Busyness!

Since the day we accepted our referral, life has doubled it's frenetic pace! Even without adoption, March and April are our busiest months of the year. For some reason, this time of year is extra busy for Brent with getting called out after work hours are over, and we have lots of church activities that are reaching their crescendo moments during this time. Add 4 kids and a mom with spring fever when it comes to the school books and we have a bit of chaos!

This year, though, it is reaching a new height of craziness! Brent is getting ready to leave for a week long men's mission trip to Mexico next week. He's led multiple ones in the past, so it's nothing new, but as you can imagine, it does consume extra time with laundry, shopping, packing, and paperwork logistics! I'm so excited for him to go (but a little jealous! I miss everyone down there!) but will miss him lots!

This weekend is our church's Women's Retreat, but Brent had to work and my TO DO list was just too long, so I've chosen to skip it this year. I'm sad, thinking about all my friends chatting, learning, praying, and getting silly at 3:30am., but I know it was the right decision. Lord willing, I'll be there next year!

We've been filling in any free minutes with shopping for spring/summer clothing for 7 children plus all the miscellaneous items for packing for a month in Colombia! It's very overwhelming!If anyone has any summer hand-me-downs, we would be greatly appreciative! Girls size 4/5T, sz 8/10, and 14/16 or Juniors 2-3. Boys sizes 6/7, 8, and 10! Whew!

We also finished the boys' room. I found the most adorable quilts with frogs on them at Target and Brent hung coat hooks, window curtains, a curtain for the closet, and a mirror. Next week I hope to finish the girls' room. Theirs is a little more difficult since we aren't fully sure whether we're going to put a bunk bed in there. So far we have a double bed and a toddler bed. Cait really doesn't want to sleep on a top bunk, and Luisa might love it, but we want to wait until we know how she does going to bed before we purchase any extra furniture. So the older girls will sleep together until we know what to do. Does anyone else's children do that? Both my older boys beg to sleep together every night (in a twin bed, no less!) and Cait and Quinn always sleep together. I only separate them when they are talking and carrying on and won't go to sleep. Crazy kids!

Today, I am elbows deep in food preparation. I decided to do a big bulk cooking day so that when we come home I can pull a dish out of the freezer instead of stare into the empty refrigerator for half an hour wondering what to fix all the ravenously hungry children! So far I have 4 Baked Zitis, 2 Chicken Tetrazinni's, a batch of Breakfast cookies (with 3 more ready to go), and am working on about 100 egg/sausage burritos and breakfast quiches. I wanted to get to some bean/cheese burritos, but I think I'll save that for another day. The freezer is looking full!

The kids are roaming in and out of the kitchen, trying to eat the Breakfast cookies, and playing outside in the spring weather.

We received an email saying our I800 was sent from USCIS to the National Benefits Center. Now we just wait for the approval I797C letter! Hopefully that will come next week!

Ok, enough of a break for me! Back to the kitchen!