Mommy Daughter Date Night

Last Saturday I took Madelyn on a Mommy Daughter date. Chad and I were feeling like Maddie needed to be given a night of one on one attention because it has been a little adjustment for her to share her time with a new baby brother. So the plan was to go to dinner wherever she wanted to go, and then she wanted to go to the party store and buy a crown. So she chose to eat at Olive Garden which is on her five fave list. Whenever you ask Maddie what she wants for dinner (even if we aren't going out) she says either: McDonalds, IHOP, Olive Garden, Costco, or Texas Roadhouse. So we went to Olive Garden, and she wanted to sit on the same side of the booth as me, which was fine but it was just a little funny because It made me think of a date Chad went on when he was in College where the girl sat on the same side of the booth as him, and he was uncomfortable the whole time because they were so close which makes the conversation awkward. By the way this girl was hearing impaired which is probably why she wanted to sit on the same side in the first place. I still give Chad a hard time about it. :) So back to mine and Maddie's date....anyways so we sat on the same side, and we had so much fun! We talked about wine and why we couldn't drink it and about what kind of crown she wanted from the party store and about starting Kindergarten, and a bunch of other stuff. She is so funny! So then we went to the party store and she was certain that she wanted a "Gold" crown so when we got to the crown section she liked the silver crowns better and she had a hard time choosing. I was shocked that it was only $1.50 so we walked around the whole store and looked at everything and she decided that she also wanted a balloon and some lip gloss, so all together I only spent $3.50 so I thought that was awesome!

I can't believe how big she is and that she is going to be in school and she is just growing up so fast! I decided that we are going to have to have a Mommy Daughter Date on a regular basis! I need to have my time with her while she is still young enough to want to spend time with me, and so that I don't miss the moments that seem to slip by so fast.

Easter at the Cabin!

We spent Easter weekend at my parents house down in Cedar City. There was a ton of snow but we still had fun! Austin is almost 9 months now but still isn't crawling so he just watched as the other kids ran circles around him. Maddie and Karli found the eggs that the Easter Bunny hid throughout the house full of candy, and the night before everyone colored real eggs. We couldn't keep Karli and Maddie inside, they wanted to be outside playing in the snow or making a snow princess(snowman)! Being the unprepared mother that I am, I failed to bring Maddie any snow clothes! So the first run outside went fine, but everything eventually was soaked, then a little while later they wanted to go out again and Maddie's boots were still too wet on the inside so she put on her regular shoes and I tied grocery sacks around them so they wouldn't get wet as fast. It seemed to be more successful then her other snow boots!

It was nice to just relax and visit with the family. The only thing missing was my brother's family. They were unable to come up for the weekend, and we missed them!

Adoption Finalized

At the end of January we were able to finalize Austin's adoption. The six months seemed to go by way faster this time then it did with Madelyn. The Judge was nice but I felt like it was way more formal then it needed to be. Chad and I had to be under oath and take the stand. The judge asked Chad if he took drugs and everything, it was funny! I am glad its over. It has been nice to be able to just move on with our lives now that he is legally ours.

This is us...the new bloggers on the block!

Okay so if everyone was jumping off a bridge I guess I would eventually jump! Peer pressure....gets me every time! Yes I have a blog now so there are no excuses for any of you out there that only communicate in blog not to keep in touch with me! This picture is about 7 months old, but we were at Crater Lake in Oregon this past Summer and we had a lot of fun! A road trip with a 4 week old isn't the brightest idea we ever had, but we already had this trip/family reunion planned when we found out about baby Austin. Austin was born July 2009 and he started his life as a world traveler.