Another Heart's Wish comes true

My heart has been overfilled with joy since the arrival of our sweet Nella! God is amazing and I continue to feel so much grace that God chose Matt and I to be Nella's parents. Before our sweet Nella arrived, Matt and I tried to have conceive a child. We prayed and prayed for God to help us and even sought medical advice to help us with the process. It didn't feel right....I felt God pulling us into another direction and that direction was adoption! We felt complete peace as we entered into the adoption journey and journey that I didn't realize God wanted for Matt and I, but once he lead us there, I could feel him guiding us and supporting us! After we chose adoption, I gave up trying to conceive a child. It wasn't something I longed for anymore! It wasn't something I thought God wanted for me! I felt God wanted me to be an adoptive mother and felt honored that he chose this for me! I stopped counting days and worrying about trying to conceive. It wasn't what I thought was intended for me and I felt peace with that! Did I wonder what it felt like to have little baby kicks in your tummy? Yes...Was I curious what it felt like to have people ask you about your pregnancy and ask to rub your tummy? Yes I did...but I didn't want that or have to have it like I did before!

Then God sent a HUGE surprise. He really likes to keep Matt and I on our toes! We were gearing up for our second adoption. We trying to figure out timing and praying to God about financing and wondering if this would be God's plan for us. The day I found out I was pregnant, we discussed financing and funding options for adoption....it seemed overwhelming and we were unsure how we would be able to afford it. Then I realized I didn't start and I began to wonder if I was pregnant. I prayed to God and said please God get this thought out of my head because I don't want to think about it if I am not. I am done doing that and I didn't want to slip back into that place. He didn't let the thought leave me. I said okay, God if I am....then when I take this test let read positive. ( I found a test in a dresser drawer and we must have had in the past)...It was even two days past due...lol I took it and it read positive! I am almost fell over! I immediately called up Matt and told him. He almost fell down the stairs and he couldn't believe it!!!!! We went out and got three more tests and all were positive! It was crazy! I keep telling Matt that I think I will be in shock until the day I see our sweet boy! I still cannot believe how crazy God is! He keeps reaffirming in my life....that I can never know what to expect with him......and it makes me trust HIM!!!

We found our little man was a boy at our little party! Our friend, Mia, helped us out big time with a cake. We went to the ultra sound and had the technician seal the envelope and we gave it to Mia. She baked a cake and made the inside the color of what the baby was! Blue for a boy and pink for a girl! Then we had some friends and family join us for a dinner and when we cut the cake. We found out we were having a boy!

Carrying our sweet boy has been amazing! It is so neat to feel little kicks and know that we are helping him grow! It is a different journey from Nella's neither one better than the other.....just unique in itself. I have loved both journeys to our children.....God is SO good!!!!

Nella at 18/19 months

Our little Roo just turned 19 months! WOW, we have a little one over a year and half. How did she grow so fast and where does the time go? It seems like she was just a little a peanut the other day! Matt and I still think about bringing her home on the plane and how tiny she was! She is such a little character! She has the sweetest smile and cutest belly laugh!

At 19 months old, little miss has SO many words. She repeats anything you ask her to and she will repeat things you say too! It is amazing how well her language has developed! She takes one nap for about 2 to 3 hours! She continues to be a good little eater and has gotten to the point where she will tell you what she wants to eat! She loves APPLES especially and has just recently moved to where she can eat the apple like a big girl (we peel off the skin). She has apple radar....she can spot an apple anywhere and when she sees it she wants it!! :)

She is quite the talker and when she is not using words, she speaks in her sweet love language and will use gestures and everything while she tells you a big tale! It is the sweetest and cutest thing ever!

Nella continues to love books and loves to be read too! Matt and I often read about 20 books a day to her.....and sometimes the same book over and over! She loves Oh the Thinks You Can Think, Elmo and Friends, If you Give a Moose a Muffin, and The Little Engine that Could. She has started to love playing with dolls. It is the sweetest to watch her cuddle and love on a baby. She feeds the baby and will make a sucking sound with her mouth like the baby would do. We even caught her sniffing the baby's bottom the other day! lol!!

Big Girl room

She loves her book wall

She continues to be very loving. She loves to give hugs and kisses! Nella loves to pat people on the back and she does it to everyone! She is going through a bit of a mommy phase right now. She wants her mommy to "hold u" all the time! I do love that she wants me, but it is sometimes difficult while trying to cook dinner and I hate seeing her reject her daddy! I know someday the tables will turn though....

Nella knows Mommy is having a baby! She pats my belly and gives hugs and kisses to the baby. I know she will be a great big sister! We are so enjoying our sweet girl and love all the sweet little things she does!!

Our love is 17 months

Our sweet little love is growing SO fast!!!

I am continued to be amazed by her! She is really such a good little baby! Although I know she is getting to be such a big girl.

She now wants to be so independent. She eats with spoon and fork all by herself now and occasionally she still asks mommy for help. She will tell you want she wants to eat now and if she doesn't like something, she is not afraid to share that too!!

She is on the go all the time! She runs everywhere she goes with this huge smile on her face! She loves to talk on her phone, cook in the kitchen, build with blocks, play with puppets, and read. She is still fascinated with books. In one evening, Matt and I typically read 15 to 20 books! The girl LOVES to be read too!!! She is starting to be able to tell you what book she wants...she knows the titles! It is crazy how smart this little love is! She loves to sing and dance! She does spins and tries to jump which maybe the cutest little thing I have ever seen!

She is a talker...and she is constantly talking! Sometimes she will look at her say something for about 30 to 40 seconds (which we have no idea what she says) and then she will say bye and leave the room! It makes us giggle everytime! Seriously so cute!

With her independence has come more, attitude. When she is upset, she will throw herself on the floor, cry and look up at you to be sure you are getting all this....we ignore this behavior and within 10 seconds she is up and saying sorry mommy. Her little sorry melts my heart. Now I have to say....Matt struggles with her doing this. He wants to scoop her up and tell her it is okay when she flings herself on the floor. It breaks his heart to see her upset and I tell him it is just part of it and she is just seeing if our no to that item will change if she tries this. I feel so bad for him because I know it breaks his daddy heart!

Our little roo was an American Doll for Halloween! She hated the box, so it didn't stay on long! But boy did she LOVE trick or treating. She can say trick or treat and loved going up to the door. She would always take the treat out of her bucket and give it back to the person who gave it to her and say fank you (thank you). So everytime mommy would tell her its yours to keep! She loved it! We even went trick or treating at the zoo! She loved it animals plus trick or treating....she was so excited!!

Another huge change for little miss is she will be a big sister, March 15 to her little brother! We are so excited and I know she will do amazing! She loves babies and is really sweet with little ones. Daddy and Mommy have been working on her big girl room! I will post pics soon! I cannot wait! She is going to love it!

We continue to feel amazed by God's love for us! We are so blessed to our Nella and amazed that we are having another little one soon! We cannot wait to meet him!

Talk to you soon!!! Love ya

Nella is 16 months almost 17 months! A little late...

Our sweet girl is getting to be such a big girl! She has grown so much over the past couple months! It is amazes me what she can do now!

She runs everywhere she goes and she loves to be on the go! She is trying to jump! It is the cutest thing! She bends her knees and gets up on her tip toes! She can climb up on the couch like a big girl!

She is very talkative! She can say or tries to say anything we say! She puts two words together a lot now! She knows all her animal sounds and is starting to sing! She has the sweetest little voice!

She loves her Elmie (Elmo)! She has a little one she brings everywhere! He sleeps with her and eats with her! She feeds him what she eats! It is so cute!!!

She continues to have a sweet, loving personality! She loves babies and gives big kisses to them!!! She will be the best big sister!!

Our girl continues to amaze us!!! She is truly our angel!

See you soon!!!

I'm 14 months

Our little love girl is 14 months!!! So hard for us to believe. She is such a big girl now and is always on the go! She walks..no really runs everywhere she goes! She loves to play hide and seek and chase! She is becoming more of daddy's girl. It melts my heart to see her reach for daddy or giggle so loudly when daddy chases her. She squeals with delight when daddy is around. Daddy has been making her blanket houses (he calls them forts...but girls call them houses). She loves it. She loves crawling in and out and reading books in her house.

She is definitely into books. Loves to be read to and loves to look at books. If I am in another room and she is being a little to quiet so I get nervous and go peek and she is looking at a book! So sweet!

She has so many words. It amazes us how quickly she picks up language and she continually adds new words to her vocabulary daily! Some of her new words are ucky, tweet, meow (but she says me), ducky, uh oh (one of our favorites), mamaw, and papaw. She is starting to put combos together too such as bye bye dadda, bye bye doggie, bite please. It is so amazing to watch her learn.

She is figuring out how to put things together and likes to trying to put lids on and stack things. I like watching her problem solve and try to figure it all out.

Our little love is also pretty independent and she gets really frustrated with mommy and daddy when she cannot do something. It is very short lived though and she always signs sorry and kisses us after which is really sweet. It is neat to watch her figure out her world and figure out her boundaries.

She is the best! Such a doll and people continue to stop us everywhere and admire her sweetness and cuteness! She is quite the ham and loves the attention. Saying hi to her fans and then burying her head into mommy.

Happy 14 months little Nella bug!

I'm 13 months!!!!

Nella turned 13 months this past Sunday! It is hard to believe how she has changed so much in such a little time. She is not a little baby anymore and seems to behave more like a big girl! Her look has changed to me as well. I can now see what she will look like as she grows and I can predict what her sweet little face will look like when she grows! She is a blast and we are enjoying every minute with her! I am LOVING being home with her and breaks my heart to think about going back to school! But I know my other kidddos need me too! :)

Nella can take 6 to 8 steps on her own now....but if she is traveling long distances she wants just one finger. It is really sweet and I love how cautious she is about it! She can stand all by herself now, but if she is standing too long she will move to where she can lean on you! I love that she still wants us to be close even though she has all this independence now! She is a very good listener! If we tell her she cannot go upstairs right now, she will stop climbing and come down and the same when upstairs and she wants to go down. She can go down the stairs all by herself now. She has so many words and she continues to pick up a new word each day! Her newest words are: hi, stop (top), no, hot (ot), bird, poof (it goes with a song we sing), night night, up, baby. She will also sign please and thank you! She will get frustrated and want help and begin to cry and we say if you need help Nella say help please. She will stop and sign please. It is the cutest ever! She points to everything and says ooha (which I think means what is it?). She does this all day long as she wants to know more about what things are called. She tries to say ee i ee i oo when we sing Old McDonald had a farm.

Our biggest challenge these past three weeks is hitting herself. We are continuing to be consistent and remind her to be nice to Nella and not hit. We tried distracting her and telling its okay to be frustrated, but she continued to hit. We started sitting her out when she does it three times in a row and it is helping. When she gets done sitting out she will kiss us and we make her sign sorry. She has been doing better and it has not been happening as frequently, but hard to see her hurt herself like that! She tends to hit when we tell her it is not for Nella or she cannot do something like...it seems she is upset with herself.

Little things about her that she is doing this month. She does a surprise face when she does something she wasn't expecting. She loves to hug and kiss everyone and everything. She mimicks everything we do...so funny and makes you think about what you do. On the trip, she mimicked my mom chewing gum and now she does it on command when you ask. She also loves showing you where her tongue is.

We are having a blast and she is growing and changing so much!!!!


HAPPY JUNE!!!!!

Happy 5 years

Matt and I have been officially been married 5 years. We have been together 11 years. I am more in love with him today than I am the day I met that handsome green eyed boy sitting in my Trig 2 class. I remember that day that I was thanking God that may last name started with a T and his started with a S, so I could sit by him since we had to sit in alphabetical order. I remember thinking how was I going to get him to pay attention to me....so I would curiously ask him what answer he got the math problem or ask him about the baseball game....to just try to get him to smile at me....and 11 years later...we are more in love than ever.

In these past 5 years together...I have a learned a lot about Matt. He is so reliable and when you ask him to do something, he will do it perfectly. He likes his laundry a certain way and usually does his laundry on the same day...makes me giggle everytime!!!! He can make me smile and laugh until my stomach hurts because he is just goofy and I love it!!! He is what I call the heater...I love it because I am always cold and so I love snuggling up to him and being warm! He has a huge heart and will help out anyone who may need it. Matt will always tell you the truth. He doesn't skate around it or try to make you feel better...he just tells it...which I have grown to love..sometimes I would like some skating....He likes to be on time...it drives him nuts that I tend to be late...but we have worked on it ;) He adores his family and he will do anything for us! Especially his girl Nella!

We have learned a lot through our years...and I know we have SO much more to learn...but we have had our share of ups and downs with infertility issues and adoption expenses and taking in God's plan and trying to roll with it...which neither of us do well....when I look back on the past year and half...its been our best! The anticipation of our child coming home that God had chosen for us....is crazy, miraculous, and takes our breath away still when we look back on it...And being in our role of mom and dad is my favorite. I adore watching Matt with Nella. It melts me. He is the only one who can make her giggle so hard! She loves her dada! And me...I am at my most confident and feel comfortable finally in who I am! I am a mama...the role that I always dreamed over and longed for! I love it! I love our family and so look forward to what God has in store of us!

The best has been watching my love grow in his faith with God. I have been apart of Matt finding God, asking Jesus to come into his heart, being baptized, and continue to grow in his faith daily. He has challenged me and we have grown so much together. We are still growing and still learning...but I love our journey so far and cannot wait for what's to come

We are SUPER busy

Happy Daddy's Day to our wonderful dad and husband, Matt!!! I knew my guy would be a great dad and adore his kiddos, but I was not prepared with the amount of love he shows for his girl. To say this girl has her daddy wrapped around her finger is an understatement. He adores her and smiles so big when he is with her! He is a great father, husband, and friend and God really blessed us when he gave us him!!!!

My dad and Matt got to spend Father's Day on the beach in Savannah with little Miss Nella...Could it get more perfect than that? They so enjoyed playing with her in the sand and trying to soak in all her excitement for the water and sand! She loved every minute of it and had a blast!!! Don't you love her hat...Old Navy...We had to get a 5 T because of her little poof...lol

It was wonderful being in Savannah. This trip felt different than others Matt and I have had. It was more relaxing and watching her enjoy Savannah through her eyes was so exciting! She loved every minute of it. She learned a new word in Savannah..hot! It was 107 two days in a row!!! WOW! She also learned where her tongue is...lol! We spent a lot of time at the beach and pool! We walked around, took miss Nella to an aquarium, and ate a lot of pie and seafood... :)

Oh how that girl loves the beach and so does her mommy! There is just something about being by the ocean that is so relaxing! When we were walking on the beach and watching our love hold hands with her mamaw and papaw I could feel God's love rush over me. I could feel him saying see I told you it was worth the heartache! I told you child to be patient! WOW was he right....being there with her at sunset will forever be engraved in my memory!!!!

We GOT a SUPER DUPER surprise!!! We got to meet the lovely Courtney and all her little loves!!!! For those of you who don't know...Courtney is one of our angels! She brought us to Nella! She is truly working to help so many families and truly an angel on Earth! She also has 6 children and has adopted 4 of them! See ANGEL right :) Her children were adorable and super duper sweet. Courtney is one fo the kindest, sweetest, and most adorable people I know and I was honored to meet her in person! Thank you hun for driving to Savannah to meet us!!!! As always, if you all can keep Miss Emmy, her youngest daughter, in your prayers as she is always needing them!!! We sure loved our time together and Nella adored them!

After we got back at 3 AM on Saturday...and my sweet morning girl woke up at 7 lol...we decided to head up to Kendallville for some girl time with Grandpa and Grandma Spencer and a special get together at Grandma JoJo's house! It was such a blast just enjoying time with our family! Grandma had 71 people there if you count all our kiddos!!!! We had a nice picnic with bubbles, tag, and homemade ice cream! It was so wonderful seeing everyone!!!! Family is the best!!!

Here is my sweet, talented, loving, compassionate Grandma JoJo with all 11 of her great grandchildren!!!!! Pretty amazing!! God is so good!!! She loves them all SO dearly!!!!!

Nella's book

Here is our link to Miss Nella's book! I hope you enjoy!!!! :)

http://www.mixbook.com/photo-books/baby/nella-s-first-year-book-5256387

Nella is 1

Our litle love is now a big 1 years old!!!! It is crazy for Matt and I to think that we have had a year with this precious gift already!!! It seems so fast! But even though it seems so fast...we still can remember the each little moment, milestone, and special event we shared with our girl.

Our Nella is such a big girl! She has the sweetest little smile and love language that she is always sharing. She always has something to say! She has many words now: mama, dada, baba, bye bye, Nella, yeah, yep, no, dog, and then some animals sounds quack, quack and buff, buff (ruff, ruff). If she is not using those words, she is speaking in her special little jibberish that is seriously the cutest sounds I have ever heard. She will tell you all about it for sure!!!

Her party was a blast. Mommy and Daddy, well more Mommy, planned for months. We had a butterfly extravaganza at our home.We had butterfly antennas for the kiddos, butterfly crafts to color, butterflies and pompoms hanging from the ceiling. We had butterflies on tulle out on the patio.....butterfly cupcakes and cake for Nella. We made sure it was fit for our little love girl to celebrate this wonderful year with our girl!!!!

She loved her cake...she so loved squishing it in her fingers. She loved all the people and enjoyed opening her gifts! She seemed to soak in her party and enjoy everyone being there!!!

A special birthday banner made for our love by her Aunt Leslie....pretty awesome!

One of my favorite decorations was her months banner. I printed all of her pictures from each month and put them on a clothesline. I was amazed at how much she had changed and grew over the months!!! I honestly have loved every month, every stage, every milestone.....that we had this past year! I loved the newborn snuggles and wide eyes as she would take in her world. I loved first baths, first smiles, first sleeping through the night, taking a nap for a long peroids of time, sleeping in crib. I love the sitting up stage, rolling overs, trying cereal for the first time, and watching her expressions as she tries every new food given to her. I loved watching her learn about her world and watching her explore everything around her! She is such a gift!!!!! Such a blessing!!!

A little about Little Miss at 1 years old

• she can crawl super fast
• she loves to eat and is such a good eater
• she switched herself to sippy cups by not wanting her bottles anymore
• she loves her whole milk
• she is taking one nap about 3 hours a day now
• she does patty cake and wheels on the bus
• she is a good little listener but is a determined little love to do things
• She pulls up on everything and I secretly think she could walk, but it is kinda sweet she still wants to hold just one finger
  
• She is answering questions when asked
• Her favorite word is bye bye...says it all the time
• She loves to kiss and will kiss everyone and everything
• She loves her kitty and doggie SO much
• She knows how big is Nella
• She loves to read and be read too! She is always looking at books or wanting you to read a book to her! When you get done, she will ewwuah, which I think means again!
  
• She points now to tell us what she wants and it is really cool to communicate with her!
  
• She is one happy girl and her smile will melt your heart in an instant
  

Our Nella is seriously our biggest wish come true! She continues to melt my heart daily and I am so proud and honored to be her momma!!!!