11 more days until we travel

11 more bubbles in the tummy filled days until we travel. Today I repacked our cases. Still can't get all of the stuff in them so I guess I'll need to wait and see if there's any room left in Eric's case. Trying to get ahead, or at least catch up, with work so it won't all of a sudden kick me in the rear end.
The doctor said Anna has a slight ear infection so we're having a relaxing evening tonight and not doing anything other than playing games.

12 days until we fly to Ethiopia

Some of you may say, 'Oh come on. Not another countdown.' I'm sorry, but counting down the days is fulfilling on my end as it helps me keep focus on what we need to get done, and how long we have to do it, as well as relish in the fact that it's only 'blank' number of days until we get to travel to meet our son.

Adoptive families go from one countdown, or wait, to the next and it feels good to have an actual number of days instead of the number of days we've been hoping for the next step of the process.

We have a dozen days left (2 more Mondays. 1 more payroll. 1 more Sunday at church) and it feels really good tonight as Luke and Anna have adjusted to their school schedule and are tucked into bed and sleeping. They are both loving their new school and teachers which makes it easier for us to travel to Ethiopia and not worry as much about if they're doing okay.

We received our 'Ethiopian Embassy Packet' from our agency and I have to say it was the most daunting packet I've seen yet. Probably because of the number of forms we need to complete and take with us. If the shear number of blanks that need to be completed doesn't scare a person, the fact that I can't even guess at some of the answers has me reeling. There's the I-600 Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative, I-864A Affidavit of Support and DS-230 Application for Immigrant Visa and Alien Reistration. I then needed to printed off a copy of our last three year's taxes, earning statements for past three years and then copied our passports and my Naturalization Certificate showing that I am English no more and legally an American.

We're going through training with our agency director this Wednesday and will cover any questions we might have at that time. I'm guessing I'll still have a couple of blanks left that need some clarification. All of this and I used to work for a government agency. You'd think I'd be able to fill these forms out in my sleep. Anna came home with an IR-3 status because we had visited once before our trip to finalize the adoption. Joseph will be issued an IR-4 status since this trip will be our first time meeting him and I believe that might be why we have a few more governmental forms to fill out. It doesn't matter; we'll fill out as many forms as needed to get him home.

I'm done shopping

Yep, that's right. Whatever hasn't been purchased by today mustn't be necessary otherwise it would have made it's way onto the formerly 5 page list, down to the current 3 page list that got drudged along to the store today. One heaping shopping cart later I felt relieved to know that the list didn't beat me. Now we have three full suitcases and Eric's case is the only one left to be packed. We're able to take four-50 lb. bags and 2-40 lb. carry-ons total between the two of us. The weather forecast for the next week is one day hitting a high of 71 with the rest of the days in the high 60's. Lows are in the high 40's and low 50's. Every day has at least a 50% chance of rain with most having a 60% chance. Sounds as if we need to pack rubber boots, raincoat, umbrella and wool socks. Before our adoption I was under the false impression that the African continent was always hot and muggy. Wrong again! Now I understand why the children are dressed in layers, at least at least at our orphanage in Addis Ababa.

Check, check, check

Yesterday I scheduled Joseph's pediatrician and dentist appointments as well as our 3, 6 and 12 month follow-up visits with Jody, our social worker.

Today is the day that Ryan and Emily (the newlyweds) are done painting and cleaning their duplex and get to move in and live like newlyweds. This afternoon was spent rounding up all of their belongings from Emily's mom's house, our house and a storage unit. I'm a little sore tonight, but not too bad. I'm wondering how grandma will be feeling in the morning. ha Needless to say, they're starting their life together with a lot of stuff and I'm glad they're not in a tiny apartment or they wouldn't fit!

Tonight was a new member meeting at church which Eric and I attended as 'old timers' who could welcome the newbies. It was great to see everyone and I'm excited about the growth.

What's happening now?

Someone asked me what's happening in Ethiopia now that we've passed court. Well, here's what our agency lists as the steps after passing court:

• Collect the official decision within two business days of the verdict.
• Decision is legalized at the office of Foreign Affairs.
• Decision is translated by the official government translation office.
• Request the child's official birth certificate.
• Register the court decision with the government of Ethiopia.
• Request an Ethiopian passport from immigration for the child.
• Your child must have a medical examination at an assigned clinic to obtain their US visa.
• Your child must have a second exam at the US Embassy for their HIV testing.
• All documents must be sumitted to the US Embassy one week prior to your appointment. (Our appointment is Thursday, September 17th.)

So, as you can see, things are definitely happening.

First day of school

Luke and Mrs. Timmerman
Luke with Eric and Deb
Luke
Anna and Mrs. Herbst
Luke and Anna
Anna

Here are photos from the first day of school. We would have liked to have more of Anna, but they took the kindergarten kids into the school early so we were out of luck.

I know, I know, I've been slacking

My handsome dude chilling out. (You can enlarge these photos by clicking on them.)
Eric is on the bottom, right, holding the acrobat. Now we know what he can do for a living when he gets out of Domino's~~he can join the circus.
My husband is STRONG
Hey, who is that woman eye-balling my hubby???

Sir Luke of the Blue Lion
Scotty, Robin, Keely, Helen, Carly and Clay
Every time Scott and Eric play basketball someone gets hurt. No broken fingers this time. Yeah!
The girls going for a hike.
Luke threw this frisbee a couple of seconds after I took this picture and he whacked me in the side of the head with it.


Eric playing the piano with Clay watching on.
Helen, Eric and Anna. Eric is the one with the GIGANTIC lips.
Anna catching a ride with big brother

It's been a little busy around here lately and my blog posting has suffered. BUT, I'm back in the saddle and ready to catch up on what's been going on.

Last Saturday we went to Madison, WI to celebrate some friends wedding. We weren't at the park more than 5 minutes before Eric got stung on the lip by a bee. The only good thing I can say about that is I'm glad it wasn't one of the kids or our weekend could have taken a severe downward spiral. Eric thought the bee had barely stung him and his lip didn't look too bad at first. Well, the photos I'm attaching will show that his lip continued to grow during the day, overnight and was still swollen the next day. I'd hate to think what his lip would have been like if the bee had 'really' stung him.

After a great afternoon at the park we went to Scott and Robin's and hung out, had a campfire (thanks Cory) and let the kids reconnect. It was great.

Sunday took us to the Bristol Renaissance Fair. I had no idea how big the fair was going to be nor the amount of people that show up for something like this. There were people dressed in full costume ALL over the place. Eric was selected to help during the acrobat show and the kids loved the jousting. Luke took his turn on a jousting zip line and he actually lanced the ring and was knighted. He was the only child that managed this feat while we were there watching. So now Luke can officially be referred to as Sir Luke of the Blue Lion.

Monday took us to school for our orientation meetings with Luke and Anna's teachers. It was great to see and hear the excitement of the teachers and how glad they were to have the kids in their classes. Teachers can make such a huge impact on their students!!!!

Today was the first day of school. Luke is now in first grade and Anna is in kindergarten. Both kids came home from school tonight bubbling with all that happened today and reeling off new friends names.

Prayers

So many positive, but hectic, things are happening in our lives right now, but we're brought down to earth with my friend Katie's family members' health issues.

Their entire family is going through a horrible time and having to make critical decisions so I again ask for all of your prayers. Katie, and her husband have three small boys. She works days and her husband works nights so she is the primary caregiver of the boys at night as well as having to make trips to the hospital and decipher medical updates. Their family needs prayers.

Travel dates set and Anna's birthmother search

We researched and booked our flights today and are happy to have that done. We will fly out of Chicago on Friday, September 11th and return home on Sunday, September 20th. We're flying KLM and so we will change flights in Amsterdam meaning we won't have to worry about getting additional travel visas.

Just an update too on the search for Anna's birth mother. We originally were working with our attorney's son in Guatemala to see if he could connect with Anna's birth mother and if she would want to have contact with us. No connection was made so we decided to hire one of the searchers who is very well-known and reputable in Guatemala. He just emailed today and said that he will get started on our file as soon as he finishes up with a couple of other families and I'm to email him in a couple of weeks to touch base. I'm pretty confident that he's going to be diligent in his work and hoping that he will come back with information. What an exciting time this is.

Travel dates for Ethiopia

Well, Dove doesn't mess around. We will be traveling to Ethiopia to pick up Joseph on September 11, 2009. Yes, 9-11. Oh well, we've flown before on that date and it seems as if security is tighter, so we'll be fine.
Our US Embassy visit is for Thursday, September 17th.

WOO HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a sudden urge to scream out, "Help us. We're not packed!!!!!!!!" But, we will be and ready to travel with bells on.

Man, I love YouTube!!!!!!!!!!!

Turn the volume up high on your computer, sit back, close your eyes, and listen to rain fall in this Perpetuum Jazzile rendition of Toto's Africa. You'll think you're in the middle of a storm on an African plain.

Congratulatory dinner

Okay, so hot wings aren't on every Ethiopian menu, but they were on this one, and we were hungry, so we enjoyed them. Notice the Ethiopian flag-colored balloons? Cool huh?
Our cake from Le Ann and Mike saying, "Congratulations on adding Joseph to your family!"
Mike and Le Ann

Last night we enjoyed a wonderful visit with our friends Le Ann and Mike at an Ethiopian restaurant. To our surprise, we arrived at the restaurant early and there was a cake and Ethiopian flag colored balloons. Mike and Le Ann had secretly arranged this in advance. The rest of the night we enjoyed food and friendship which was much needed after not seeing them for a while. Thanks for a great night guys!

Do you know who is 7,669.21 miles away from us? Our SON Joseph. We passed court!!!!!

**Sorry, I had to remove photo until we sign paperwork in Ethiopia.**
Please allow me to introduce the latest addition to the Lockhart family. This is Joseph Duane Lockhart and it's official he is now a Lockhart. That's right, we passed court and now we have to figure out all of the particulars of traveling 7,669.21 miles in order to bring our SON home. It feels so good to write the word son with the knowledge that yes, he is indeed legally our son.

We have been so very fortunate to have gotten through the adoption process in such a short amount of time. We are thankful to everyone that has helped us from the very beginning which believe it, or not, just began November 15, 2008. Family and friends provided much needed prayers, letters of reference and support along the way. Our agencies: Hillcrest Family Services, Building Arizona Families and Dove International did an excellent job of leading us through the adoption process while answering questions and offering an immense amount of support too.

We are ready to bring Joseph home and start sharing the rest of our lives with him. We are so blessed!

Today's the day!

We will get a phone call this morning (morning as in Oregon-pacific time) from our agency director letting us know what transpired at court. Last night was a very short night on sleep and a long night on wondering what the call is going to be.

Helpful hints for when Joseph comes home

We've read many, many books on what we should do when Joseph comes home to help with his bonding and attachment to us and I had read an article quite some time ago and lost it, but finally found it. Here it is:

Your baby needs your full attention now

Here are some tips for keeping happy, healthy, and focused on the new priority in your life.At last, after months of waiting, your child is home. Adoptive parents may worry that missing out on pregnancy or their infant’s first days or months will impede attachment. In fact, for both biological and adoptive families, attachment is almost always a journey, not an instant event.

It takes time to get to know your child, to develop the rhythm and confidence to parent. In these first days, it is vital that you take care of only the essentials—your partner, your current children and your baby. Avoiding other claims on your attention will enhance your ability to bond. Much as you want to show off your new baby, use the first weeks to get acquainted at your own pace.

Remember that, in these first weeks, you and your baby are in transition. You’re not yet familiar with your child’s cues or the meaning of his cries. You may feel clumsy at holding, making bottles, burping, bathing, diaper changes.

There is extraordinary joy when you first learn that, after years of longing, your baby is waiting for you. Don’t be surprised if it is impossible to sustain such joy. Disappointment is very common after attaining major milestones. Like bio parents some adoptive parents will experience a post-adoption depression as a result.

Strategies for the first few weeks:

• Limit visits. Your baby needs time to bond with you, unencumbered by distraction. Unplug the phone or leave a voice message if excited friends keep calling. Get help. Hire out the housework, lawn mowing, or cooking. Ask friends to fix meals, run errands, shop, and care for your other children. The less you have on your mind, the more attention you can pay to your baby’s well-being.
  
• Get support. Join an adoption support group, if you haven’t already. Share your feelings with others online or in a community setting. Some adoptive parents are embarrassed to complain to friends and family about baby’s crying, colic, or diaper rash. “I felt like people would say that I asked for him....” Adoption counselor professionals can be an enormous aid, too.If you are feeling unsure about caring for your baby, attend an infant care seminar hosted by a hospital or adoption agency. This is your chance to get “hands-on” experience. Many hospitals and public health agencies can arrange to have a nurse visit your home and give one-on-one instruction.
  
• Make things cozy, not fancy. Infants don’t care about an elegant nursery. All they need is to be safe and loved and warm. Be sure that your baby’s crib or bassinet (as well as her car seat) meets the highest safety standards. To reduce the risk of SIDS (crib death), always put your child to bed on her back.
  
• Take care of yourself. Even a 15-minute walk around the block or 20 minutes of yoga can help you relax and clear your mind. Try to eat well. Get some sleep! Exhaustion can make those first weeks even harder. Sleep when you can—preferably, whenever baby naps.You may decide to keep your baby in the family bed for the first weeks. If so, do not use a waterbed or soft bedding that could smother a child. If you can’t get sleep well with your baby in the bed, try a bassinet or crib that attaches to your bed.
• Hang on to your sense of humor. Raising children is serious business, but you have to laugh at yourself or you are finished. Take everybody’s advice, even mine, with a grain of salt. Sister, friend, doctor, mother-in-law—all will tell you what to do. Follow your own instincts about how to raise your child. Even as a new parent, you can trust that gut feeling about your baby.

So, if we don't answer your phone calls on the first ring or invite you over to play cards every night please don't think we're trying to be rude or hurt your feelings, we're just trying to work on our newly formed family.

1 more day until court

Today's it! This is the last day before we enter court. Our file could be reviewed as early as sometime after midnight tonight (our time). We ask for your prayers today and tomorrow.

I would like to get a ton of work accomplished today knowing tomorrow will be a 'write off' day. I will sit by the phone and by the computer waiting for the call/email.

Tomorrow night we're heading to Iowa City to celebrate with our friends Mike and LeAnn. Hopefully, it will be a celebration and not a crying party. Either way it will be awesome to be there with them.

Please keep our friend Katie and her family in your prayers. I can't say why right now, but prayers are needed.

October 7th court date

My friend Mimi, from here in Dubuque, just emailed to let me know that they received their court date and it's October 7th. So, I'd ask everyone for prayers for her and her husband, their children here and their daughter in Ethiopia so that all goes well and they pass court quickly so Mekdes and Joseph can be play buddies soon.

This is a good day!

2 days until court!!

2 more wonderful, glorious days until court. It's drizzling rain here but that can't put a damper on our day.

3 days left until court

3 days left until court so the countdown could be changed to hours (72 or less) if we knew the exact time that our file would be looked at. We don't know the exact time so I'll keep it to days, plus I don't have the time to do an hourly countdown. Finding the numbers would be the easy part, but posting them would be a little tough as I do plan to sleep.

I spent quite a few hours working on our packing list last night and honestly have no idea how we're going to get everything in the cases. My first list was 5 single-spaced pages. One person even suggested bringing our own bedding. How on earth does one do that? What end of the vacuum cleaner do I hook up to our king-sized pillows to make them sandwich bag size?

It's probably safe to say that we'll have one case full of medicine and ointments because every list I've read says to take them and be ready to treat any slight illness or injury that might occur when we're in Addis Ababa instead of trying to track down these items once there and sick.

Also needing to be squeezed into the cases are the 70+ spiral notebooks that I bought for the kids at the orphanage along with crayons, scissors, markers, glue, pens, pencils and folders. I'd like to take balloons, jump ropes, bubbles and Hot Wheels race cars too. It could be touch and go trying to get our suitcases through customs with all of these items, but we're going to try.

4 days until court!!

We're speeding along and only four more days until our file goes to court. Luke, Anna and I were talking about going to court next Wednesday and if we pass Joseph would then officially be their brother. Luke then asked, "Why wouldn't he be our brother? Can someone say he can't be our brother? What will happen if he can't be our brother?" Wow, that was a hard one. I always try to keep explanations to a minimum about the adoption with the littles, even though that's not my personality, but this one was hard. I gave my little explanation and the kids took it at face value so that was good, but I hadn't thought much about the possibility of anything possibly going wrong with Joseph's adoption other than court being rescheduled time and time again. Prayers, prayers, prayers.

Happy Birthday Gerry!!

This could be what Joseph will be like

Please click on the title of this post above "This could be what Joseph will be like" and watch a little boy who was being taped by his newly adopted parents while at Chicago O' Hare Airport. We could experience something like this with Joseph. We can only hope he's this verbal and that he would find a play phone this entertaining. I've put together a list of items that we will be taking to Ethiopia that have been suggested by other parents as great 'fillers' to help us through the 23+ hour flight with layovers, but I'm not sure how the other passengers would feel about the phone.

5 days until court

5 days until court.........That's just a handful of days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And during those five days we have tons of things on the agenda so we're hoping they fly by. For some reason seeing the number five has made me cry. This journey is full of countdowns, time frames and guessing games and there will be many more before it's over, but this is one of the BIGGIES. This is when Joseph is officially a Lockhart, if we make it through, and our family grows to seven. (I'm still counting the older two because even though they're no longer kids and are on their own financially (thank heavens), they're still our children and a major part of everything our family stands for.

Ryan and Emily are on their honeymoon and in their words, "Having the honeymoon of a lifetime." Ryan tried wind surfing yesterday and as a result of that he had his knee on ice last night. ha. I shouldn't laugh, but this is the first time his wife, who is now officially an RN, can nurse her husband back to health and we're not getting a call from Ryan asking if he should ice or heat the knee.

Kelli is heading off to Santa Monica for work for a few days and that should be fun. She travels an incredible amount. Good thing she's young and loves it. She asked if I wanted to go along for a mother-daughter trip and I passed. It's been too busy around here lately with the wedding and I'm just starting to feel as if I'm winning the laundry battle. Kelli and I went on a mother-daughter trip to Fort Lauderdale a while back and our goal was for each of us to do three things we'd never done before in our lives. Now that's pretty hard at my age, but we did it and kept it all legal. What a fun trip that was.

Okay, back to laundry.

Anna & AJ graduated!

Anna
Luke
Adam and AJ
My girlfriend Katie with her boys: Adam, AJ & Aiden
Papa and Anna
Gerry, Pat and Eric. (Eric with his cupie doll haircut that I DID NOT DO)

Mom and Anna
Anna with Kristie and Kristie's group of kids
AJ. How cute is he????
Aiden and Eric bonding
Anna and Kristie. We love Kristie!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

6 days until court

6 days until court. That's less than a week. In less than a week we'll know if we passed court, or not, and if we need to hurry up and get ready for Joseph, or if it's going to be a while. I haven't bought him any clothes because I'm so unsure of his size and what it will be when we go and get him so I'm going to power shop once we get the news. Back to school sales are happening now so I'm having a hard time passing up on some of the deals. I'm not good at taking items back that don't fit so I'm trying not to jump the gun.

7 days until court....do I hear a drum roll?...oh, that's just my nerves

Big day today for our family as Anna graduates from the Parents as Teachers (P.A.T.) program and gets ready to start kindergarten. Parents as Teachers is a tremendous program that is made possible through local empowerment funds, with no family income level qualifiers. It's free for children from birth to kindergarten. It also tests kids periodically to see how they're doing based on the Denver Learning test (that's probably not the right name of the test, but it's close).

Every other week a professionally trained staff person comes into our home to work with Anna through play. Our person is Kristie O. and she's amazing. Luke was also in the program and he had a great experience as well.

Kristie teaches learning concepts through play. The list of things that we've done is endless but a few examples are making our own play dough, painting with shaving cream, walking on balance blocks outside, placing pegs in the right shaped openings and so on. Kristie finishes up each hour-long session with reading a book that ties into the 'play' work that we just did.

I love P.A.T. because I'm not very creative. I love to play, but need help especially in the craft area. It's much easier for me to read books to the kids. One of the goals of the program is to help parents (both the mom and dad) learn how to play with your kids while teaching them critical concepts..

Each month the program has an event where all families are invited to come in to a large group activity. Last month Eric did a pizza throwing party. He loves doing these with kids. I believe there were approx. 37 kids and 30 adults. He started by throwing the dough in the air and trying to get it 6 feet wide. I'm not sure if he made it to 6 feet, but the kids sure thought he was great. He made bracelets, watches, necklaces, Superman capes, and ghosts out of the dough and then had all of the kids come up to tables and pound dough. The cornmeal was flying all over the gym. We warned the P.A.T. gals that we'd be making a mess. ha Then we capped off the evening by me reading pizza books to the families and serving 14 pizzas. It was a blast!!

So, tonight is Anna's graduation night. When Luke went through graduation the ceremony consisted of a slide show of the kids in the program, cake, diplomas and the Lockhart favorite--the graduation cap. Luke kept his cap and diploma on his dresser forever as they were cherished items. The grandparents are invited too so I'm sure they'll love it.

8 days until court. WOO HOO!

8 days until court. I can hardly contain my pre-court jitters. This morning I went and completed registration for Luke and Anna to start school. Luke will be entering first grade and Anna kindergarten. This is a new school for them so I'm guessing there will be a few moments of anxiety on the 25th, especially for Luke. Anna will probably walk in like she owns the place and ready to make a million new friends. I swear she knows far more people than Eric and I do.

Last night we started swim lessons. It's nine nights in a row from 5:15 to 5:50 p.m., not counting the weekends. This makes dinner at our house crazy, but we get lessons knocked-out quickly this way.

10 days until court and Ryan and Emily are married!

Ryan and Emily at the rehearsal


Gerry, Pat, Mom and Dad
Kelli, Deb and Anna

Luke and our babysitter Ellen. Ellen came to rescue the kids from the rehearsal
David, Ryan and Luke. Luke was the bell ringer

Kelli, Cassie and Brandy

Eric

Bill and Emily practicing walking down the aisle. Yes, he cried.
Martin (our extra son)


Emily and Ryan at the rehearsal dinner


Deb and Eric
Sherry and Bill
Janet, Stephen, and Janet's parents

Gerry, Pat, Mom and Dad


Dinner card table at the reception hall. We went to see it after the rehearsal. Janet and Emily.
The reception hall. How beautiful is this?

Kelli, Deb and Cassie out for breakfast
Janet, Emily and Mom at breakfast

The wedding formally began
Bill handing off Emily to Ryan
Bill and Emily

Kelli and little brother Ryan
The aisle runner
Anna (flowergirl) with Alex (ringbearer)

Ben and Brandy
Cassie and Martin
Nate and Kelli
Mom, Dad, Pat and Gerry
Dad, Mom and Kelli
Anna and Emily
Ryan and Emily did not see each other before the wedding so this is as close as they got around the corner from each other.
This is probably my favorite picture. Emily is waiting for Ryan to hold her hand while she hides.
Deb, Mom, Kelli and Anna
Daddy's girl Kelli and Eric
Me and Tall Guy

Luke and Anna
Deb, Anna and Kelli
Anna and Kelli


Kelli and Cassie in the limo riding to the reception

The newlyweds


Brunch on Sunday. Pat and Gerry
Eric and Mom


The infamous bachelor party.


10 more glorious days until we go to court. Woo hoo. We survived the HUGE weekend of Ryan and Emily's wedding. And when I say survived I really mean that.

It started Wednesday night with Emily calling to ask what I was doing that night. I said I was doing some sewing for Ryan and was going to take in 5 of his shirts and one of Eric's. She was happy about me sewing and wondered if I'd be willing to hem 40 yards of fabric that would be scalloped around the staircase at the reception hall. Well of course I would. The wedding fabric took about 1 1/2 hours, but Ryan and Eric's shirts took another three hours. My sewing machine was grumbling pretty hard by the time I was done.

Thursday was Ryan's bachelor party. I will upload at least a couple of photos from the bachelor party tomorrow.

8 am Friday Emily found out that she had officially passed her boards and she can now put "RN" behind her name. She's brilliant! Friday was also the final day of Vacation Bible School, YMCA, haircut, color, manicure, pedicure and then on to the wedding rehearsal and rehearsal dinner (which we were hosting).

Yet again the craziness of Joseph's adoption continued and while I was getting ready for the rehearsal dinner we (Eric) received updated photos of Joseph. I'm in awe how all of the updates and news goes through Eric. It's so nice to get the photos and our agency said that they would be forwarding other information as soon as they get it.

The wedding rehearsal went really well and we were pretty confident that Luke and Anna would be ready to rock and roll when the 'real' wedding started.

Then it was off to the rehearsal dinner at L May Restaurant. They did a top-notch job with food, atmosphere, staff and details. Ryan and Emily loved it and according to comments from the other 35 guests, they all loved it too. Dinner consisted of all homemade food starting with three beautiful appetizers, then salad, bread and seasoned butter. Then came salmon, chicken marsala, meatloaf, and lasagna. We finished off the meal with dessert plates.

Saturday is still a blur. The wedding and reception was extraordinary. Ryan and Emily are now officially married and are enjoying their honeymoon in Playa del Carmen, Mexico.

Sunday we went to church and the kids performed their vacation bible school song and so that was pretty cool. We then jumped in the car and headed to Emily's parents house for brunch and to open wedding presents. None of us could hardly move Sunday evening so we found ourselves perched on the couch vegging out.