Life on the Farm

 Sadie running around trying to collect Easter eggs.

 We got 21 chicks at the post office several weeks ago. They are much bigger now and are ready to go out to their coop this week. Nate loved setting one of the chicks up in his tractor that moves. Nate got such a kick out of pushing the "go" button and watching his chick have a ride.

 Happy Kids' Day! When I was a kid my parents had Kids' Day for us a few times. I have such fun memories of it. Our last kids' day was about 4 years ago so we were due for another one! It was fun to do a few things we don't normally do. Sadie's favorite snack in the world is chips and onion dip and we pretty much never have it unless there's a party or something like that. So we had that for our appetizer and strawberry lemonade (another rare thing around here). Dinner was lemon/blueberry/buttermilk whole wheat pancakes and a potato/bacon/egg dish.

We played the flour game and Sade had to dive for the dime!

We played the fishing game (this is one of the games I remember playing at Kids' Day as a kid). Dave was a pretty tough fish to catch back there.

And we ended the night with a family dance party - one of our favorite things. One of the prizes Nate got during one of the games was a kite. He was so determined to fly that thing. Here he was trying to fly it from the stairs. Later on we noticed he was gone. He had gone up to his room where there is a deck outside his bedroom door. He was hanging his kite over the deck. We were all dancing...and looked out the window and saw a kite floating in the air. It made us all laugh to see his determination to get the kite flying!

One sunny day, the kids and I went rattlesnake hunting. I prefer to be on the offensive, so we decided to go on a hunt. I brought my gun and the kids brought pocket knives and sticks. And a shovel, too. We didn't find a snake but we sure looked! I guess it wasn't hot enough yet. 

We loved having our good friends from Missouri visit us over Easter weekend.

The snake hunters...preparing for battle.

We found these boots for Nate at the consignment store. Nate loves wearing his cowboy boots all around.

These pictures do not do this little story justice. We had a dental school BBQ with 4 families that we went to school with that have ended up here in Colorado. Nate and this cute little girl, Ella, had so much fun talking to each other that night. The top picture is how they looked most of the time. She was leaning in, and then he was leaning in. All smiles the whole time. I tried to get them to look at me for the picture but they were both a little shy about it.

It was such a treat for us to have a visit from Grandma Bowen, Grandma and Grandpa Walton, Brittany and Sam! Nate just loved having Grandma Bowen here. We all did!

Nate wanted a silly face picture with Grandma Walton! We loved having them here!

It was so precious when Nate quietly walked up to Grandma Bowen and said "Want to play a game with me?" I'm not sure that was Grandma's first choice of activity but before I knew it, there was Grandma Bowen walking with Nate to the game cupboard to pick a game. She sat and played with them for a long time. Such a special thing!

Ashlyn and Sadie's choirs had a big end of year performance last night. Ashlyn's choir did Newsies and Sadie's choir did Annie. I like the picture above of Sadie when we were just testing out the curly hair and outfit. It looks more like Sadie without all of the makeup!

They were supposed to wear loads of makeup for the big show. Ash had so much fun being a Newsy and Sadie loved having a little solo for Annie.

Dave and the kids have been working hard on the chicken coop. We've had so much snow that it's taken a lot longer to get it done! Those chicks are ready to go outside!

Dave and Leland have been having quite the fun trying to eliminate the prairie dog species in our yard. It's cute to see them walking around with their guns.

Nate and Jack are such good buddies.

Getting our chicks at the post office.

Ashlyn and Sadie dressed up for their end of year speeches in class. Sadie was Mansa Musa and Ash was Confucius. They had to dress up as their character and then give a speech in first person and at the end the class guesses who they are.

Adoption "Situations"

Learning the ropes of adoption seems to be equivalent to learning a new language. Every new step is completely new territory for us. So much to learn.

We finally got 100% approved with Act of Love agency a week ago.

In this next stage, the term "situations" is a big deal. If the agency has a birthmom that seems to match our criteria, then they show us her situation. A "situation" is everything they know about the mom, including all sorts of details about her parents, siblings, grades, ethnicity, health, drug use, ETC. It is packed with as much information as possible. Included in her situation, is an itemized list of the cost. Each adoption costs a different amount. It depends on if she needs help with housing, food, medical costs, counseling, etc.

We read over the situation, and have to decide if it's a situation we would be comfortable accepting. After we sign some paperwork, the agency sends the birthmom a handful of adoptive family profiles (including our story, pictures, etc) and the mom gets to choose a family. Once we are chosen, we are considered "matched". Then we wait for the due date. And prepare to sign 100 other forms once the baby is born.

Today we got our first SITUATION. My heart stopped when I saw the email come through. I was so nervous/excited/anxious to read about this mother. Dave was on the phone with me so I read it all to him. This baby is a girl due in June. The downside about this situation is that the price is incredibly high. The mom needs all sorts of financial help. The problem is, if the mom changes her mind, a huge chunk of the money we would pay (we pay it all up front, once we are matched) we could lose. All of the money that goes towards her living, counseling, medical, etc, and that is used, never gets returned to us. It is a pretty big chunk of change to risk losing without having a baby to come home with us.

But most of all, there are no bells ringing saying that this baby is the one. So we will be patient (try, that is) and wait for the next situation to come along.

Our last stop!

 Now that we have moved 6 times in our marriage, we hope this is the last stop! We've had a very dry winter, but as our luck would have it, we had all sorts of snow the week before we moved. It added some excitement (moving truck getting stuck in the driveway, needing to plow the driveway a couple times, etc) We thought this was a pretty neat ice sculpture that welcomed us!

Grandpa and Sadie on a hike with us in the foothills behind our house.

 It made me smile seeing Sadie hiking with her snow boots, church dress and soccer sweatshirt combination. My kind of girl!

 The house had this bright color above the fireplace and all over the kitchen. We got rid of that color pretty fast! Nate had so much fun helping Dave paint! He is a careful little boy like his Dad.

 I told the kids to get some mopping socks on all fours. They had a lot of fun making up dance moves to help them be better moppers. We have been spoiled with the army moving us the last few moves. I can't believe how much work it takes to move! We had lots of help from friends and family that made a huge difference!

A shooting lesson was on our "to do" list yesterday. I should probably hide the fact that we get rattle snakes here at our house, because this may prevent some from wanting to visit! And we love visitors! So, we are taking the necessary precautions to get rid of those snakes! We were doing Facetime with Mom and Dad when Dave said "Meliss, you should show them your new toy." My first thought...my new mop? Nope, Dave was referring to my new revolver. That way I can take care of the snakes if Dave's not home to do it for me! Crazy if you ask me, but I really wanted to live on land and this is part of the land. We've received some great tips on getting rid of the snakes, so hopefully our first snake season will go well. I'm actually kind of excited to shoot my first snake. Dave is planning on cooking it.

Weekly Dinner Date with Nate

 Since the girls leave at 6 on choir night, that's Dave's night to stay a little later at work and get caught up. Nate and I like to get Dad's dinner ready for him right before he gets home. Nate and Dave have a tradition of playing Mastermind (a super fun game that really makes you think) while Dave eats his dinner. Well, one night Nate said he wanted to get Dad's dinner all ready. Here is what it was. I thought it was so cute that he had the game all set up ready to go, too. Nice dinner!

Nate loves to help me make Dave's lunch. He wanted to stick a note in his lunch one day. He always starts with "From Nate". To translate the note: From Nate. To Dad, Thanks for all your'e doin'. Love Nate"

Happy Birthday Ash!

 Since we knew we were moving 4 days after Ashlyn's birthday, we had a party for her a couple weeks before her real birthday. This was such a fun group of girls.

 Ash wanted a strawberry cake with cream cheese frosting.

 Watching "Newsies" at the party with a donut for cake. It was the greatest idea one of my kids had a few years back. A donut is so easy for a party!

 Most of our things were packed on Ashlyn's birthday, hence her presents being wrapped in boxes and with packing tape.

It's hard to believe our baby is 12! And even harder to believe that she will be heading on to college in 6 years???? She is so happy to be 12 and is enjoying some of the privileges of being 12...while Sadie is jealously watching on and thinking it will be FOREVER before she is 12.

Work with Dad

 Nate's staff member was sick a couple days this week so I got to go in and help out! One of the days I brought Nate with me and he was beyond excited to go to work with Dave. He got ready, with his "meeting shirt" and even a tie. He wanted to look like his dad. He helped me pack a lunch for the two guys. I put two cookies in Nate's lunch so he could share one with Dave. Nate was so excited when it was lunch time - to show Dad what he had to share.

Here they are with their lunch bags all ready to eat lunch!

The Beat of Battle

Here's our Lego movie we made (inspired by Beck and Gibson's movie):