Adeline's Adoption Story

On February 6th we got a phone call from our adoption case worker that he had received a phone call from Maya's birth mom that she wanted to place her baby with us ... and her water just broke!  We were in shock!  We had known for a couple of months that she was pregnant, but didn't expect or think she would place her baby with us. It was a miraculous surprise! 

We flew out the next day to Detroit, Michigan!  All the while, we were in touch with Maya's birth grandma and birth sister!  They were keeping us posted on how things were going with Maya, and now the new baby girl's, birth mom!

Our adoption agent in Utah was able to help us find an agency in Michigan.  We met with them the next day and that night drove to meet this sweet baby girl for the first time!  We were just going to meet her, but when we pulled in, we got a call from the hospital social worker.  She asked us if we had a car seat, we told her we did and she said the baby was ready to leave the hospital and we could take her with us that night! What a wonderful surprise!  

There she was - this tiny perfect human. 6.7lbs, 17.9" long, full head of hair, calm, and beautiful!

It is quite a miraculous experience to look at her for the first time and the thought enters my mind, "Oh!  There you are!"  As I know I've said before, a recognition of knowing someone you've never met is an incredible experience!

Maya was asleep, so she got to meet her sister Adeline, at the hotel.  BIG sister!  She took right to it!!

We stayed in Mchigan for just under 8 weeks! While there, we were blessed to meet our daughters' birth grandma and birth sister!  What a wonderful experience!  We even got to meet the girls' birth mom, but I will save those pictures for our personal viewing. I don't know if we have her permission to post, so we will keep them as a sacred memento for our family. 

We sure do love being a family of four!  We are so blessed! I mean, just look at these two!

3 Years Old!!!

Guess who had a birthday in April ?!?  How is this girl 3 Years Old already!  We are so grateful for the amazing blessing of adoption and the incredibly difficult decision her sweet birth mom made to place Maya into our family!  Maya, we love you so much!  Maya is a fun, sassy, happy, smart, grateful, helpful, strong, independent, outgoing, and thoughtful little girl! How lucky we are to be her parents!

We had a little birthday party for May with family a couple of days early, because Brandon and I made plans for a last minute surprise!

She sure loved the decorations and loved being the star of the day!

Maya was pretty specific about her cake, she wanted a Bubble Guppy Cake!
The difficult part of that was finding a bakery that made that specific cake, I couldn't
find one anywhere nearby!  So, I ordered some fun Bubble Guppy candles online and a
local bakery made a fun beachy/underwater cake, we added the candles, and it
looked great!  Maya was so excited about it!

Opening Presents!

Look who got a strider-bike!  She loved it and picked up on the idea of how to
ride it pretty quickly -- what a girl!

And on for the big surprise ... Brandon and I decided a few days before her birthday to take a last minute trip to, of course, Disneyland!  No better place to celebrate the BIG THREE than at the Happiest Place on Earth, right?

One Happy Faimly!

We always decorate the house for birthdays, and being away is certainly
no exception!  We brought decorations to keep our fun family tradition
alive at the hotel!  She loved waking up to decorations and presents!

Birthday Breakfast at Goofy's Kitchen!

Swimming at the hotel pool!

We didn't get to see the Sound-sational parade back in February so we made
sure to get a spot to enjoy it this time!

Ready to ride Winnie the Pooh!

Happy Birthday big 3 year old!

Our Forever Family!

Guess what happened in mid October?!?  Our adoption was finalized!  Most people finalize at a courthouse in front of a judge - but in our family, we finalize via text message! LOL!

Once we got the finalization paperwork in the mail we could start planning our very special day - being sealed together forever in our temple!  (If you don't know much about our temples or about our church you can learn more at mormon.org).  We were sealed in the temple on November 9th.

Best day ever!

Pic from my sister Amy

Pic from my sister Natalie

And we had fun celebrating after too - we all went to my parents' church where Brandon gave Maya a beautiful blessing and we had a luncheon to celebrate the day!

This is Maya's sealing dress she wore to the temple.
And the beautiful shawl made by my Grandma Maya was wrapped in for the blessing.

This is the blessing dress I wore when I was blessed,
Maya wore this blessing dress too!  So special!

Everything was pink, we had a fun 'Make Your Own Party Drink' table, Candy Cabobs,
My sister Amy made adorable cupcakes, and everyone wrote a special note to Maya.

We couldn't have asked for a better day!  Our hearts are so full to have our baby girl forever!  Oh, and I made this little slide-show that we showed at the luncheon too - just another way to celebrate our girl!

Maya is 5 months old!

Can you believe this?!?  How can our tiny babe already be 5 months old?  Time is flying by!

Here's a little of what we've been up to ... and a little of what we've got planned! ;-)

1. Maya started eating cereal at 4 months (loves it) and baby food at 5 months (LOVES it)!  2. She has the BEST personality - super fun, loves to smile and is very easy going.  3. Doing well at tummy-time, has rolled over a bunch from her tummy to her back and prefers to sit straight up rather than leaning back.  4. Smiles all the time and sleeps 9-10 hours/night! -- she is one happy babe.  5. Maya's favorite part of the day is bath time!  6. Can't get enough of play time - not only is she cute, she's strong too!  

We really can't get enough of our sweet girl - our life has changed in the most amazing way with her!

I'm back to work part-time so Maya gets to spend a couple of days with two of her favorite people - Gram and Aunt Nan!

Maya got a special phone call to let her know some future plans for our little family (see the video below)!

We are so excited - we can't wait to show her the happiest place on earth!

12 Weeks Old

Guess who is 3 months old? This little beauty!

Time goes by too fast -- our gorgeous Maya is growing and changing every day!  Here's a bit of our life in instagrams since bringing Maya home!

More recently my sister and her family are here visiting for a few weeks - so Maya has been enjoying a lot of family/cousin time!  These kids sure do love being together!

On Thursday we went to Lagoon!  It was a super hot and super fun day!  Maya loved it!!  Her first ride was the train with Aunt Nan.

We feel so blessed every day to be the parents of our precious girl!

And this smile melts my heart!  She sure loves her mom and dad too ... one happy family!

Time to Celebrate!

Now that we're home and happy it's time to Celebrate!  The celebrating started with showers for our sweet baby Maya!  We had a friend shower, a family shower, a work shower and many presents from excited family, friends, co-workers, and neighbors in between!

top left: special present from Grandma Shelia and Auntie Sky-lar in Missouri
Bottom Right: pick with special blanket from Grandma Great Maxine

Our baby girl got pretty spoiled!

And that's not even all of it!  You wouldn't believe how much my family keeps giving too!

And then came Mother's Day!  I'm so excited to celebrate this special day thanks to our sweet baby girl!

For Mother's day Brandon gave me some gorgeous roses and took me on a hot date the night before!

Last, but not least, my birthday!  All this last year I would always say how I did not want to turn 37 and still not be a mom - well, I got to be a mom just before the big day ... how lucky am I?  It was a pretty special weekend!  Brandon got me some gorgeous roses and took me shopping, and we had a big celebration on Sunday with family!

My sis made my all-time favorite cake - yum!

Homecoming

We were so excited when we got word we could come home - as a family - with our beautiful baby girl Maya!  We got right online and purchased our plane tickets.  Even though we loved our time as our small family unit in Michigan, the time to get home just couldn't come fast enough when we got the word!  We had a layover in Denver and Maya slept the entire time on both flights - what a good girl!

We flew in late Saturday night (actually arrived early Sunday morning).  Then we spent the day Sunday with our family!  It feels so good to watch other's adore our baby girl - one of the best feelings in the world if you ask me! By the way, "Grape" (Grandma Great Maxine) got the first genuine smile!

Her pets love her too - they're very gentle and curious!

Maya is so loved and we are so blessed!