It's About Time!!!!!

Well, I've been meaning to get this family blog up and running for a while now, and for some reason (or two little reasons named Anna and Simon) I just haven't gotten around to it :-). We have had a lot happening this past week, so I figured that now is as good a time as any to get this thing started.

For starters, Simon turned one yesterday! It was not as planned of a birthday day as we would have liked it to be due to us having to leave town QUICKLY on Thursday because Jen's sister went into labor, finally - more on that below. So, we woke up in a hotel room in Novi on Simon's birthday. Grandma and Grandpa were in the room next door, so they did sing to him and had a little present for him and a card, which was his favorite part of the gift - that and the tissue paper. Anyway, after breakfast, we packed up to head home. So, we spent a good part of Simon's first birthday in the car - poor kid. When we got home, Jen quickly decorated and wrapped the presents while Joel ran to the store for cake fixings. We made a pirate themed cake and ordered pizza for dinner - one of Simon's favorite things to eat. Simon had a GREAT time with the cake - see the photos to follow. He got the Little People pirate ship with accessories and loves playing with his new toys - when he can get them away from Anna, who has her own big kid pirate ship, but seems to think Simon's is much more fun at the current time.

Birthday Boy!


The cake eating started out like this....




And ended like this....







Last Thursday we had our court appointment to finalize Simon's adoption. He is now officially ours forever and is a U.S. Citizen. Now we wait for his Michigan birth certificate to be issued so we can apply for a passport and a Certificate of Citizenship from USCIS - the paperwork never seems to end! It was our county's adoption day at the court so it was full of adoptive families and they had punch and cookies and Santa was there for the kids to visit. The hearing was much shorter than we thought it would be, but Simon kept everyone entertained with his shrieking (just for the sake of shrieking) and his banging on the table.



Simon being entertaining





Right after our finalization hearing, we rushed home to pack as Jen's sister had gone into labor with their first baby and Jen was expected to be there to be the photographer :-). We ended up not leaving until that evening as Karen wasn't sure she was in labor (denial!). We got to the hotel around 8:30 that night but didn't get called to go to the hospital until around 1:30 in the morning. It was a long night, but beautiful baby Olivia Grace was born at 7:13am on Friday, December 14 (she and Simon are now forever bound by joint family birthday parties :-). She was born with a full head of hair and is ablsolutely gorgeous. We took the kids up to the hospital later in the day to visit and Anna is totally smitten with her new little cousin.





Auntie Jen (me) and baby Olivia


Uncle Joel and baby Olivia


Proud parents


Proud grandparents with all 3 of their grandchildren


Well, that is the gist of our eventful, crazy week! I will do my best to keep this thing updated and post photos - I take a gazillion photos of my adorable kiddos, but am rarely finding time these days to do anything with them.