A Hope and a Future

Forever our babies

Today we got two very precious pieces of paper in the mail from the Clerk of Courts office.....our Adoption Decrees for Hannah and Samuel! We have waited over two years for this to happen and we could not be happier. It ended up taking much longer than anticipated not due to any "scary" circumstances just a bunch of red tape issues really.

Of course they have been our babies in our minds since the day we brought them home but it is nice to have it be officially official!

 We are so thrilled and I just wanted to share that with you!

My little "mexican"

                                   

My Samuel....bless his heart the child has SO much hair! And when it grows out it is wavy and bushy and ummm...interesting:) The easist thing to do with his hair is to just keep it super short which I have done on and off. He had his most recent date with the clippers a couple of weeks ago (SO much fun to cut a screaming 2 year old's hair while Daddy tries to comfort him...) and he looks so much better:)

Most people who meet Samuel and Hannah or see pics of them don't think right off that they are twins. They think Samuel is hispanic and Hannah is black. Which reminds me...have I ever told you the story of what happened over Christmas? We were eating at a restaurant in Dennis' hometown and I was passing by someone's booth when I overheard the gentleman say "they have a black baby, a white baby, and a mexican baby!" Oh the laughs we got over that one:) You just never know what people will say I guess!

Birthday celebration

 We've had a great couple of days celebrating Hannah and Samuel:) Dennis and I got them a little gift apiece and let them open it yesterday. It was comical to watch their reactions:

                                  

At first they just held the packages like "huh, what should we do with these?" 

      

Then Hannah remembered what to do but she was hilarious....she took the wrapping paper off piece by piece and had to stop each time to take the paper to the trash can and throw it away:)

       

Samuel had to be helped along by daddy to reveal his new cars and he enjoyed playing with them.  

                             

Hannah seemed mostly interested in Samuel's gift so I never got a pic of her playing with her recorder but Isaac was quite willing to play with it! 

Today we were blessed by a visit from my sister and brother and their families. One of the awesome things about our move is that we are now within 45 minutes of them so it was great to get together today without having to travel hours and hours!

                             

Some snuggle time with my new nephew Jack (Drew and Susan's son) 

      

Bama was thrilled to have all SEVEN of her grandchildren in one place but getting a picture of them all together proved quite difficult! Our "little mama" really enjoyed playing with Jack when he was in the doorway jumper....of course:) 

                              

And of course there was dinner and birthday cake.....here are the twins while we were singing "Happy Birthday" to them.....they look a little confused! 

      

They didn't get NEARLY as messy as last year but seemed to enjoy themselves.   

      

Concentrating on cake.....and little man's messy face:)

TWO!

From this.....

                                       

to this....

                                       

in just two years!!

Today my babies are two....can't believe it! They are getting so big and it is so cool to be able to interact with them in new ways and watch them understand more and more. Dennis and I have been working together to think of things they are up to these days both for this post and for an update for their birthmom (our agency requires a yearly update until they are 18). Here's what we came up with:

                                        

Samuel:

• He is still our most emotional child. I wrote about this in the 18 month post and he is still much the same. I have to say, though, that I think he is getting better as he learns how to better communicate what he needs and is able to understand what we are saying. We can usually calm him down now and figure out what he needs or talk to him and get him to stop the whining. Most of the time, anyway.
• This goes along with the above but he is easily upset when hurt in any way. For some reason his head is VERY sensitive so if it gets bumped it is ALL OVER. He's always been this way but I don't think I've ever written it down.
• He still loves music and will "dance" to it sometimes....cutest thing ever!
• His vocabulary is taking off some and has increased since the 18 month update. He still says mama, dada, and uh oh but has added cup, ball, Jessie (the dog), Becca (ca ca), night night, paci,please (mese), and others I'm just not thinking of right now.  He is a champion babbler and sometimes has entire "babble" conversations with us where he goes on and on and looks at us like "you understand me, right?" It is the cutest thing.
• He still loves, loves, loves to be held and interacted with as much as possible. He would prefer to be held while the person is standing up and I have no idea what that's about. He loves to be tickled and his giggle is precious!
• He loves balls and anything he can push around or throw.
• He LOVES to be outside; can be super whiny inside and turns it off immediately if let outside.
• He STILL puts everything in his mouth (seriously, WHEN does that stop?)
• He is shy and unsure around people he doesn't know; he has NOT been a fan so far of our new church's nursery. I'm hoping he gets used to it soon because so far one of us has had to go sit with him every week because he is inconsolable.
• He will eat most anything but just not much of it at a time. His biggest problem is sitting still long enough to get a full meal in his belly.That and the fact that he'd really rather DRINK his meals as he still loves milk.
• He sleeps well at night; about 12 hours from 7:30pm-7:00am (HUGE milestone when my babies started sleeping past 6am....I was ECSTATIC!) and takes a 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon.
• He loves to look at books and will sit still and let us read to him for like one minute at a time.
• He knows where his ear, eye, nose, and mouth are. He shows us where his nose is by sticking his finger in it:) He knows what a dog, cat, duck, sheep, and owl say.

                                     

Hannah:

• She is our "little mama". She is quick to "tattle" on anyone doing something wrong and will correct her siblings herself if necessary. Some examples: "Isaah si" (Isaac sit....when he's trying to stand in a chair; same goes for Samuel), "Nanu top" (Samuel stop....that could be for any number of things!), or she'll just tell them "no no" or say "mama uh oh" and I know I need to go check out the situation! It is very cute now but I'm sure it won't be for long!
• Her vocabulary expands almost daily it seems. Added to the 18 month list is: nanu (Samuel), caca (becca), all gone, mine, top (stop), bok (block), ball, si (sit), hush, ni ni (night night), paci, no, cookie, hol ju (hold you), nack (snack), and others I'm just not thinking of right now. She also puts things together in two or three word phrases such as "mama sit" "Isaah mon eeea" (Isaac cmon eat....when he wasn't in his seat yet for a meal....cutest thing ever), and examples like above where she is telling on someone.
• She is our best eater and almost always cleans her plate. She has no trouble eating:)
• She sleeps well at night; also about 12 hours from 7:30pm-7:00am and takes a 2 hour nap in the afternoon.
• She knows what a dog, cat, duck, owl, and sheep say. She knows where her eye, ear, nose, and mouth are.
• She seems to be entering that dreaded "terrible two" phase here lately and is getting quite good at screaming and throwing fits when she doesn't get her way. Sigh.
• We often say she "doesn't know a stranger" and is very friendly. She didn't blink an eye when left in the new church nursery and was totally ok with it.
• She loves to be sung to and will say "sing" while waving her arms up and down. She has certain songs she wants, though, and if you do the wrong one she will say "no" and "stop" until you change to another one.
• She does NOT like it when I show affection to Dennis. If she is anywhere nearby when I try to hug or kiss him she will try her best to get in between us while saying "no mama" :) Jealous much, Hannah?
• She is not a fan of having her hair fixed. I am learning slowly how to manage her hair and unfortunately for her it takes a lot of work if it is to have any sort of style at all. Sometimes I leave it natural but am experimenting more and more with different ways to "fix" it. She has beautiful healthy hair but it is hard to manage!
• She loves to look at books and will sit still for about a minute at a time to be read to but we usually don't make it through an entire book.

We are celebrating the miracle of their precious lives today and praise God for the privilege of being their parents!

The pictures in this post are brought to you by Heather who has not only an awesome camera but awesome skills behind that camera....thanks friend:) 

We had a blast even though I can't prove it in pictures:)

This past weekend we traveled to the next state over to visit with dear friends from our old church. We had a great time reconnecting and got to see a lot more folks from church than we usually do since we were free to stay and go to church on Sunday (on past visits we always had to come home on Saturday to be at church here). I even got to take Rebecca to the hospital there which is both where I worked while living there and where she was born. The only problem is I failed to take ANY pictures while there.....bad blogger:( Here's the only two shots I have of our trip and they are very random:

                                               

Dennis took this shot while packing the van to leave. Jessie is always VERY nervous when she sees we are packing up because she does NOT want to be left behind (sometimes we leave her home and our friend comes to stay with her). Jessie will take the first opportunity possible to get in the vehicle and just sit there until we leave.....the only door open was the back so there she sat when Dennis came with the next load:)

                                             

Isaac has discovered that drinking out of a straw is very fun. He got fussy at one point so I offered him my water cup to sip (while I was holding it) but he would have NONE of that.....he wanted to hold it himself, thank you very much! He looked so cute holding that HUGE cup! 

                                            

Now this picture has nothing to do with our trip but I HAD to post it. The girls were playing with dress up clothes and apparently Samuel wanted in on the action. He wore this thing around for quite awhile and every time I saw him I chuckled......it was hilarious in person. I'll be sure and show this picture to his first girlfriend:)  

If you are looking for exciting reading you might want to look elsewhere today

I started a list the other day of words the twins say now at 21 months and I know the only way I'll actually keep it and remember is to put it on the blog! Hannah's list far outweighs Samuel's right now but he is making slow and steady progress. I wish I had a list like this for Rebecca....she talked so well so early that I cannot remember a time that she could not articulate her needs (although I'm sure there WAS such a time).

Hannah:

mommy, daddy, Becca (ca ca), Isaac, baby, cup (cu), eat (ee), cracker (caka), Jessie (the dog), banana (nana), no, stop (sto), up, sit, sock, shoe (sue), bye bye, hold you (ol jue), shirt, nose (no), night night, paci, uh-oh, thank you (tant u), bite (the way she asks for food), outside (sie)

Samuel:

mommy, daddy, uh oh, whoa, cup (cu), banana (nana), paci (taci), Jessie (tessie), cracker (ca ca), ball. He is also the only one of the three babies interested in saying any animal sounds right now: he can do dog, cat, and duck.

Wow....THAT was a flashback moment!

                                              

This is Samuel at two months old. Yes, he is in a doll cradle. Actually, it's the doll cradle that my precious grandfather made for me when I was probably 8 or so. Rebecca now uses it for her dolls. But back in the "newborn twins" days it was often used in the middle of the night for Samuel. See, in those days Dennis and I did a "split shift" for the night. He would stay up till 1am then come get me to take over. I would usually end up in Rebecca's room sharing her bed (it's our former guest bed so it's a queen lest you think I was sqeezing myself in a twin bed with her!) There was many a night when one twin or the other (but it was usually Samuel) would end up in the cradle right next to me when I felt as though I could NOT drag my exhausted/pregnant-and-nauseous self out of bed one.more.time to comfort a crying newborn. Having him right next to me allowed me to be able to reach out and put his paci back in/pat him/just keep my hand on him so that we could both get some rest.

Fast forward to today:

                                           

We were playing in Rebecca and Hannah's room this afternoon and Samuel thought it would be fun (apparently) to climb in the cradle and sit. I immediately thought about the newborn days.....it was one of those "my BABY is GROWING UP....sniff sniff" moments. He's so big:) 

Wheee!

      

                         

For some reason our computer chair has become a popular spot lately. Samuel loves to crawl up in it and sit (and play with things on the desk that he can reach, but that's another story). One day I decided to spin him around in the chair and now it's become a "thing"......I took these pictures the other afternoon when the boys were up from their naps and Hannah was still asleep. The boys had a ball being pushed round and round by big sister and Becca got some energy out:)

Shoes: love em'/hate em'

The twins are entering a new territory around here: shoes! What's that? They're 18 months old so why haven't they been wearing shoes for months? Oh, ok. Let me explain.

See, I have never been one to put shoes on my non-walking children. I have never understood the need. Socks if it's cold, fine. But ever-practical me just didn't "get" the cute little baby shoes. No offense to anyone who puts shoes on their itty bities but me, I just never did. Since the twins didn't even start walking till 15 and 16 months old it wasn't an issue for a long time. Then when they did start walking it was summertime and we always run around barefoot in the summer. I did buy a pair of "wocs" (that's what a friend of mine dubbed "fake crocs" from Wal-mart) for Hannah and Samuel had a pair of hand-me-down sandels but honestly they only wore them a handful of times. Hannah was fine with hers but Samuel did NOT care for them. He screamed like I was killing him the first time I put them on (yes, they fit just fine) and it didn't get much better.

Fast forward to yesterday. The time has come that these children have got to get used to wearing shoes. So into the closet I went to pull out the bags of hand-me-down shoes. We are INCREDIBLY blessed with hand-me-down shoes and clothes from family members (the only child who needs ANY clothes for this winter is Rebecca) so it was not too hard to find a pair of tennis shoes for each twin to wear this winter.

The difference in their reaction to their new footwear was, while not unexpected, very cute. Hannah immediately trotted away and loved hers. In fact, when I took them off a few minutes later (we are barefoot-in-the-house people around here) she SCREAMED and cried until I put them back on and then was happy as anything! She wore those things until naptime:) Samuel, on the other hand, while he didn't scream bloody murder (thank goodness), was less than enthusiastic. It took him a few minutes before he would even TRY to walk in them and then he just tolerated them. He was (of course) not upset when I took his off.

Thankfully it will be at least a few more years before hand-me-down shoes are not "cool" any more:)

         

         

Took these pics at the doctor's office this morning; we were there for their 18 mon checkup. Today was the first time I took them in walking (not in the double stroller) and it went pretty well. They had fun walking around the waiting room trying to talk to everyone:)

Here are their official 18 mon stats:

Hannah: 27lbs 9oz and 31.5 in tall

Samuel: 23lbs 1oz and 31 in tall

One-and-a-half

                                             

It's hard to believe that Hannah and Samuel are 18 months old! They are growing and changing so fast and I wanted to record some of the things that they are up to these days while I can still remember them!

Hannah:

• Is a champion walker now.....and can run when she wants to. It's so cute to see her running along on those short little legs!
• She "dances" along to music which is adorable
• She LOVES books and is constantly bringing us a book to "read" to her. She won't sit still for more than 15 seconds at a time for it but that's ok! When she brings us a book that she knows plays music she will "dance" in place when she hands it to us.
• She is "little mommy" already. I've seen her try to correct Samuel's behavior and is always handing Isaac things to play with especially if he's crying.
• She is quick to let us know if she is displeased about something....she has definitely learned the word "no". It's changed from being "doe" to an actual "no" word now. She has quite the temper and displays it often, I'm afraid. Funny, though, instead of throwing herself on the floor as some kids do she will gently lay back being careful not to hurt herself; recently I even saw her go to throw a fit, look carefully around her to make sure there was nothing on the floor, and only THEN did she lay back. So funny!
• Her current vocabulary: mama, mommy, dada, daddy, cup (cu), Jessie (our dog) (sounds like daddy), uh oh, thank you (tant tu), doggie (also sounds like daddy), bye bye, Isaac (Izee).   I've noticed that she calls both the boys Izee and cup can mean any type food she sees as well as her actual cup. The thank you thing was something she started all on her own which is adorable to me....I guess she learned by watching Rebecca. She is quite consistent about saying it, too!
• She will point to her nose if asked "where's your nose?" but only for her daddy! I can ask her over and over and get nothing and he asks her once and she'll do it!
• If I'm sitting on the floor and she wants to sit in my lap she will come over, turn around, and back up into my lap. If I need to change her diaper I can sit down on the floor and she will come and lay down in front of me (sometimes even when it's not her I need to change!)
• She is not a picky eater and will eat most things that are put in front of her. They eat what we eat now for the most part.
• She sleeps well at night; usually from 7:30pm-6 or 6:30 am and naps for about 2 hours in the afternoon. She has a "quiet time" in her crib in the morning for an hour but does not usually sleep then.

Samuel:

• Has also gotten walking down pat and runs when he wants to. His favorite thing is to run away if he thinks he will be chased....he giggles and loves that!
• He is definitely "all boy" and can be rough; loves to hit things and bang things. We have to watch him and keep him from hurting his sibs with his wildness.
• Let me preface this next statement by saying that I love this kid FIERCELY but MAN he is whiny. He is the whiniest kid I have EVER seen. He does have happy times and when he's happy he is truly happy and his smiles will take your breath away. But when he's not, watch out! He cries and whines for a good portion of the day most days. Of course I try to eliminate all possible sources of whininess (tired, hungry, wet/dirty, etc....) but sometimes there is just NOTHING wrong with him. He LOVES to be held and I think if I could velcro him to my hip he would possibly never cry but seriously? He's gotta share:) Hopefully he will outgrow this? A girl can dream, anyway!
• One of his favorite "games" is to take something away from Hannah and take off running with it while grinning/laughing and looking over his shoulder to see if she'll chase him for it. So naughty but SO funny!
• Speaking of naughty, this one is going to give us a run for our money, I can already tell. We tell him not to touch something and he will look at us, grin, and reeeach his hand back toward it (often touching it again) just to see if we're serious. He is HARD headed!
• His current vocabulary: mama, dada, uh oh. That's about it, folks! He vocalizes quite a bit but it's either (a) whining or (b) babbling. I can tell sometimes that he's trying to say something but he's not speaking english yet:)
• He's not a picky eater either although his appetite comes and goes. He has trouble at times sitting still long enough to eat. They sit in booster seats and I think the only reason he sits still at ALL to eat is because he is strapped in. He LOVES milk and we have to moniter his drinking during meals or he really won't eat anything!
• He sleeps well at night too, 7:30pm-6:00am. He usually sleeps 1.5-2 hours in the afternoon and still often sleeps for 30-45 minutes in the morning as well. He doesn't seem to want to give up that morning nap just yet.

I'm sure there's so much more but my tired brain won't let me remember it:)