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Anna's Bridal Shower & Jewelry

Had a great (but SHORT) visit with Anna this weekend. Mom, Dad, & I left Kanosh around 10 am (UT time) and didn't get to CA until about 8:30. I've decided that I REALLY dislike CNG cars (natural gas). We had 2 seperate hour PLUS delays because of complications finding or getting filled up so we could continue our journey. But we DID eventually make it to Anna's house!

The shower was the next day & there was a great turnout! It was nice to see so many people that love Anna (since I'm so far away!). Looks like she's got some good friends. For the family side there was me, Mom, Esther, Sheri & her daughter Makayla, & Joanne. She got some nice gifts too!

One of the things we did was to stop at Michael's (craft store) to find some more beads to use for Anna & her bridesmaid's jewelry for the wedding. Found some beautiful things! I just got the prototype put together and just LOVE how they turned out!

(click to enlarge)

Pioneer Day in Kanosh

We always have fun on Pioneer day! This year was a special treat because my brother Michael, his wife Joanne, and their kids Brent & Chelsea stopped on their way up to BYU Idaho (dropping off Chelsea). My parents came down too. We all had SUCH a nice visit! Another bright point of the day was that my old 1st counselor came down! Karen Baadsgaard and her family came down from Roosevelt (sp?). It was so grea to see them! Can't believe how big the kids are! The funniest part of the day was the greased pig contest (yes, a real pig - and the winner takes him home!) Usually the circle is so tight around the poor piggy that there's no chance it's getting away. However, this year he did! Should have seen the crazy crowd running after the little piggy! Too hilarious!

We're not CRIMINALS!

...in other words - our background checks finally cleared for foster care!!! I talked to our liscenser yesterday and we have an appointment set up for a week from today for our home study! I'm SOOOO excited!!!! Thankfully, we had a party at our house in the basement a little over a week ago - so all the rooms are finally switched around. Now I just want to do a little extra scrubbing (I know, not really neccessary - but I want to get it done anyway). Need to install our little magnetic locks for the few cupboards with harmful chemicals, put up the fire alarm in the basement, and sort/compile all the chemical things (deciding where what things will live). AND I'll be gone this weekend to my sister Anna's wedding shower! So I've got a busy week ahead of me. Busy, but SO exciting!!!!

Paperwork Update

So we finally got our "live scan" fingerprints done on 4/11. Our background checks have been submitted for LDSFS and UTFoster. Now we're just playing the waiting game again. Meanwhile we're busy getting the house ready for our homestudy. There are about a zillion safety issues that we have to meet. Had to buy a small fire extinguisher, make sure there's a fire alarm on each floor, first aid kit in house and each vehicle, and SO much more.... What I'm focusing on this week is finishing up the rearranging of rooms. We're in a 6 room house right now (I know, that's a LOT of house for just the 2 of us - but it won't be for long!). Right now we've got a guest room and a craft room upstairs (along with the master bed) and we're switching them downstairs to turn both of those rooms into KID rooms. I'm about 80% done with one room and only about 40% with the craft room. I'm hoping to be done with them by Saturday night. That's my goal.

The hard part has been that part of the craft room is my amazing inventory of bead supplies for my business. So I have to re-organize a LOT of that too. I'm actually really excited about finally having my supplies in a better system so I don't have to spend so much time looking for a tiny specific piece for an order that needs to go out. I'll be mounting these huge boxes (like tool boxes with little drawers) on the wall in the office. I can't wait until this is done! It's going to be great!

I still need to find a good baby gate to go at the top of the stairs. There are 2 gates that were left here when we moved in, but one's a bit rickety and I can't figure out how to use the other one! We're thinking we'd like to get one more twin bed too. We found out that we can only get licensed for as many kids as there are beds/rooms for. Currently we have 1 twin, a foldable crib, and the queen guest bed in the basement. We also still need to get the little magnetic locks for all the cupboards in the house that have chemicals (anything that says, "harmful if swallowed").

I'm kind of stressing about the backyard too. Dave (our landlord) still has a TON of wood stuff and yard tools in the back yard. So we either need to fix up some sort gate or organize it all in a way that will be "safe" for our inspection.

Tour of Kanosh

I have been enjoying such nice walks every morning, I wanted to share what a beautiful town we have here in Kanosh. I love all the old houses, pastures, and the cool breezes in the morning. Our little town has a lot of personality. From new "modern" homes, to some still standing from pioneer days, to renovated chicken huts turned into homes, to Victorian styled homes, to trailers with houses added on to them... get the idea? If you want an idea of how big Kanosh is, if I walk around the border of the main town (we have people that live in the outskirts, a few minutes out of town) it's about 3 miles! Crazy, huh? When we first moved here (5 year now!), I heard that there were about 500+ people. But now there's around 700. Yet, we're still small enough for the whole town to only be 1 ward (so far anyway...)

Adoption paperwork...

I can't believe how much paperwork we have to do!!! It seems neverending! About two weeks ago, I finally went through all our paperwork and finished EVERYTHING I have in my hands now and sent it in! I heard back from LDSFS right away - had to redo a couple of forms (filled them out wrong!) and submit our sealing certificate too. Today (2 weeks after I mailed them in!) I called the foster care people and asked for an update. Turns out the person I mailed everything to doesn't usually get much mail... so it was still in her mailbox! Anyway, glad I called instead of waiting for them to call me! So she's sending our next packet of paperwork. We're getting closer to doing our homestudy. I'm not sure if we need to do a homestudy for both of them or if one will do for both. So exciting to be getting closer to getting some kids!!!!