December

Still trying to get the blog completely updated so even though these are from last year I didn't want to just leave them out.  

December was an amazing and busy month for us.  

This little beauty arrived on December 2nd.  She is such a blessing in our lives.  

Our great neighbors (and Claire's best bud) from when we were living with my mom and Ron gave the kids some gingerbread houses to decorate.  Here is Claire with hers.  Crue's never got this far.  He just didn't have the vision of what it could be....all he saw was a bag of candy, a bag of frosting, and a couple cookies and he just ate it right up.  And then when Claire wasn't looking he started eating hers too.

We all spent lots of time cuddling with this little beauty.

We all got together at my moms to decorate more gingerbread houses.  

My mom and Ron trying their best to save their gingerbread house.  In the end it couldn't be done and it collapsed. It sure was entertaining though.

It snowed and snowed and snowed.  Here the kids are outside playing when we lived at the cook house.  

Crue fell in love with this dog while we were living at the cook house.  Even now he will ask to go back and visit the dog.  And yes, the poor boy is wearing a pink snowsuit.  That's what happens when the builder doesn't have our house done on time so all our snow stuff is still boxed up somewhere.  Crue didn't mind though.  He actually loved it and several times I would go check on the kids during the night only to find that he had changed out of his pajamas and into the snowsuit.  

We really got lots of cuddle time in.  Little Anna decided she needed to be held at ALL times...day and night.  

Another family party at my Dad and Holly's.  Gotta love the life size cutout of Sam.  He is currently serving in Oklahoma.

The grandkids.

Crue, Ashlyn, and Caitlyn

Holly did her annual Christmas Craft Day with the grandkids.  This year they made these cute snowman wind chimes.  Here Alexa is finishing up one of them.  

Ri and Claire with their wind chimes.

Grandpa and Anna

 The week before Christmas we were finally given the keys to our house.  We were so excited to finally get moved once and for all and then what happens...it snows and snows and snows some more.  We already had about six inches on snow on the ground  and then it snowed another 15 inches on the day that we were going to move.   It was such a bummer to have to put moving off for a few more days.  All our stuff was being stored in a shed behind my Aunt's house and the snow made it pretty much impossible to get it all for a few days.  We finally moved into our new home three days before Christmas.

 Christmas Eve with me and my girls.  

Our three amazing children in their Crhistmas pajamas.

Crue got this great train set for Christmas and he played with it nonstop for days.  

When the kids grandma asked what Claire wanted for Christmas, Claire really wasn't sure but finally mentioned that she wanted some wind-up chattering teeth.  Luke and I were laughing so hard when Claire opened up a gift and inside were her chattering teeth.   

The kids also got some snow paint which they totally loved.  

We went ice-skating with the family.  

My mom, Crue and Luke. 

Claire was really getting the hang of it this year and by the time we left she was skating by herself.

Crue didn't do too bad either and ever since we went he happens to mention ice-skating in every prayer he says.  In fact every time he blesses the food the prayer is entirely about going ice skating again.  

Our sweet Anna all ready for church in her new Christmas dress

Our favorite person came to visit us.  We sure love Abbey.

New Years Eve was pretty quiet around our place.  We bought a pizza, a bunch of treats, and just stayed home watching movies.  After the crazy year we had, it was nice just to be all together at home.  It was perfect.  

Hooray for Summer

Claire's last day of school was on Friday.  She has loved school so much and did an amazing job this year but she has been counting down the days until Kindergarten would be over.  So on the first day of summer vacation we headed out and had some fun.  

Grandma Holly had been talking about going on a bike ride on the Legacy Highway Trail but last year was just too busy with selling the house and moving and everything else so it just didn't happen.  We definitely wanted to get it in this year.  We woke up to rain and wind and all the way in to Salt Lake it was raining but it quit the moment we got there.  It ended up being a beautiful morning.    We really had a lot of fun.

Look at the beautiful girl of ours.  We love her so much.

Claire took a picture of our next adventure with Grandma Holly...hiking on Antelope Island.  We are checking some things off the bucket list this summer.

Saturday night we met up again with Grandma and Grandpa to go out to dinner and then we all 

headed over to the Bees game.  

Crue and Anna waiting while daddy gets our tickets.

Ben with Grandma and Grandpa before the game.

The first thing we did was get in line for the train ride.  

Anna's first train ride at the Bees game.  

They packed so many kids into the train cars that it was kind of uncomfortable.  Here is Crue's not so happy face. 

Me and my man

Anna hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa

Our seats were on the front row and there really wasn't any other kids around.  These two kiddos waiting and waiting hoping to get a foul ball thrown up to them.  They talked us into going out to get some treats and during the five minutes we were gone there was a foul ball.  The baseball player looked around for a child to throw it to and there wasn't any there.  Bummer.  Better luck next time.  

Crue's favorite part of the game was watching the people dressed up as vegetables racing around the field.  He just thought that was the funniest thing.  Ben and Claire's favorite part was watching the fireworks.  It was a great way to start summer vacation.

Totally in love...

Luke and I aren't the only ones that fell in love with this sweet little baby of ours.  

Our sweet little Anna

Last November I got a message from our caseworker wanting us to call her back.  It hadn't been all that long since I had talked to her so I had a feeling something was going on.  I called her back and she wanted to know how things were going with our house being built and how long until we would be in the house...as in an exact date when we would be in.  I thought that was kind of odd.  She then proceeded to tell me about a possible placement opportunity.  A birth mother was looking at placing her baby and she was pretty specific in what she was looking for in a family.  Since we met all the criteria and because there weren't a lot of families that did, our file was pulled and shown to her.  (Our profile had been taken off the site when we sold our house because we then didn't have a current home study.  Our plan was to get home studied once we got into our new home)  Our caseworker wanted to know if we were interested  and if we were interested we needed to hurry and get my mom's home home studied since that is where we were currently living or move into another place and get it home studied since the baby would arrive before our home would be finished.  The baby was due in three weeks but could come at any time.  It was the call that I had been waiting for.  For months I felt that we would be getting a baby soon and I felt that when it happened we wouldn't have a long time to get ready.  Heavenly Father was definitely getting us ready and His hand was in every step of this adoption.   I already knew that we were interested but our our caseworker told me to talk to Luke and take some time thinking and praying about it.  When I called her back and let her know that we were definitely interested she then told us that the birth mother was deciding between us and another couple and that we would find out later that week.  I can't even begin to explain how excited we were.  We ended up not finding out that we had been chosen until a week later (Boy, that was a loooong week.) but it felt so right when we found out.  Like I mentioned earlier, Heavenly Father's hand was in every step of the adoption.  Within a day we had arrangements made for another home that we could stay in and get home studied until our house was finished, Luke was able to take the time off work that was needed to get things in order, the place that we would be temporarily staying at was in the same school boundaries that our new home was.
Our little baby girl didn't come early like we thought she might.  On a early Monday morning Luke and I were headed out to wait at the hospital until our baby girl arrived.  Since my dad and step mom live near the hospital we went there for awhile.  Since we didn't know how long it would take our caseworker told us that she would let us know when to head for the hospital but probably not until the afternoon.  Well I think I lasted about fifteen minutes at my dads place before I got so antsy that I couldn't stand just waiting there.  Luke was busy doing something so I headed out to go pick out some flowers for the amazing lady that was carrying our baby.  Thirty minutes later and while I am in the middle of shopping I get a message from our caseworker that things are moving along pretty fast and that we should head to the the hospital.  I was so excited.  I couldn't believe that the baby that we had been praying for was on her way.  We were soon set up in a hospital room just down the hall from our birth mother.  In our hospital room the nurse logged on the the heart monitor in the delivery room so we could see when the contractions were happening and they told us what to look for on the screen so we would know exactly when the baby was born.  One minute we are looking at the screen and suddenly a green line appears that showed us that our baby girl had arrived.  Within a minute they were bringing her into our room to get her cleaned up.  It was such an amazing thing.  Our baby girl was beautiful. We instantly fell in love with her.

  Here is the monitor showing exactly when she was born.  We were so excited that Luke just had to take a picture of it.  She is here!!

Here they are getting out sweet little Anna all cleaned up and weighed.

Daddy and his new little princess

Isn't she absolutely beautiful!

Later that night my mom brought the kids by to see their new little sister.  What a good big brother. And look at the grin on Claire's face.  We pretty much kept this a secret until she arrived.  The only ones that we told were those involved in helping us get set up in our temporary home.  We didn't really even tell the kids beforehand.  We kept saying "If we get a sister soon...." and then explaining what would happen  but Claire had been praying for a baby for so long that we didn't want her to be upset it didn't work out.  After Anna was born Luke called Claire and told her that she now had a baby sister and it just didn't sink in.  I had to take the phone from him and tell her several times before she really understood.  Then she was so excited that she ran over to the neighbors to tell them.      

They love their little sister so much.  They came with presents and each got to pick out a balloon for her.

I got in plenty of cuddle time over the next few days.  I was told beforehand that our birth mother wanted me to stay at the hospital with Anna but I thought that meant she wanted me to visit the baby a lot.  Ha Ha...that is totally not what she meant.  They gave me and Anna our very own hospital room until she got released.  I must say that it was so nice being able to stay at the hospital with her.  Luke and I got in lots of bonding time with our sweet little angel.  

All dressed up and waiting to leave the hospital.

On our way home.  

We are so grateful for the miracle of adoption.  For a long time we knew that we were missing someone in our family and only through adoption were we able to get her.  Her birth mother is such an amazing and strong person.  Even though we have yet to meet her we love her more than she could possibly know. Thank you so much for giving us the priviledge of being a mom and dad to this sweet little girl.   

Pictures of the day

It was supposed to be "picture of the day" but I couldn't pick just one this time.

This expression is such an Anna expression.  I get this look all day long.  It makes me smile every time I see it.

Getting some smooches from daddy

Luke was playing airplane with her but the second she got up in the air her attention turned to all the fun things happening outside.

 And a few more smooches from dad.  Her cheeks are so cute you just can't help it. 

Where to begin...

Right when I am starting to get things updated our computer decides to crash....big time.  Big time as in the hubby couldn't fix it and he can fix ANYTHING.  Big time as in we had to take it to someone and just prayed that they would be able to get our data off of the hard drive.  The good news is that we did get all the data restored and now we are back in business.  The bad news is now I feel like I am so far behind that once again I am not sure where to even begin.

Happy Birthday Luke

Happy birthday to my best friend, best daddy ever, most amazing storyteller, hard working, and can literally fix/build anything man.  We love you so much.  You take such good care of your family and we appreciate all that you do for us.  We are so very lucky to have you for all eternity.

 

 
The kids insisted that we make him a Hulk cake so that is exactly what we did.  They were so excited for Luke to get home from work so they could show it to him.  Apparently one night he told the kids that they better behave or he would get mad and turn into the hulk and since then they have been fascinated with him. 

Bathtime

"I am just giving me a bubble bath, Mom."

 

 

 

It was pretty quiet for a minute there so I should have know he was up to no good.  

Crue's Birthday Interview

What's your favorite color?  Blue

What do you want to be when you grow up?  A baseball player with a bat and Claire can throw me the ball.

What is your favorite thing to do with Claire?  Play in the mud.

What is your favorite thing to do with Anna?  Hold her.

What is your favorite thing to do with mom?  Go exercise with her.

What is your favorite thing to do with dad?  Work with him

What is your favorite thing to do with your family?  Play with them

And after that he decided he had enough of the questions

Three Years Old

My three month blog break has finally came to an end.  Seriously I can't believe that three months have gone by.  I am so far behind on everything that I don't even know where to start.  The last time I blogged I was living at my moms...and since then our family has grown (and our little addition is absolutely beautiful), we moved out of my moms house, then two weeks our new house was finally finished being built so we moved again.  Add on Christmas three days after our move, New Years, birthdays, and I don't even know where to begin.  I think I will just start with the latest and work my way back. 

 

So....

 

 

Guess who turned three!!

 

...Our little Crue Buddy...

aka Baby Batman

aka Sandlot

aka Stuart little

aka Cruey Jaxson

aka Cruey Jaxson Batman Mascarenas

Okay, I could go on and on

Several times a week he tells us what his name is for the day and that is what he expects us to call him.  Just don't call him "honey".

 

 

He had a great birthday.  He wanted to go fishing for his birthday but that will have to wait for another month or so.  His next choice was to go to a trampoline place so we headed to The wAIRhouse.  It was so much fun.

Here is his spiderman cake.

 

 Me and two of my sweethearts. 

 

Crue Funnies...

I made homemade macaroni and cheese but only had the medium size pasta shells.  Halfway through dinner he tries to quiet us all down and while holding a single cheese covered shell up to his ear he says, "Shhhh. I can hear the water.  I can hear the ocean." 

 

I was cleaning out the van when Crue noticed my emergency stash of snacks.  He asked me for some and I told him that we couldn't eat them because they were for an emergency like if we got stuck in the snow on the side of the road.  He just looked at me weird and went on his way.  Several minutes later I hear him calling my name. He is standing in a big snow pile on the side of the road in front of our house.  He just looks at me and with his totally serious voice says, "Can I have some of those snacks now?"

 

Crue: Mom, are you thinking what I'm thinking?
Me: I don't know buddy. What are you thinking?
Crue: I think we need to go catch a shark before he decides to eat us.
We were so not thinking the same thing....not even close

 

Crue: Mom, look at my hair!!
Me: Did you get into the gel again?
Crue: Nope, I just got some water from the toilet.