The Adventure

Our adventure started last Thursday, June 24th at 3:00 p.m. We had decided to work through another agency the Tuesday before, and on Thursday they contacted us for the first time. They let us know they got our application and oh by the way we have a birth mom due on Friday, are you interested? Zane and I had very little time to discuss and pray. When we thought about the baby, we felt peace. When we thought about leaving our home and traveling to another state for who knows how long with a two-year-old and everything else about the adoption process, we felt fear. We went on faith though, packed up the car and headed out on a two day drive. Dallin did wonderful as long as he was watching his movies. We have been potty training before we left and he did a great job on the road and throughout our whole trip. We haven't had any accidents! Amazing for a two-year-old whose life went crazy all of sudden.

We arrived and went straight to the hospital at 5 p.m. It wasn't the ideal time for Dallin so he and Zane didn't stay long, but I enjoyed a nice long visit with our birthmom, her mom, and her 17-year-old daughter. We hit it off and I enjoyed spending the next two days with them. I think Gavin knew we were driving out instead of flying, so he waited to be born on Saturday morning instead of Friday. One of the first questions we were asked when we arrived at the hospital was what we were going to name the baby. We threw out three names with Gavin being the last. Everyone shouted out that they liked that name the best, so that is how Gavin got his name. (On a side note, Gavin's birthmom thought all our names were fake because they are on the unusual side. We just like unusual names.)

Placement is the hardest part of an adoption process. It is hard to watch someone you care about go through something so hard and painful. Thank you doesn't seem to cover how much we appreciate Gavin's birthmom. We appreciate her strength and courage to choose to give her son a life that she couldn't offer at this time. We are eternally grateful for her sacrifice and love she had for her son.

Gavin stayed in the hospital an extra day, and then we picked him up Tuesday afternoon and brought him back to the hotel. He has been very sleepy and a wonderful baby so far. Dallin has enjoyed having a brother and is very proud of him. We thought we would be out here for at least two weeks, but we just heard that the courts have cleared us to leave. Living in a hotel with a two-year-old and a newborn isn't the ideal situation so we are thrilled to be heading home. This trip has been an adventure, but we feel so lucky that we were picked to be a part of it.

Welcome Baby Gavin

Baby Gavin was born 7 pounds 4 ounces and 20 inches long on Saturday, June 26th at 12:58 a.m. We brought him home from the hospital today and are thrilled to have him as part of our family. We saw the hand of God again in our lives in the way he was brought to our family. Stay tuned for that story!

Little Helper

Dallin is really into helping me right now. Most of the time I love it. I pulled out the corn on the cob the other night then turned my back to do something else. When I turned around, I found him doing this.


I was shocked and laughed so hard.

We have now gone blueberry picking twice as a family. Dallin loves helping pick/eat them. He gets a bucket at the beginning, but by the end, we can never find his bucket. He drops it along the way so he can use two hands to pick and eat.





Picking blue berries is hard work, so we always get a snow cone after wards.

S'more Please!

Since Dallin didn't get to eat S'mores on the Father's and Son's camp out, (Zane felt like he had enough sugar and didn't need anymore) we made S'mores at home. I think he liked them.

One Fanstastic Dad and Husband

We ended our stay-cation with one last project. Last December Zane started building shelves in all our closets to add more storage space. He built two more for me as his last project on his time off. I'm so lucky he is so handy.

This last weekend we bought a freezer. Zane spent all Saturday afternoon rearranging the garage and getting it ready to fit a freezer. It isn't fun working outside in the hot, humid weather, but when Zane gets going, there is no stopping him. He is a very hard worker, and I love everything he does for us.

Our goal for Father's Day was to pamper Zane. He did get to sleep in an extra 45 minutes before Dallin snuck in to jump on him. (Dallin waved good bye to me and before I could catch him was through the door and onto the bed.) Instead of getting pampered, Zane spent the day helping me with everything (we had my family over for dinner.) He never complains and is always willing to jump in without being asked. Zane is Dallin's favorite person to play with because daddy's are just that much more fun. I love watching the two play together. It always brings a smile to my face.

We love you Zane and hope you had a great Father's Day. You deserve it.

Going to the Beach

Our stay-cation continued at the beach. This is the first time we took advantage of living so close to the beach. We had so much fun that we will definitely be taking more trips down. Dallin especially loved everything about it. We don't have the prettiest water, but it is warm and enjoyable to play in.

Dallin started off by wearing his floaties because he is so crazy in water, you never know what will happen.

After awhile, we took the floaties off and ventured out together to jump the waves. This was our favorite part. Lately I have been saying things about "My boys" in reference to Zane and Dallin like I love my boys etc. While we were jumping waves, Dallin would keep one arm around Zane and then grab onto me hugging us both. He would then say "My boys" as he hugged us. He wouldn't listen to me when I told him I was a girl. Who cares anyway. When he hugs us both and calls us "My boys," my heart warms right up.

A group of teenage boys gathered up all these hermit crabs. You can't tell from the picture, but they probably had 100 crabs in this pool of water. Dallin thought it was sooo cool!

Dallin also loved the sand. This is their attempt at a sand castle. Zane made the moat and started on the castle, but Dallin really just loves to knock things over. They didn't get very far. We did spend a good 15-20 minutes making mud balls to give to Dallin so that he could run over to the ocean and throw them in. Destruction and throwing, two of Dallin's favorites.

We will definitely be coming back soon!

Scary Dinosaurs

Dinosaurs are visiting our zoo this summer. We liked this exhibit so much we went through twice. Dallin thought the moving heads and bodies of the dinosaurs was so cool and scary at the same time. He was a little apprehensive about some of the dinosaurs, and others he was trying to sneak under the rope to go touch them. The last one was really fun because it squirted everyone with water.

Going to the Zoo

We took a break from swimming at our neighborhood pool and from projects around the house and went to the zoo. The highlights were seeing the four week old elephant who refused to pose for my picture, chasing the birds, and the air condition reptile house.

Dallin would run after the birds with his hands like the picture below. I'm glad I caught this look on camera. It still makes me smile.

Watch out for the piranhas

Dallin is obsessed with animals' mouths. He was suppose to be brushing the hair on the goats back. I hope the goat liked his mouth brushed instead.

Thanks for posing for me gopher

My gophers

Dallin walked the entire day until the end when we convinced him to take a ride in the wagon. He sat back, picked up this map, and started looking at it as we pulled him to the car. It cracked me up.

Stay-cation: First Project

Zane had vacation scheduled a couple of weeks ago. We looked into going out of town, but in the end, decided to vacation at home. Zane has worked a lot lately and his projects were really piling up. We enjoyed doing fun activities together and getting some time to do projects around the house.

Our first project on the to-do list was finishing replacing sod in our backyard. We had some major problems with our grass after last summer's chinch bug hit us. We have been working on the grass for a month trying to find time to tear out the bad grass, get the soil ready, and re-sod. Here is part of the area we redid.


While we worked, Dallin had a few extra friends over to entertain him. In the end though, Zane did most of the work, Dallin played, and I ran back and forth between the two.

Dallin's entertainment included sprinklers

Going down the slide

And rides in the wheel barrow

I loved Dallin's face here and laughed at his friend Ruby's need to always have goggles on.

I think we need to get a bigger pool!

First project done and it looks great. Now for the rest of the week!!!