4th day of Christmas...

Tonight we met up with some friends and went snow tubing at the Bricktown ballpark. We have been wanting to go for years and were so glad our friend Misti got things together!

Getting ready for some tubing!

The boys

The girls

We really had such a great time! Hopefully we will have some real snow here this week! "I'm dreaming of a White Christmas"!

5th day of Christmas...

Last night my amazing sister-in-law had a wonderful Christmas idea for her 4 girls and we were able to be apart of it. They all watched Polar Express the movie yesterday afternoon. Last night, the girls were put to bed and my brother-in-law got them up for a trip on the "Polar Express". They stayed in their pajama's and had hot cocoa and cookies in the car and drove around looking at Christmas lights. How much fun is that! We were a surprise at the end of the drive. They got here late and got to spend the night! It was so much fun seeing how excited they were telling us about the whole night.

Did I mention they were were footie pajamas?!?! My favorite!!!

When the girls got here, we made an Elf Yourself video with their faces.. They laughed for 15 minutes straight! It was hilarious!

The Polar Express Night was such a great idea! I am definatley stealing this idea when baby Plumb gets here!

6th day of Christmas...

A day late on the 6th day, and the 5th day will be a day late too, but I will catch up!:) Yesterday was one of those jammed packed kinda days. This afternoon we went with my parent to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert at the Ford Center. The music was great and the light show was amazing! And I have never seen a group of people throw their hair around like these people did! They LOVED their hair!:)

Getting ready for the concert.

Here is a little peak of some of the excitement.

After the concert, the youth group had our annual Christmas party. We did a regressive party this year. We went to 4 families houses with a meal at each house. The difference with a regressive dinner is that we started with dessert and ended with the appetizers. The students also dressed up "backwards". We had summer clothes, close worn inside out, and other fun outfits.

The Sr. High

The Jr. High

Love these guys. They always make for a great night!

7th day of Christmas...

Today was a very relaxing day, but filled with Christmas happenings. We started the day out waking up around 10, and watching Home Alone. We are trying to enjoy sleeping in late as much as we can because we know that that won't be happening in a few months when a certain someone gets here!:)

We then decided to get creative a build a Gingerbread house. Now we did cheat a little bit and bought a pre-built house.
The icing was so annoying. There was no way I would have been able to make a bow like they showed on the box! No way!

Brian concentrating hard!

The finished house!

Well, I thought we were finished. Brian kept finding more things in the kitchen to add!

8th day of Christmas...

Tonight after eating dinner and looking at Christmas lights with some friends, we turned on the fire, cuddled up on the couch, and turned on out favorite Christmas movie.... No matter how many times we watch it, it always makes us laugh! And we love finding new things that make us laugh that we have never noticed before!
Brian's favorite lines: Clark: "Hey kids, I heard on the news that an airplane pilot spotted Santa's sleigh on its way from New York City?"
Eddie: "Are you serious Clark?"


My favorite line(s): Eddie: "She falls down a well, her eyes go cross. She gets kicked by a mule, they go back. I don't know."

Put your Christmas hat on!

Have I mentioned that Brian LOVES Christmas? Anything that has to do with Christmas, Brian loves. And the tackier the better.:) A few years ago, he started to collect Christmas hats. Let me show you some of the collection. The traditional Santa hat.

We call this the "Eddie" Christmas hat.

(Eddie from Christmas Vacation)

Santa's helper.

The beard hat. This is kind of a famous hat. You may remember seeing a guy from Oklahoma wearing it on the Today Show a couple of years ago.:)

And here is the newest addition to the collection! A hat that sings and dances! How much more fun can it get?!?!?!

9th day of Christmas...

On the 9th day of Christmas we went shopping and we are F-I-N-I-S-H-E-D! Yippee! We were going to get everything done on Saturday but something told us there would be a lot of people out getting that shopping list done. It is kinda sad that all the shopping is over. Brian and I both LOVE buying gifts!

I even found a new addition to our baby library! (Did I mention that I LOVE children's books!)

Brian shopping. I think he looks good in hats, don't you?

So we have been Christmas shopping, light gazing, goody making, and choir listening. Wonder what the next days of Christmas will hold!

10th Day of Christmas...

Tonight's Christmas task was looking at Christmas lights! It is something that Brian and I both have wonderful memories of doing with our families when we were younger.

Brian "oooohhhh"ing and "awwwww"ing over the lights!

I am the driver because all the stopping and going makes me sick. I was the passenger last year. It did not work out. This video was at some church friends, The Cochran's, who have a Christmas lights show at their house.

Christmas lights will definitely get you into the Christmas spirit.

11th day of Christmas...

Tonight was Christmas baking night. Well, I guess we didn't actually bake, but we did make some Christmas goodies. Brian and I (and when I say Brian and I, I usually mean me:)) always try to make something little for our coworkers. This year, I found a recipe for a gourmet popcorn. Really easy and REALLY good. Even Brian joined in on the fun!

The ingredients for 30batches of popcorn crunch

Stirring, stirring stirring.

The most annoying task was picking our the popcorn kernels. Butter everywhere. YUCK!

Brian, don't stand too close to the microwave. There are studies out about that you know!:)
The finished product. Why does it always sound like more fun being in the kitchen making Christmas goodies
than it actually is?

P.S. I am never going to eat popcorn or almond bark again!:)

12 days of Christmas!

Can you believe it! Only 12 more days until Christmas! Where is the time going? I feel like we haven't even really enjoyed the season yet. Brian and I have decided that for the next 12 days, we are going to do something Christmasy every day. Try to savor the season!

Tonight, we went to the Westmoore choir concert to listen to some of the youth group sing. They were great! At the end, the director invited anyone who knew the song, "Hallelujah" to come on stage and sing along. Brian jumped right up! Keep in mind, he did not know any of the words. He just figured that he could just move his lips and fit right in.

That is Brian right in the middle. Green and blue striped shirt. Pretending to read the music notes. I am so proud. :) Enjoy your 12 days of Christmas!

2 months!

2 months on the waiting list?!?!?! That is it?!?!? I have to admit, this month has gone by VERY slowly waiting wise for me. Maybe it is the fact that we have seen some Oklahoman families get their referral (yippee!), which make me even more excited for ours! I am just ready! Some days it feels like we have already been waiting forever! But everyday is one day closer to our baby!!!!

Eat Mor Chikin

I should tell you that Brian LOVES Chick-fil-A. In college, he would split a tray of 50 nuggets with his best friend. It is even a staple at the Plumb family Christmas. So he was super excited when we saw that there was a Chick-fil-A opening on the south side!

A couple of days ago, two markets came to the church to promote the restaurant opening this week. I guess Brian got pretty excited about the free sandwiches and coupons they brought. The next day, the manager came by and asked if the youth minister was there. He had heard who excited Brian was and came to personally invited him to the invitation only grand opening. Isn't that hilarious! We went and had a great time! Oh, and there was free food!:) We love the way the restaurants close on Sunday. They even had prayer before the meal! We were seriously treated like royalty. By the end of the night, I was thinking about quitting my job at the clinic and applying to work at Chick-fil-A

The invitation!

Brian had a chicken sandwich, med french fry, 6 mini chicken biscuits and a peppermint shake!

Yum!

It was packed!

Our grand opening goodies!

In adoption news, 2 Oklahoma families that their adoption referrals this week! So excited for them! It makes us excited! Can't wait until it is our turn!

I did it!

30 straight days of blogging! I am sure you are getting tired of me by now. I will admit, it was tough! But I will say that this has made me a little more excited about blogging. And although I will save you from my daily rambling, I promise I will not go back to blogging once a month! Thank you guys for following these last 30 days!

This 30 days of blogging has gotten me to make some other challenges. Brian and I have started a competition to see who can work out for 30 minutes the most days in a row! I have really gotten out of the habit and need a little motivation. We are both competitive, so it will be interesting to see how this turns out!:) Stay tuned!

Oh my! I just say a commercial for American Idol starting in January! Can't wait!!!!!

Still thankful

Even though Thanksgiving is officially over, this time of year really gets me thinking about all the things I am thankful for.

- My savior who died so I might live

-A wonderful husband who makes me laugh, is my best friend, always puts my needs or wants above his and has a heart for adoption

- A wonderful family who I really LOVE to spend time with

- An awesome in-law family who has always treated me with one of the family.

-Adoption!!!!

-A house full of stuff we do not need

-A church family who loves us

-A job

-Our health

-The fact that I do not have to worry about if I will eat tonight

-Christmas!

-Freedom

-Rainy days

-Naps

-Clean water

The list goes on and on. We have really been trying to pay attention to the small things that we often take for granted. We know that there are parts of of the world, such as Ethiopia, that struggle for the very things that we waste. Thank you God for your grace and blessings in our lives!

Thanksgiving 2009

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Black Friday

Last night after Thanksgiving with the Plumb's, me and Brian, along with his brother and his wife and his sister and her husband, went out to find those Black Friday deals. We left at 1130 and headed to Toys R Us. It was crazy!!! It always blows my mind at how many people will actually cut in line! After waiting in line for about one hour, we hadn't even gotten in the store yet! We wimped out and headed to Walmart to get an early start. We shopped and shopped and shopped! We finally got home at about 9am. We probably in the end do not save a ton of money but it is just the thing to kick off the Christmas season!

Brian and I getting ready to head out. He has worn this hat the past 3 years on Black Friday! He honestly loves it!

Amy and Ralph getting the shopping plan together!

John and Kelli are ready to go!

I made them do a cheer for Christmas deals!:) They know I am cheesy. They are supportive!:)

In line at Toys-R-Us.

John was really excited to be out shopping at midnight.

Wal-mart!

We had a great day today and got a lot of shopping done. It's officially Christmas season! The most wonderful time of the year!!!!:)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope everyone had a day full of family, friends, food and fun! Can't blog for long. We are on our way out the door for Black Friday shopping. Pictures tomorrow!

A Thanksgiving tradition

I love traditions! Every thanksgiving Eve for as long as I can remember, we have gone to a movie. This year we went to see The Christmas Carol in 3D.

I am not a huge fan of 3-D movies. They make my eyes feel funny and I have a hard time really seeing the little details. Anyways, the movie was a little creepy. Definitely not a little kids movie. There was some stuff that was scary! It also got a little long in parts. But it is The Christmas Carol! Such famous Christmas story! It def got me in the Christmas mood!

There is no place like HOME!

One of my favorite things about Thanksgiving and Christmas is the time that we get to spend with our families. Even though we only live about 30 minutes away, we always make it a point to come home to Shawnee for a couple of days.

Isn't it funny that after 6 years of marriage, 1 apartment and 2 houses of our own, I still think of my parents house as home. Brian feels the same way. It is sort of like a mini vacation. You can just relax. It doesn't hurt that we are majorly babied! I mean, my mom cooks our fav foods and does some of my ironing! I know! I am tempted just to move in!

And there is just something about being back in my parents house that totally makes me regress. There was a time about a year ago that we stayed with my parents while we were waiting to move into our new house. I am a little embarrassed even to admit this, but the first night we stayed, I managed to leave the oven onall night, forgot to lock the door, left 2 cabinet doors open in the kitchen and left my cup in the living room without a coaster. The next night, my mom left me post-its all over the house for reminders!

Tonight, when I walked into the room where we stay, I found a collection of things that my parents have started to buy to stock up for the baby! It is so exciting to see how excited our family is for baby Plumb!

Hopefully this time next year, we will have a little one to enjoy the holiday with!

Prayer request...

Tonight I need a favor. Prayer for the Stephens' family. The 2 girls are in our youth group and their dad is having some health problems. He is in need of a liver transplant. This whole family is wonderful. The two girls are the sweetest and their mom has been a great friend. Prayer is powerful. Please pray for healing for their dad.

The weekend..

What a busy and fun weekend! It seems like we did so much , but it doesn't feel like it is time to go back to work. A lot of time with the youth group, we like to share Pow's and Wow's of the week. Pow's are the lows of and Wow's are the highs. So I thought I would share our weekends Pow Wow's.

5 Pow's

1. Waking up early on Saturday.

2. Missing the Queen of Sheeba, an Ethiopian restaurant in OKC where families adopting or who have adopted from Ethiopia meet up occasionally.

3. Brian and I have both had sinus headaches today. Boo for allergies!

4.We were out of American cheese for our lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches today. Swiss cheese just was not as good.

5. I can't think of another Pow. It was a good weekend!

5 Wow's

1. Had a slumber party with our awesome nieces! They are just so much fun.

2. Got to spend lots of time with my mom and dad. I am so ready for them to move from Shawnee to the south side of OKC! They say just a couple more years!:)

3. Dinner with my parents, sister, and her boyfriend at Hideaway. Best pizza ever! We always laugh so much when we are together!

4. A nap!:)

5. Brian had the whole house cleaned and the Christmas lights up outside when I came home Friday from work! I know, I am so lucky!

Hope your week has more Wow's than Pow's!

Baby pictures

30 days of blogging. It is getting tough. I don't know if I can keep this up!:)

I was looking through some pictures on my computer tonight and thought I would share some pictures of Brian and I as babies!

He has always been so cute!

I guess my mom liked ruffles!

If you have any blog post ideas, don't hesitate to make a suggestion. If not, I may just keep posting randomness!:)

A few things I learned tonight...

So my four nieces spent the night tonight, and I thought I would share a few things that I have learned.

1. The quiet game is really just an invitation to yell at the top of your lungs for 5 minutes straight.

2. When sitting down with 4 kids under the age of 10 to eat dinner, there is a good chance that you will only eat half a piece of pizza, but still manage to have pizza sauce all over you.

3. 4 and 2 year olds are scared to death of life-size Santa's that sing and dance. (But their 10 and 8 year old sisters think it is funny.)

4. Spending $15.00 on tokens will win you 236 tickets that will buy 1 corn popper, 2 plastic rings and 1 rubber ring. (Which BTW takes 25 minutes to pick those 4 prizes out.)

5.A cartoon figure of Sammy Davis Jr can be mistaken for President Obama by a 10 year old girl.

6. There is nothing sweeter in the world than to hear a little girl say, "I love my Shannon". Precious!

7. You shouldn't laugh at a 2 year old when she keeps yelling at the top of her lungs at a restaurant. No matter how cute her yelling face is. It just encourages her.

8. 8 year old girls don't get sarcasm when you ask them to "please move over for your sister", they say "I don't want to",

you say "Thank you",

and they say "You are welcome".

9. It is really hard to take a good picture of 4 kids at one time.

10. It is never to early to open a few gifts under a Christmas tree!

Puppy Post

Ok guys, so I am really feeling this 30 days post. I am so tired tonight and can't think of one semi-interesting thing to post. So, I will leave you with a couple of pictures of Louie as a puppy taken about 2 years ago. I mean, who doesn't like puppies?!?!?:)

Ok people, off to bed. We have four little brown hair, brown eyed girls staying with us Friday night, and I have a feeling we are going to need some energy!

JunkPosse Jewelry

Christmas is right around the corner, and if you are anything like me, you are trying to find the perfect and yet unique gift for that family member or friend. (I kinda sound like a tv commercial here!). If that is you, you need to check out JunkePosse Jewelry. They have the cutest necklaces! I particularly love them because there are designs special for Ethiopian adoption. In fact I already have this necklace, Heart for Africa.

I also love this one. HOPE for Children.

The next one I have my eye on is this one, the Ethiopian Angel necklace. (The wing is in the shape of Ethiopia!)

She also carries adorable necklace like this one. which I will def need in the future. (I hope Brian is catching these hints I am throwing out!:)

The designer of the jewelry is actually donating a portion of sales of some of the Africa adoption designs, such as the Heart for Africa and HOPE for Children, to help another family travel to Ethiopia to pick up their second child! In fact, if you mark "Bottomly baby" in the notes section when placing an order, you get a free pair of earrings. Can you really pass that up!:)

Baby names

Ok, so this blogging everyday is getting tough! I am having a harder time everyday trying to think about what to blog about! How about baby names!

Growing up, I always kept a list beside my bed of baby names I loved. I would cross one out, add a new one, add one I have already crossed off...you get the picture. Names are one of the most fun things to talk about, yet one of the most frustrating. It is a lot of pressure. The name we choose will be with our son forever! Luckily I have Brian, who can think of any bad nickname, or looks at abbreviates or initial. (This can be a useful and then again annoying talent he has.)

We have decided that we are not going to finalize a name until we actually see baby Plumb's face and find out what his birth name is. But that has not stopped us from throwing around a few name so we can be prepared.

One of our names on the list is Alex, meaning defender of mankind. To me it sounds strong, yet cute and cuddly. (Does that even make sense?)

Another name near the top is Isaac, meaning he will laugh. Doesn't that just sound like a name full of joy and happiness. I hope our baby will laugh a lot, so that seems fitting...

Caleb, meaning brave and faithful, was a favorite, but we have pretty much scratched that one. Caleb Plumb. I just don't know if the double B's flow well. Do you see what I am saying?

I really like the name Casen, but Brian isn't a big fan. I don't know what it means, I just like it!:)

Some others that we have thrown out there are Joel, Elijah, and Aaron.

A name is really something that is hard to pick out. The funny thing is that whatever name we pick, in a couple of years, we won't be able to imagine him with any other name!

So I am just going to randomly open the boy section of the baby book and point to a name to make the decision for us. So it looks like the baby will be named.......Norbert! LOL!

CAN"T WAIT TO MEET HIM!

Tme to reveal yourself

So, I will admit it. I am a blog stalker. I have many blogs that I visit frequently without ever saying, "Great post" or "Right on". (Cheesy, I know.)

I am trying to be better about leaving comments on blogs. I know it makes the blogger feel like someone out there is actually reading what they are saying. When someone leaves me a comment, it is like Christmas! I really do get so excited!

So now it is your turn. I would love to see who out there is visiting our blog. Especially if you are adopting from Ethiopia! Maybe we could be friends!:) You wouldn't want to let a girl down would you!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Ev'rywhere you go

Take a look in the five and ten glistening once again

With candy canes and silver lanes aglow

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Toys in ev'ry store

But the prettiest sight to see is the holly that will be


On your own front door

Brian finally talked me into putting up the Christmas stuff today! He has been trying to get me to put it up since Halloween! But it is now up and I am in the Christmas mood! Love this time of year!:)

Clean water

I saw this on a friends blog yesterday and had to share. It is amazing to me that something so simple like clean water is something that so many have to go without.

Brian is doing a bible study with the youth group right now from a book titled, "Stripped Clean: Down to Nothing But the Cross". In the book, it states that according to adventconspiracy.org, an average of $450 billion is what Americans spend on Christmas presents every YEAR! They estimate that it would take only $10 billion to provide everyone clean water.

Right now, 1.1 billion people do not have access to safe, clean drinking water. That is one in six of us.

Charity:water is a non profit organization bringing clean, safe drinking water to people in developing nations. 100% of the money raised goes to direct project costs in areas of greatest need. Just $10 can give one person in a developing nation clean water for 10 years!

"Stripped Clean" challenges to drink only water for two weeks. No Sonic drinks. No Starbucks. After the two weeks, donate that money to the cause of clean drinking water.

Click here to be directed to the secure donation site of charity:water and click on the Yellow donate button. $10 could change someones life.

Do you floss?

My mom was always to great at taking us to the dentist. Every six months we were there for our cleaning. When I got married and we were in school, the dentist is just one of those things we cut out. I had never had a cavity, so I wasn't too concerned.

Brian and I finally made an appointment for both of us to get a check. It had been 4 years!. I was in shock that I had SIX cavities!!!!!! I will admit it, I have kind of slacked off in the flossing department. I had six small cavities in the back between my teeth that needed to be filled!

I had my appointment today for the left side of my mouth, top and bottom, to be filled. And I was numb! My face felt so swollen. It was so funny!

This is my "smile" face.

The "kiss" face.

This is me trying to show my teeth.

Probably not as funny to you, but me and Brian had a pretty good laugh!

BTW, I am now a regular flosser. You should be too!:)

What to Expect...

While organizing one of the closet's tonight, (one of the task on our baby list), I ran across this book.

I actually purchased this book about a year and a half ago when Brian and I were thinking about starting our family. (Kind of funny that I bought this book when I am a PA for a OB/GYN! ) It really got me thinking about that time a year and a half ago.

At that time, Brian and I felt that it should be time to start a family. I mean, it was apart of out "plan". I had graduated school and had been working for a few months. We were looking for a bigger house. It was just time.

When it didn't happen right away, we were really ok, which was actually shocking to me. I had always had a feeling it would be difficult for us. I thought that this would be something that would just devastate me. It honestly didn't.

After we had been off of birth control for awhile. Brian and I began talking about what the path was that we wanted to follow. Adoption or fertility? We always knew we wanted to adopt. I remember having conversations about it when we were dating in high school. The more we started talking about it, the more we started just talking about adoption . I can't really even explain it, but we didn't even think about anywhere else other than Ethiopia. It felt right in every sense of the word. We decided to go on a little camping trip and take the time to pray about it.

When we got home we decided to take a few weeks and listen to what God would say to us.

Shortly after that, Brian went to a lunch with some youth ministers in Edmond. At the lunch there were two women in line in front of them. They started talking and it turned out it was this family and they were leaving in a couple of day to pick up their son from Ethiopia!

At work, one of my patients was adopting through the same agency as we researching. As time went on, we knew this was our path.

We had dinner with the Silvestri's, who were kind enough to answer all the questions that we had. The next day we sent in our application and here we are! The waiting list!

Looking back now, at that time when I purchased the book, I had no idea what God had planned for us. He was already beginning to shape our hearts. We have no doubt that the son we were meant to have in our lives is waiting for us in Africa.

Bizarre dream

I had a dream last night that a muskrat was trapped in our bathroom. (I am not exactly sure what a muskrat even looks like but I knew that's what it was. When I Googled it, I was grossed out. The muskrat in my dream was not a rodent like) I was bravely able to get it outside.

Then a dog appeared from underneath the tub and while Brian took it away, I noticed a rabbit under the bed.

The whole time in the dream all I could think about was that I needed to take some pictures of these things to add to the blog :) I guess my subconscious was trying to help me out with some blogging ideas! Random, I know. But that is what you get when I have to blog 30 days in a row!