I just wanted to share Z's referral pictures. I can not believe how chubby she was (and still is)

MIssing Her So Much It Hurts

Today I am feeling very sad. As i go through this adoption process it is like a roller coaster of emotion . Sometimes i am happy and so glad i am a parent other day i miss her so much it hurts. Today is one of those days. I am not saying i do not miss Z everyday because i do but some day are just harder than others. So i will set here all day wondering what she is doing and wishing that he was here to comfort me.


I love you Z and miss you come home soon

New Pgae

If you know me at all you know that i love Halloween. So i changed my page to reflect that. At our house i put up my Halloween decorations Sept. 1 and take then down Nov. 1 I decorate more for Halloween than any other day of the year.

Storms in Haiti

Many of you have been asking about the storms in Haiti. So far every thing is good the children are safe and the orphanage director was able to go out and get food for the children. That is all the news we have received. I will keep you posted if there is any changes

Thank you

Steve & Shanna
THANK YOU

A BIG THANKS

Well we need to give a big thanks to some people. Over the last few weeks we have been planning a fund raiser to help us get to Haiti. It all started when the owner of our local pub wanted to help us raise money to get us to see Z in October. So our planning began. We when to local businesses and had prizes donated for a raffle and we also had a poker tournament that people could donate and play poker and win fabulous prizes. We had the fund raiser on Sunday and it was a success we made our goal. We get to see Z.


A few people that we need to thank

My brother Steve..... He is my heart and soul. He did such an amazing job. He spent countless hours trying to get people to sign up for the tournament and promoting this for weeks I do not know how i will ever thank him

Bill and Heidi.... the owners of our local pub (Brewskis a private club for members )
With out their willingness to do this and there support this would of never happened and there generous donation of plane ticket and more we would not be going to Haiti.

And i would like to thank all our friends families and well ...perfect strangers that came together and supported our cause

and last but not least i have a very very special thanks

Shanna ....she is really the reason this all came together. She spent hundreds of hours putting together poster flyer's getting donations. I do not know how i will ever thank her enough. When this whole thing started Shanna and myself were friends and now i consider her my family. She has went beyond what anyone normal human being would do. She has a heart of gold. I love you Shanna Thank you so much

Good News

Well there is good news from Haiti. They have found a teacher to come to the orphanage and he speaks fluent English. This is so great because now the children will be mentally stimulated and start to learn English which will make there transition easier. YEAH

OUr Adoption Story

It has just accrued to me that i started this blog to keep in touch with our adoption family and i have really never shared our story of adoption. Well R and i really never thought about having kids but 2 years after we got married we got the usual pressures for friends and family "when are you going to have kids" i guess that is the next step in most marriages. So we started to talk about it and adoption was the only choice for us.. I have always wanted to adopt ever since i was in the sixth grade and I got my first cabbage patch doll. I told my mom then that i wanted to adopt.

So growing up I never wanted children. Even when R and I first met i still did not want children and neither did he at that point in are lives, we were only 21 at the time so as time went on and we dated for 5 years we talk about marriage and children but it just was not in the cards and that time. We broke up and went on with our lives.

After four years we both were single again and coming out of fairly long relationships I called him out of the blue to see what he was doing and to my surprise he was happy to hear from me he came to my house that evening , two months later he propose and a year later we were married.

We started talking about adoption couple years after we were married. We researched agency and we found WIA. At first we wanted to adopt from the Ukraine so we requested info and WIA sent us a packet. One Day while i was looking through the info i was watching The Adoption Story on TV and this family was adopting from Haiti. I call R into the room and basically that is how we started to adopt from Haiti. Once we seen the children it was over we, submitted our application and here we are today waiting for a beautiful baby girl who we call Z

So this is our story, simple but all ours. Everyone has their own reasons for adopting and for the most part they are all different but one thing that is the same in all the stories. We all just want to be parents.

THe Greatest Band On The Planet Earth

Dave Mathews Band is the greatest band on the planet earth. I have enjoyed their music for like 15 years now. I have seen them in concert probably 20 or so times.



Isn't funny how music can bond you with someone. Me and all my friends just love the Dave Mathews Band. We all started listing to them at about the same time and as our group of friends have grown so has the love for DMB. When we first met R did not like DMB and i told him "you have to see them live" so he did and now he is hooked.


I suggest if you have never listen to DMB just give it a try you will be surprised. It is some of the greatest music ever written

LeRoi Moore

Yesterday one of the great musicians of all time died. LeRoi Moore the saxophonist for the Dave Mathews band.

He will be missed

http://www.dmband.com/

It is official

It is official we are going to Haiti. We booked our flights yesterday. I can not wait. October seems so far away now. What a great anniversary gift this will be. We were married on Oct. 31 2003. WOW five years. well i have known R since 1993 so most of my life really, but that story i will save for another time. Anyways.... We are so excited to be going and get to see Z again and our other adoption peeps. It will be fun and sad at the same time. i really can not wait for the last time i HAVE to go to Haiti because that will be the time we bring Z home. PLEASE BE SOON.

Z update

Here is the latest and greatest picture of Z
She is giving such a great dirty look just like her mom. What great hat they found. At least she looks healthily and happy. I just can not wait until i am the one in the picture holding her. The Oct. trip is in motion so we will be seeing her soon. We are going to celebrate her first birthday while we are there her grandma Milly has already got her a build a bear monkey it is so cute and me and R got her a sock monkey..... I hope she likes monkeys since that seems to be the theme. We are going the take a cupcake for her first cake and get hats and stuff for the other little kids it will be fun. Come on October

zoo

Here are some of the animals in the zoo

St. Louis Zoo

We just got back from visiting R mom and brother we had a great time but it was really short visit it always is when you do not see your family enough. My family lives five minutes away so i see them every day I feel sad for R sometimes because he misses he family so much. We went to the St. Louis zoo it is amazing. It is a huge zoo it has thousands of animal and it is free to get in. There was a baby elephant it is so cute it was playing in the water and with her mom. the animals were so amazing they had a lot of animal the are going extinct and they breed them and send them back to the wild. If you would like to read more here is some info http://www.stlzoo.org/

If you ever get the chance i would recommend going.