If it's on the internet.....

It must be true!! 

Here it is folks, the big news on the Lewis front.

http://reecesrainbow.org/38638/sponsorlewis-2

We have decided to adopt a sweet little girl from Eastern Europe!  We'll call her E for now, as we haven't decided what her official name will be!

This is huge!  We enjoyed living the cushy, safe, comfortable suburban life since we were married 5 years ago.  But, we've had enough now.  Now it is time to do something big. Something good.  Something scary. Something that God tells us in His word that we should do.

We had a friend who was thinking of starting a journey on an international adoption and in response to a naysayer, she listed all of the things she had going for her:  Solid faith, strong marriage, healthy lifestyle, the ability to stay at home with her kids, steady employment for her husband, supportive family and friends, etc.  She then asked said naysayer, "If we aren't prime candidates, who is?"

That stuck with us.  We have an amazing life!  Are we millionaires vacationing on our own tropical island?  No.  But do our blessings abound?  YES! We have been so blessed in really, just about every way possible and why shouldn't we bring a child into our home to be a part of this?  We love kids and always wanted a large family, so why not help give a child a future that she wouldn't otherwise have? And really folks, who wouldn't want to be a Lewis?!

Those were just some of our reasons.

One of the biggest reasons was E herself.  Having seen her picture on RR, I eagerly tried to get my friend to adopt her.  She was born in March 2011, just like Audrey.  Audrey and E both had dark hair and eyes and I just knew they would be best friends (besties, BFF's, whatever the new lingo is). When my friend chuckled and continued to show me other children that she had been considering, my heart sank a bit. How could she not see just how amazing this little girl was?

Then it sank lower, and lower.  The thought of life without Audrey's best friend, her "fake" twin just sent me on a crying fit.  The fit lasted over a week. I couldn't do anything at home without thinking what it would be like to have 2 little brown haired girls toddling around in cute dresses and uttering cute phrases.  2 girls to take prom dress shopping.  2 little girls to send away to college (YIKES!) God was screaming to me that this little girl was meant to be in our family.

When Dave and I talked, his first response was, "It's a great idea, too bad we can't afford it right now."  Lucky for him, I have our family budget spreadsheet forecast out until 2018 (totally not exaggerating here) and I showed him that with a few lifestyle changes, some tapping into his work adoption assistance benefit, and some support of friends and family through fundraisers, perhaps she isn't out of reach after all! It would take a lot of sacrifice, but heck, Jesus died for us, surely we can pull our belts tighter and have some uncomfortable conversations with friends asking to support her grant! This may be the first time we get to truly sacrifice for our kids; we get to really rely on God to make this happen!

We decided to wait 6 months.  After seeing me crying (again) the next day, Dave suggested waiting a few weeks instead. Then the next day (surprise- another day of crying over her beautiful little picture!), we decided to call the agency the next morning.  After hearing about the number of inquiries she had had, we got all the paper work from our adoption agency, RR (the partner) and our home study agency filled out in 1 day and overnighted everything.

The next day, we saw her on the My Family Found Me page on RR.  What an amazing feeling!

Now the fun begins! We prepare for mountains of paperwork, physical exams, psychiatric exams, home study evaluations, finger prints, a dossier and a few (3 to be exact) trips to Eastern Europe. A short 8-10 months later, she will be ours.

And I am still crying!  Go figure :-)

Why is it that....

You get your house all ready to sell and in the process fall in love with it again??

The past 4 days have been spent sawing, nailing, trimming, priming, painting, steaming and even power washing.  Our perfect, out of our dreams finished basement is officially finished and we will be leaving it asap. Awesome, right?

We can finally say that the house is ready for the market.  We can also say that we are old and in pain from it all!

We have also decided that we are too old to have all of our friends load up our moving truck for the low low price of free pizza and beer.    If you are a fan of How I Met Your Mother, you may recall the episode where they made a list of things they are too old for.  This tops ours!    For the first time ever we will be hiring movers thanks to the fact that Dave's new company will foot the bill.

You are welcome friends, very welcome :-)

Now bring on the buyers!

Boston or Bust!

As of Sept. 5, 2012, Dave will officially  be an employee of Atlantic Trust, located in Boston, MA.

After 3+ years of killing himself with 80 hour work weeks, he will finally be able to relax a bit in the evenings as he won't be slaving from home.

What is this transition going to look like for us?
Dave will continue to work at SEI until the day after labor day.  This ensures he keeps his SEI benefits for the whole month of September! 
Our house is going on the market on Tuesday and we are hoping for a quick sell. Luckily the real estate market is booming, right?  UGH!  Prayers in this area would be greatly appreciated!

We will head to Boston in August to house hunt a bit, though the first priority will be to find Dave a short term corporate place to house him as a long term commuter until our house sells and we are able to all join him in Boston.  The kids and I will be here in Sanatoga until the end of Sept. at the very least.  Dave' new boss has allowed him to work from home 1 day a week to be able to commute back and forth and spend weekends with us.  Moral of this story:  Be prepared for needy phone calls and lots of playdates in Sept.  We will be a lonely crew!

We will start bonafide house hunting in Boston once we have an offer on or at least some serious interest in our house.  We are checking out neighborhoods and schools, but no sense in falling in love with a house that we can't put an offer on until this one sells.

So, that is the plan!  Crazy!

Oh, and in case you were wondering, we WILL NOT be living in Foxborough! 

She is making raspberry sounds in this picture.  Just as all good Steelers fans should do when discussing the Patriots!

Go Steelers!

Long time, no blog

We thought we should check in just in case you were getting ready to file a missing persons report.  We are, in fact, alive and well.  Just busy- because really, who isn't these days?

So just what have we been up to?  Contemplating many big things, that is what!  Dave has been working 80+ hours a week (and that is a good week!).  While we were always ok with him having to work a bit in the evenings, as it allowed me to get some of my work done, staying up until 2, 3, even 4 am working can no longer be classified as working a little bit.  Nor is it fun.  Or healthy.

When his favorite clients approached him with a chance to interview for a position at their company, Dave's curiosity was peaked.  It was even more peaked as he received emails at 3:59 each Friday with reminders that their company closes early on Fridays in the summer.  They have since altered the job description to his exact skill set and have increased it's level of responsibility.  This week, he goes to interview (read:  be wined, dined and entertained by the Red Sox) and then we await their official offer.  Since he has already met all of the people he is interviewing with, he isn't that nervous.  Plus, the HR rep has already told him that this interview is merely procedural.

Oh, perhaps I should mention that this is Boston!

Realtors have been called, moving companies have quoted and once we receive and negotiate an official offer, we may get to make the good ol' Pros & Cons list and make the big decision.  Eeeek!

At least we love Tom Brady and the Patriots.....NOT!

Aside from planning major life changes we have been doing some fun things.

We welcomed Dave home for a three day Memorial day weekend with lots and hugs and kisses...after pelting him relentlessly with marshmallows, of course.

We got an indoor pool.

I spent a week in Greensburg with the kids, visiting all of the grandparents and great grandparents.  The kids also learned croquet!

Dave and I celebrated 5 years of wedded bliss.

Grammy came out to visit and we picked more fruit!  Blueberries and cherries are a big hit in this household!

Strawberry Fields Forever

Noah explains what to look for in a strawberry.

Our favorite time of year is here: Pick You Own season at Weaver's Orchard! Strawberry picking opened on May 19th, and by golly we were there by 10 am.  We were not going to miss the prime berries of opening day.

Noah never liked strawberries as a baby, which was fine as they gave him a nasty rash. But like 99% of kids, he now loves them and could eat them at every meal if we would let him.  He was thrilled to go strawberry picking and we were excited because this would be the first year he would be old enough to really get in on the action and pick his very own berries.

Audrey is also a big fan of strawberries.  But that isn't saying much as we dare you to find a food she doesn't gobble down in milliseconds.  She has become so independent since she started walking and we knew that she would love the ability to go and chow down on as many strawberries as she liked while we picked.  She slept in the car on the way to the orchard and was ready and raring to go when we arrived.

We were very impressed with Weaver's organization.  We were the very first folks to pick our area thanks to their well run system.  Noah did a great job obeying and picking only in our assigned row.  He held his own cardboard box and was very patient and picked only red and healthy looking berries.

Yeah, we couldn't really hid the fact that she had indulged in a few before paying!
Caught her red handed!

Audrey followed Noah and proceeded to taste test the majority of the berries that Noah put in his box.  We had thought of putting her in some cute white summer outfit and luckily thought better before we committed to her clothes for the day.  She was a cute little strawberry mess.

We filled up both cartons in less than a half hour.  So we spent the rest of the morning hanging out with the chickens, goats and duck at the petting zoo and playground area.  We are eagerly counting down the days until blueberry, peach and apple seasons arrive!

On the agenda for tonight:  Chocolate covered strawberry dipping (and eating) sessions with the kids!

Daddy and Noah showcasing their prime picks.

Our loot of the day!

The Big 3-0!

Dave is officially old now--just like me!

We kicked off our celebration on Friday night when Dave got home from work. We knew Saturday (the big day!)  would be long and tiresome and we wanted Dave to be rested when he had his birthday treat.  We had made comments about Noah and I making him a cake, but we actually hired our friend Faith to make his favorite cupcakes!

(Note-  Dave is NOT a sweet person. I mean, personality wise he is, but he just doesn't dig a lot of desserts.  I kept trying to get him to try Faith's cupcakes after our MOPS fundraiser and he wasn't interested regardless of how many times I told him how amazing this cake and frosting was.   Then when we got them for Noah and Audrey's birthday party, he started wolfing down 3 or 4 a day!  Yeah, he is hooked!)

On Saturday morning, Noah decided to give Dave a very special start to the day by sleeping in until 9:30!  Then we were off to Dorney Park.  We had wanted to go there for a long time, as Noah has a real love for Charlie Brown and the Peanuts Gang. In short, this place was Noah's Disney world!  He was in heaven.  He hugged just about everything Snoopy related.  We rode the rides, we saw the show and stalked the characters.

Even Audrey was a trooper.  They had this amazing Family Care Center, so diaper changes, nursing, even milk storage was super easy.  They did a really great job.

We pretty much stayed in Planet Snoopy and did the same 7 or so rides, some with all four of us.

At the end of the day, Dave felt young at heart.  He also felt old in the knees, back, etc.

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Just like Noah's birthday, we had to do the candles about 10 times!

This was such a sweet moment.  Noah truly loves Snoopy!

Every Snoopy we saw got a hug!

Ad did Peppermint Patty, Charlie, Linus, Lucy.  Franklin only got a high-five, though.

Noah loved the truck ride, too!

Noah claims his souvenir.

Audrey approves of Noah's choice. 

Noah made a new friend on the helicopters.  Not so sure at first.

Didn't take him long to warm up to the older woman!

Noah loved the waterfall.  And it was nice and cool, so we were happy to oblige.

Audrey wants Snoopy's cookie.  Go figure!

Even the benches were Snoopy-ized.

He loved riding the helicopters.

Audrey held up beautifully!  At 8:30 pm we called it a night, but both kids could have gone longer!

51%

Dave and I are never quite sure when to do the big announcement that our kids are walking!  Audrey started taking her first solo steps right around 11.5 months, and at 12ish months, she was doing a dozen or so steps solo.  But her first instinct was to crawl.  She would only walk from the table to the chair or if she was being bribed with food.She could walk, but she was still primarily a crawler.

In the past few days, she has reached the magical 51%!

She is walking more than crawling now! She is walking the length of the house and tries to walk before she will crawl anywhere. Her first instinct is to walk.  She has also figured out that it is much easier to carry things from point A to point B walking, rather than crawling.

In short, we are all in agreement that AUDREY IS A WALKER :-)

Now I must figure out how to post amazingly cute video of her toddling about!