We Are Soooooo Excited!

9 months ago my sister, Shauna, and her husband, Sean, found out they would be adopting a baby.  They have been involved in the waiting game that comes along with adopting and were finally selected by a mom in Indiana.  Everyone is so excited for them.  A week from today they fly to Indiana for the birth of their baby boy.  A week ago yesterday my friend Ligia and I threw Shauna the most spectacular baby shower.  I know that kind of sounds conceited, but it turned out pretty awesome.  Ligia and I spent a long time online looking for baby shower themes and finally decided on a candy/sweets based shower.  We found the cutest invitation idea and the test of the ideas flowed from there.  We had so much fun planning the shower.  We probably had too much fun.  Shauna had a very large invite list and so many people turned out.  It was a happy day to celebrate the little life they are being blessed with.  Asher we are so excited to welcome you into the family next month.  Thank you so much Claire for being an answer to prayers.  Sean and Shauna are truly being blessed by you.

The Invite:

The Decor:

I ended up with an adorable onsie banner thanks to Carrie teaching me how to freezer paper stencil.

Chantell made the best diaper cake.  Look at the binkys on the bows.  They are made of candy.

The Friends:

This is Shauna and Sara (one of Shauna's best friends from forever ago).

It was so good to see the love and support of so many people.  We had 40 people show up for the shower.

The Games:

Wendy was our lovely game hostess.

Sean showed up for a few minutes to participate in the "Parenting Game" very much like the Newly wed game.

The Food:

The Candy/Decor/Favor:

This was the best part!

The Favors:

These takeout boxes turned into our favor boxes.  We didn't want to be left with all our candy decorations so...

...at the end when people were leaving they got to fill their favor boxes with sweets to go.  It was great seeing grown ladies act like kids in a candy store.

Wendy and Ligia filling up on sweets.

Thanks for doing the games Wendy and Chantell for some of the beautiful pictures, adorable diaper cake, and some delicious food.  And the biggest thank you to Ligia for helping me give Shauna the best shower ever.  I totally sound like I'm accepting an award.  Well it was a great shower.

Montgomery County Fair

Three years ago we took Tade and Seth to the county fair.  Seth was only a couple months old and didn't remember a thing, but Tade LOVED it.  Every time we pass the fair grounds he brings up that he wants to go to the fair again.  Unfortunately we have been out of town for the past two fair weeks.  This year we were finally in town during the fair.  So Andelyne, the boys, and I headed to the fair.  It was a hot day in the high 80s low 90s which for this summer was actually not so hot.  This summer has been miserable.  As we were driving in and paying for parking my phone rang.  It was our friends Ligia and Madeline telling us to look in the mirror.  She was right behind us.  We had talked about going to the fair sometime, but never picked a day.  So it was fun that we picked the same day and time and ended up parking right next to each other.  When we got there it was just the 4H barns that were open.  We saw a lot of sheep, chickens, cows, pigs, rabbits, and goats.  It was a lot of fun to share the stinky animals with our friends.

Tade and his buddy Madeline.

I think this was Seth favorite part.  He keeps telling me he wants to drive big trucks and tractors when he gets bigger.

Our scout troop we there helping with a rope bridge in the kid zone.

So long, but not farewell

Last week we said goodbye to our good friends the Fredins.  They moved to Maryland two years ago knowing they would probably only be in the area for two years.  That time has flown bye, but we will never forget the fun we had together.  Thank you Carrie, Nat, Luke, Noah, and Isaac for being such good friends and such a wonderful example of a loving family.  We have observed and learned so many things from you.  We will miss you.  We find ourselves very grateful for modern technology and how easily it allows us to keep in touch.  Good luck with the next chapter of your lives wherever that might be.

A Call to Arms

Battlefields in this area during the summer are awesome.  They do a ton of reenactments.  Jake took the boys back to Monocacy Battlefield for their Jr. Ranger Call to Arms Day.  They had so much fun doing infantry training, signal corps, and artillery loading.  The boys came home in full civil war mode.  It was quite cute.

Taking their soldier oath.

Learning to march

Marching with muskets.  Both Seth's hat and muskets were a little too big.

CHARGE!!!!

Receiving regimental discharge papers.