Jess-ica

Posing for the camera. 

At our house Jesse has an alter ego named Jessica. Jessica comes to visit about once a month. With Jesse's gorgeous long eyelashes how can Gracie resist dressing him up every now and then?

Not so sure about this whole Jessica thing. This is the first
picture taken. He quickly got into the groove as you can see above.

Hair Bow

Gracie amazes me with her interest in hair. I literally had never touched my hair until I moved in with my dad at the age of 12 and woke up realizing I had to do my hair for school. This was no small feat considering I still was ratting my bangs at that time (yes this was 1994 people). Hence my nickname Chia, as in Chia pet. ba ha ha. Another story for another day. Anyway Gracie loves to look up hair styles on Youtube and then practice them. My little fashionista!

She partially made this one up on her own. It's literally a hair bow.

My darling girl. Love her! She made dinner for the family tonight and bathed the baby. Thank you sweet girl!

Gracie's 9th Birthday

Nine already?!? It can't be so. My baby is growing up. She is maturing so quickly. She is our perfectionist and worry wart and we love her SO much! She has always been so darling and I am proud to be her mama.

Another pirate party!

I made this shirt for her to wear. She loves it!

This is a necklace she wanted off Etsy. She was really thrilled that I actually
remembered and bought it! 

Pin the patch on the pirate! Of course it couldn't just be a generic pirate
it had to be the infamous Jack Sparrow!

Freeze dance! Emmy (girl in blue) won every time. She is great at
stopping on a dime!

Constipation maybe?!?

Kenzie (on right) is just about to sneeze.

In the middle of saying "CUUUUTE!"

Gracie and her friend Gracee....adopted from Guatemala. She is such a character!
I always enjoy having her over.

Gracie got a new outfit for her favorite baby  Alissa.
I am NOT allowed to call Gracie and Ava's babies "dolls." 

L-R : Leah, Kenzie, Gracie, Emma, Gracee
Jesse and Ava too!

Monsters and Cupcakes

I have been working frantically trying to get this monster quilt done for my new nephew Learick! We got to go down on Friday and meet him. He is dark and ADORABLE! He is half Columbian and 1/8 Mexican. Love it!

Ava and I had a great time combining a few different appliques to make
her a little monster girly. Gracie even pitched in and decided we could
use a whale spout for the pony tail.

Learick Samuel Webber

This is little Learick Samuel. Yes I'm looking divine aren't I? Hunchback don't have nothin' on me!

The lady that sales the appliques names them. This is Humphrey. 

This is Spike.

This is Chunk the Cave Monster. He started out with two arms but wouldn't fit
 so I had to perform surgery and get rid of one. It is tedious work sewing around every eye,
tooth, mouth etc... but it gives me time to just zone out and think.

 I made the quilt below for a darling girl that was just recently adopted from Bulgaria. I contacted her mom and she said she would adore having a little rag quilt for her. You can read about her story here. You can also find more of the adorable applique patterns here.

Christmas Part 2

I just wanted to finish my thoughts on our 2012 Christmas holiday! 

The girls spent the evening dancing to their shuffles and twirling their twirly-ma-gig things that Santa bought. Ryan and I sat on the couch and humored them, although he was playing Angry Birds on his phone most of the time. ;-)

Ryan made an afternoon meal of ham, potatoes and gravy, rolls, salad, and raspberry crunch!

YUM! Love that crunch!

After the boys were in bed, Ry and the girls started the book Who Was Walt Disney?

Announcing......

We are finally adopting after years of having it on the table. We have chosen a 5-year-old little boy from Hunan, China. He is 5 months older than Breck, born on July 21, 2007. He has some special needs, right eye ptosis (lazy eye), and 3 fingers on each hand. We are very excited to finally be pursuing his adoption and look forward to sharing this journey with our family and friends.

I am unable to publicly share a blog about him at this time BUT I have set up a private blog where you can see pictures and find out more about our little guy. You do need a blogger account to sign in. If you don't have one they are easy to create. Please if you are interested give me your blogger email address so I can add you to the list. If you aren't comfortable leaving it in the comments you can email me at rachelshphrd@yahoo.com If you set up a blog account I'm pretty sure you can just use your regular email address as your blogger email address.

Don't forget to vote on the two polls I have set up on the side of the blog! You can find the blog by clicking here.

Christmas Part 1

This had to be one of the best Christmases we've had. Not because of what we got but just the feeling in our home. Ryan told me he wouldn't be home from Mongolia until December 26th but he surprised us all and came home on the 21st! We spent the 24th swimming at the public pool, watching Christmas movies, making and eating finger foods, and unwrapping Christmas jammies.