the season!!

I love this time of year and we have been so busy enjoying it!!

pick your own apples! I never knew there were so many kinds of apples.

pumpkin patches and farmers markets every where. we love upstate NY!

And since we are searching for a great antique vanity for our bathroom we have tried to enjoy the leaves and double with antique hunting.

we found some great options. so fun!!

some projects + a yummy dinner....

It has been fun to have some extra time these days. And since I have a pile of unfinished projects I got busy! I love these colors and fabrics and we use cloths all the time.....easy pezy!

Our last trip down to my favorite fabric store we found this jumbo ric rak......so I finally finished this girlie quilt. I love the Peter Rabbit print.

and the trim was a needed touch!

Chris loves soup this time of year so we tried this new receipe for tomatoe soup. I do not love the taste of tomatoes but this was less tomatoe and more veggy tasting. It was so good!

But my favorite part were these delicious homemade croutons! ah!!

there is enough love

some days I wonder if I have it in me to do this. today was one of those reality check days where I felt like I have no say and no control in any of it.
And I was really mad!

I show up for the bio mom visit with the baby and there is no worker to supervise their time together (mom needs support in feeding and caring for the baby..yes). So we wait, call the worker, call the visitation team and they inform me that no, there will be no worker. Mom is on her own and the courts have decided it is time. We did know this was coming but really....no one could have called us, warned me. So I had to just leave him there all alone with her and hope that she had learned all that she needs to with the 8 months of visitation workers from the past. Ah! I know not really a big deal because truly she is his mother and should know what to do but it feels like a big step. And I got upset about no one even letting us know this step would happen. (and there it is my pride!)

So I am recognizing that Heavenly Father is watching over all of us and I will move on and press forward. I re-read through the words of a favorite hymn after our stake conference

#120 Lean on my ample arm.

Lean on my ample arm,

O thou depressed!

And I will bid the storm

Cease in thy breast.

Whate'er thy lot may be

On life's complaining sea,

If thou wilt come to me,

Thou shalt have rest.

If thou wilt come to me,
Thou shalt have rest.

Lift up thy tearful eyes,

Sad heart, to me;

I am the sacrifice

Offered for thee.

In me thy pain shall cease,

In me is thy release,

In me thou shalt have peace

Eternally.

In me thou shalt have peace
Eternally.

And it reminded me that there is enough love.....in my own heart, for bio mom, for this baby and most importantly for me, enough love to overcome all of these pains and well stresses....to comfort me and help me overcome these feelings. There is enough love and it will cover all of these difficult and heartaching moments. Turn to it and move one! Or maybe submit and press forward.

Lake Ontario hike

We have had gorgeous weather on some of these fall days! To enjoy them we have gone on a few hikes, a few drives and hopefully we can enjoy a few more before the season is winter.

we brought the camera but the battery was too low so we just took a few with our phones and chris actually got some fun shots!

the sunset over the lake was just a beautiful ending!

9 months...

What a busy baby this kid is...and I cannot believe he is 9 months. He just continues everyday to do more and grow. We love him so much and are so grateful he is in our home. We really take and enjoy every moment. It gives us a good perspective!

one of his favorite things is bathtime with bubbles and toys!

crawling really fast and all over

he has begun to climb up on things

He pulls up on furniture and can walk along couches and chairs

he is really strong!

we see a really stubborn side of his personality as well

he chews on everything; 2 bottom teeth have appeared!

he loves, loves books and music

he giggles in front of a mirror and will sit for minutes in front just smiling and reaching

he loves wooden toys especially this stack able one with circles-mostly because he chews on it

he cries when you leave him alone and does not like strangers

he have several instruments that he enjoys and classical music will calm him down

he is eating more and more each day! still not holding his bottle or drinking from a sippy cup but he loves to eat any kind of baby food.

his smile is infectious and his laugh even more so!!

visits with bio mom have been very regularly lately and the goal is reunification but there is so much that has to happen or that could happen between now and then. We are living life and moving forward trusting in the Lord to watch over all of us. It has been very difficult with court, lawyers and visits with mom 4 times a week now including Saturdays.

We look forward to Halloween, Thanksgiving and especially Christmas. We will be here since we cannot go any where with Capo's schedule but are excited to have a quiet Christmas at home.

travels

We had our stake conference this weekend with a visiting general authority. I was so grateful for the talks and the spirit and grateful that my talk was finally over with. I had been worrying about it for weeks. It also marked the end of an almost 4 year calling in the stake. I am a person who likes and enjoys change and new challenges but this almost feels like I lost a PT job. It was more than half our married life spent planning around and living around these activities. Overall, I am not sure yet how I feel about it being over, even though I have known for months that it was coming. It has been my life everyday I spent doing something for it and thinking about it. The reality of the change has not set in yet. I am excited to have my own time again but also so sad not to be a part of it any more. I was far from perfect or even good but I put everything I had into it. I think both Chris and I are both not sure what to do with ourselves now. I am a little bored! I might have to add hours at work or something. Or maybe we can get this bathroom remodel done.

Looking back I am not even sure how to sum up all of what I have learned or to even see how much I have grown. But I am so grateful for the opportunities, the lessons learned and the stretching that happened as well as the friends throughout the stake that I have gained. What an experience it has been.

one of the things i will miss the most about YW is traveling to visit other units in our stake. i will miss them them and their association so much!

warsaw is about an hour and fifteen minutes away but such a beautiful drive!

the drive to Geneseo

Girls camps, youth conferences, high adventures, monthly super saturdays, unit conferences, beehive activities, General broadcasts, YW in Excellence, countless lessons taught and visits made to units, and new presidency trainings and talks given. budgets and stake histories and closet cleanings and RS service days.....all of these have literally taken up time, sweat and many, many tears as well as vacations sacrificed and countless hours of late night pillow talk with Chris. I will miss so many things about it. And am so grateful for the women that have done the same serving with me! But now it is over and we will be on to new things.

late at night

we all do funny things....but this little kid has the biggest personality and keeps us laughing so hard especially late at night.

one night around midnight we were both still awake, chris working and well me just being lazy I am sure but the fatman woke up and would not go down until we fed him again. so I got a bottle ready and chris sat down to feed him. Chris had a pen behind his ear from working and the baby would not eat his bottle because he kept reaching for it. We laughed so hard and took a few minutes to play with capo so Chris put it behind the babies ear and the he tried to chase it like a dog chases his tale and never reaches it!! We just died! It was late yes but so funny.

We have also been finding the baby in the weirdest sleeping positions!

we cannot keep him on his back anymore!
this bottom one just kills me...how does he even sleep like that. the giraffe is his music box and his leg is up by his side.

he loves to sleep in his daddy's lap! he wiggles too much for me and I just cannot hold him plus the 20 + lbs for an hour or more. But it is really cute, the two of them!

I love this too...how in the world? one sock no blankets and his nok on his back?

we went on a hike the other evening and when we got home he was fast asleep with his hoodie over his head and he had been chewing on it....

a few pictures

Sorry! We came home and took a ton of pictures after we got pumpkins. We never get good family pictures but I think with our little tri-pod we got a few of everyone!

the fam

showing off his 2 teeth!

My favorite from the weekend because you can just hear him in this photo!

those dimples kill me

I love this time of year! Happy Autumn!!

pride

While preparing for a speaking assignment I was reading "Are ye stripped of pride" and realized how little I understood about pride and how prideful I really am.

Two things that struck me:

1. How simple the war of Heaven was and the downfall of Lucifer was pride. He wanted the glory and could not accept Heavenly Father's plan. He also persuaded a third to follow him by lies.

2. We can be prideful in 2 areas in prosperity (not me..i have been blessed but would not say we are rich.) and the second in adversity (that is what I am struggling with. And pride can be toward man (which again I feel like is not my issue) or toward God that is me! I get mad and do not feel like praying and get lackadaisical in my worship because I am proud.

I never put that together before. I know! So simple but it was a big light bulb moment for me.

I now have this article saved to my phones home screen. It is that good!

Check out this article out! Kim B. Clark "Are Ye Stripped of Pride?"

I have two good examples in my life, everyday, who are the least prideful individuals. And I can be better at recognizing those moments when the great lie creaps up. I am grateful for moments when I see myself clearly and for people who love me anyway!

It feels like FALL

We made apple crisp yesterday while enjoying conference. Saturday between sessions we went to a pumpkin patch with the baby and enjoyed a small corn maze, mums, yummy fresh produce and goats!

It is finally fall weather here as well I am loving this time of year in upstate NY

I love the food of this season, the smells, the colors and even the fashion. I am so excited fall is finally here and it feels like it.

Chris bought the biggest pumpkin he could find and not for the baby. He is excited to carve that thing.