Gotcha Day!

One year ago today I flew to Guatemala and Sadie came to stay with me that night forever! It's hard to believe it's been a whole year! The time has gone quickly but when I look at pictures I see how much she has changed in a year. We will be celebrating by visiting my niece and her family in Austin, TX this weekend. I hope every year Sadie and I will be able to do something special during this week!

I've been meaning to update you on the situation with adoptions in Guatemala. Many of you received an e-mail from me awhile back asking you to contact your representatives regarding legislation in Guatemala that would stop all adoptions as of January 1--even those already in process. Well, there is good news to report. Although not final, there are amendments that will be voted on soon that would allow in-process cases to be completed. In addition it pushes back the Hague implementation date to April 30 rather than January 1. This is more in-line with the US date of Hague implementation and hopefully would allow adoptions to continue uninterrupted (though that's a big hopefully). Finally there is some legislation that would allow singles to continue to adopt which was threatened as well. This is all good news and I appreciate all of you who made phone calls, wrote letters, and prayed about this situation!

In more good news to report--Sadie now calls me Dr. Mommy! Well, not really but I made her say it! Yes, I finally defended my dissertation last week and all went well! I won't graduate till the spring but it's fairly official at this point! Woo hoo!

Enjoy the pics below!

We visited our favorite paint your own pottery place last weekend. Sadie was perfectly happy with her pen and paper but when everyone begged me to let her paint, I gave in...here she is being prepared for the job!

My little Picasso...

She actually did very well and there was no lasting damage!

They had a Halloween parade at Sadie's school. I was sure if she saw me she wouldn't walk in the parade but she did so well! I was so proud of her marching around the parking lot with all the other kids!

Hi Mommy!

After about 15 minutes all the kids start melting down...you can see Sadie is preparing for an outburst here!

" I've had enough! Get me out of these crazy clothes!"

I had to include some pics of my sweet niece (well, actually she is my great-niece but I'm still having trouble claiming the title of "Great Aunt". Hmmm...maybe Dr. Great Aunt Dorie might work...) who was a 50's girl for Halloween! Isn't she adorable? She is just 3 weeks younger than Sadie. We will be seeing her in 2 more days!