i love being a mommy

mommy: elijah
elijah: what
mommy: elijah
elijah: what
mommy: guess what
elijah: you love me
mommy: how did you know that
elijah: because you are the best mommy

elijah's first few days...






what a sweetie

merry christmas to our daddies!!

we miss you both so very very much!!

these are some of my favorite photos

11/04 Grandpa & Grandma Sutton cuddling with Caleb (2) and Elijah (6 months)


5/05 Dad, Tina, & Milo on the boat on our once in a lifetime family vacation in Northern Wisconsin


9/04 Dad & Tina at Eden Park in Cincinnati


5/05 Grandpa & Grandma at the zoo for Elijah's 1st birthday!


12/02 My sister and I picking on my dad :o) i love this picture!

too calm at the Sutton's

well, let's see here. we have had we have been in our home for 2 1/2 months, we have been in IL for 3 1/2 months, Peter has been at his job for 3 1/2 months, Micaiah has been home for 15 months, Elijah has not been a baby for over 2 years, do you see where i am going here??

we are ready to add more adventure and excitement to the Sutton home!!! no, I am not pregnant, and no we are not adopting at this point. we are however, going through the process to be licensed to do foster care, with hopes of adopting! We should be licensed by then end of March and ready to receive a child then!

we are praying for a little hispanic girl, we live in an area with a large hispanic population. we have requested that she be somewhere between an infant and a one year old.

we will keep you posted.

in the mean time we will...try to get our christmas cards out, finish painting the house, attend almost 30 hours of foster care training, fill out lots of paperwork, continue to parent our 3 children, work on minor repairs in our home, hmmmmm, what else can we fill our time with???

in all reality we are so very excited about the possiblity of opening our home to a baby who needs a family. the kids are excited about the baby but still confused about foster care. i trust God will protect their little hearts as we venture ahead!

testing

you tube is having some difficulties with my videos, i thought i would test it here. i am trying desperately to share life in America with our Aussie family!

this is adorable, Caleb and Elijah are singing a song from Caleb's kindergarten Christmas program. they just started in on their own, I ran and got the camera, by then the song had ended so I asked them to sing it again.

the youtube video only shows a portion of the video, the top left corner of the screen!!! urrrrgggh

anybody know how to fix this??? my brilliant husband can't figure it out! (that's not meant to be sarcastic, as you all well know. he knows all about computers, but he has had a long day, maybe tomorrow he can figure it out? in the mean time...??)

Caleb's kindergarten Christmas program

here he is..... (don't worry we recorded the whole thing!)after the show...

Caleb's kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Haboush. we all adore her, including him. She gave him this teddy bear, dressed as his character as a christmas present!
it was so special to have everyone come out to see Caleb's program, thank you all! we are so grateful to be so close so many of you!

Benjamin, Caleb, and Jack

Caleb sat next to Benjamin at the beginning of the school year, they have become good friends. Jack is a new friend Caleb is beginning to enjoy hanging out with too. Interesting, they are 2 of the oldest kids is his class both of them are 6 and Caleb is one of the youngest!

Caleb, Lainey, and Ethan

Caleb posed and asked me to take this picture. Lainey lives about 10 minutes from us and we often see her on the road on the 20 minute drive to and from school. They have become good friends.

I think Caleb was drawn to Ethan because of his friend Ethan in Cincinnati. They have quite a few similarities... last name starts with an H, mom named Rachel, younger sibling adopted! We have had a playdate with him and I have really enjoyed getting to know his mom. bummer is they live about 40 minutes from us. we both drive the farthest to get to school, but we live in opposite directions!

caleb jumped in this picture with all the girls!! Lainey, her little sister Leigh, and Mary Cate
Caleb and Lainey

UNDERWEAR!!

I should mention the potty training is going much better (for Micaiah that is). She is consistently going to the potty, bm is another story :o( anybody have any tricks to make them go on the pot and not in their pants, i'm all ears!!! so today, after her daily bm accident i told her to go upstairs and put some new underwear on. (she can fully dress herself!! that is right, she is 27 months old!) i usually put her in 2 pair, one girly pair with a thick training pair on underneath to keep the accidents a little neater. she came downstairs like this!
yes, she is wearing 3 pairs, proud of it, and hoping to put all those in her hands on too!

funny side story: a couple of years ago caleb lost his ball in the garage and asked peter to get it. peter said, "where is it?" caleb said, "under there" peter said, "underwhere?" caleb laughed hysterically and said, "daddy you said underwear!" Since then we are always trying to get each other to say "underwear!" we all laugh.

fun in the snow!!!!!!

caleb was out there first! he grabbed the shovel and was on a mission!
micaiah looking like a sumo wrestler (thanks to the Palmer's for her snow suit!) when she was outside she just stood there looking at the snow, though i don't know how much she could have moved if she wanted to! once we got inside she decided to taste it! not bad.

then she fell over, and couldn't get up :o)
the boys had a blast playing on our little tiny hill in the backyard! (did you notice the new fence peter built!!!!)

i don't know why the sky is pink!!! (not sure what i am doing with my camera?)
elijah just layed in the snow and took it in!

check out past blogs

oct 22 is the farthest i backdated! :o)

micaiah

cuddling with daddy after a nap, she is such a daddy's girl. she loves to put clothes on, even if they aren't hers!

the most adventurous christmas tree hunt ever!

okay, here it is... we decided to chop our own tree this year. i spotted a sign near the house regarding a tree farm just 4 1/2 miles away. great, we would go there friday afternoon. daddy had to work later than expected, we will go friday evening. we were hanging out with cousins having way too much fun, no biggie we will go saturday morning. after much coercion we finally got the kids dressed and out the door at 10am. off to the tree farm. then a sign posted at the entrance, $39 for a tree, or $49 if you want to spend even more. this was well above our budget but we decided we would splurge for the cutting experience... so here is elijah riding on the tree cart out to hunt for the perfect tree.

after much searching through the $39 trees, they wer all ugly and we couldn't bear to spend $49 and go check the other trees out, so we left. treeless, cold, and whining...
then we spotted another tree farm sign just 5 miles away. we diverted off the path to Home Deopt to get a tree and went to check it out. The boys went to scope it out while Micaiah and I stayed warm in the car. There we found out they only take cash, of which we had none. So, back to the Home Depot plan. still treeless, cold, and whining...

...we got to Home Depot and began to look through the tree lot, the kids however were done looking at trees, still cold, and still whining. we decided to take a break, go to project day, warm up, and then go back to the HD tree lot and find a darn tree... micaiah made her first HD project (a monthly tradition in the Sutton family since Caleb was 18 months old)...now still treeless, a little warmer, still whining we are off to find a tree! then, of course, caleb has to go to the bathroom (he tells us after we have everyone buddled to go back out into the cold to pick a tree). i take the kids to the bathroom, daddy heads to the tree lot to find a few good trees, we will meet him out there, choose one, and get a TREE! into the bathroom i go, coats off, do our business, coats back on, and off to the tree lot. where is daddy? we can't find him in the tree lot anywhere? then the salesman points us outside. he is picked out a tree, bought it, and has it almost completely tied to the car already. my response, "that is the most beautiful tree I have ever seen!" (of course, it is wrapped up and tied to the roof). oh, i forgot to mention it started snowing while we were in HD, the beginning of 5 inches of snow, it was quite a blizzard out there!) and here we are on the way home, life is looking a little brighter!!
peter is lifting elijah to the top to put a tiny little star elijah punched out on top the tree with scotch tape, he insisted! :o) (sorry these pics are so bad :o(
elijah was in awe of the huge football ornament!decorating the tree caleb and i made paper chains last year, he was sooo excited to do it again!


did i forget to mention the tree FELL OVER on Sunday while we were at church!

hope you had a laugh:o)

Merry Christmas!!!

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9613680660

Enjoy!

da Bears game at uncle chris and emily's!

elijah telling emily a VERY LONG elaborate story, requiring her full attention during the game. she was very amused :o) caleb took this one, he's becoming quite the photographer!
snack time!

brothers! what a blessing it is to have family so close!
the guys watchin' the game!
emily's mom, glenda, teaching Micaiah and I how to knit! (hee hee)
giggling with grandma!