Our little ham!

ODG has always loved being in front of the camera. When she was 9 months old, we were at a family wedding and girlfriend was CHEESIN' IT UP for the photographer. If the photographer's camera wasn't pointed at her during the reception, she would do something to get her attention or to let us know she wanted to move closer. She was fascinated! Fast forward 2 years and not much has changed!

At Disney World last November, after waiting for a parade on Main Street and watching the Disney Photographer snap people's photos for about an hour, she decided it was her time in the spot light just moments before the parade began. She hopped into the middle of the street (by herself) and told the fun photographer, "I want you to take my picture, please!" Let's just say about 100 pairs of eyes were all on her and she was taking it all in!

Again, not much has changed!

ODG loves to have her picture taken - I think that's fairly evident - but we don't do it often enough with "Daddy's camera" (the nice Nikon). It was a beautiful night last night, so we decided to get all dolled up and head to a cute little area down the street from us and take some snapshots of our little budding model. I'm so glad we did, because we had SO MUCH FUN make goofy poses (she didn't know they were poses, she just thought we were playing & being silly) and enjoying the night! Here are a few of my favorites from the night! 

If anyone knows of a good talent agent, we're in the market! ;-) 

Thanks for letting me share our little ham with you! I just wish you could all get to know her personally. She is SO incredibly creative, super smart (witty), and keeps everyone who spends time with her laughing...or plugging their ears from hearing her talk so much :-) 

Foster Care Update: Our licensor asked to postpone our first home study until we get back from SCENTSY FAMILY REUNION (AHHHH! Excitement in & of itself!!), so I'm a bit bummed, but we won't be having our home study until after July 13! Would love some prayers for patience for that :-)

Lately...

....we've been busy! I am thankful for the busy times, but I wish I had more time to blog about life as it happens instead of big photo dumps every couple of weeks. This shall do for now :-)

April was a whirlwind...we finally feel like we're settling in, making great friends, and finding out what "home" means to us in Washington. We celebrated Easter with the "F" family {who we know from Texas...see ODG < 3 ELF} and we are so glad to have them nearby -- it has made the transition quite a bit easier to have a piece of Texas here {even though neither of them are Texans...}

We stopped to see the tulips after church before lunch. ODG felt like a ballerina in her Easter dress!

Anlee has better pictures I'll post later, but this is the only pic of ODG & ELF that I got the entire day!

In April, we discovered the "touch tank" where you can pet starfish, crabs, and have so much fun!

ODG points with her middle finger at everything....no matter how many times I correct her to her pointer!

April was the opening of our local farmer's market! It's every Saturday and if we're free we head out there for an hour or so and see what all our locals have to offer. It has been so fun! From good food, to balloon fun, to fresh produce, we are loving it!

Spring has officially sprung in our town and it is beautiful! As if the views we've seen haven't been pretty enough, they just keep getting better!! The rainy days are more scattered apart and the flowers are in full bloom. 

And in addition to all of that....we have FINALLY hung curtains! We didn't even hang curtains in our old house we lived in for 2 1/2 years, so I'm quite proud of this accomplishment! Hopefully I will do a picture walk of our house soon...stay tuned!

In other exciting news, I'm scheduled to be a guest blogger on a local gal's blog here in the next couple weeks! I'm so excited to share the top 5 things I love about our new town over on BellingFAM. I'll post a link when it's available!

What was your favorite part of April? Anything you're looking forward to in May?

Where have I been?

Well....

{you may have to click on the image to enlarge it}

Someday soon our family will be getting a little bigger.

With that said, we don't know when, we don't know age, gender, race, etc.

What we do know is that he/she will be loved greatly and we can't wait to meet him/her,

and we thought it was time to announce it to all of you!

We have been busy busy busy attending training classes and filling out paperwork, as well as beginning to prepare our home for a new arrival! I could write on & on about this next chapter in our life, and I hope to share a bit of our journey, but I'd love to hear what questions YOU have, so please DO NOT HESITATE to comment with any questions you may have and I'd love to answer as best I can in another post :-)

We covet your prayers as our lives begin to drastically change...and we are so excitedly expectant! 

It came...

I knew it would come, I just didn't know it would come like this or when it would come.

I first want to preface this post. I am not whining. I am not complaining. I'm not even wishing we hadn't done this. I'm not looking for pitty. I'm not looking for "I told you so's." I'm just sharing my mind. Getting it off my chest, so to speak. Those who have moved away from "home" before know this feeling...and knowing I'm not alone, nor the first person to move away from "home", helps me. But so does venting :)

Today it hit me that I miss home. That's part of the problem...I think. When I'm talking to people I say "back home" often. If the saying "home is where the heart is" is true, then I've obviously left my heart in Texas. The problem? It's really not in Texas, it's physically in Washington. I am LOVING it here. I am loving the people I have met, the parks we have visited, my new favorite coffee shop. Seriously, I love it.

But what happened today made me miss my friends & neighbors who were our extended family, I miss CCDC friends who were also more like family than I could've ever imagined. I miss being able to have some one to talk to and now have to worry about the time difference.

I feel like I have been on such a rush moving here. Meeting new people, enjoying our new town, making a new home. Each & every moment has been a blessing. But, today, when things got real, I missed Texas. I'm making a commitment to not call it home anymore...starting now. Washington is home. The place where I make meals, play games with ODG, enjoy movies with Hubby at night...that is home now.

Vent over. I am home now. But I am still, and always will be, a Texas girl, because...."You can take the girl outta Texas, but you can't take the Texas outta the girl" ;-)

Family movie night snuggles with ODG

Who knows what movie we watched?