Shawn, Bonnie & Ava

Ava's many faces!!!

Here is our sweet little Ava showing her beauty! She has been such a good little girl and we are so happy with her in our family! Shawn and I continue to fight over who gets to hold her and snuggle...I guess that's what happens when you wait so long for such a sweet blessing! I will post more pics of her later, just thought I'd post these pics now.

Playing Catch Up

I know I haven't posted on here for a while, but as most of you know we have been super busy. I love that we have been busy, and I wouldn't change it for the world!

These first 2 are of Shawn and I in St George last summer playing with the oranges we got from breakfast...we were waiting for our friends to get ready, so we had a little fun with our fruit!

just us being us!

Here is our annual trip to the Wheeler cabin in September. We took 2 4-wheelers up to ride around and they are alway a big hit with the kids. Shawn and I like to go off trail and take the scenic route of beautiful Eden. It's such a nice time of year to be up there. The leaves start chaning colors and there's a nice breeze during the day.

Todd & Will going for a ride at the cabin

Shawn and I on our little ride

Will & Anna feeding the ducks at the pond

Grandpa Cal & the kids

This last year I decided to put my bandsaw to good use and make a lot of crafts. I did 5 booths from September to November. It was a lot of fun to put my talent on display and make sales. Shawn was such a sweet heart to help me out with my cutting while I was at work, and he also helped me get things ready to sell and setting my booths up. I honestly coudn't have done it with out him. Thanks babe!!! My sis-in-law Anna participated in 2 booths with me and sold some of her stuff too. We had a lot of fun together doing this, and we hope to do it agains someday, but this year is a little too busy for me!

My booth at Plain City Days
I sold Fall & Halloween crafts

Anna & I at our booth in Farmington

Success

So we had our walk through Aug 7th, and guess what....it was a SUCCESS!!! Our case worker was very impressed and she said everything went very well. Now she has to take our profile to a meeting where the case workers get together and approve the couple. This will happen next month, and after that our profile will be published on line so all the birth mothers can see us and make their decision!

Sorry, but I think most of our future posts will be about adoption, only because it helps me keep track of when things happen, and because it's our life right now!

Adoption

So as most of you already know, we are in the adoption process and we couldn't be more excited! This is such a great opportunity for us to start our family, and such a great way to do it for those who want to give their children more. We are so thankful for those birth mothers out there that choose this route, especially grateful for their selfless act. We have had our ups and downs on trying to get pregnant, and so far it hasn't been for us, so that's why we have chosen to take this opportunity to start our family by adopting.

So far the process has been hard, due to all the paper work and research we had to do on the computer. It seems very difficult for us to be in this position, and to know that we are under watch during this process, but we know it is the agencies job and they are to make sure they place children in safe homes with trusting people.

We have been in contact with our case worker and she is in need of a few more papers so she can review, then she will stop by our home this week to do our walk through. She will be checking the house and making sure we have things in the proper places, and making sure that we have a safe home for a child. We are so grateful for our case worker, so far she has been very willing to help us out with anything we need, and just her willingness to be here for us makes a huge impact on our process.

This picture is just one of the ones we have for our profile, and our idea of this picture is just letting those birth mothers know that we want so badly to be a Mom & Dad, but right now we are missing that someone to be a part of our family!

General Conference

Yeah this is a little late, but I figure it's worth posting! We went to General Conference in April with the Missionaries that were in our area, and it was a great experience going with them. Elder Johnson and Elder Hennessee got us tickets at the last minute and they were so excited to go because both of them have never been. It was a beautiful day to be walking around Salt Lake, to see all the flowers and all the people there to listen to the words of our Prophet Thomas S. Monson. Being in the Conference Center is such a spiritual high, especially knowing that the First Presidency is there to share with us the wonderful words they prepared. I really do appreciate all those men for their words and their love they share with all of us, they are truly called of God for a reason.

Me & Hal checking ourselves out in the mirror!

Beautiful Salt Lake Temple

Shawn & Elder Johnson

Mmmm...Chikin

St. George

Oh how we love to go to St. George...aaahhhh....so relaxing!!! We went down a couple weeks ago to just be by ourselves and take a break from work (well, my work I guess) Shawn took his with him. Anyway, we went down with no plans at all...yeah...NO PLANS!!! Those are the best breaks to take when you aren't always on a schedule. So, of course we had pool time which is always so nice, Shawn played in the pool most the time and I was in and out, I had to work on my tan! We also drove around and went shopping, stopped at SWIG and found our new love for Dr. Pepper. I am not a fan of that drink, but they make a drink down there called the Dirty Dr. and it is soooooooo......good! I think we stopped, actually I know we stopped there every day for the rest of the time we were there. One of the days we decided to head over to Zions to hike and play. It was a nice drive over there and a nice drive through the park. We stopped to check out one of the slots, and it was pretty cool to go further in and feel the cold draft coming through. There were no clouds in sight so we were ok! After our little adventure there in the park, we got back to our hotel and went swimming some more. Of course we went on dinner dates and we really did have fun together just being able to laugh and talk about life. Our last night there we went to see Dark Knight Rises, and that movie was so intense, especially since the Colorado shootings happened the night before...eek! When we got to the theater we noticed a few police men standing around keeping an eye out for anything suspicious, so that right there made me EXTREMELY nervous, and once we sat down I just kept thinking what if someone decides to freak out at any moment and pull a gun on everyone. I had some gum I was chewing and popping during the movie, and it made me think, what if someone around me doesn't like the sound of the gum popping...what if they hurt me...so I stopped, just in case. Talk about anxiety.

So that

was our little trip, and we loved every

minute of it!!!

Family Trip to Texas

Wow...it has been forever since I have posted. My sister in law had to remind me that I haven't posted our family trip to Texas this last Christmas. Thank you Erin!!!

So, to start, my whole family wasn't able to make it on the trip which sucked, but we still had fun! Shawn and I were able to stay a week, then we had to fly home so I could get back to work...no fun.We stayed at my Uncle Mac & Aunt Gloria's house which is way nice and my brother and his family got to stay at one of their beach condos, which was even better!

The last day we were there, saying goodbye to my Grandparents.