Anniversary weekend and change coming

I am so excited for this weekend! Dh and I are celebrating our 5 yr wedding anniversary!!! We are going back up North to my in laws cabin on Saturday for a few days, then on Monday we are leaving Izzy with them and heading to michigan wine country and we are goign to stay 2 nights at a B&B that we stayed at last yr. I am so excited!!!!! It is so pretty up there and the b&b has the BEST breakfast!! We are going to visit some wineries and taste some wine :) Eat at a fancy place for dinner one night and just relax! I can't wait!!!!

In other news, I am thinking about putting Izzy in daycare one or two days a week versus having the babysitter we have now that comes to our house. I feel like as she gets older she needs to be exposed to more things. A friend of mine loves where she takes her son and it is really close to my house. They dont' have any minimums so it sounds like I could put her there as little as one day a week. I need to get over there and check it out and see how much it costs etc. Right now i have a babysitter that comes to the house once a week (who i love dont' get me wrong) and then one day a week I take Iz to my moms....I am pretty sure my mom woudl be really disappointed if I took away her day but at the same time it would be so much easier to put her at hte place right by my house. Who knows I need to do some research and see how much money we are talking etc. I am also going to enroll Iz in a mother toddler play/music class once a week. I am already dreading the weather turning colder and not being able to be outside and do a lot of the activites we do now. I am still working the two days a week and really enjoying it. It is a great balance for me. I just switched my work days from tues/thurs to tues/wed so i can pick up my 11 yr old niece from school every thursday. Having had her a full day a week this summer we have really bonded and I think it is really important to keep giving her that time with me, plus she loves being with Izzy and is a huge helper.

So lots of changes coming I think but hopefully they will work out.

Garden Girl

We were up North last weekend at DH's parents cabin and we had such a nice time. Before Izzy I used to LOVE going up there for the weekend, it is really pretty and peaceful. I would relax, read and enjoy some wine and cards with DH's parents. Well last summer when we went there with Izzy I HATED it!! Izzy didn't sleep good and was kinda crabby. But this year, oh what a difference! She LOVED it. They have a very large garden with beans, pickles, corn potatoes, carrots, squash etc. Izzy was a big help at helping to pick beans. She also got to ride on the lawnmower tractor with her grandparents. She just loved all the time outside. And she slept GREAT. The first night it was hard to get her down but once she was down, she slept 13 hrs, and took a great nap on Saturday and slept 13 hrs again Sat night! Couldn't have asked for better! Even the car ride wasn't too bad but on the way home it normally takes 3-31/2 hrs and it took over 4 b/c of construction.

Here are some of the photos from the trip

18 month well check up and Ice cream!

Well I took Izzy her 18 month check up today and the doctor was very pleased. She said she is where she should be developmentally and kept commenting on what a great personality she has and how sweet she is. That makes me so happy!

She weighed 24 lbs (40%) and was 32 3/4" long (70%)

I don't have a ton of time to post but I wanted to post these pictures from last week of her enjoying an ice cream cone! What pure JOY!!!! Yum Yum she loves her ice cream (sounds like hi meem)

Amazing BM!

I don't have a lot of time to blog as I REALLY need to clean up this house a bit because we are having our sub block party tomorrow and will have people over. Since I just put Izzy down for a nap I have about an 1 1/2 to clean like crazy!!! But I had to take time out to post an e-mail from our BM C. I just recently sent her a bunch of the professional pictures we had taken of Izzy at 15 months. She just received them and this is what she said. I have tears in my eyes

Hello!!!!!!!!!!!! First of all, i want to say that i am so thankful for meeting and having y'all as a part of my life. I thank you very much for having such a open adoption with me i appreciate it very very very much. :-} I got the pictures in the mail today. She is soooooooooooooo beautiful!! I can't believe how tall she is. She's very big. She looks very happy in all the pictures even with the one with her little tongue sticking out. HA HA HA HA. Thank you once again. I love them all. I went back to work just this week and it's smooth right now. Tell Chris i say hello and give the Princess a hug and BIG kiss for me tell her that i love her too. I will talk to u soon. Take Care and god bless. LOve AlwAYs, C

How awesome is that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This wonderful woman has been through so much in her young life and I feel so much love for her. It makes me happy beyond words to read those kind words from her and know that she feels the same for us that we feel for her. Our adoption story is such a blessing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!