While the boy is away...

While Sean was gone to Southern Virginia University over the summer for his sports information internship, I took advantage of some vacation time and went to Lake Tahoe for the 4th of July weekend.

This was the first time that I had ever been to Lake Tahoe and it was well worth the 10 hour drive. My sisters husband's uncle has a town house near the lake which we were allowed to use. It was wonderful to be so close to the lake and take advantage of all the wonderful things around there.

After work on Thursday, I hopped into the car and started the trek to the lake. I was able to get to the town house a little before midnight and waited for Maria and Mitch to arrive.

On Friday we celebrated Maria's birthday! We started off the day with a bit of hiking. We were trying to get to Shirley Lake but with out a map and with poor markers, we ended up never making it to the lake, but we saw some beautiful sights:

 This was a huge log that we had to climb over and us to cross the creek that we were following.

 Along the trail this was one of the dead ends that we hit. Quite a bit of snow! We decided to try to find another route up to the top.

 We finally hit a point where we weren't getting any closer to our destination and decided to make the trek back down the mountain so we could get ready for dinner.

 We headed over to this great restaurant called Fire and Ice, located on the south side of Lake Tahoe.  At this restaurant it was kind of like a Mongolian grill. You would get a bowl full of meat and vegetables, then pick a sauce and take it all over to this circular grill they had in the middle of the restaurant.   Then the cooks would take your food and throw it onto the grill. You would also get a little bit of a show while you were waiting because the cooks would throw bowls around the grill, and flip the food in magnificent ways.

Maria and I

 After we had stuffed our face, we had ordered a gram crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate to make smores as Maria's birthday "cake".

Mitch and Maria

Mitch being crazy

The smore kit. The purpleness in the middle is the flame.

The next morning we decided to go bike riding and take in some of the beautiful views. We biked from a park to the Olympic athlete village. 

 

Amy and Maria

Mitch and Jeff (Amy and Jeff are very good friends of Maria's)

Amy and Maria again

Jeff, Mitch, Maria and Amy.

 This is where we stopped to eat our lunches and take a breather before we headed back home.

 This weekend, Amy had her birthday as well so Maria made cake balls to celebrate!

 On Sunday, after church, we headed out to hang out on the beach of Lake Tahoe! It was a beautiful day and it was nice to see how pretty of an area it is.

Me, Maria, and Amy. You can't tell but all of our feet are in the cold water.

 Random Pictures while hanging by the lake.

  Since we would be leaving the next day, we decided to take advantage of seeing the fireworks that would be shot off the lake. Here are some pictures of the lake at sun set.

Maria will probably shoot me for posting this picture but this is where we all were sitting to watch the fireworks. We got there about an hour early so we could get a good seat. While we waited we played 5 crowns and just had a good time.

On Monday, we all said our goodbyes and headed our separate directions. Driving home was fairly uneventful, which is always nice. Once I got home though, it was really fun to watch all of the fireworks that were let go right around our house! There were quite a few of them the were set off and it beautiful to see.

It was a wonderful weekend and it was great to spend some time with my sister and her husband, get to enjoy natures beauty, celebrate birthdays, and our freedom. The only thing that was missing was Sean but I know that he was doing what he needed to be doing and that being apart would all be worth it in the end!

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Well That didn't happen...

Well I didn't get this blog updated this weekend. Between work, a baseball alumni game, and my brothers farewell party. Time got pretty swallowed up. Stay tuned for an update. I will get it done as soon as I can. :)

Combining Blogs

For a while we have debated about how to manage this blog and our personal blog. It has been suggested that we combine this blog with our family blog so you all can get to know our family just a little better. Hopefully this will give you a chance to get to know us on a more personal, real and daily level. From now on we will be posting a lot more on here!

We are excited for you to get to know us better and to get a glimpse of our life!

(PS I am hoping that by this weekend I will have this blog up to date with everything that we have been doing the last few months. There is a lot to come!)

Mothers

I found this movie today and I really want to share it. I like these women am very grateful for my mother and the wonderful example that she is for me. I wouldn't be who I am today with out the love that my mom has for me and I hope that someday I will be able to have that same special relationship with my children. 

Adoption is about Family

Since posting last I have been thinking a lot about adoption. Big surprise huh? I have thought a lot about birth parents, about the adoption processes, being a mom, Sean being a dad, about how we are building our family and everything in between. I came to a conclusion today, although I have had this thought before, today it tied everything together: Adoption is all about Family!

When you have a family, you understand the joys, the pain and love that can only be felt in that family unit. To be able to help our family grow, we have been blessed with the opportunity to find our children through the process of adoption. Yes I did say blessed. I feel blessed because I have been challenged in ways that I never knew were possible and have grow immensely because of those challenges. Although I may not ever be able to carry my children in my womb, I feel extremely blessed because when our children inter our family though adoption, we will not be growing our family with just children, but with their birth parents as well. I say that because they will always be an integral part of what makes up our family.

I am so grateful for a father in heaven who knows us so individually and understands what we need to help us be the best that we can be. I have always been the type of person who is there to serve others and take care of everyone else but when it comes to serving me, I didn't need it because I could do it on my own.

When turning to the decision to adopt, I realized that being able to have my own children was something that I personally was not going to be able to do. For a while this was something I struggled with because it is very hard for me feel like I need the service of someone else. But I now understand that for me to be able to be a mother I must allow someone to serve me in a way that I will never be able to repay them.

Although I will never fully understand the emotions that a birth mother and father may go through when they allow their baby to be adopted, I do feel that it is a completely selfless service that they are giving.

I feel that this service or sacrifice is similar to that which Christ made for each and everyone of us. He suffered in the garden of Gethsemane, bleeding from every pore, for our sins. He then hung on the cross and died so that we all my live again. That sacrifice was made because we could not have done it for our selves. He came to be our savor and to provide a way that we could be happy in this life and return home to our father in heaven. The atonement wasn't something that we could do but it had to be done by our brother, Jesus Christ.

Although extremely difficult, birth parents make a huge sacrifice for their unborn child and for the family that is adopting that child. It is not something that they have to do but they understand that it is about something bigger then themselves. Because of their completely selfless act I someday will be a mother and Sean will be a father. Because of this choice that they will make, our family will grow and like the sacrifice that Christ made on our behalf, their sacrifice for us will never be forgotten.