Quin’s favorite is In-N-Out so Lindsay made her little cheeseburger cupcakes in honor of her obsession. And I gave her this rad bag. Not that a 2 year old can really appreciate this sort of bag, but it is so gosh darn adorable I had to take a picture of it.

Not sure if Rara or Nana had a better time, but I have a guess…

Too many pictures of Dean? Impossible.

One…

Two…

Three…

Can’t handle Quin in this sequence!

My dad still can’t hold anything over 10 pounds while standing up. He can hold Dean like this for a few minutes before his hands give out, so they make the most of those few minutes.

Dean, Dean, Dean. My favorite little munchkin! Look at all the rolllssss!

Happy Mother’s Day to all my mama friends!

And if you are a mommy who has lost a baby or child, I wrote an article on Darling Magazine Online just for you. Read it here. You are not forgotten. xxoo

Our kids don’t really know what normal “when I was a kid” stories are.

My dad grew up in the projects in LA. His stories involve everything from sharing a double bed with two of his siblings to living on his own in a barn at the age of 14 while working for a guy who trained horses for movies. And then there was the time he had to wear his sisters clothes to school to save money. Ai. The kids fave would be anything involving firecrakers. My dad seems to have a lot of those.

Then there is Joel. Sometimes the kids are just staring at  him in disbelief. To spare him from a million comments (because there are many students who tell me they read this blog and would loooovvveee to hear some hilarious stories to bug him with!) I won’t share too much, but let’s just say that growing up as a white kid in Mexico you come back with an odd collaboration of superb spanish & unbelievable tales that are in fact true. You may not have much else, but those are ensured.

The girls concerned faces in the middle picture kinda capture what I’m talking about. It’s a mix of laughter and horror, followed by a million questions, but always a good time. I’m starting to think we should just stick to fairy tales at the end of the day. It’s possible they are getting too many bad ideas from the guys in our family, haha!

Now I like to joke Zara that, “the Lord blessed you for your many years of baldness” because look at this headful of gorgeous hair!  It’s so so soft and the color is stunning.

I’ve actually been trying to talk her into cutting it since it is ridiculously long, but she is stuck on having “mermaid hair” and how can one argue with that?

Few other things to mention: How do you like the new look?  And yes, my absence is because we were sick, again, always and forever. It’s May though, so flu season is over now right? xxoo

Before writing this post I wasn’t familiar with Kia (or any cars for that matter since I am “that” person who really doesn’t know much about cars). However, I spent last Saturday with my friend, who’s car also has the fancy little button push start engine thingy and I’m sold on that feature for all mothers! Have you seen it? If not, it’s shown in the middle of the episode below (the car is the all New 2014 Kia Sorento). So the basics are as long as you have your keys on you, or in your purse the doors unlock when you get within range, and then when you want to start the car you literally just push a button without ever having to dig in your gigantic purse or diaper bag to find those pesky little keys! I’m sure that it was invented to be cool on the James Bond level, but it’s basically the most mother friendly invention ever. Below is the latest video by Circle of Moms POPSUGAR.

And since you know I have a habit of being terribly honest, how awkward was that first part of the episode? Please tell me, were any of you thinking that?! I was cringing a little more than a lot, BUTTTTTT, they totally made a come back! Especially at the end where they give the tips for taking photos with a camera phone. (I literally give people those exactly same tips for any camera, they are helpful for both!)

And last, but not least, thank you to all of my fabulous blog readers who don’t ever complain when I do a sponsored post. xxoo

Disclosure: This post was sponsored by Kia through their partnership with Circle of Moms. While I was compensated to review the Kia Motors video and write a review, all opinions are my own.

My mom is going to hate that picture because I caught her mid-laugh, but everyone is smiling. There’s just that trio of odd faces between mom, Cruz & Dean that kinda throw it. (Also note my dad was drugged, doesn’t he look great?!)

Happily searching, that is until Uncle Zac started filling the eggs with dirt and shouting, “I found one more.” Then the kids were crying. That was super fun.

He’s the cutest-est. And so brown. Cruz is so happy that he now has Grandpa, Mommy, Quin and Dean to be brown with. (No joke, the kids sort out who is brown and who is white. They argue over Grandpa, “Is he brown or is he RED?”)

Quin. It wasn’t worth it guys. You can’t fight with a two year old over pictures, Jude tried though.

I can’t stop staring at this one of Dean. He knows so much.

Easter hairs.

Grandma is so smart, just fruit snacks and money in the eggs this year. Solves the allergy problems and the kids are obviously not given enough money. All that over a quarter, haha!

Even this guy couldn’t contain himself with all the joy going round.

Nana & Rara, our faves.

And just one more of my favorite little guy since he’s so new. He’s already/only one month old, but look at those cheeks and arm rolls. The best!

When we first got all the information about this situation it seemed much more grim then what the actually story ended at. We didn’t realize the level of support this girl had, or the level of doubts she had about adoption until the day before she went into labor. (Note that I was not talking directly to the mom at this point, only to the social worker, so it’s always a little more confusing in any case.) We are super open with our heart for adoption, and we want to help in any way we can, but if a girl feels she can parent (despite a crisis pregnancy), her family and friends want to support her, and they have the resources to do so, then it probably isn’t a situation that needs us. That’s basically this situation in a nutshell.

The positive is, with both Joel and I, we know we were respectful of this momma, we truly wanted to support her and her baby no matter what she chose, and there is nothing to regret in the sense that we are just us, doing what we love – supporting adoption because we believe in it. We only wish we could have had more information earlier so we could have known our place better. The worst feeling I’ve had in this is that I didn’t really know what this girl wanted, but because of that, I assumed that she needed our “help”. “Help” essentially being that we would “take” the baby she wanted to parent – possibly the most awkward feeling ever!

Once I learned that this mom had both the ability and the want to parent, my whole mom-side turned off toward the specific situation. The only real unfortunate part is that this all coincides with us running out of time on our home study and still never having had a viable adoption situation. We don’t qualify for most types of adoption. We have biological and adopted children. We’ve never experienced infertility (or even a miscarriage). We are young and not rich. We have full lives. Most birthparents want everything the opposite of us. It’s hard to think that we aren’t good enough for adoption when there have been few things as important to us in the past 10 years.

On the flip side, my dad had another surgery yesterday that we hope will give him some real relief, we get to see all our family on Sunday (our new nephew Dean is going to be subjected to both Joel and I aggressively fighting over him for the entire Easter holiday), and we stinking love the kids we have. If this is all life offers us, how dare we complain. As my mom says, “No one died, so that’s good.” (And how much does that say about our last year as a family?!)

Ironically, today is the day that we actually celebrate death – Good Friday. The day Someone did die making all this adoption stuff more then just a legal process and giving it a heavenly meaning for believers. Doesn’t that seem funny that I’m here today blogging this? I kinda can’t get over it. Much like I can’t get over sharing this song every Good Friday.

Come close listen to the story, about a love more faithful than the morning

The Father gave his only Son just to save us

The earth was shaking in the dark
All creation felt the Fathers broken heart
tears were filling heaven’s eyes
The day that true love died, the day that true love died
When blood and water hit the ground
Walls we couldn’t move came crashing down
We were free and made alive
The day that true love died, The day that true love died

Search your heart you know you can’t deny it
Come on, lose your life just so you can find it
The Father gave his only son just to save us

The earth was shaking in the dark
All creation felt the Fathers broken heart
tears were filling heaven’s eyes
The day that true love died, the day that true love died
When blood and water hit the ground
Walls we couldn’t move came crashing down
We were free and made alive
The day that true love died, The day that true love died

Now, Jesus is alive

Jesus is alive
Oh, He is alive
He rose again

When blood and water hit the ground
Walls we couldn’t move came crashing down
We were free and made alive
The day that true love died, The day that true love died

>>>><<<<

xxoo

Happy Resurrection! 

(*Updated to add: Both rompers on the ends are Gap, as are both the sweaters. The grey dress on the left is Peek Kids, Mustard yellow dress is American Apparel, and the outfit in the middle is Mabo.)

Unfortunately/Fortunately I didn’t have anything in tiny little girl size, so you know what we had to do? Shop. The girls are in heaven! How are baby things getting so much cuter by the day? When Jude was a baby, things were not this cute!

So, along with that, we’ve just been cleaning the house and trying to be ready for whenever baby decides to arrive.

>>>>><<<<<

Now, for those who asked me questions/those who want to hear all the details…

We really truly considered not telling anyone about anything adoption wise until after the baby was here, but the more we realized we were bad at keeping secrets, the more we also realized that secrets aren’t going to make our friends want to adopt. (Hint, hint, anyone?!) So, while we are fully aware of the “risks” (if you call them that) of sharing it all with you, we also really hope that people will be able to learn from this process with us and be supportive of us no matter the outcome… and if you all adopted too, we’d be overjoyed!

That being said, here’s how we explained this whole situation to the kids, “There is a mommy who is considering adoption and we are going to do everything we can to help her while she makes her decision.” They understand that this means they go to Grandma & Grandpa’s while Daddy & Mommy go out to dinner with her, and that we are getting ready to bring the baby home, and that she has two options: A. She takes her baby home and parents her. OR B. She asks us to adopt her baby and then we get to be the baby’s family too.

To us, the “risk” is that we help this girl, but don’t necessarily adopt this specific child – not a bad thing, right?! Our prayer is that while this mom moves forward in her adoption plan, which she is, that she would have peace that it is the right decision for her and her baby. We will hear more about her hospital plan after the weekend, or maybe she’ll have the baby tomorrow? We are placing bets on that possibility it since our social worker is out of town and unavailable tomorrow only – babies love to make dramatic entrances.

And do you know what showed up on my doorstep last night? A box from Zara with this in it…

Julia, you are the best ever, and I’m guessing you had an accomplice?! Thank you, thank you!

There are a million other things I want to tell you all and I’m sure there will be lots of questions, which we will be happy to answer (You know how to comment!) I wanted to call everyone and explain personally before making a blog announcement, but with so little time it just couldn’t happen – so forgive us for the rush, but we really are so thankful for everyone who has been praying for our adoption and please pray for this mom as she moves forward in her adoption plan. As exstatic as we are, adoption always has a flip side. xxoo

(Can you imagine one more precious little face in with these?!)