Teaching Us!

The short time Miss Olivia has been in our family, she has already blessed our lives and taught us so much!  We cheer when she smiles and giggles!  The way her whole face lights up is adorable!  There has been a whole lot more singing going on!  We have always been big on singing but now even that has been stepped up!  She seems to especially love hearing little voices singing!  She stops and holds very still and listens.  It's so fun to watch her learn about the world around her!

Here are a couple of pictures!

I love this one with Olivia and Talisha!  Olivia has her eyebrows up, while she is listening to whatever silly song I was singing at the time!

LOVE THIS PIC!!!  How precious is that face???  I love her little hand resting under her chin!

Miss Jasmine was telling Olivia all about her day at kindergarten!

 

 

Because sweet Olivia is not able to see, we talk to her about everything we are doing!  Walking up the stairs, changing her diaper, getting her bottle ready, getting in her car seat......everything.  We tell her what we're doing so she will be able to start to form impressions in her mind that will help her relate to the action.

 

Imagine for a moment if you didn't have your sight and you just got bounced around doing things, without ever knowing what was going on.....it might be a little scary.  We want her to feel safe and secure as much as possible!  We figure if she at least hears our voice, it will give her some comfort even if she doesn't know what's going on.

 

We continue to thank our Father in Heaven every day for this precious gift!  How thankful we are to her beautiful first mother, who gave her life and then chose our family to love her precious daughter!  How thankful we are to the amazing woman who cared for her for the first 3 1/2 months of her life!  What a beautiful beginning she has had!  She has been blessed by love.

Blessed By A Bit Of Heaven

We made it home!!!  We have spent the last couple of days adjusting to life with a sweet new baby!  We wanted to post some pictures of the last couple of days.  We have so many more pictures to post but this is a start!

Olivia is doing so well and has captured our hearts!  We adore her!  I honestly can't begin to count how many times I have heard someone say, "She is PERFECT!!"  Here are a couple of pics!

 This was last Monday, Daddy meeting Olivia for the first time!!

 

Vanessa snuggling with sweet Olivia!

I just love this picture! This was taken just moments before Samantha left to drive home after staying here to help babysit while we were gone!

The oldest of 12.......the youngest of 12.

Thomas loves to sit and hold his baby sister!

Levi seriously loves this sweet girl. 

 

I love this picture!  So cute!

Savannah loves to snuggle with Olivia!

She decided to read a book to Olivia!  Olivia loved hearing the store about Amelia Bedelia!

 

 

Sabrina and Olivia!  Cute sisters!!

 

More pictures to come!!  We had such an amazing time in New York!  I will share more later!

Think Pink!

I never cease to be amazed at the way our lives are blessed!  And sometimes I just sit back in awe and thank my Father in Heaven for this wonderful life!  I honestly can't begin to guess what the future holds for our family, but I do know one thing: we are being blessed by a sweet angel who will join our family in a couple of days!

We are headed to New York in a few days to bring home our new baby girl!  She just turned 3 months old and we are so excited for her to join our family!  She was born with some special challenges and yet it's just amazing to me how anxious and excited our children are to bring her home and love her!  After seeing her picture, our 16 year old was reduced to jello!  He couldn't believe how beautiful she is!  The other children just oohed and awed over how precious she is as well!  I keep hearing comments like, "I can't wait to snuggle her!"  "Look at her tiny little hands!"  "I just want to hold her!!"  "Look at how perfect her lips are!" And on and on........

Our adoptions typically come in a whirlwind!  Out of the 8 adoptions, the longest we have waited to be matched with a new baby once our home study is complete, is maybe 3 weeks!  We are used to things happening very quickly.  The agency we are using in New York is amazing!  I will give more details about the whole situation once we return home but for now we just wanted to share a teeny bit of news about our adorable new baby girl, Olivia Grace.

We can't wait to meet you baby girl!