Calling all pictures!

As we said before, we are starting the process of adopting. One thing we have to do is put together a "profile" of our family, which is pretty much a scrapbook/photo album to show the birthmother who we are and why she might want to pick us to place her baby with. If any of you have a good picture (or two) of me, Forrest, or Judah (by ourselves or in a group) I would really appreciate it if you would forward it to me! Thanks in advance =)

Here is one recent family pic that I plan to include in the profile.

Oh, and Judah has a new trick: cruising the furniture! Here's him posing with his toy box.

Goodbye sweet girl

We had Annie (Ani) euthanized this morning. She has been very anxious for more than a month now and, even with strong medications, has been so upset and unhappy. The last few days were times of constant anxiety for her. It was a hard decision to make, especially because it is one we can't take back, but we think it was right. Please pray for our hearts and for God to have a really wonderful dog park in the sky.

Thank God for the weekend!

Forrest and I are off to a bed and breakfast on the beach for a couple nights and, while I feel bad about leaving my mother-in-law with Judah and Annie-oh-so-nuts, I am so looking forward to our first weekend off since parent duty started 9 months ago. It became very apparent yesterday that I need a break: I went to Target without Judah (thanks to G-mama) but with Judah's lunch smeared all over my shoulder where he had burried his face and blown a big raspberry-- I am that mom.

So, in the midst of dealing with crazy dog, cleaning the house for Grandmama to come stay with us, getting a drug screen for our adoption (I was clean. Whew!), and planning for our anniversary weekend, I still managed to get a few good pics this week.

Roo is 9 months old!

On Monday, our baby turned 9 months old! He has started to pull up on the furniture and crawls crazy fast, especially when there is a sock left on the floor to gnaw on (it's not the worst thing he's ever chewed on at least-- I pick my battles). His newest achievement is disobedience! I knew it would come sooner or later, but this is a little sooner than I had hoped. It goes something like this: I say "No, Judah. Don't touch the dishwasher." He takes his hand off the dishwasher, looks straight at me, then touches it with the rattle that is in his other hand and smiles... I have a feeling this will be an ongoing challenge of parenthood.

Our big news is that we have decided to adopt! We are just starting the process now and it will take a few months before we have all of our paperwork, homestudy, etc. in order. We want to adopt domestically (a baby from the US) and the organization we have decided to use is called Bethany Christian Services. The way adoption works with BCS is that when a pregnant woman who is interested in placing her child for adoption comes to them, if she chooses adoption after counseling about her options, she chooses the family she wants to place her child with. This means that we have no idea when we will be adopting as we will have to wait until we are chosen. We are very excited to be pursuing this and hopefully will be adding another wonderful life to our family sometime in the next couple years! For those of you Judah-lovers out there, don't worry, I think we will have more biological children someday too =)

I was holding Judah the other night, nursing him before bed, and I started thinking about a couple verses from the Bible. One is Joshua 1:5 where God says to Joshua "I will never leave you nor forsake you." Another is Romans 8:38-39 where it says "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." I cannot tell you how much I love Judah! It has brought me to tears many times. I will tell Judah this now and for all his life: nothing can separate you from my love. That this is what God tells us blows me away more and more as I understand what it is like to have a parent's love for a child.

Sunny days

...chasin' the clouds away, on my way to where the air is sweet! So, Judah's official first favorite thing to watch on TV is "Elmo's song," compliments of youtube and his papa. Forrest heard an allusion to it on the radio and decided he wanted to see if he could find the video online. Sure enough it was readily available and before he knew it Judah had that glazed veggin' out look and was doing a little bop to the music. We've got to be careful with that Sesame Street!

Adam and Amy came to visit and we are sad that it is over already! We had a wonderful week. We hit the beach a couple times, visited St. Augustine and Amelia island, and played games, most of which were won hands down by the girls, of course. They just bought a new house so we got to share in their excitement about their new beautiful lot (including a monkey tree-- they're so funny looking!) and the new addition they are already planning. Here are some pictures from the week:

Judah and Aunt Amy at a picnic

Judah, Uncle Adam (wearing a shirt to prevent a second bad sunburn), and Forrest

Chatty baby!

Things that aren't food...

1. Poop

Apparently we didn't review this very thoroughly with Judah... and maybe we stressed the importance of recycling a little too much...