know if they all love it, but it's great for us because we don't have to eat two full meals, Wes behaves a bit better at our home, and it forces me to "really" clean (and you know how I like a clean house).

Good news from our house, drum roll please. After 14 months of being "daytime potty trained," we have now moved into conquering the nighttime realm (I'm talking about Wesley here)...I hope I don't have to eat my words, but so far, so good. We aren't going to go sleeping over at someone's house without protection, but he's "safe" in his bed. I have to say that daytime training really happened for us in a weekend (with a boy, no less!), but nighttime has been a long time coming. For so long we had to put Wes in a diaper because he would soak through pull-ups. We were able to move into pull-ups, then wearing underwear to bed until Damon and I went to sleep, then pull-ups for the remainder of the night. The last few months, Wes has wanted to wear underwear all night, and we've been holding back. Who really wants to change a soaking wet bed at 1 in the morning, then again at 4 when you have to be at work at 8? No thanks. I figured he wasn't going to head to college wearing pull-ups, so I didn't stress about it (at least not too much).

I've spent time lately thinking of how blessed I am. I've been getting frustrated with the adoption process, so I have to focus on what I do have, not what I don't. And lets be honest, it is SO EASY to focus on what other people have that you don't, how easy things appear to be for other people, and just how bad things are for you. I mean, having a little pity party for yourself can happen before you even realize what you're doing!!

I went out last week with a few girlfriends and we had a photo shoot with our boys (five boys from 2-4.5 years old). Here are a few favorites of Wesley:

I like this picture, but I need to "fix" the sky with Photoshop (it's all blown out)

look at that sweet smile :)

the bored look

this picture is classic Wes to me...climbing, dirty, and with a stick in his hand

here are all the boys running away from us

(I think they were tired of the picture-taking)

Happy Birthday, Damon!

I would like to start off by saying happy birthday to my wonderful husband Damon! I won't tell you how old he is, but he is a few years older than me :) 

Saying that though, anyone who knows us knows that in many ways I am the older one. Just Friday night when we were walking through a parking lot to meet my parents for Damon's bday dinner, I was carrying Wes like a baby (not an easy feat, mind you). We were kidding around, and me not being all that graceful, I stepped in a huge hole and lost my footing. Of course we both went down, but somehow I managed to keep Wes from even hitting the ground. That means that I took the whole brunt of the fall, and I am still physically paying for it . I landed on my knees (quite bruised,making it tough to walk), my left elbow hit fairly hard (I had Wesley's head in that arm and no one wants to fall on their kid whilst dropping him on pavement head first - imagine explaining that to the police), then my right forearm hit (also bruised). Somehow in the whole ruckus, I hurt my right foot (bruised and swollen) and my right hand is bruised. The good news though is that Wesley wasn't hurt at all. Of course he cried, but it was definitely not because he got hurt. The bad news is that I have apparently entered the phase of my life where I fall and get hurt. At least its just bruising and not broken bones...yet!

A relaxing Sunday afternoon...I was watching the Bengals struggle against the Colts, but at least they picked up the pace (too bad they lost...again). Thankfully Carson Palmer has begun throwing the ball to his teammates instead of his opponents. At one point he was 2/4 with two interceptions (this means that two throws were caught by Bengals and two by the Colts). YIKES! Now I do like Peyton Manning, but I would have liked him to lose today.

So you can see I've been working on a Christmas background. It's not exactly what I want, but I'll keep it up until I make one I like better. I've also been working on making our Christmas cards for this year. The banner above is a simplied one that I made, but again...not exactly what I'm looking for. Why is it that when you make something by hand it is difficult to be pleased with it? I could spend hours remaking and redoing things I make by hand, but I won't.

I bought this super-cute necklace on etsy.com from "your charmed life." I love it! Once we accept our referral, I will order charms for Wesley and his sister. I would have gotten Wes one now, but I decided to wait until I was able to order them for all my kids :)

it's been three weeks?

I cannot believe it has been three weeks since I last posted. And I was doing so well...guess its time to get back on the blogging bandwagon. I write blog posts in my head all the time, but then I don't ever have the chance right then to post, then I forget (or get lazy).

Our home study is done!! I asked them to make a few grammatical changes, but it is good to go otherwise. We have seriously been waiting six months to say it's done. Now the dossier collection begins. I typed up all the documents for that already, so I don't think it will take long to get things together. Waiting for our fingerprint appointment and approval from US Citizenship and Immigration will take the most time, but I'm praying they are working overtime this Christmas season :) Who am I kidding? Its government...they'll probably be closed most of the month of December.

We had a good Halloween. Wesley dressed up as Cat in the Hat and he LOVED trick-or-treating. (Funny in my opinion because the kid doesn't like candy)

Cat in the Hat's fish in the bowl where Wes collected candy (I made it myself and my mom painting the water)

a family picture (I would like to point out that Duke, our wild dog, is lying on the floor and Damon isn't even holding him). Why are Damon and I the only ones who look happy? Maybe because we are the only ones not wearing costumes...

the family outside (notice Duke in the window though)

Wesley with his Grandma and Grandpa

(aka Doda and Pawpaw)

the dogs checking out the trick-or-treaters

I am sure I have more to say, but I am heading to bed. Damon and I got to spend the day together just hanging out while Wesley was at school, so we did a bit of Christmas shopping, ate lunch and just enjoyed each other's company. We haven't just hung out like that in a long time, so it was nice.