Shutterfly Holiday Cards!

I really love photos, especially of my boys :) Shutterfly is a great place to order prints of your photos. I have used them to print photos, print Brayden's birth announcement, and make a photobook for Bennett with pictures of him from Ethiopia. They have tons of great gift ideas for the holidays as well. I plan on using them to print my Christmas cards as well! I will be able to add photos of the boys and a family picture too! Here are just a few cards that I like so far. This one I could have one of each boy and then a family one. Plus it says Merry Christmas. You can find it here.

This one would be nice for a picture of each boy. You can find it here.

This one is a folded card so you could put a message inside! You can find it here.

If you have a blog you can get 50 FREE holiday cards from Shutterfly....sign up HERE!

A lot of people who read this blog are in the process of adopting or are starting a family so Christmas cards may not be in the budget...but they can be now!

Adoption Awareness

November is Adoption Awareness month and today was Orphan Sunday. Our son once was a orphan in Ethiopia and now his is ours forever and a orphan no longer. It is easy to ignore the fact that there are several orphans all over until you see their sweet faces. Here is one face that I saw :) This is him in an outfit that we sent over for him in Ethiopia.

Our first meeting.

Here is my little man now!

Words cannot express how much we love this little man!

Brayden's First Time to Church

October 31, 2010 Brayden was able to go to church for the first time at 2 weeks and 1 day old. He did so good in service.

Halloween Season Pictures Overload

Here are some pictures of all of our Halloween fun. Bennett was a lion and Brayden was a pumpkin. Below they are in their Halloween pjs.

Family picture after trick-or-treating.

Auntie Christa was scottish.

Brayden in the candy bowl.

Bennett rode in style while collecting candy.

Brayden rode in his carrier.

On the hayride at church's fall festival.

Mischievious Bennett

So Bennett has been discovering new things he can get himself into. We have had to re-proof the house this week. Here are some pictures to show what he is into. He learned how to open doors with long handles...including this one which leads to the garage. He opened the door and walked down the stairs (which he doesn't really know how to do?) and got into his car. He can also reach the stove now so it has protective sheild to prevent him from burning himself. Oh, and the oven, he can open it too so it has a new latch. He can reach the round knobs so we know it was only a matter of time before he opened them, therefore they now have covers on them.

He lovvvees getting into Mercedes food..and WATER. And yes he does eat it some too. YUCK!

And worse he loves opening the bathroom door and getting out the gross toilet bowl brush. EWWW. This boy is yucky lol.

Oh and for added cuteness....a picture of Brayden.

Brothers

Everyone has been wondering how Bennett is handling being a big brother. I think he is doing wonderfully. He is very curious about Brayden. He often looks at him and then just grins. He also will give Brayden lots of kisses, which just melts my heart!!! Bennett doesn't understand why I can't pick him up which is hard for me (I had a c-section and can't lift anything heavier than Brayden for 6 weeks!). Thanks for all of the prayers, visits, messages, flowers, and meals; we have great friends and family!

Brayden has arrived!

We started induction on Saturday morning at 7am. Started out great, was having strong contractions on Pitocin and I didn't even hurt really. I eventually got the epidural because I assumed pain would start eventually considering I was on the highest dose at that point. Well after a while I stopped making progress despite really good contractions. They thought the baby may just be too big. Around 11pm they decided a c-section was going to be our best option. So we went ahead with that. Brayden was born at 11:19pm weighing 8lbs 7oz and 20inches long. And he has a head full of long black hair! We love him and cant wait to be home with both of our boys. Bennett is not quite sure what is going on yet but I am sure he will love it too.