Trip To Pittsburgh Part 2

The whole reason for making the trip to Pittsburgh was to attend my cousin Krystal's wedding. The wedding ended up being beautiful. It was at a place called The Mansion. The ceremony was held in a grove of trees on the grounds and the reception was held inside the mansion. Grace was great! She was quiet during the entire ceremony, she was good during dinner, and when the music started she was a dancing machine. She danced with any random person that wanted to dance with her. At one point she was dancing with her Daddy, it was so precious. My heart was so full of love at that moment I could not contain the tears. I am so blessed!

Here are some great pics, enjoy! I will be back soon with more about our trip.

Trip To Pittsburgh Part 1

We have been back from our trip to Pittsburgh for a little over a week now. The trip was a whirlwind, it just wan't long enough. We spent the 4 days there mostly visting family. It was so great to see all of the Aunts, Uncles, and cousins who we haven't seen in a long time. It was so great for everybody to finally get to meet Grace.

While in Pittsburgh we stayed with my Uncle Jim. He lives in a very cool loft on the Southside of Pittsburgh. We loved staying with him. My Uncle has some very special and unique people in his life. One of those people is a neighbor who's boyfriend passed away. While helping her clean out some of his stuff, my Uncle noticed a lot of very interesting hats. As it turned out his friend's boyfriend collected hats and she offered them to my Uncle. So ... Uncle Jim has these hats on display in his house and I thought it would be cute to take some pictures of Grace in the hats. It was hilarious, she totally "worked" the camera.

Enjoy the pictures and I will be writing part 2 of our trip soon!

Our Budding Artist

Grace loves any kind of art. She loves to color with her crayons, draw with her markers, put stickers on paper, and doodle on her Magnadoodle. She has just found a new medium in which to create a masterpiece ... watercolor painting! It is so cute, she is very serious about her art. Here are a couple of cute photos from last weekend.

Big Girl Bed

We decided to bite the bullet and buy a "big girl bed" for Gracie. Her crib is a 3-in-1 (crib, toddler bed and full size bed) but grace is getting so long that if she lays flat with her feet touching one end and reaches above her head she can almost touch the other end of the crib. Also, she is getting really good at climbing out of her crib. She's getting so good at it that I am not even afraid she is going to hurt herseld anymore. I don't want to convert the crib to a full size bed because it would be way too big for her room, she would have no room to play. So ... after much discussion we decided to buy her a regular twin size bed that she can use for a long, long time. At first I was looking at Craig's list everyday to see if I could find a used bed but I hadn't had any luck. I was looking around online and found the cutest bed at a really great price from http://www.jcpenny.com/ . It was just perfect for her room so I bought it and it arrived yesterday.

We are really nervous about changing her over. I wonder how she is going to handle it. We decided to wait to do it until we come back from our trip to Pittsburgh at the end of the month, so we will keep you posted. Here is a picture of the bed.

Tea Party

As I did some stuff around the house yesterday morning Grace was playing quietly in her room. When I went to check on her I found her having a tea party with her bear and her baby ... It was so cute it brought tears to my eyes. Here are some pictures of the event.
















Other then having a tea party yesterday, Grandma and Pa Pa came down for a visit. We didn't do much We watched the first Steeler game of the year and we relaxed. In the afternoon Grandma and I took Grace to the YMCA pool, that was a lot of fun. Grace took a moment out to pose for a picture with Pa Pa. It's so cute, they are both wearing their Pittsburgh Steeler gear.

Shoe Fetish

It's official, our daughter has a shoe fetish! Last weekend we went to the mall on a hunt for a dress for Grace to wear for my cousin's wedding at the end of the month. Did you know that no stores have toddler dresses right now? After going to Gymboree, Children's Place, JC Penny, Target, Walmart, Sears and Mervyn's I thought that I would never find a dress for her. As a last resort on Wednesday I suggested to Tim that we go to Fashion Valley to try Macy's and Baby Gap. We had gift certificates to both places so I was hoping we would have some luck at one of them. As it turned out Baby Gap had a bunch of cute dresses. We picked out a cranberry colored dress that has fall colored flowers on it ... very cute! I got Grace out of her stroller so I could hold the dress up to her and she immediately spotted a wall of shoes and made a beeline toward them. She looked at each and every pair and ohhhhed and ahhhed. I spotted a pair that were so cute and matched her dress so I grabbed them. After struggling to get Grace back in the stroller we headed to the register to pay. As the salesperson put the shoes in the bag Grace threw a huge fit, apparently she wanted to wear the shoes right then. So the salesperson was nice enough to cut the tags off and Grace got to wear her new shoes home. On the way home Grace fell asleep so we gently got her out of the car and to her room. I laid her on the changing table and changed her diaper while she continued to sleep. I attempted to slip off her new fancy shoes and she immediately woke up and screamed ... SHOES!! It was soooooo funny! After Grace was asleep in her bed Tim quickly slipped the shoes out of her room and he stuck them on top of our dresser, but I hadn't noticed. The next morning Grace was sitting in our bed watching her Baby Einstein video when she spotted the shoes and started yelling ... SHOES, SHOES! Of course she had to wear them to daycare that day. Lora, our daycare lady, said Grace kept saying pretty shoes all day. She cracks up up! Needless to say, those shoes are safely hidden away, out of site for now.

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Close To My Heart

Close To My Heart is a company that sells scrapbook and stamping supplies. It is sold through consultants and I have been one of those consultants for awhile now. I have not been very good at selling, I mostly used it to support my scrapbook habit ;) Now ... I am going to try to get this business started and sell something. I completly believe in the CTMH products. They are far superior than a lot of the products on the market. Their paper packs come in beautiful colors and patterns. CTMH is the pioneer of clear My Acrylix stamps that make it so much easier to create multi colored images. These pictures are of a lunch pail that I altered using CTMH More To Adore paper and My Stickease. This lunch pail is a wedding day suvival kit that I made for my cousin who is getting married at the end of the month. (I hope she is not reading this blog)

{Krystle - if you are reading this SUPRISE! This will be showing up on your door step in the next week or so:)}

Anyway, I am launching my new CTMH website. Please check it out and feel free to buy something from me! You can order directly from my website. The web address is:

http://www.foleyfun.myctmh.com/

Thanks for your support!

Oh Happy Day!

Last week my sister and brother-in-law fianlized the adoption of Tristan and Hailey!! We are so happy to have them "offcially" be part of our family. Tristan and Hailey have felt like family since the day they arrived at Kelly and Chris's house, but to make it final is great feeling of such peace and joy. We celebrated with the Newton family and 50+ of their closest friends and family at a park in Corona yesterday where the thermometer pushed 100 degrees! Even though it was HOT, we had a great time celebrating this very special occasion. Here is a link to the website Kelly and Chris have set up for the kids. http://www.babyjellybeans.com/web/do/site/home?ID=176365 There are pictures there of their court proceedings last week, plus much more.



Fianlly, here are the long awaited pictures of Grace's birthday party. I have put them into a costco album, just in case anybody wants to order prints. http://www.costcophotocenter.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=20693532/a=4245274/

Till later ... God Bless!

Our Little Star

We took Grace to get her picture taken for her 2nd birthday a couple of weeks ago. When we first walked into the place she started crying. I really thought we were going to have to reschedule. Tim took her and walked her around to look at all of the pictures while I gave them all of our information. After a few minutes she calmed down and it was our turn to take pictures. We put Grace in front of the backdrop and she turned into a different kid. All of a sudden she was totally working the camera. She was doing every pose the Photographer asked her to do with big smiles. We got so many great shots! When we were leaving the store the photographer asked if we would sign a release to use her photos in the store and last week they called to say they were going to put her photos up in the store! I am such a proud momma! Here is a link to view the photos.

http://smilestore.picturepeople.com/my/images?tk=8b94db83-05bf-47b0-8cdb-9ebbfb7ea595

I promise, coming soon ... the birthday party pictures. I need to upload them from my camera still.

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Our Big 2 Year Old

I can't believe that Gracie is 2 already! Where has the time gone?! To celebrate we had a party at Playtown, an indoor play area near our house. The last two years Grace's birthday has been the hottest day of the year and we needed a place that was cool with fun activities for the kids. Playtown was perfect. The kids had a great time, the staff there took care of everything which allowed me to take tons of pictures, play with the kids, and mingle with the adults. We will definately have Grace's party there next year.


Grace had her 2 year checkup the week after her birthday. She only weighs 23 lbs, which is the 10th percentile, but she is 34-1/4 inches, 60th percentile. The doctor said she is perfect, long and lean. Don't we all wish we could be long and lean?



Since turning 2 Grace has definately embraced toddlerhood. The other day I went to pick her up from daycare and she was saying Mommy and pointing up her nose. I asked her what was wrong and she kept pointing up her nose. I asked her if she had a boogie and she said yeah. I asked her if she wanted me to get it and she said yeah. I looked at the daycare lady and another mom that was there and I said, "that weird she never lets me near her boogies" So I pulled Grace closer and I looked in her nose and I did not see a boogie, but what I did see was a googly eye!!! You know, the eyes that you use in crafts, the ones you can stick on. Lucily, it was just inside the nose, it wasn't shoved way up there, so I sucessfully removed it. It was really funny.


We have been spending a lot of time trying to beat the heat at the beach and the YMCA swimming pool. Grace loves the water. The YMCA in our town has a great interactive pool. It is a very shallow, maybe 2-1/2 feet deep pool with a play structure in the middle. The play structure has water guns and valves and water shooting out everywhere and it has a couple of little slides. Grace loves going down the slides.

I guess that is about it for now. Coming soon ... pictures of the big birthday bash!

Hugs!!!

Back From Vacation

It seems like I have been planning our first big family vacation for months and it is already over. I am a little sad. I can't believe how fast it went by. Now it has taken me almost a week to finish this blog entry.

Let me start by saying we had an AWSOME time! Some of you may not know ... our daycare was closed the week of Jun11th (her daughter graduated from high school so she took her New York for vacation). So we decided to plan our vacation for that time. Origianlly I really wanted to go to Maui, it would have bee during peak time and everything was really expensive. We threw around a bunch of vacation ideas and finally decided that we would spend a few day in Orange County and go to Disneyland and the beach and stuff. This way we didn't need to fly anywhere, but we would still get away.

We left Tuesday 6/12 and we drove up the coast. We stopped for lunch then we went to the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana. That was really neat, Grace had a great time running around and exploring everything. After a couple of hours there we headed over to our hotel to check in. We were staying at the Doubletree Guest Suites down the street from Disneyland. The hotel was really great. The staff could not have been nicer, the room was great and the beds were comfy. We decided to go swimming for a little while. We tried out Grace's new arm floaties. She hasn't been in a big swimming pool since last summer so I wasn't sure how she would do. She loved it! At first she was a little clingy but soon got comfortable and didn't want to get out. The rest of the week she stood at the window of the room and looked out at the pool and whined waaaterrrr, waaaterrr!


The next morning we got up bright and early and were at Disneyland's gates before opening at 9:00 am. First stop was City Hall for a button for Grace that said "1st visit" then it was on to our Minnie and friends breakfast. Breakfast didn't go as well as I had planned. Grace saw the characters from across the room and she excitedly waved and said hi ... then the got closer. She FREAKED! Needless to say we shoved our breakfast down and got out of there as quick as possible.

The rest of the days at the parks weres a blur of rides. Grace rode EVERYTTHING and loved it. Here is a list of all the rides we went on in the 2-1/2 days: Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Carribean, Winnie the Pooh, Flik's Flyer, Heimlich's Chew Chew, Small World, King Arthur's Carousel (5 times), Buzz Lightyear, Dumbo, Casey Jr. Circus Train, Pinocchio, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, Storybook Boats, Monsters Inc., Goofy's House, Roger Rabbit, Golden Zephyer, Sun Wheel, and King Triton's Carousel ... Whew! We also caught the parade one night, Grace was in awe by that as long as the character's didn't come too close.

Friday afternoon my mom came down and picked up Grace and kept her overnight so Tim and I could ride the "big" rides. We had a blast! It was so fun that ee ended up splurging for annual passes while we were there. I can't wait to go back in the fall. By the time we hit the bed Friday night we were exhausted. We had so much fun!

Here is a link to a small portions of our photos from the trip, Enjoy!

http://photosmart.hpphoto.com/FilmStripHome.aspx?JobID=2bdbb7bc-78ac-4243-bb90-7363dd8910fb&SKU=HP

Good Times

Uncle Jim flew in from Pittsburgh last week and came down to spend the weekend with us. After about a half an hour in the house Grace warmed up to Uncle Jim and from then on she wanted nobody but Uncle Jim.

We packed the weekend full of fun activities. Friday night we went out to dinner. Saturday morning we went to gym class. Uncle Jim got to come with us and participate. After gym we went to the old train in Poway. After taking a ride on the train we walked across the street to the park and let Grace run wild. Later that evening I had mom's night out with two mom's from our adoption playgroup. We went out to dinner then came back to our house to work on our scrapbooks. I have finally finished Grace's 1st year and I have started on her 2nd year.

On Sunday we spent the afternoon at Balboa Park. It was such a beautiful day. We walked through the park to the International Houses and we were excited to find that they were having a food fair that day. We sampled food from so many different countries. Grace really loved the noodles and Lumpia from the Philippines. After the food fair we walked through the botanical gardens and Spanish Village to the train. Grace and Uncle Jim rode the train then we walked (Grace ran) over to the carousel. It was such a fun and relaxing day. Later the evening Gramma and papa came down to spend the night.

On memorial day we had a BBQ here at our house. Kelly, Chris and the kids came down and so did Uncle Sean. Our daycare lady Lora also came and we all just hung out and ate tons of food. It was a really warm afternoon so we broke out Grace's kiddy pool and we let the kids spash around. At one point we were adding more water and Tristan was holding the hose and squirting Hailey and Grace so Tim shut off the hose and he said, "Tristan, what happened? Look in the hose and figure out what's wrong." So Tristan looked in the hose and Tim turned it on really quick, Tristan jumped a mile. It was so funny I almost wet myself.

It was such a fun and busy weekend, I loved it!

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Great Weekend

This weekend was soooooo much FUN! My best friend Amy flew out from Colorado to visit for the weekend. This year is 20 years since we met, I can't believe it! Amy is the first friend I made when we moved to California from Pittsburgh. I miss her so much, I wished she here again.

Friday morning I picked Amy up from the airport at 8:30 am. We stopped for breakfast, it was great to sit and talk get caught up with each others lives. After breakfast we picked Grace up from daycare and headed home. I had been teaching Grace to say Amy all week, but it came out like "Mamy", it was cute!

Kelly brought Tristan and Hailey down and we all piled into the van and headed to the beach. We went to Mission Beach and we decided to eat before going out on the beach. Finally out on the beach the kids had a blast. Hailey went bonsai right for the water, she couldn't get enough, she was such a happy girl. Trisan totally fell in the water and got soaked. Grace was being a bit of a chicken and attached herself to my leg. All in all it was a great time.

Saturday, Amy and I took Grace to her little gym class. She did so great this week. She tried every skill that the instructor taught, she landed on her feet everytime she let go of the bars (usually she drops on her butt), and she side stpped across the bean with hardly any help from me. I can't believe how great her balance is.

Later in the day Amy and I headed to the spa for some relaxation. We got there an hour before our facial appointments and took full advantage of relaxing in the jacuzzi. It was so nice!

Gramma Karen came down to babysit so we could all go out for a night on the town. Grace has finally mastered the word GRAMMA, my mom is so happy. It is so special to see Grace's and my mom's face light up when they see each other. My heart feels like it might burst with happiness in those moments. That evening we headed downtown for some fun!

Sunday Amy and I took Grace to the San Diego Zoo. We had a fun time. Grace always loves the petting zoo and the monkeys. After the zoo we went home and BBQed and then took Amy to the airport :( This weekend went TOO fast, I am sad to see Amy go. I am excited to see her again in a month though, her and her family are renting a beach house at Newport Beach at then end of June. I am looking forward to seeing her and her boys then.

Happy Mother's Day!

I hope all of the mother's out there had a wonderful day! Mine was great. We went out to breakfast and then took a drive up to the little mountain town of Julian. Julian is known for their apple pies, so of course we brought one back with us. It was a beautiful day, it was so relaxing. We strolled the town and looked in all of the little shops. On the way home Grace was really cranky. As we drove the winding road back home Grace kind of caoughed and gagged and puked all over herself!!! GROSS! I think she must have gotten carsick!

Last week we had our Adopted Friends Playgroup. This time we met at Grace's favorite park ... Santee Lakes. When we got there I pulled into the parking lot next to the big play area that Grace loves and realized that they had it closed for construction! I was so bummed. Up ahead was a smaller play area so we met there. The day ended up being really great even though it didn't go as planned. All of the mommies sat in the shade on the bank of the lake and watched the kids play on the play structure or feed the ducks. We had two new babies join the group. I love hearing their adoption stories and reminiscing about our own adoption journey. This group means so much to me. I love seeing all of the kids grow up right before our eyes. Several of the families are starting the process for their second adoption. At playgroup Grace and Benjamin always seem to gravitate toward each other. At first Cindy and I would talk about how Grace and Ben are going to be best friends and part of me thought, "nah, we just want to think that Grace and Ben are such good friends because cindy and I have become good friends." Really though ... Grace and Ben play together more then any of the other kids. It's like they are in their own little world, talking their own little language, and chasing after one another all over the place. It is so cute!




This weekend Grace said soooooo many new words. All of them were so clear. She said Grammama, bubbles, bell, cow, moo, oink, water, and yellow. I think she is going to start talking like crazy now. I can't believe how fast she is growing up!

All Better

Two weeks ago Grace had a runny nose when we dropped her off at daycare. Her runny nose was clear and she was biting on her fingers so we thought her last tooth was finally coming in. By the time I picked her up from daycare at the end of the day she had developed a cough and her nose was icky green. We broke out all of the cold remedies that night, you know, the humidifier, the saline nose spray, the nose sucky thing, and we raised one end of her crib so she could breathe easier. She had a pretty restless night and the next morning woke up with a fever of 105!!! We immediately got her in a cool tub and gave her motrin and called the doctor. They were able to take us right away. The outcome ... pnemonia! Our poor baby! After two weeks of some super antibiotics she is all better and back to normal, but last sunday I came down with her cold. I am all better now, hopefully Tim won't come down with it.

Last Saturday was a pretty warm day and Uncle Sean was here visiting us so we decided to take a late afternoon stroll at the beach. It was fun. Grace had a great time running up to the water's edge and running away real fast when a wave rolled in.

Mom and Dad are almost ready to move. We have spent the last couple of weekends helping them pack and get stuff into storage. Last Sunday they decided to take a little break from the packing and come down and spend the day with us. While my dad and Tim tried to change out our bathroom sink, me and mom took Grace to Victoria Gardens to pick strawberries. Grace got the hang of it right away. She was having a great time until she tried picking one that was a little too ripe and her thumb squished right through it. She stuck her had up to Gramma and said YUCK! Then she didn't want to pick anymore. After that she wanted to ride the pony. She was cracking us up, she went right with the guy and let him put her up on the pony. As the pony went around in circles she rode like she has done it a million times before. She was swaying with the rythem of the hooves and everything. It was so funny!



Well, until next time ... God Bless!































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Easter and Stuff

We have been keeping busy around here, especially on the weekends. Grace loves her gymnastics class. I can see the progress she has made in just 5 weeks. At the beginning of class we do a name song and each kid runs up and give the teacher high five. Grace has been really shy and the teacher usually has to come to her. Two weeks ago she ran right across the circle and gave the teacher high five and she has done it every week since. It is so cute! Her favorite part of class is always the bars. She can swing and hang on forever. When the teacher is demonstrating a skill she runs to the front and the teacher always uses her in the demonstration.

Two weeks ago Seaworld had a special evening just for annual members to kick off their Spring shows. We went and had so much fun. Grace actually sat thru the Sea Lion and Otter show. She was dancing with the music and laughing when everybody laughed and pointing to the animals. We went through the Wild Artic Exhibit, she loved the Walrus and Polar Bears.

Yesterday was Easter and we had such a great day. We went up to mom and dad's house and attended service at their church. Kelly, Chris, Chris's mom, Tristan and Hailey met us there. When Tim checked Grace into the childcare before church she started to get a little teary and her cousin was right there to make her happy. Tristan took her hand and said, "It's ok Gracie" and led her away to go play. HOW CUTE!!!! It is so awesome that Grace has cousins to play with now. They are going to have some great times. It reminds me so much of growing up with my cousins, especially Tim. I really miss not being around the family in Pittsburgh sometimes. Later in the day we had an egg hunt for the kids. Tristan was a pro. He had a basket full of eggs before Grace had two eggs. Grace was just fine with one egg in each hand shaking them and making lots of noise. Hailey was good just sitting in the Grass with her box of animal crackers and one egg. We tried really hard to get some good pictures of the kids but it was a difficult task. Rounding up 3 toddlers and trying to get them to sit for a picture is virtually impossible.

Easter ended up being bittersweet. It marked the last holiday we will celebrate in Mom and Dad's house. We figured out that in August it would have been 20 years since we moved from Pittsburgh to Corona, California. There are so many great memories in that house. We are looking forward to making great memories in their new house.