Our Gotcha Video

Well it took us 8 months to complete Mia's gotcha video. Better late than never, right? Justin put the video together and I think he did a beautiful job.

Mia Grace's adoption story from Justin Bufkin on Vimeo.

October Recap

October has been a fun-filled month for our little family. Mia is enjoying her first Autumn in America and I just love that she is here this year to be a part of our memory making. Last year at this time we missed her so and couldn't wait to have her home, so this year we are making the most of every moment we can. Justin's sister took some cute family pictures of us this month. 

Our family participated in a Buddy walk to help raise money and awareness for adults and children living with Down's Syndrome. We had a great morning together supporting a wonderful cause. 

A couple of weeks ago we took the kids to a fall field day put on the speech and language department at ULM. Mia has been going to speech there this semester. 

The kids had fun painting pumpkins, doing sack races, playing games, and getting lots of fun goodies. Mia had her face painted for the second time this month. She has loved spending time with Mrs. Jennie this semester. 

 Two weekends ago we took the kids to Curry Farms. This was our third year to take the boys there and Mia's first. They loved showing her around and she loved it all. We picked out a pumpkin for each kid.

Last week we took the kids to their school Halloween party at skate town. 

My friend took these pictures of all the kids in their costumes. Mia had a blast. I couldn't believe how good she did on her little skates. Last year at this time we didn't know if she would ever walk without assistance and now she is skating and doing potato sack races. I love the way God works!

Jax had fun wearing his black ninja costume. He won the costume contest for Kindergarten boys. He was so excited! 

Sawyer looks so serious in his Wario costume. I found this for 50 cents the day before the party. Sawyer won the costume contest for his grade too! Glad I decided to splurge on his costume. Ha! 

Last weekend we took a little trip to Shreveport. Justin went to take some pictures for friends and we went along with him. We took the kids to Sciport and spent one night at a hotel. It was fun besides Jaxon getting sick with the stomach bug. This passed through everyone in the family except for Mia. I hope she doesn't get it. So far she hasn't really gotten sick since she has been home. 

Tuesday we had our storybook parade at MDO. Mia dressed up as Mia from one of her favorite books, "Mia and the to big tutu." I think she looked precious! 

Yesterday was Halloween and I stayed home with a sick tummy while Super Daddy took all 3 kiddos trick or treating and to trunk or treat at our church. Love my Thor, Michealangelo, and Minnie Mouse!! I think Mia had a great first Halloween. As the holiday season approaches we are looking forward to many more firsts with our girl.

7 Month Update

I missed posting an update on our Mia at 7 months home. So, I will post a little update now. Better late than never. 

 At 7 months home Mia's loves are: 

Dressing like a princess

Playing with her brothers

Pretending to put on make up with Mommy

Playing with the sweet friends in her MDO class. She can now name all the kids in her class.

Her #1 favorite food is pizza. I have never seen a kid love pizza as much as she does and we are a pizza loving family. She wakes up asking for pizza. When I serve her a meal other than pizza she will look at me and say,  "where's the pizza? " 

Foods other than pizza she enjoys are cheerios, strawberries, yogurt, apples, pb&j sandwiches, chicken and dumplins and edamame. 

She does not enjoy eating raisins and broccoli. 

Her favorite disney princess is Cinderella (rella).

Before this month she didn't like tv at all, but now she loves to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Yo Gabba Gabba on the Ipad. 

Her favorite character is Minnie Mouse. 

She is speaking in sentences more and more. One of her favorite sentences is, "Why did you do that?" when I do something she does not approve of. 

She also says, "I happy. or I sad." to describe how she is feeling. 

She does not like being told no or sharing the Ipad with her brothers. 

She is making lots of progress in PT, OT, and speech. 

We have such a busy schedule this fall. Mia has therapy on Monday/Wednesday morning and afternoons. On Tuesday/Thursday we go to MDO. We usually spend Fridays trying to catch up on things we weren't able to do earlier in the week. Mia is doing really well with all of these activities, but since all of this started she has had some trouble at home. She has just been more irritable and easily upset. I am sure part of it is that she tired from our busy schedule. I am not totally worried, because I know this is normal for a kid her age and it really shows me that she is attached to me and feels safe in our home. I know I miss our time at home together, so I'm sure she does too. This week I decided to cancel most of her therapies and any other activities I could.

It was just me and my girl all day Monday and it was such a good day. I just focused all my attention on her. We did puzzles, read books, had a picnic, and spent time cuddling. It was so good for us. I never thought I would miss our cocooning days, but I really do. This week we are cocooning as much as we can and it has been good for both of us.

A Party and A Referallversary

On Saturday, we celebrated our middle child. Jaxon requested a lego cake and party for his 5th birthday. I am not a very crafty in the kitchen or anywhere for that matter, but I saw a lego cake on pinterest that looked doable. My grandma came over Friday afternoon to help me. Actually, she did most of the work and I was the helper. She used to make cakes for me when I was a kid, so it is pretty special to be able to make cakes with her for my kids.  We had a lot of fun and I think the cake came out pretty good. 

 I think my baby boy looks so grown up in this picture. We had his party at our church's children's building. Jax said it was his best birthday yet. He also said he can't wait for his 6th birthday because it will be even better.

 I thought the cake turned out pretty cute. Jax was excited about how it looked, but he is not a big cake eater, so I don't think he even tasted it. He did enjoy the marshmallow off the top.

 I also made cheese and cracker legos. Just gotta love pinterest.

 Sawyer came to help us set up for the party and he created this Lego Car. He was pretty proud of himself.

 My mom and dad came in for the party, too. It was fun to spend the weekend with them. Mia loves her Nana and Poppy.

 This week was one year from the day that we accepted our referral for little Miss Mia. Wow! It has been quite a year. I'm so glad we said yes to our princess. Just like her name means, her life has certainly been a reflection of God's grace.

 As I think back on the past year, there have been a lot of highs and lows. The joy of meeting her for the first time, the ache of leaving her in Africa for 2 and a half months while we waited for our embassy appointment, the relief of being cleared to get her, the pain of seeing her grieve as we took her from the only home she  knew, and the great joy of seeing her become a daughter and sister. This journey is not always easy, but it is a privilege to be this beautiful girl's momma.

Jax is 5!

Jaxon turned five on Thursday. We celebrated with a donut party at school that morning. After the donuts the class went on a field trip to the fair and the park. It was a pretty fun day to turn 5. 

Then for dinner we went to one of Jaxon's favorite places. Aunt Jessica and the Strain family met us there to help celebrate our boy. 

Today we are getting ready for Jaxon's Lego party. My grandma came yesterday and helped me make a pretty cool Lego cake. Actually, she did most of the work and I assisted a little. This morning I took a little stroll down memory lane to look at his past Birthdays. 

 This is Jax and his friend Naomi at his first birthday party. He looked so serious in all of the pictures from this party. I almost forgot how calm of a baby he was. I also don't think he felt very good the day of his first party.

 He had a construction themed 2nd Birthday party. Here he is showing off his cute shirt. Oh, how I love his sweet face.

 He was all about toy story for birthday number 3. My cousin made him this very cute cake.

 I think he had fun at this party!

 Last year we celebrated at Bayou Gymnastics with a Mario themed party.

 Happy Birthday Jaxon!!! We love you to the moon and back!!

Back to School and Six Months Home

Well, I pretty much abandoned my blog in the past month. We have been so busy lately. Here is a little recap of what we have been up to. The boys started school a couple of weeks ago. 

Sawyer is loving first grade and Jax is doing great in Kindergarten.

 Last week Mia and I started MDO. This is my 4th year to teach the sweet 3 year olds. I teach the older 3s twice a week, while Mia goes to the younger 3s right next door. It is at our church, so Mia is already very comfortable there. She had a great first week.

 Here she is with her teacher, Mrs. CaraMarie. One of Mia's favorite things to do is puzzles. She also loves snack time and lunch.

Today Mia has been home for 6 months. She is doing so well and we all just love her to pieces. Here she is on the therapy swing. She has grown to love therapy and we added speech to her schedule last week. 

This girl has pretty much perfected the cheesy grin. She loves to smile for the camera! 

August 17

I originally planned to write and post this yesterday or the day before,  but it didn't happen. Last year, on August 17 I saw the face of my sweet girl for the very first time.  Our agency sent out an e-mail titled new waiting children. They were advocating for two precious children in need of families. Because of their needs and age, the two children did not match the parameters of any families currently on AGCI's waitlist. The first child was a sweet little boy, S. I looked through his pictures, read his story, prayed for him and then I scrolled down to find this little face smiling at me. 

At the time our parameters were healthy female 0-20 months or sibling girls 0-24 months. We were in the process of increasing our parameters to girl 0-3 years. We were also open to the idea of adopting a child with special needs. As I read about sweet 2 year old Mestawet, I wondered if this could be the daughter we were waiting for. I actually said aloud as I read, "is this Mia?" When Justin came home from work I showed him the e-mail and we both agreed to pray that these children's families would find them. We prayed for them with Sawyer and Jax before bed that night.

The next day while the kids were at school and Justin was working, I must have looked at the e-mail a hundred times. I stared at Mestawet's sweet smile and big eyes. Oh, how I longed for this precious child to be in a family and I wondered if we could be her family. By the time Justin got home, I was a mess. Through tears I told him that I could not stop thinking about this little girl. He told me to e-mail our case worker to let her know we were interested in learning more about her. I think I sat down and immediately wrote the e-mail.

The next day our case worker replied and let me know there was already a family who was interested in adopting Mestawet. She said if things did not work out she would let us know, but there were others ahead of us on the wait list who had expressed interest in learning more about her. You see, we were not the only family praying and falling in love with this little sweetie. I was sad that we weren't her family, but I was thankful our prayers for her to find a family were being answered.

Of course that is not the end of the story. On August 30 I got a call that I was not expecting at all. Our case worker wanted to know if we were still interested in learning about this little love.

As I read back over the waiting child e-mail and look at the pictures of our precious girl, I can not help but praise the Lord for the mighty work He has done in her life. We were told she could not yet walk on her own or speak 2 word sentences. She is now running around everywhere and talking constantly. We were told she was shy, reserved, and easily frightened by new people. I almost have to laugh at this now, because if you have ever met my daughter you know this is no longer true. She has really come out of her shell. Even the director of Hannah's Hope told me when we were in Ethiopia that she never would have thought Mestawet would be such a "wild girl". I knew exactly what she meant and we got a good laugh about it. 

I amazed at what the Lord had done in the last year. The precious girl in the picture is not the only one whose life has drastically changed for the better. I am also happy to say that sweet "S" also has a family. He is still in Ethiopia and we continue to pray for him as his family works to bring him home. 

God sets the lonely in families, he leads forth the prisoners with singing; but the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land. Psalm 68:6