Birth Mothers Day!

I got the opportunity to make birth mother gifts for our agency! I was SOOOO excited this is what I love to do. When I can combine my passion of craft making with my passion of adoption, I am a happy girl! I had a lot of fun and hope these special girls enjoyed their gifts!

We celebrated at the birth mothers walk our agency held! It was a blast we only wish our sweet birth mom Amy could have been there. :) We know she's working hard in New York and we miss her!!!! She was in our thoughts and prayers all day. 

These two clowns are always fooling around! Gotta love them! 

This day was all about Mya's birth mom and celebrating adoption in general! We love you AMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Birth Mothers/ Mothers Day to all girls who have been through this and made the most selfless decision to place their child along with all other girls who are carefully contemplating their options. We love you, respect you and will always honor you in our hearts! Without women like you we wouldn't have our precious little girl. We are forever thankful!! All our love! 

Nick, Tiff and Mya

Where can I turn for Peace

Where can I turn for peace?

Where is my solace

When other sources cease to make me whole?

When with a wounded heart, anger, or malice,

I draw myself apart,

Searching my soul?

Where, when my aching grows,

Where, when I languish,

Where, in my need to know, where can I run?

Where is the quiet hand to calm my anguish?

Who, who can understand?

He, only One.

He answers privately,

Reaches my reaching

In my Gethsemane, Savior and Friend.

Gentle the peace he finds for my beseeching.

Constant he is and kind,

Love without end.

As I sat in Sacrament this last fast Sunday our family had very specific things we were fasting and praying for. I sat there focused and tried my best to hear my Heavenly Father’s guidance and/or directions that he may have for my family. I ended up reading in the Hymn book and came across one of my most favorite songs that I haven't heard in a long time “Where can I turn for peace”.  Reading through this hymn took me back to one of the darkest times of my life, a time when I needed peace; I needed to know that I could get through the trials that had been placed in front of me. I remember hearing the words to this song as a girl read them in Relief Society, getting chills and knowing that this was a message from my Heavenly Father for me.  He was there for me and He would be the one to help me get through any hard time that I would face. I felt an overwhelming sense of peace as I continued to read the words. It was a pivotal time in my life and in my testimony. My hardships didn’t go away in fact they lasted and intensified for several more years. But through the heartache I learned to rely on the Savior and allowed him to help me and at many points carry me through my days. In the midst of pure chaos I was really able to find peace through Him.

I look at where my life is now I literally have all the blessings that I wanted and waited for, for so many years! This song helped me to reflect on the blessings that I have now and reminded me of the dark hard roads that I had to walk to get here. I was reminded that the only place I ever found true and lasting peace was when I turned to an all loving Heavenly Father and my Savior Jesus Christ. Those dark days helped me to get to know them, love them and trust them. I hate that life gets crazy and I seem to forget that sometimes. It also made me realize once again that I am where I am and I am who I am because of those hard times. I had so much to learn and I still have so far to go. I just have different challenges and trials in my life now than I did back then. I needed the reminder that when life gets hard as I’m sure it will a million times over I do KNOW where I can go and I am grateful for that!

I’m not sure why I felt the need to share this.  When I needed to hear the words of this song it was shared to me by a girl I didn't even know and I will forever be grateful that she shared her testimony and love for this song with me! I hope these beautiful words will help, inspire and heal someone else the way they did for me.  I am so thankful for my amazing husband, my beautiful baby girl, and our families which include Mya’s wonderful birth mom. They are all also a great source of peace and I know a heavenly gift to help me through this crazy ride of life! 

February went too fast!

We LOVE spending time with our families!

Our trip to the dinosaur museum. I love having my sister and her 2 kids so close! We love going to do things with them as much as possible!

More family fun at the Artic Circle playground! Perfect for when it's too cold outside to go to the real park. These two become inseparable!

Playing dress up with cousin Bentlie! We babysit my sisters kids sometimes when she has hair clients and we love it!

Mya pretty much lives in these dress up clothes right now! I always said I would never be one of those moms that let their kids wear stuff like this to the store....I have to admit I have done it! She loves them so much and really when else can you dress like Ariel on a normal day and get away with it!

More cousin time! All of our family is near by so it makes it nice to be able to get the kids together often they all really love each other!

Potty training at it's finest...

This is what we started with to keep her on the potty, lots and lots of puzzles! 

We had to take turns, lol it got a little old! 

Now we have had over 1 week with no accidents. She gets herself on and off the potty! We are so proud!!! 

Sometimes she still likes to have some entertainment on the pot like blowing bubbles! Hey whatever keeps her motivated is fine by us! We're saying goodbye to diapers and hello princess underwear! Woo Hoo! Go Mya!!!!!

Valentines Day!!!

This is what we put on Mya's mirror for Valentines Day! I also put one on ours for Nick that said "I love you" Nothing big but it's fun to wake up to a message like these! 

Nick knows the way to my heart! No joke one of my most favorite things in the world to do is vacuum! I have always wanted a Dyson and now I have one! I love my man!!!

We got Mya a cute little tent with a giant Elsa (Frozen) balloon tied to the top and then we filled the inside with heart balloons! It was so cute and she was SO excited to wake up to this little surprise!

We had a great day! Nick took work off and we just hung out all day followed by a fun family dinner at Arbys! This may have been the lowest key Valentines Day ever and we had so much fun just hanging out as a family! 

Happy Happy Birthday Nick!!

Mya wanted to get Nick this giant Olof balloon again from Frozen! She's a little obsessed :) Nick loved getting this sweet gift from one of his favorite girls! We made him some breakfast and later on took him to see the Lego movie! We hope he had a fun birthday, he sure deserved it! 

We had a fun family dinner at his parents house the next day. Mya always loves to help us blow the candles out!

You know you're getting old when a shaving kit is what you ask for and are excited about getting for your birthday! :) 

We had my whole family over to our house for a dinner birthday party! They got him a drill which we are BOTH excited for! We played Ticket to Ride for the first time which was also so much fun! Can we just say one more time how much we LOVE our families!

Dance, dance, dance!!

Mya just started taking dance this year and we've had so much fun! She's a blast  to watch, it's adorable to say the least!! She calls her teacher Miss Hillary and tries so hard to do exactly what she says! We put her in dance to try and help her get used to listening to a teacher since she'll be heading to preschool this coming fall. She's getting so big too fast! I wish I could push pause sometimes. Every stage she goes through I call my favorite but man right now is AWESOME! She is our little buddy :) We talk, laugh and she can interact so well at this point it's just fun. I really wanna pause right now...... she's a sweetie we sure love her!

Tiff's birthday!

Nick took me to Park City for my birthday! It was so much fun we shopped, ate at my favorite steak house, went on a sleigh ride and just relaxed! It was so much fun! Mya got to stay with Nick's parents and she had a blast with them. I am so grateful for a husband that is always trying is hardest to make me happy! 

We went to my favorite Chinese restaurant with my family! I love going to dinner with my family for birthdays it's one of my favorite traditions! 

This man is my absolute favorite!

These two couldn't wait to dig into my birthday cake frosting! 

When I had a hard time turning 30; thinking I was waaaaaaay old Nick promised me that my thirties would be the best years of my life. Well he was right! I am now three years into my thirties and these last three years have been some of the very best of my life! So many of my dreams have come true in the past three years. :) I have an amazing hubby (got him in my twenties but he keeps getting better), the best daughter in the world...I'm a mommy :) and we built our first brand new house. Hopefully those dreams will keep being fulfilled as we continue searching for our next special birth family. We are dying to add to our little family and give Mya a sibling. Here's to being in your thirties, woot woot!

A special visit!

Can we just say how much we love this girl! Well both of these girls! Mya's birth mom is one incredible person! We always look forward to seeing her, since she's in New York going to college we don't get to see her very much. We love every second she's able to be with us. Love hearing all her crazy stories from college and watching her and Mya is priceless. 

She was in town for Christmas so she stopped by for a visit to spoil Miss Mya......as if Mya needs any more spoiling! ;) She came and spent about 3 hours just chilling and talking on our couch! She did puzzles with Mya and sat through Nick and I making Mya do all her cool tricks...like counting, saying her ABC's, singing. She probably walks away thinking oh my gosh these people are crazy and so obsessed with their child.....its true we are!! 

But really we love that we are able to have such a good relationship with Amy it's really been awesome. She is a very special part of our family, we wouldn't be where we are without her. The kind of strength she has is something I will always admire and strive to emulate in my own life. 

Nick and Mya playing with some of the toys that Amy brought her for Christmas. Our sweet little daughter loved the minion fart gun that she got the most! Lol.....nice right!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas this year was AWESOME! Mya is 2 1/2 and she really got into things. This year instead of crying when she saw Santa she happily jumped on his lap, told him in her little munchkin voice what she wanted and then thanked him for the candy cane he gave her! It was so cute, I'm gonna be honest it almost made me cry! She's getting too big too fast! 

Anywhoo we stayed here in Utah since we have both families here. We had lots of snow and Christmas day was beautiful (cold though....brrrrrrrrr) and sunny. We went and saw Elf the musical in Salt Lake City with Nick's family which was pretty good, of course never as good as the movie. Nobody can do Buddy the Elf like Will Ferrell :) We had our annual Christmas Bingo party with Nick's family which is always epic....this may be the coolest family tradition I have ever experienced!

We went on a wagon ride through some Christmas lights with my family. We also had my family's annual extended family Christmas party at the Energy Solutions Arena which is always so much fun! My Uncle is in charge of all events there and they always make the Christmas party AMAZING! Often times we get to go and walk through the Jazz locker room, Nick is a HUGE Utah Jazz fan so that's like heaven for him! 

We got to spend so much time with our families which is always our favorite. Mya's birth mom is in town for the Holidays from New York so we can't wait to see her this upcoming week! She is a part of our family and we miss her like crazy!!! Christmas this year was so great, it also brought more of the feeling that we are missing someone. We hope this upcoming year we will be able to find that someone that are hearts are longing for. We're gonna do our best to find them! We trust in our Heavenly Father and know that things will work out when they are supposed to. 

We hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!! Here is our month in pictures......there's a lot :)

Hanging with my cute family minus my daddy cause he had to work :( We love these guys so much! 

I love Mya's cheeseball face! This is how she smiles for pics.....it's awesome! 

Mya got this for my mom for Christmas and was so excited to give it to her. She is such a sweet little girl! 

This was our first Christmas in our new house! This is a 9 foot tree, I've always wanted a really big tree so it was fun to finally have one! 

Mya was so excited to get all of our Christmas stuff out and put it up......almost as excited as me! 

Nick is the bomb he never complains about helping me do stuff I know he doesn't care about, like decorating for Christmas :) Such a good man, glad he's mine! 

Mya's cousin Cooper had turned 2! We had so much fun at his birthday party. There are so many little kids in my family right now it makes it really fun for Mya. We just found out that my baby brother and his wife are expecting their first baby girl in May! Hooray! 

Mya and her BFF at the Festival of Trees, we love hanging with friends! 

Mya's first time seeing Santa this year...no tears! Woot woot!

This month Nick took a day off to spend with Mya and I. Mya's favorite place to go is Kangaroo Zoo and Daddy had never been there with us before. We had a blast and it was more fun for me cause I got to play in the toys too this time! 

Yeah I think its safe to say we suck at making gingerbread houses....at least we had fun!

Going to see the lights at Temple Square in SLC is one of our favorite things to do at Christmas. It was cold but well worth it, they are always beautiful and the spirit is so strong. 

Christmas lights on a wagon with my whole family and some of Nick's too! 

This was the cutest, I walked in my room to find Nick studying for his GMAT exam with Mya watching a movie. She had put reindeer ears on both of them! Nick will do anything for his little girl! This made my whole night to see :)

Family party at Energy Solutions Arena with my extended family! All the kids are attacking Uncle Derek! He's kind of like a big kid, Mya calls him Captain Hook. Lol!

Another encounter with Santa and still no tears! 

Nick's family party! Mya's cousins that she absolutely adores....we kind of like them too! :)

This is our talent portion of the night and Mya wanted to sing jingle bells! She smiled and sang the whole time, she was pretty excited to have everyone sing with her! 

Grandma and Grandpa got her dress up clothes! In this pic can't tell who's more excited me or Mya! 

I got lots of cute clothes from Nick's parents, they are so nice! 

Nick got his beloved PS4!!!!

Here we are playing bingo Christmas Eve with Nick's fam.....they always have the most fun prizes and we all laugh and have so much fun with this every single year! 

This my friends is what Mya wanted from Santa. Her face when she opened it was so cute! She immediately said "oh I gotta tell Santa thank you, he's so nice" What a sweet heart.....I don't think Santa can say no to this little girl!