2014 Highlights

2014 was a pretty big year! 

In January, we celebrated 2 years of Jeb being home with us! 

Then in February, he lost his first tooth! 

March was a big one, my first time flying alone, to a country I'd never visited before, to meet my daughter and bring her home.

Another highlight for me-visiting Hong Kong Disney!

And becoming a family of 6

We celebrated Journey's 4th birthday late because I was in Hong Kong on her birthday

Eric's birthday at the zoo in April

Vivi turned 5 in May

In June and July we went on our 10 day road trip through the East Coast

Also in July, we celebrated 7 years of wedded bliss!

In August, we started construction on our house

After a lot of thought, we decided to put Vivi in a young 5's preschool program 

And Jeb turned 7

Vivi lost her first tooth

I finally got my wish for a group Halloween costume for the kids

Jubilee turned 3 in November! She was sick on her birthday, but still managed to enjoy herself

We finalized Jubilee's adoption

And the day before Christmas Eve, we had our last inspection and clearance to move into the upstairs of our house! 

I have another post ready to go about Christmas so I won't include that in this post. Big big year! Next year promises to be just as big with travels to Texas and a country in Europe for our adoption already in the works. We have been unbelievably blessed this year and wish the best for all of you in the coming year!

Trimming the tree

The house wasn't done when we usually decorate for Christmas, but we managed to get all of the construction stuff out of the front room so we could decorate it. It felt so nice to finally have a room that didn't have 5 gallon buckets, boxes of nails, wood, tools...all the reminders that we were still living in the middle of it all. For my Christmas present, Eric let me pick out new decor for that room. We didn't have much in it before, a hand-me-down couch, a kids art desk, and some toys. I hadn't found window treatments that I liked for the bay window, and with the staircase taking up space in the room, our hand-me-down couch felt way too big. My parents watched the kids so we could do our Christmas shopping for them, and while we were out I took advantage of a Target coupon for 40% off some curtains and a rug I had been eyeing for awhile. 

Anyway, here's some pictures of the kids trimming the tree

I didn't know what Jubilee would do with a Christmas tree full of ornaments, so we decided to leave it for a few days without decorations. The kids were bummed about that, and remembered that I had found a roll of streamers and put it by the basement stairs to be taken down for the party supply bin. They asked if they could decorate the tree with it, and then they made some paper ornaments

Her face when we turned on the lights for the first time

And the finished product, complete with curtains after 3 years of living here!

Finally final!

2 weeks ago, we stood in front of a judge and promised to love and care for Jubilee forever, and she became legally ours! She has been home for 8 1/2 months so it didn't change anything, other than that now we can post her picture on the internet!!

It was a really nice ceremony, it took place on National Adoption day so it was a big to-do. Lots of judges were there and a ton of other people, including a couple I recognized from the political ads from the recent election. Richard Bernstein was there, which was cool to show Journey a successful person with 2 blind eyes who doesn't let his disability slow him down.

There were 6 families adopting 9 children that day, it was really fun to be a part of it. It ran a little long, with so many important people wanting to make statements, but finally every family had their turn with the judge, and then it was party time!

There was a photographer taking photos of the newly finalized families, and then we were escorted down to a reception area full of balloons, centerpieces, food, and bags of gifts for everyone.