Featured!

A big thank you to Katelyn over at 100 Letters to You Blog who did a fun little feature on us and our hope to adopt!  Katelyn is a wonderful and kind person who is a birth mom and blogs about her open adoption and adoption in general.  It is a beautiful read for anyone who has been touched by adoption or just for anyone!  :)  

She was so kind to do an adoptive couple hopeful feature on us!  Thanks Katelyn!!! 

You can find the feature here. 

An interview with the red kitchen.

My dear friend and college roommate has the cutest/entertaining craft blog that I know. She is always trying to help us find our baby and we are so thankful. She did the following interview post on her blog recently for us! Thanks Katie!

 Here is the interview that she did:  

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you know I have a soft spot (okay, a really soft spot) for my friends who are waiting to adopt. Maybe I'm a bit of a broken record when it comes to doing anything and everything I can to spread the word about them in the hopes that some good will come of it. But I intend to be a broken record and keep spreading the word until these dear friends of mine are finally able to adopt a sweet child of their own.




Richard and Emily have been married for 5 years and, after a difficult medical diagnosis and a lot of prayer, decided that adoption is just right for their family. And they've been working on adopting ever since! So, to help spread the word and help you get to know these wonderful friends of mine, we recently conducted a little interview. Read it below! There just might be a few good YouTube videos in it for you. :)




And if you feel so inclined (and I sure hope you do), it would be really awesome if you'd share a link to this post on Facebook, Twitter, etc. to help spread the word. When it comes to adoption, every kind thought and gesture counts. So thanks in advance for your love and kindness!




And now I give you... Richard and Emily!

completed nursery!

A few months ago we posted about our nursery.  At that point it was mostly done but still needed a few things, including a crib.  Well a few months later we got a crib and have been working on the finishing touches every since.  And this morning we finished!  

I love our nursery.  It is probably my favorite room in the house!  I love our nursery theme and I love all the handmade items, made out of love by us and others. 

Now we all we need is our baby!  Hopefully coming soon.  We can't wait to see a sweet little baby in this sweet little nursery. 

Here are the photos of the finished room!  

A Happy 4th

 We had a very relaxing Fourth of July yesterday.  Richard had to go to his clinical at the hospital (his clinical is an 8 week program that has him shadowing and working with a physical therapist) and I was lucky enough to babysit the cutest little three year old all day.  

We then went over to our wonderful neighbor's home for a most excellent barbecue dinner.  We watched half of the movie "Independence Day" together before a huge storm ended our party a little early.  But we already have plans to reconvene tonight to finish the movie and put on a little firework show!  Yay for summer! 

A fourth of July puppy.  I found this adorable dachshund flannel fabric at Jo Ann's the other day and couldn't resist. 

Sunflowers from our garden! 

A three year old project.  You can't go wrong with glue.  She loved it. 

While babysitting we played with magnetic letters which were very appropriately colored. 

While naptime I crafted up this to hang in our nursery.  And, by the way, what is more precious than a sleeping child?  I loved checking on her because she was so peaceful and adorable!  It was so fun to have our house a mess yesterday, full of blocks and books and toys.  

 

 

 Hope everyone had a fabulous Fourth of July! 

last week

 Last week we went on a really quick trip to Texas.  

A really quick trip. 

We flew in on Tuesday afternoon and drove away on Friday morning, around 6 a.m.  

We were blessed to spend two and a half very fun days with Richard's wonderful family.  

And we got to see my wonderful sister.  

We went rock climbing, played in Richard's family pool, ate yummy Texas barbecue, 

and went out to eat.  

And we got a new (used) car.  

Which we then proceeded to drive 20+ hours back to our neck of the woods.  

We had a grand time on a fun road trip together.  

We drove over the Louisiana bayou, had yummy snacks, stayed in a fun hotel, 

and thankfully didn't run into the messy, messy storm that has since hindered the majority of Virginia and our surrounding area.  

And we are even more thankful that we were blessed to come home to electricity.  

We had a great little mini-vacation and are thankful to be home, safe and sound! 

Oh and while we were galavanting around Texas, this little girl had her first ever legitimate play date.  Here's the proof: 

Thanks to my parents for taking care of her and socializing her while we were gone!  

She had a great time! 

a little encouragement - taking over the blog world!

Dear Friends,

We have been approved to adopt for almost 11 months!
With no contact.
Except from a probable adoption scammer.

So we need a little encouragement from YOU.
And we need some help.
So.
We are trying to take over the blog world!
If you have a blog,
any kind of blog,
a family blog,
a craft blog,
a blog about dogs,
a blog about logs,
a blog about school,
a blog about you being cool,
PLEASE consider helping us spread the word.

We have had friends who have done blog spotlights on us and our hope to adopt.
We have friends who have added our adoption button to their blog.
If you can do either of these things (or both!) we would be absolutely thrilled.
And it would make our hearts so, so happy and encouraged.

P.S. - if you want to do a blog spotlight on us you can feel free to use photos from this blog or our adoption blog!  And you could email us some questions and we could email you some answers!  Whatever you could do to help would be so appreciated!

We think you are all wonderful!  

empty arms

I know many of you will have no idea what I'm writing about.  And that's okay.  

But did you know that empty arms can seem so, so heavy?  

Did you know that your arms can literally ache to hold your child 

and that your heart aches even more to be called a mother.  

Your ears desperately want to hear a baby's cry or the little laughs and squeals of a child as he or she runs around, giggling with delight.  

You wish you could get up at 2 in the morning, and 3 in the morning, and 4 in the morning to rock and hold your baby close.  

You can just barely smell that new baby smell and when your friend's baby spits up on you, you don't mind at all.  In fact, you actually like it, because it smells like you've been holding a baby.  It reminds you that being a mother is the most precious thing.  

When we had an adoption scam, for a brief moment we thought - this could be it.  We could finally be parents.  

Our arms ache so badly to hold our children.  

And our hearts hurt even more.  

Our families are hurting.  

I know our parents want to be grandparents and our siblings, aunts and uncles. 

And I know Richard would drop everything to be able to be a dad.  

We can't wait to find our little that is meant to be ours.