Christmas picture post

My sweet boy's first Christmas!

At a friend's Christmas party; he loved playing with the bows

Our sweet friend who will hopefully be adopted this year!

Playing with the box; this was from his buddies in FL

Love him!
Christmas Eve
Where did all of this stuff come from? I have no idea why he looks so sad :)
ooooohhhhh
Our sweet family of 3

Christmas 2011

To say that we have had one of the best Christmas times ever would be a complete understatement. I just can't put into words how sweet this time has been. Of course Garrett had no clue as to what was going on but we were so excited to share this special time with him. We are completely amazed at all of the blessings God has given us this year. It's funny that at this time last year we had no idea that we were about to receive a phone call that would change our lives forever.

We have had so much fun spending time with family and with our sweet boy. As he walked into the living room on Sunday morning, he spotted a basketball goal that we got for him.....his response...."ooooohhhhhh" too cute! He has been in love with the Christmas tree and the lights and I think he was a little worried when we took them down today. I think our parents and siblings had just as much fun as we have for Garrett's first Christmas. We truly feel blessed to have this sweet gift! Pictures are coming soon :)

11 months!

I know I have been completely slack at updating this blog but between home and work, things have been crazy! Thankfully Friday was my last day at work until January! Yippee! I'm so enjoying this time I'm getting to spend with my sweet boy. Monday, he turned 11 months old. I know I ask this almost every month, but can someone tell me where time has gone? I can't believe that in less than one month we will be celebrating his first birthday. Seems like yesterday that we received the call that we had been chosen.

His new favorite word is "uh-oh" and I have to say it's really cute. He had a really bad cold at Thanksgiving that lasted well over a week. The pediatrician said he was too young to have anything for "just a cold" and to keep doing the things we had been to get it to go away. Well that turned into an ear infection and then they gave him some antibiotics. It seemed to be cleared up and then this past weekend he started sounding stuffy again. Now we have a runny nose and he's been pulling on his ears. He's teething too so I'm hoping that's why he's pulling on his ears but we are going to make another trek to the doctor in the morning. Poor baby, I hate it when he's sick!

About 2 weeks ago he started walking, really walking. He's all over the place now. My mom bought him some New Balance tennis shoes this past weekend and he had a little trouble in them at first (his others were flat) but now he's gotten the hang of those too. He's also dancing. It is hilarious! Any time he hears music he starts dancing. He's quite the entertainer.

We went and saw Santa and he did great with him too. As it became our turn, a guy from the newspaper asked if he could take his picture. I think it's supposed to run tomorrow. I thought that was pretty neat. He was just checking Santa out, trying to figure him out! We've had 3 Christmas parties and he's had a blast at all of them. He doesn't really care about opening presents but loves the bows!

Who is this?

I'm so glad we don't have ball ornaments :)

Cheezin' (better late than never) :)

Finally!!!!!!

After several phone calls this week to various people.....in our mailbox yesterday was Garrett's social security number! Yippee! I really can't believe it's taken this long. We received our adoption decree in the beginning of July, got his birth certificate on October 3rd, and it's taken 2 months to get the actual number (we applied for the number on the same day we got the birth certificate). Wow! My plan is to write to our governor, representatives etc and let them know about our experience and that honestly something needs to be done about this to change things. You wouldn't even believe how one of the "workers" talked to me over the phone. This is a big deal for us because we need that for filling out our taxes. I really did not want to have to go through the hoops of applying for a tax ID number for him. So I'm thankful that this was finally processed. Funny story--when I called Raleigh this week to check on things......they began to tell me that the paperwork was never processed, meaning they couldn't "find him." Um are you kidding me?!?! Then I spoke with 2 other people along with the local office here and finally found out that everything had been processed (that day mind you)...hmmmmm I'm just glad we have it!

On other exciting news, Tommy and I have been chosen to be a "mentor family" with Bethany (our agency). So we have been "assigned" our first couple (they are getting ready to start their homestudy). We're really excited to be able to pray with them through this journey and hopefully answer questions that they may have along the way.