Family Sleep Over

Little A and I had a sleep over with AG and family. It was so fun! We had intended on going swimming, but the fires that are covering the west made the air super smokey. You could see, smell, and taste the smoke in the air. So, we went shopping instead. Not nearly as fun for little A, but very fun for the rest of us. ;) We also went out for Chinese, little A's favorite, went for breakfast at the restaurant AG works at (which is amazing), and had some delicious donuts that I've been craving ever since, ha! It's always so fun to be with them and see little A with them. She is so much like AG, it makes me laugh! She had a ball playing with AG's dad as well. We completely exhausted her when we went shopping. They also gave us bags and bags of hand me downs from A's birth cousin! What a blessing!

Allan was supposed to be on a scout camp out, but at the last minute it was cancelled, so he had some spare time to work on projects while we were gone. His dad had given him some wood for a table for little A's kitchen a while ago, but he hadn't had a chance to build it. When we got home he surprised us with a completed table for little A's kitchen. A loves it! We set it and have a little tea party every day.

Allan and little A were wrestling one evening like they do every night after dinner. She hooked him in the nose pretty good, but they continued to wrestle. Suddenly Allan felt blood start to trickle down his nose so he hopped up quick and stuck a Kleenex in his nose. Little A got the biggest kick out of it. She pointed and laughed, then would go back to playing and then stop to point and laugh again! She did this the entire time he had it in his nose.

Little A has started to get a little bit picky about her breakfast. For some reason it is really important to her that she pick her breakfast. Lately she's been wanting to eat chicken nuggets and BBQ sauce. I try to mix in some eggs, yogurt, german pancackes, etc as well. One morning we had run out of chicken nuggets, so I asked her if she wanted to eat some eggs. She said she did, so I made them. She ate 4 bites and then said she was done. I told her she had to eat two more bites. Boy was that the wrong thing to say to her! We sat there for about 30 minutes before she ate the first bite.

She cried and cried and refused to swallow. Eventually it disintegrated in her mouth enough that I told her to eat her next bite. More tears, snot running down her face, looks of anguish and torture, and she finally put another bite in her mouth. She again refused to swallow, so we sat there for another 30 minutes and then she spit out what was left. Ug. In all it was an hour and a half struggle. Sheesh.

There was a brush fire at Allan's work. When they heard it over the radio they all went down to see if they could help. They ended up putting it out using fire extinguishers. Allan ended up inhaling a lot of smoke and chemicals from the fire extinguisher and got to feeling pretty sick, so they took him to the ER for smoke inhalation. The doctor told Allan that his CO levels looked like he had just smoked a cigarette. Allan can't figure out now why anyone would ever want to smoke - he felt awful! They released him from the hospital pretty quickly, and then he took it easy the rest of the night. He is feeling great now, but he promised me that he wouldn't go after more fires.

Little A has started wanting to eat whatever we are eating. Tonight at dinner Allan got an orange and A told him that she wanted a piece. Allan said, "Are you going to steal daddy's food again with your beautiful blue eyes?" Little A looked at him very soberly and then batted her eyes twice, lol! She got half the orange. :)

AG and her family gave little A the cutest bows for their favorite college team. I used to put one in her hair and one on her monkey so they matched, A thought that was great! Right about the time her hair was long enough for pig tails one of them broke. I finally figured out how to fix it, so now she can wear them again! They look darling on her! :)

Nana and Pops went on an adventure to Ireland and brought us back some lambs wool scarves! They are so pretty! I decided to try mine on one day, and A wanted to try on daddy's (she got a cute shirt instead of a scarf). If you look at her hand closely you can see that she's pointing at the scarf. :)

I have been working on planning an adoption conference (more on that in another post). I needed to hang flyers around town so I put little A in the stroller, and we walked all over town hanging flyers. She was such a good sport and even got an ice cream cone for the walk home. When we went to the library to hang a flyer she wanted to climb on the gun outside, but my hands were full of flyers and library books. I told her I couldn't help her get on because my hands were full and it would be better to climb on the gun on the way out. She was upset, but she said okay and walked into the library without any crying! I was so proud of her! She had a ball climbing on it when we were all done in the library.

A little bunny decided to visit our porch! Little A was SO delighted!

We went on a little family outing to scout out a campsite and go on a short hike. It was so nice to feel the cool mountain air and be together as a family. Little A loved walking around the campsite, especially this little bridge we found.

She wasn't as sure about the hike up the mountain. It was pretty steep. She kept turning around to make sure I was coming. 

We only hiked to the top of the hill, but it was really beautiful. (Allan: Just like my ladies!)

I saw a way to cut A's hair ties out of her hair with a seam ripper. It had been working great for the last few days, but Saturday night I cut the hair tie out and some of her hair with it! I almost cried. It was her first hair cut and it was a total accident. Thankfully it wasn't enough to even tell where it was cut from.

Our wonderful friends watched little A for us so we could go to the Temple. It was a much needed trip. We really enjoyed the time alone together, when we got back little A was sleeping peacefully on their trundle bed. She had had a great time! We are so grateful that we have these friends nearby.

We also had another home visit to update our adoption home study. We're still hoping to adopt again! Please pray that we'll be blessed with another child!