I'm one!!!

My first cake!

My first birthday party!

Last night Allie had her first birthday party with Cory's side of the family. Unfortunately, they weren't able to celebrate with us next weekend so instead we had a little party out in Sioux Falls last weekend. We went out to eat and then Cory's sister invited us over for a cake that she had ordered (which came with a little one just for Allie) and opening presents. Allie had a blast!!! Here are a few pictures...

Rambling...

With Allie's first birthday fast approaching, we've been thinking a lot about Allie's birth mom. I've been wondering how she's doing and if she's having a difficult time knowing that Allie's birthday is approaching. I wonder if our thoughts will always gravitate towards her around these special days. How could we not think about her? This young woman helped to make all of our dreams come true. If it hadn't been for her, we might still be waiting to become a family of three. It's amazing to think that a young woman that we've only met in person two times, has given us the greatest gift we've ever been given!

Along those same lines, it's hard to grasp the idea that each and every one of our children will come into our family this way. In order for us to add to our family, someone else has to go through an amazingly difficult and painful process.

I remember last year this time, Cory and I really struggled not knowing what to pray for. Should we pray for a child to come to us through adoption? We struggled to pray for that because we knew how much pain that would bring someone else. We decided to pray for strength. Strength for our birth mom, for our future child, for us and for everyone involved. In the end, I believe that our prayers really did pay off.

Fast forward one year and we are again praying for strength. We pray for strength for "T" and her family as we can only imagine how difficult this time of year must be for them. I pray that they know how much love we have for both Allie and for them. We also are praying for strength for our future child/ren's birth families. They may already be going through unbelievably difficult times and we pray for their strength and for their health.

11 months old!

Updates...

It's been a crazy last few weeks. With Jen gone to China, I offered to help "teach" her dance classes at her studio. It was fun seeing what Jen does after school, but I'm not sure how much "help" I really was. It's a great deal of work and It'll be nice to be home after school with Allie now.

Last week, Allie caught that awful cold that was going around. That made for a pretty miserable week! I'm SOOO ready for summer!!!

As far as the adoption goes...

We heard from Children's Home Society, they did receive all of our information and since we already attended all of the classes required for our program...we are ready for our social worker to write our homestudy. We are hoping that we are able to set up an appointment to begin that process within the next two weeks. I'll just be nice to have our homestudy complete and be able to begin our next set of paperwork that's required.

Other than that, not much new! Have a great week and we'll post pictures soon!