I need to cook

I really need to start cooking more. I run out of ideas and the same ol' stuff gets boring.

You'll notice I added a bunch of mom blogs on my bloglist that have gobs of ideas for quick, easy, cheap dinners.

The one named $5 Dinners is a good one and she is on Rachel Ray today! It comes on here in 22 minutes. I can't wait to watch!

So, what am I making for dinner tonight? I dunno. Maybe I'll figure something out watching Rachel Ray :O)

Just some cuteness . . .

Springtime by DY 2nd Grade

I was going through the schoolwork D brought home yesterday ( I keep EVERYTHING in a Rubbermaid tote).

When I read this poem she wrote, I said, "Wow!"

So, this proud Mama will share with you an original work by DY:

SPRINGTIME

It's Easter, a grand old day,

eggs are hidden in every which way.

Rabbits hop all day long,

bees buzz along, small but strong.

Children play there and here,

I can tell that Spring is near.

The Family of God

On Sunday morning, EASTER morning, D made her Profession of Faith in Jesus as Lord of her life! We are thrilled beyond imagination.

At the end of the service she grabbed my hand and said, "I need to talk to Dr. T" and I said, "Right now?" and she said "Yes, right now." So we went forward and her daddy had a choir member come take his place in the pulpit and he met us in the front as we stood with the Pastor.

We bought her a special gift in Russia, even before we met her, that we knew we would give her on the day of her Baptism. We had faith that she would come to know God and accept Christ into her heart! I'll let you know what that gift is when we present it to her (she reads the blog sometimes ;o)

She'll be baptized on Mother's Day. C will be dedicated that day as well, so grandparents will already be here. It will be a great Mother's Day!!

Here is the picture that will be published in the Church newsletter announcing her decision:

Some Easter Pix

We had to hunt eggs indoors because of the rain. We "hid" C's egg right in plain view beside his bucket and he crawled right to it!

We had to be creative hiding D's eggs, this one was in the clock. This clock has the different time zones (Los Angeles, NY, Moscow and London and the big one in the middle has our time, Central Time) my hint to her was that the last egg (a camoflauge plastic one) was in California. It took her a few minutes to figure it out.

C took his turn wearing the bunny ears, hubby had to keep them on since they were a bit big.
D wore the bunny ears all afternoon, during lunch and "hunting" eggs.

Here's our beautiful girl in her Easter dress.

Here are D and C at church in front of the lillies.

It Won't Be Like This For Long

Oh my goodness, have y'all heard the song, "It Won't Be Like This For Long"?

Darius Rucker, who was the voice of Hootie and the Blowfish in the 90's has now gone country.

This song just made me bawl!

I've been thinking about this topic so much lately. The time just zooms past so quickly. I wish I could hit Life's pause button and then barely tap play so it just plays really, really slowly.

Going to get the Kleenex.

You've got the cutest little Baby-Legs!

Now that C is crawling everywhere, his little knees are just red as can be. I'd looked at buying Babylegs brand leg covers at Target and they only had the skull ones and I'm just so not into skulls (I just don't get the skull thing - ick!) plus at $12 a pop that's a little pricey to me. I looked online to see about making them myself and found this tutorial and it looked simple enough.

I found some cute puppy dog socks for $1 at Walmart and wah-lah! C has some cute little baby legs for his cute little baby legs! And for $1 and about 15 minutes of time - you can't beat that!

Here are my own step by step photos:

Easy as 1-2-3!

p.s. Yes, he kept them on all evening, I think he liked them! He hates socks on his feet and they're off 1 minute after I put them on him, but he didn't try to bother these in the least.

Who'd Have Thunk It?? I wish it would have been ME!

This is one of those things, I wish I would have thought of! It's a great idea.

It's called Teething Bling and it is jewelry that is child chewable! I rarely wear a necklace anymore and if I do, C goes right for it to chew on! This would be great to have, especially during church.

Final Court Hearing!!

We went to court yesterday, April 2, 2009 at 10:00 a.m. CT and finalized the adoption of our sweet baby son!

We are FINISHED!!!!

Waking up yesterday morning, getting ready for court, hubby and I both noticed that we weren't nervous at all. The day we went to court in Russia for D was probably one of the most nervous days of both our lives! We've been to this judge twice already for D's re-adoption in 2005 (in order to get a Texas birth certificate for her) and for the first hearing on September 11 for C's adoption.

We were so surprised that 20 friends from our church were at the court house to support us. My sister is here visiting this week, so she was able to be there too. The judge said usually he takes adoption cases in his chambers, but his chambers weren't big enough for this group, so he allowed everyone to come stand behind us as we stood before him.

When it was time for us to raise our right hands and swear everything, even C raised his hand and D raised her left hand (she's left handed ;o) The judge asked D a few questions of her own, it was really sweet. After she answered her questions he gave her some candy.

Our attorney is a friend of ours and when he was presenting the criminal history section to the judge he added that luckily we were both all clear with no criminal records since it would be a little embarrassing if we had a record and all these people would learn about it!

The whole thing took only about 10-15 minutes and we were done!

I am so glad to have it signed, sealed and delivered and to be fully and wholly C's mommy forever and ever AMEN!