September

We had a few exciting things happen in September this year.  We went to an FSA (Families Supporting Adoption) BBQ, Mia had a birthday, Grandma and Grandpa came to visit from Idaho,  and we had a fun day with Monty's whole family. 
The first weekend in September we went to an FSA BBQ.  It was a lot of fun meeting other families who have adopted, are trying to currently, or both.  They had a bounce house and Mia absolutely loved it.  She would hold on to the netting, jump up and down, and just shout "jump, jump, jump," over and over again.  They also had an awesome playground she played on but I didn't get any pictures of that.

 I just had to remind her a few times not to bite the netting.

 On the 15th Mia had her 2nd birthday.  We just had a BBQ with grandparents and with Aunt Trina since she lives with us now.

 Last year Mia wanted nothing to do with her cake.  This year she still didn't care much for the cake but was definitely a fan of the frosting.

 For her birthday Mia got all kinds of fun clothes,

 Including an RSL track suit (Monty's family is HUGE soccer fans)

 Legos,

 A new baby.

And a bunk bed for her babies.  This bunk bed my grandpa made for me when I was little and to make a long story short, it just recently found it's way back to me so we cleaned it up a little bit, I got mattresses and made some sheets for it, and now it's Mia's.

 After our BBQ Grandpa helped Mia work at learning how to pedal her trike.

 Mia enjoys taking care of her new baby.

 She just keeps growing and tries to be such a big helper.

The last weekend the month, to celebrate Monty's mom's birthday, the whole family (minus Gina who's in Connecticut) got together and went out to Simpson Springs to go 4-wheeling. I'll admit I was a little nervous as to how Mia would do in the desert all day with no nap and outside her normal routine, but for the most part she did great and we all had a good time...overall.
When we got out there Mia got to go on a little ride with Monty on the 4-wheeler around the camp ground

Mia wasn't too sure at first but ended up loving it.

Mia started her eating early when we got there and never did stop. She used her little camp chair and then made the picnic table bench her table. At least for a little bit, then she realized it was much more fun to run and eat at the same time.

Monty and I left Mia to play with the family and took off exploring on our own on one of the 4-wheelers.

A little while later the big 4-wheeler was back and available so the whole family went out for a ride. I felt much better about this ride over Monty's ride with Mia because Monty could focus on driving and I could hold on to Mia. Mia just sat there looking around and every now and again would say "Weee."

We spent a lot of time just hanging out, talking, enjoying each other's company,

And of course eating.

The longer the day went on the messier Mia got. She didn't mind a bit though.

Nana brought some little water guns so we had a mini water fight going on.

By about 3:30 Mia was pretty tired. She decided to just lay down in the dirt to rest. Silly girl.

By the time we left everyone was exhausted. Mia was enjoying a little nap with Aunt Trina, but that was when the real adventure began.

Sadly the naps didn't last very long. Luckily we were in the back of the caravan on the way to dinner because about a half an hour down the road, Monty's parents truck blew a tire. What I neglected to mention is that when they first got to the campground and got out of the truck they heard a hissing sound and saw a tire going flat so the spare tire was already on the truck when this one blew.

So we emptied out our trunk into the bed of the truck, loaded the first flat tire into our car, I got out and Monty's dad got in and they headed into the big old town of Vernon, UT (population 200) that was 8 miles down the road. Once Matt and Jen realized no one was behind them anymore, they turned around and came back to find the rest of us.
Jen and Sam took the blown tire off.

While the rest of us sat around, supervised, and waited for the tire to come back.

Luckily someone in the tiny town of Vernon was able to put a couple plugs in the tire. They made it back with the tire, got it put back on the truck, and managed to make it the 8 miles to Vernon before to plug came out and the tire went flat again. The wonderful nice family that fixed the tire in the first place let Monty's parents borrow a car to get home and to get a couple new tires and then made the hour and a half trip back to Vernon on Sunday to put the truck back together and get it home.

Kelly was kicked out of the truck and made the rest of the journey back to West Jordan in our car. We didn't stop with everyone else in Vernon seeing as we had an exhausted and hungry 2 year old. Luckily Mia had 2 aunts entertaining her for the ride home.

Unplanned adventures aside, we all had a great time.

August

August was a relatively boring month for us.  It was too hot to do much and we were spending lots of time working on the basement.  We went to the state Families Supporting Adoption conference which was really good but that's about all the excitement we had for August.

Mia has officially figured out how to get out of her crib and does it with great ease.  She doesn't do it very often, mostly in the afternoon when she doesn't want to take a nap.  It's funny because in the morning she hangs out in her crib talking and playing until we come get her even though she can get out on her own.  The other day I finally snuck a couple pictures of her climbing out. 

Mia really likes our bed so hopefully the transition to her own big girl bed goes smoothly.

I finally decided that Mia was old enough that I could set up my keyboard again.  She loves to play it and knows exactly where the power button is and how to turn it into DJ mode.  She is very good though and doesn't pull on it or try to knock it over which was my fear and why it's been down for so long.

The 2 bedrooms we have been working on in the basement are finally almost done.  The closets still need finished and they need trim.  We are still working to get the closets done and we are going to put trim up around the doors but I think we will probably wait a bit to do the floor trim.

Monty's sister moved in this weekend so one of the rooms is already occupied.  The other is just a guest room for now but we will probably wait until Trina moves out and do all the floor trim at the same time.

 It will be so nice when the closets are done and we can devote our spare time to something else.

We still have a little bit of our garden left keeping us busy.  There are still tomatoes and peppers growing.  Our raspberries are doing great this year.  Even with Mia eating them by the handful we have been able to freeze a bunch.  We also have 3 peaches and 3 apples about ready to be picked from our fruit trees.  It's not great numbers but hey we'll take it.

2 year update

Now that we are trying to adopt again, I realized I have completely abandoned our adoption blog.  Here in one post I'm going to try to give you a brief summary of what the last 2 years of our life has been and then resume my once a month posting.  In July of 2010 we met Mia's wonderful birth mom.  She has been such a blessing in our lives and she is such a fun spirited girl.  We got to know her over 8 weeks and then on September 15, 2010 our sweet daughter Mia was born.  We were able to see her that night and bring her home 2 days later.

 Mia's first night at home.

 We had lots of firsts that fall...First walk

 First bath

For Halloween Mia was a lady bug.

And we were her bug catchers.

 We had our first Thanksgiving as a family at home.  Mia is definitely Thankful for Grandma.

We took Mia to temple square to see the lights. She stayed toasty warm zipped up in Mom's coat.  She kept mom toasty warm too.

 Mia and her Christmas stocking that Santa filled with all kinds of goodies.

 Mia wasn't too impressed with Santa, but at least she wasn't screaming.

 All ready for church Christmas Sunday...still not real impressed.

 Since all of Monty's family was in town for Christmas we did family pictures.  As you can tell they are big Real Salt Lake soccer fans.

Decorating Mia's room.

We celebrated Monty's 30th birthday

And Mia grew and grew

We had 1st foods. She was unsure at 1st but that didn't last long.

When Mia was 5 months old we went to Hawaii with Stephanie's family.

We got an umbrella for Mia which was great since she spent a lot of time sleeping on the beach.

 Mia slept in Monty's suitcase as her crib.  It looked a little funny but worked really well, and of course her dog Violet went to Hawaii with us.

 Mia and Grandpa at the luau.

 Some days you just feel crabby right?

 Our Hawaiian Princess

 The zip lining crew.  Grandma is afraid of heights and Mia was too little (obviously) so they are missing from the picture.

 We had a great time in Hawaii and Mia was really good.  It helped that there were a lot of people to play with her.

On her 6 month birthday Mia say alone for the 1st time.

 The end of March we went to court to finalize Mia's adoption.

 Then the beginning of April we took Mia to the Bountiful Temple and were sealed as a family.  It was a blizzard that day so our only pictures were inside.

Mia has lots of attitude and she isn't afraid to show it.

 For Easter we colored eggs, Mia mostly watched.

 The Easter bunny brought Mia stuff to start doing her hair, her first toothbrush, and all kinds of fun stuff.

Mia and her crazy hair.

 Summer brought lots of playing outside.

Popsicles.

 The park.

Playing with friends.

 The 4th of July

 Crawling

 Swimming

And cruising

 

In August of 2011 we went to Mesa Verde, Colorado and did some hiking and playing.  Mia LOVED her backpack and still does to this day.

 Chimney Rock

 The cliff dwellings

 Mom's turn at packing

The big climbs didn't stop us.

 Nor did a little rain.

 Swimming in the pool

 Old Hundred Gold Mine

 The museum

 And the biggest bath tub we've ever seen.

Labor Day weekend we got to meet cousin Khloe for the 1st time.

 Stephanie's Family

 Just too cute

 September also brought Mia's 1st Birthday and with that came 2 parties...one with her birth mom's family and one with all our extended family.

 One chocolate cake.

 One white cake.

And one cup cake so she didn't have to share.

 Mia's favorite part of the day was her balloons.

 Opening presents.

 Taking off with her bus.

Just after Mia's birthday we did family pictures and they turned out really good.

 

 

October 10th Mia stood alone for the first time and then took her first steps.

 Baby proofing stepped up big time.

 For Halloween Mia had two costumes in 2011.  She was Boo from Monsters Inc.

 And a Utah State cheerleader.

 Her Nana also got her a pumpkin dress for Sunday.

 November brought our first snow storm and also Mia's first snow day.

 She enjoyed it for a little bit.

Thanksgiving was spent with Monty's family.  Mia liked dessert and playing with cousins the most.

 December brought Santa again...at least she was awake this time.

 The Christmas Village (we forgot to take the camera when we went to Temple Square).

And Christmas in Idaho with Stephanie's family.  Mia really like the stockings at Grandma's

Checking out what Santa brought.

 Our family Christmas morning.

In the new year of 2012 Mia worked more on learning to feed herself...

 With lots of messes.

 The Super Bowl (bet you can't guess what team we were rooting for?)

 More messes.

 Hot tubbing with Grandma

 Playing with Mom's slippers...

 And Dad's hats.

In February Grandma wanted some Mia time so we let Mia stay at Grandma's for the weekend and we went snowmobiling in West Yellowstone.

 They got lots of snow while we were there.

 Our 2nd floor balcony was almost at snow level.

Once spring came we were able to start heading back to the park again. 

This past Easter Mia was old enough to help (if you call it that) color eggs.

 Had her first Easter egg hunt.

 And had a beautiful Easter dress.

We also got to spend some time in Idaho this spring with Stephanie's family.  Grandma loves her girls.

 We got to pet horses at the neighbor's house.

 Mia wanted to drive Grandpa's lawn mower.

 Bouncing on the tramp was lots of fun.

 Since cousin Khloe was using the baby swing Mia had to use the big kid swing and did great with it!

In May we celebrated our 5 year anniversary.  Grandma came down from Idaho to spend the night with Mia and we spent the night in Salt Lake.  We went shopping at City Creek.

 Had dinner at a traditional Japanese restaurant.

Then in the morning we went paragliding.

 Stephanie flying away

 And Monty...I think...

Mia likes to hang out while Monty does yard work.

 Relaxing while the fence was going in.

 Mia also got a tricycle this summer.  She's getting better at riding it as summer has progressed.

 Mia is very much a Daddy's girl.

 Spaghetti anyone?

 Peak-a-boo

 Playing the piano with cousin Isabella was lots of fun.

Mia may be slightly obsessed with Stephanie's fuzzy socks as well as any kind of shoes, including boots that are too small.

 The 24th of July is always a big party with Monty's family.  Not only is it Pioneer day, it is also Monty's dad's birthday.  This year we had a water fight.

 Played in the pool

 And of course had fireworks.  Mia was the youngest cousin and the only one not scared of the fireworks.

  The end of July Mia and Monty got to go swimming at Uncle Sam's.

 Mia had a great time and loves the little bit of freedom that her new puddle jumper gives her.

And that brings us to the end of August 2012 and to the end of the story of 2 years of our lives.  Now back to the monthly updates.