Jace's Blessing

We blessed our handsome boy on Easter Sunday, April 24th, 2011. The day was extra special because my cousin/one of my closest friends, Che'Lyn, blessed her little boy (well her husband Landon did) as well. It was a really great day. Devin gave Jace an incredible blessing, saying many wonderful things. The thing that stood out most to me was that he said Jace is a "noble spirit" who was sent to the Earth at this time with a great work to do. I can already get a sense of Jace's noble spirit that Devin referred to and I am excited to see what he accomplishes in his life. He is such a sweet boy and we love him very much.

Remember how Jace was born on Chris's birthday and is named after him? His blessing was held just one day before the anniversary of Chris's death date. In honor of Chris, my favorite Chris-ism before going on: "I never have bad days, only good days and better days." Love it. I hope that my little Jace grows up understanding that, though he never met Chris in this life, he would do well to learn about his life and to follow his example.

Alright, some pictures. Jace's little outfit barely fit, and seemed to be high waters unless we continually pulled the legs of the pants down. Oh well. Tall...what can we say?
Hallie and Sadie wanted to pose in their Easter dresses and get pictures holding Jace. Check out Hallie's glum face in the last picture. Nice, very nice.



Some pictures of those who came: (Sorry we didn't get everyone!)
Kylie, Slava, Shawna, Jace, Kayden, and Keegan
Cortney, Mason, Avery, Max, and Neil
Landon and Che' and their little man (Jace's best friend) Hudson Colby. Nothing better than sharing your blessing day with your cousin and newest best friend.


Jen and Steve
Brock, Grandma, Lynn, Barb, Desi, and Emilee. It was a tad bit cold in the park where we did the luncheon. We were just glad it did not rain.
Linda, Jack, and Brad
Trey, Trex, Tyge, Mesha, and Tade. Too bad Aaron was home with an pneumonia.
Cole, Travis (and Jace), Kirston, Ryder, and Brelynn
Jenny, Dallin, Brooklyn, Katelyn, Samara, and Travis
The spread. Putting a luncheon on for 100 people is stressful, let me just tell you. We had WAYYY to much food, which is better than not having enough! It turned out really well, though.
Pictures in the car seat are not the best, but he was just looking so darn cute, I couldn't resist.

Cute little shoes and high water pants.
ohhhh that sun is bright!

Our family of four. Not the best picture ever, especially since Hallie was not willing to smile, but oh well.

What a great day!

Easter Celebrations

Our Easter was amazing. We held most of the festivities on Saturday. Friday evening we did get to go swimming, though. Hallie had been excited for days when we told her that Grandma and Poppy were coming and asked if we could go swimming in their pool (they always stay at the same hotel and stay there so often apparently the pool has become theirs). I came home on Thursday from work and Hallie was walking around the house naked (except for shoes) and carrying her swimming suit because she was really itchin' to go. Swimming is one of her favorite activities.

Anyway, we did get to go swimming. Hallie was a maniac. She jumped right off the edge of the pool over and over and didn't care if anyone was there to catch her. Good thing she wears arm floaties. She also has learned to swim on her own. No guidance needed. So fun. Little Jacer had his first swimming experience as well, which was very fun. We thought he would hate it since he does not like to be cold, but he really enjoyed it! He didn't cry once. Apparently we have fish for kids.



We decided to do our Easter baskets on Saturday morning instead of Sunday so that we could focus on the spiritual aspect of Easter on the Sabbath. We had quite the lineup on the fireplace with Jen and Steve's stuff, too.



After the fun of baskets, we had breakfast and then started running a lot of errands to prepare for the afternoon and for Sunday's activities. We just had to catch this picture though, as Sadie wanted Hallie to feed her her sippy cup and Hallie was more than happy to comply. Its funny that Hallie thinks she is so much older than Sadie and treats her like a baby. She just enjoys bossing someone around, I guess.
The girls got bubbles from Aunt Jen and had a good time playing with them outside while Devin and I were gone. Sadie also liked helping to feed Jace. That afternoon, everyone started arriving. Boy was it fun to cram like 30 people into our tiny house! I love it. Chaos everywhere, people all over, extreme amounts of noise...I just really enjoy family time. We had many things going on at once: cupcake making, egg dying, brownie making, salad making for the next day, stuffing easter eggs, eating, and chatting.

Finally the time came for our amazing hunt. I LOVE this tradition. Growing up, we had an egg hunt at my Grandma's house every year. The boys hid eggs for the girls and vice versa. Her yard is perfect for this type of thing as it has tons of trees, bushes, rocks, etc. We girls thought we were sneaky and would hide huge stockpiles of eggs in really hard spots and then go back to get them after the hunt was over and the boys didn't find them. ha ha! We always got money in our eggs, not candy, which is spectacular. There is nothing better than carrying around a ziplock baggie of $14 in quarters, dimes, nickles, and pennies. Anyway, we combined the two methods for the kids this year and did some money and some candy. We did two separate hunts in a park down the street- one for the four 2 year olds and one for the other four kids that are older than 2. So much fun! I love it. The best part is that it was pouring rain.
All the kids- Jack, Carter, Mason, Ryen, Avery, Hallie, and Sadie. Max is unpictured as he was not happy at the time.

That night, we went to dinner at Sizzler. It was fun until Mason threw up and then Hallie threw up. Then, not so fun. Yeah, no family functions are complete without a few throwing up incidents. Too much candy, anyone? Anyway, it was a great day and we had a blast with everyone.

While all the festivities were fun, it is important for me to note that I am grateful for the real reason for Easter- the celebration of the resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for Him and his ultimate sacrifice so that we can live eternally with Him and our Heavenly Father some day.

Grad-u-A-tion

This weekend was a very busy and exciting one for our family. It started with Devin's graduation, then Easter celebrations, and culminated in the blessing of our sweet Jace. More on the latter two later, but let's start at the beginning.

Friday was a big day in the life of Devin. He graduated from BYU with his degree in Landscape Management. I am so proud of him. It seems like this was a long time coming to me, but in reality, he completed his degree in the normal four years. We are the same age and got married a short 6 months after his mission (yeah, what were we thinking?! Just kidding...it has all been wonderful).

I am usually not one to talk constantly about how amazing my husband is, but I am going to this time. Let's face it- he is amazing. Devin's typical schedule for the past four years was to get up at 7 am or so, go to school until noon, come home and be with the kid(s) while doing home work until 4 pm , then go to work from 4-12. Wake up the next day, repeat. Weekends were not a break, but typically consisted of more work. Devin has always been a very hard worker and he is also a very committed family man, so he had to walk a fine line to balance all the roles he needed to play. It was never a question that his priority was at home with me and the children, but he also managed to work full time while going to school full time. He was quickly promoted to a management position in his job, which allowed us to get through school debt free.

While we decided at first that we wanted to wait about two years to have children, we soon knew that we were supposed to have children quicker than that and knew that everything would work out. We had Hallie after we had been married about a year and a half and we have been so blessed. I look back and I am just amazed at how well we have been taken care of. My job has also been such a huge blessing, which I have talked about before- but one that I am so grateful for because it allows me the flexibility to always rearrange my schedule around Devin's so that he can be home when I am not.

Last weekend we had stake conference and I just sat and reflected the whole time on how blessed we have been in these last four years. I had my journal with me and felt like I should write down how grateful I am for all that we have been given. (Sorry to those who spoke for not paying attention as well as I should have...)

It is interesting to sit on the threshold of a new era of our lives now, since all we have known is being students and going to school. I guess we will see how life changes as Devin looks for jobs, etc. On that end, we will be staying in Utah for at least another year or so because we need to stay in our house for three years total (we bought it with the tax credit) and because moving would jeopardize the adoption process. After that, we will see where life takes us!

Okay, enough of my ramblings. Please enjoy some pictures of the long and boring event (but one that I so loved anyway because it truly meant the end of one era and the beginning of another!). We were grateful to have my mom, Dave, my sister Jennifer and her husband Steve and daughter Sadie, and Devin's two sisters Shawna and Alisa come to the ceremony. Sitting next to Shawna and Alisa was great because it kept me entertained throughout some of the more dull parts (like the reading of a thousand names, of which Devin's was within the last 10. Lovely.) Hallie and Sadie were also entertaining. They were shushing their babies and rocking them. Love Sadie's face here...
Alisa and Shawna. Devin's sisters are beautiful. I want to be like them someday.
Nice face, Steve. I am sure they were not bored at this point or anything.
Sadie wanted a chance to hold "baby Jace" as she calls him. I think she needs a sibling, eh?
Dave is a good egg and ran down to the floor to take pictures of Devin appearing out of the tunnel.
Walking across the stage. Luckily he is easy to spot since he is so tall.
Three of the Perry children.
Our little family. Hmm, does it appear that I am not supporting Jace's head very well? Please ignore that. I try to be a good mother and that generally includes supporting my children's heads when they need it.
My family who came: Sadie, Jen, Steve, Hallie, Dev, me, Jace, Mom, Dave
This just makes me proud. and happy.
Hallie was supposed to be in this picture but was throwing a fit instead.

Ahh, okay, there we go. That's the best we could do.

Now onto the next adventure. Which is????

(PS, thanks to my sister for all the pictures from the entire weekend. Her camera is much better than mine, so she graciously agreed to capture all photographic evidence of our weekend)

Hallie-isms

I feel like I do these posts all the time, but Hallie says funny things a lot and I want to record them. She will love it later, promise. So here are some recent Hallie-isms:

*During General Conference, Devin and I didn't want to move to go get Jace a diaper, so we asked Hallie to go get one. She ran upstairs and came back down a short while later with this announcement: "I couldn't reach, reach, reach" all while doing a little jazzer-cise move, jutting out her hip and pointing her hand in the air. (This is false, by the way. She can easily reach, reach, reach the diapers).

*While throwing a little ball back and forth with Devin, she suddenly said, "throw it to my hands, sweetie." This is odd because neither Devin or I use the word "sweetie" that I can recall. Later, she added to it by saying, "throw it to my hands, sweetie dad."

*Whenever she gets something out of the fridge or cupboards that I tell her she can't have, she retorts with, "I am going to share with my dad!" I am so sure... she is just trying to make me believe that Devin requested some food item. What she doesn't know is that I am smart and I am aware of her favorite snacks and his favorite snacks and they generally aren't the same.

*One night Hallie threw a fit when I tried to help her brush her teeth, clenching her mouth shut and rolling her head around so the task was just short of impossible. I gave up and sent her to bed. (Yeah, I know what you are thinking... I am a bad mom for not brushing her teeth for two minutes three times daily. Oh well.) A few minutes later, she started pounding on her door and shouting, "mom! I need to brush my teeth! My mouth is dirty!" Yeah...a trick to get out of her room. I didn't fall for it.

*We had zucchini one night for dinner, something Hallie had never had, or at least not that she could remember. She had a really hard time remembering what they were called and ended up calling them "Cinderellas" all night long. I am not sure how she went from zucchinis to Cinderellas, but okay. All that matters is that she liked the "Cinderellas" and ate a lot of them.

*After Jace spit up on me once: "Awwww, honey, your shirt is dirty!" (in her sweetest baby voice).

*One day when Jace was fussing a little bit and I was in the other room, I heard Hallie consoling him with the following: "Jacer...Jacer...no need to whine, buddy!"

*One night when I woke her up to take her to the bathroom, she was still fairly asleep, but kept repeating, "whip cream....whip cream....whiiiiip cream" all the way up the stairs. I wonder what she dreams about?

*Recently we were singing "Old McDonald" and I let her choose the animals to sing about in each verse. First she chose a cow, then she chose a dog, then she chose...an animal cracker. When I told her that an animal cracker is not specific animal that we could sing about, she was quite mad. Being as insistent as she is, we sang a few verses of "Old McDonald had an animal cracker..." Now, you try to tell me what sound an animal cracker makes.

*One night at dinner, as I was getting seconds, she eyed me worriedly and said, "That's A LOT, Mommy!" Well, thanks, Hals. Glad she is worried about my weight. Someone should be.

My Other Life

I feel like I almost have two lives: my life at home and my life at work.

While I only work about 18-20 hours per week, my job has become a large part of who I am and the things I get to be a part of influence me a lot.

I got my case load all nice and tidied up before I had Jace, so that nothing pressing would need to happen while I was gone. When I went back to work (I only took two weeks off, so its not like it was that dramatic), I was honestly bored for a while since I had done everything I needed to do before I left. I told everyone that I needed more clients and I could help them with whatever they might need help with. Ha. That comes back to kick me in the butt quite quickly.

The interesting thing about my job is you never know what you are going to get and the tide can turn quickly. This week has been crazy and though I feel like I have barely had time to stop and smell the roses (and yet I sit here blogging), it has been a good week.

Saturday I was able to go to the sealing of one of my adoptive couples to their daughter. In Utah, couples wait six months to finalize their adoptions and then can go to the Temple to seal their children. That was a really special experience for me. I love the spirit of the Temple and I love seeing families bound together through the sealing ordinance. This one was particularly special to me because I had been the worker for the birth mom, too, so it came a full circle. I knew her story and I knew this couple's story. The whole thing was just sacred because I felt the Spirit testify to me that this little girl was being sealed to her family, the family she was supposed to be in, despite coming a different way. It is interesting because when her birth mom chose this couple, I was concerned because she literally just picked the family off the top of the stack of profiles without even looking at the rest. I had such thoughts as "what if I didn't put the right family on the top of the stack if the birth mother was just going to choose the first one?" Well, I know now that this little girl was always intended for this family, not matter where their profile would have been presented in the stack. Special experience for sure.

The rest of the weekend can only be described as a madhouse. Before the sealing, I got a text message from one of my couples who said their birth mom went into labor 3 weeks early. After I got out of the Temple, I got another text from a birth mom I was working with that said that she was in labor, 8 weeks early. Wowsa. Suffice it to say that Sunday was insane. I went from texting and making calls during church (don't worry it was necessary and I hid in the mother's lounge so as to not look ridiculous and rude in Relief Society) to a trip to the hospital to see the birth mom I am working with, then to the agency to sign placement paperwork with my couple, then back to the hospital to see my birth mom and go through a face to face meeting with the couple she had chosen (she came in quite late in her pregnancy and we did not expect the baby to come that early, so she had never met the couple...). I was gone basically all day. Most weekends are not like that. I sit home and relax. It just so happened that both of these things occurred at the same time, making it a little crazy.

Monday the birth parents I am working with (the birth father was involved) relinquished their rights to their baby. Relinquishments are always bittersweet to me. While they are incredibly sad and emotionally difficult, there is also a sense of happiness in knowing that the baby is going to go to a family who is prepared to have him/her and it is especially comforting knowing that God does guide this process and that each child is sealed to the family where he/she belongs. I know I have said that before, but I have such a testimony of that.

Tuesday another one of my couples had a face to face meeting with a birth mother who has chosen them. She is due next month. Hopefully her baby comes on time, not this week...that would send it over the top for the most action at once, for sure. Face to Face meetings are exciting as well. This one was particularly funny as both the adoptive mom and the birth mom are hilarious and have similar personalities. The other caseworker and I just sat back and laughed for the great majority of the time. Again, though, it was easy to see that this birth mom has chosen the correct family for her child. Both the birth mother and the adoptive mother shared pretty sacred experiences that have led them to where they are now.

I just think it is so incredible that I get to play such a role in the creation of families. I keep a little list amongst my work things of all the relinquishments I have been a part of and all the placements I have been a part of (relinquishment means I was working with the birth parents and placement means I was working with the adoptive couple) and sometimes I just pull it out to reflect on all the special experiences that I have been a part of. It is just amazing to me that I have been trusted to do this. While I know that my most important role is that of a mother, I feel that this work is also incredibly important and I am blessed to be a part of it. Is it sometimes stressful? YES. Ask my co-workers how I described this week at our weekly meeting. They got an earful. BUT, in the end, I am always so grateful to be a part of the creation of eternal families through the sacred process of adoption.

Videos of the Kiddies

Hallie is pretty funny with Jace sometimes. You can see her interactions with him in these videos.



I tried to interview Hallie about her life in this last one. She somewhat participated...

Also

How cute is my new background? My friend from high school, Hilary, runs a shop called Simply Yours Designs, where she customizes blog backgrounds. Check it out here! I WON this background in one of her giveaways and I was so ecstatic because you all know that I have no creativity and my blog always needs help. So THANK YOU HIL for giving me a much needed face lift!