Did you find me?

As Kiara & I were cuddling the other night she looked up at me and while stroking my cheek, asked

"Mommy did you find me?"

I grinned and said,

"Honey you have no idea. Yeah, we found you."

She then said,

"Thanks for finding me, Mom."

It was one of those moments when I was convinced my child knew way more than we give her credit for and I was humbled at her wisdom. How lucky I am to have found my angel and for her to agree to be my daughter.

Happy Birthday, Blog!

Well today is my blog's first birthday so I thought it would be an appropriate time to make up for a birthday post that I missed in January.

My niece, Macy turned 2 on January 20 and she is even more adorable now than she was 2 years ago, although at the time I thought that wasn't possible!

Macy has one of the cutest personalities of any child I've ever met. She really just radiates happiness and makes people smile everywhere she goes. I'm fairly confident that a child has never been longed for and anticipated as much as Macy was and she is totally adored by everyone!

My brother & sister-in-law traveled a very long and painful road to get Macy home and now that she's here they make sure she feels their intense love for her. She has been such a blessing to our whole family. What a strong spirit our little Macy is. She will be, and already is one of those people with whom people count themselves lucky to be around.

I could sit for hours and watch Kiara & Macy play together. They are only 6 months apart, making them the closest in age of all of the girl cousins. Kiara loves leading Macy around and being like her big sister and Macy is very patient with her. Laura got these great shots of them when we were in UT in October.

Macy has the greatest laugh and this video proves it. My brother is making her laugh so hard that she can hardly breathe. I LOVE watching the two of them together. It makes my heart happy and makes me so happy to know my precious little niece is so adored! We all should be so lucky!

Happy Late Birthday, Mace. I love you and hope I can come see you soon!

Letting it all hang out

Something came over me the other night and I decided to let Kiara's hair stay down. I have pulled her hair back in sections every day for almost a year because if I leave it down it dries out a lot faster and gets very matted and tangled. I have a lot better product now than I did then and I know what I'm doing a lot more than I did then too so I decided to see what would happen. Here is the end result:

(By the way, in the first two pictures Kiara is totally posing, telling me how I should take the picture. Maybe this contest thing is getting to her head!)

Needless to say, we got A LOT of comments at church yesterday. It really is unbelievable how much hair is on that cute little head!

Kiara-isms

#1-I lifted Kiara up the other day and said, "Wow, you're getting really heavy kiddo!" (a comment I know I can't say too much longer!) Her reply: "You're welcome, Mom."

#2-Ben: "Kiara, where are you?"
Kiara: "I'm right here Daddy-honey."

#3-Kiara was "hiding" in this cooler yelling, "Dad where's Kiara? Can you find her? I can't find her! Where is she?"

And the winner is....

KIARA!!!

And as you can see, she couldn't be happier with the results! The final number of votes for her was 743! The little girl (who was quite cute by the way--all of the contestants were) with whom Kiara was neck and neck most of the contest was the next closest with 666 votes. This really was the best way to liven up a dull and dreary February. I had so much fun following the results this week; it was amazing to watch them change almost by the minute. I don't know what I'm going to do with my time tomorrow!

Kiara was very excited when we gave her the big news. I'm so proud that she's not letting the fame get to her head. In fact she even took time to thank the little people who helped her make it this far. Here she is kissing her friend, Bridget and telling her the great news.

And now for the acceptance speech...

The camera died before she got to send a shout out to those who helped spread the word, specifically Aunt Lala, Aunt Heather, Aunt Audrey, Aunt Tiff, Uncle JD, Grandma, Papa, Kim, Shauna and most of all, the Academy. A big thank you to everyone who voted and supported us throughout this wild ride! We couldn't have done it without you! Now if you'll excuse us, Access Hollywood is calling.

Beauty Queen

I've always called Kiara my little beauty queen and it turns out that may be her official title soon. I entered her into a cutest baby contest on Leeloublogs (the site where I get most of my templates) and she is a finalist! Apparently they received over 800 entries and she is in the top 7 for her age group!!

So now I need EVERY one of you to go vote for her and tell all of your friends and family to vote too so that we can prove that she really is the cutest kid around!

More importantly than the photo contest though, is the reason behind it. The contest is just one aspect of an online baby shower that the people at Leelou are throwing to benefit two precious little babies who have been in the NICU for months and their families are drowning in medical bills. They are accepting donations of cash or any other goods people can donate to raise money for these families. Please take a minute and check it out.

Thank you so much. Here is the link: http://leeloublogs.blogspot.com/

Don't forget to put a post about this on your own blog!

2 years ago yesterday...

Our family became a legal family and Kiara received a birth certificate with our last name.

2 years ago today...
Our family became a forever family and Kiara made our lives complete.

How grateful we are for the knowledge that we can live together forever. It is the greatest gift anyone could receive and our lives would mean much less without it. It is safe to say these have been the best 2 years of my life and I can't wait for many more to come!