Happy Thanksgiving

It wouldn't be Thanksgiving if I wasn't thankful for something. Here are a few things I am thankful for.

• Life here on earth.
• A Heavenly Father who loves me
• My faith
• The serves men that serve our country so that I can have a great life here on earth
• My free agency.
• My family. They are fantastic. Especially my amazing nieces. They are the best.
• Brad's family. I couldn't have asked for better in-laws.
• My job. Even my patients. Even though they drive me nuts at times, without them I wouldn't have a job, let alone an interesting job.
• My health.
• My challenges of not being able to have child. I LOVE the time that I have with Brad.
• Adoption. Can't wait to meet the wonderful birth parents that will one day make Brad & I parents.
• My dogs: Lucy & Abigail. They help me cope with not having children. They are the coolest dogs in the world. I love them.
• Quilt group on Thursday. I have meet the best people there & they are such great friends.
• Facebook. Yes. It helps me stay in contact with friends from all different parts of my life.
• My house. It is small but it is great. Cozy & perfect.
• The Book of Mormon. It has helped me in my life more then any other book EVER written.
• President Thomas S. Monson. A living prophet on the earth. Wonderful. He is such a great man. Thank you.
• My parents. Who have given me everything & has asked for nothing in return.
• My brother. Mostly because he has made me an aunt to those amazing girls. And for being a great big brother:)
• My friends who deal with me & all my wonderful slips in life.
• That Henry is doing well & is with his family for the holidays.

Mostly I am grateful for all that I have been blessed with. I know I don't thank Heavenly Father enough for the blessing in my life. But I am thankful. I couldn't have asked for a better life. He loves me & I am thankful. I have a great family. Don't get me wrong I have fun times that happen, but they are fun times so matter what they are. I love my husband and thankful for him, he is the man in & of my dreams. Thank you to you all. Happy Thanksgiving everyone:):)

Life & Death

I will be the first to say that I am scared to die. I am not dying, don't worry. I think mostly because there is still so much to see & do here on earth. Reason I talk about death is, a great Uncle & a very dear friend died with in the last month or so. They were young & it ended so quick. My uncle died of pancreatic cancer. Went to the hospital because he wasn't doing well & was diagnosed, went home & died about 2 weeks later. Which made me think, if I had 2 weeks to live what would I do. One I wouldn't want to sleep in fear of never waking up. I would want to be with family & go to Italy for a week. Then I would love to go to the Temple & finally fall asleep in the celestial room with my husband. The funny part is I talk about death all the time with Brad. Most wives will give permission to their spouses to remarry & be happy. NOT ME!!! I am a little possessive. I want him to myself & I don't want him to fall in love again. He can get a dog. I have to say with death around me, it makes me think. I am grateful for the gospel. Having the knowledge of the after life & knowing that we will live again. I am thankful for that knowledge. Especially since Brad & I were sealed for time & all eternity in the Temple. That death will not separate us. I am thankful for the Atonement & that I can be forgiven for my sins to one day live with Heavenly Father. I know I am not perfect & I sin everyday, but I am thankful that I can be forgiven. I am thankful for the willingness of Jesus Christ to take upon my sins & ALL the sins of the world so that WE can return. I could never image the pain & suffering that he went through for me. I am thankful for the Bible & The Book of Mormon that teaches about Him & what he has done. When I drive home or right before I go to bed I think about what I can do to be a better person. Of course I fail because I haven't changed the things that I hate about myself. I know that I can be better. I can be a better person, nurse & wife. I especially need to be a better child of God. I am a child of God, no I am a Daughter of God. I always think that if you really knew who you were you wouldn't do the things of the world. But sometimes life is hard. Which brings me to my good friend that passed away. She knew that she was a daughter of God & she knew that the Lord loved her, but life & addictions are rough. I know she isn't in pain anymore. I know that she is loved & that she will live again. She didn't commit suicide, just her body just had enough & it was time to go. As her funeral is tomorrow & her family asked that I read her eulogy, it makes me think also what would my eulogy say. Because eulogies are always written by someone else, it makes me think what people think of me from the outside. Hopefully good. I hope I have a long life ahead of me & that I will be a mom & that Brad & I will be able to raise great kids here on earth. Like I said that are so many things that I want to do & see before I go. The biggest thing is having a family here on earth w/Brad. I can't wait. But I need to have the patience. I know it will happen one day. When I don't know. Only the Lord knows:):) But be thankful for this time of earth. It is such a small time in our lives, but will effect the rest of our lives. It is a test & I want an A++++++++++++ so that I can go to the highest degree of the celestial kingdom. That is my ultimate goal.

ABL2

You ask yourselves: what is ABL2? Well let me tell you. It stands for "Alpenglows Biggest Loser 2". It is a knock off of the TV show biggest loser. No Brad & I are not on a diet. We just needed motivation to get into shape. It is the coolest thing:):) There are about 20 teams(couples), I think, that compete for 13 wks. There are 9 wks of challenges & then 4 wks of on your own. And of course those 4 wks are during Christmas time. Yikes. But this is a great motivation for us to get into shape & to do stuff together. We weigh in every Saturday & do a challenge. Brad came in second today. It was a jump roping. There are certain things we have to do each day to get points. If we are perfect we can get 140 a week. For example: morning/even prayer, eating a health breakfast, exercising 30 minutes 5x a week etc. We are excited to be doing this. But ask us in about 4-5 wks if we still have a drive. The nice thing is we have to weigh in, so it is like reporting your success & sometimes your challenges (not failures). I am happy because it is getting me to exercise but also saying my morning prayers (which the last time that happened was on my mission) & studying (not reading) the scriptures. We are actually using the Preach my Gospel book to help us study the scriptures & also make us better member missionaries. Oh & today we rode our bikes to the challenge. Which was amazing because Alaska is having a beautiful fall. It was sunny & of course cold, but very refreshing. I hope we keep it up:):)
Other things happening. We FINISH our adoption application. We are now live. So now it is the waiting game. They say it is a 1-2 yrs wait. The nice thing is we are done with the application. If you want to see our file just go to: itsaboutlove.org & just go to look up adoptive couple profile & you can look under place: Alaska or by our first names: Brad & Sarah. I have a feeling it will be awhile. I am sure lack of faith, but because I will be a working mother. They said that will be a disadvantage to us, but then they say that I am nurse. I am sorry that we aren't rich or able to be a stay at home mom. All well.
Oh, next. We bought a carpet cleaner. Yippee!!! I love it. It is a bissell & works wonders. I may like my carpet again. Speaking of cleaning. I need to go & clean. Hope everyone is doing amazing.

Closure

We found out what happened with the birth mother. When she gave birth, the baby looked just like the birth mother's father that her parents have adopted him. OK, that sounded really weird. But I am sure after awhile of thinking and contemplating I am sure. But it is nice to know what happened. I am happy for her. She does get the best of both worlds. She gets to see her son, but also gets to full fill her dreams. I pray for her. I hope that she accomplishes so much. He will be so proud of her. But that is how it ends.
The great news is, we are DONE with our home study, but we do need to change some of the application. We need to make it more birth parent friendly. So Brad & I are going to sit down & finish it this week.
Now on to the next adventure.......

Best Nieces EVER

Brad & I get the opportunity to watch my nieces over night. Both Mike & Dee are out of town, too bad for them. So we get to have Kennedy (9) & Reyna (7) over, along with their dog Chewy. Who is also a westie like my dogs Lucy & Abigail. They in fact love it when Chewy comes over, because they just play & run around like mad puppies. Well tonight I went to a pamper chef party & when I got home my nieces & I looked at some of my old photos from high school, reason why is because Reyna has school pictures tomorrow. I told them some embarrassing school picture days & showed them proof. Then I told Reyna that I was going to put tiny braids in her hair & then we'll take them out the next day to make her hair HUGE. Well Kennedy & Reyna got the idea that they wanted to braid my hair & make it big. Not that it doesn't take much. But here are some fun photos of them doing it. I love those little girls. They are the best. I am very thankful that they live near by & I can have a relationship with them. They are fantastic. I love them.

Oh, Reyna is trying to make the "L" symbol for loser

Curtains

These are the curtains I made for our living room. I just have to make 2 more for the smaller windows. The same material is also over the sliding glass door. I am not going to get the same for the smaller. I haven't decided what material I will get. But something different. I am still having issues on making the bottoms even. But, not like Martha will be visitng anytime soon.

9/15/09

My Uncle Art's birthday, my original due date, but came early AND the day that the birth mother gave birth to a little boy. The adoption is over. We are not adopting. It is over. Well this one. We are on to our next adventure of adoption. We have our last interviews on Thursday & then they will check everything over & that will be it & we go live & anybody can see our profile. Maybe we will get a call from Hawaii or something. Darn. Actually if we adopt out of state, we hope it is near family because we will probably stay in that state for about 2-3 weeks until the state will let the baby go to Alaska.
So back to this adoption. We actually found out through the great vine. Even to this day, no body has official said she gave birth. We have no idea if she kept him or chose another couple. In fact things that were leading up to that day were fun. Where we left off was waiting to hear back from her agency to see if they would work with us. Well a little over a week they finally responded & told us that they will release her (as if she is a prisoner) if we can give them our documents in like 10 minutes. I was like OK. I called my agency, of course around closing time, and asked them to do that. The secretary was so nice & was getting right on it. Nicki our social worker told us that we would have to sign release of information. I was like that is fine. So it would take a day or two & I let the other agency know that. Also LDSFS was reluctant to give them my information, because one if they are going to release her then they don't need it & two that is some really personal information. Well I can understand why they needed it, because they represented her still & wanted to make sure we were legit people. Then I thought about it, because the birth mother to this day, has not written us or anything. We had no idea if she knew what was going on exactly. So I wrote her agency & asked. Never heard back. In fact I even wrote them & said I heard that she had her baby & still nothing. OK. So on Wednesday I was driving home & was praying. I love that time in the car when it is silent & no body is around & you can have a REAL discussion with Heavenly Father. I asked him what should I do. I want to write her & just lay it out there. I prayed really hard & knew that I needed to write her one last letter. I got home & I wrote. I told her if this isn't a good experience for you, then stay with your agency & choice another couple. I encouraged her to pray about it & if she knew that we were the ones for her son then to fill out the paperwork for LDSFS. I wrote that if she chooses another couple, there would be no hard feeling. I told her that we appreciated meeting her & that we basically wished her the best of luck. We did tell her that we would love to adopt him & he would be loved. There was more to the letter, but that was the just of it. I sent it out Wednesday night & Thursday afternoon I found out from a dear friend that she had her baby. I knew then it was over. I will not lie I went through denial, crying & anger in like 3.3 seconds. I am still a little angry. I don't know at who or what. I think I just need closer, either knowing she kept him or chose another couple. I am sorry that it ended this way. But to tell you the truth I had a feeling it wasn't going to happen. You can ask my family & some of my friends & they will tell you that I said that from the beginning. I just had the notion. I also had that notion she was going to go early. I didn't want to sit on it with having to deal with both agencies & trying to get things done. She was due soon & needed to get the ball going. I also wrote the letter with hopes that if she didn't chose us, then she would have enough time to chose another couple & feel comfortable about it. If she kept him, I wish her the very best as a single mother. If she choose another couple, they are very lucky.
But that is the latest & greatest from our end. I know I always say there is a plan forever body & I know that. I will admit, I wish I had more control of that. But one thing I learned was to put it in the Lord's hands. He knows the whole picture. We did everything we could do get this beautiful baby in our house, but we can only do so much. I still want answers that I may never get. But I do know that there are little spirits waiting to come into our home. We can't wait to be parents & hope we do a good job.