Holy Moly! It has been over a YEAR!!

Happy Holidays to you!!!!!! I cannot believe it has been OVER A YEAR SINCE I POSTED!  How terrible!  It has been one crazy year though!  I was just talking with a co-worker this morning, and she told me about a blog her daughter had started to document their journey to adopt a baby from Ethiopia.  It brought me back to my first blog (TheNewlywedFiles) where I documented our new beginnings as a newlywed couple, and foster parents to little Isaiah! That adoption was documented in that blog, and fast forward to this blog, which started right after we found out we were pregnant with Camryn! Well....Camryn is now going to be 22 months old tomorrow, and Isaiah is about to turn 7!

Let's backtrack...my last post was when I first started this position at my new school in St Lucie County, FL.  We had just moved 2.5 hours away from Lakeland, and were settling into our new surroundings...I am currently still a guidance counselor at the same wonderful school, but many things have happened in between!

We have moved twice!  We moved here and stayed in my aunt and uncle's house for two months until we got settled and found a rental home.  We moved into that home on October 15, 2012, and thought we were their to stay...atleast for a long while!  But, the owners of the home decided to sell and we had to find a new rental.  We have now been settled into this new home for a little over a month.  We love it and hope to be here for the unforseeable future!!

I graduated with my second Master's Degree.  I finished my Master's of Science in Educational Leadership, and I am on my way to pursuing my goal of becoming an Assistant Principal.

Paul is currently a stay at home dad!  He is working on his master's degree and staying home with the little one at the same time!  He is enjoying every minute...but he does admit, it is HARD WORK!

And, of course, some updated pics of the kids!

I promise to be better about blogging!  In the meantime...enjoy!

Fall & New Beginnings!!

Happy FALL! I cannot believe that Fall is upon us!  Summer was such a whirlwind of fun and excitement, and we have even more exciting news to share.  We have MOVED!  It all happened very quickly, but I was offered a position as a Guidance Counselor at an Elementary school in St. Lucie County, Florida.  The name of the county might sound familiar to some of you, because YES, it is where my Grandma and several other family members reside. As of August 4, we officially moved to Port Saint Lucie, FL.  I started my job at the new school on August 13, and Paul started his new job on August 21. He transferred with the agency he worked for, and has really enjoyed it!  Isaiah is a Kindergarten student at the school I work at, and Camryn goes to an awesome sitter everyday just a few minutes down the road from my school.  Everyone seems to have settled in nicely.  The only member of our family that did not make the trip was our beloved bassett hound Bella, who passed away this past July.  May she rest in peace and live it up in doggie heaven!

In one week, Camryn will be 8 months old.  I have NO idea how that happened!  I feel like we just brought her home from the NICU a week ago!  She is now crawling, saying mama and dada, and continuously laughing and smiling!

We have been living in my Aunt Val and Uncle Mark's house here in PSL. They graciously opened their home to us while we transitioned to our new surroundings.  We moved in on Aug 4, and will be moving into our own house in just a few short weeks.  We are very excited to finally have a place to call home!

                                     Isaiah's first day of Kindergarten!

                                         Cami's beautiful smile!
Come visit soon!

Love, Us!

SUMMER!!!!!!

I cannot believe I have not posted since St. Patrick's Day!!!!!  Shame on me!  We have been busy busy, but really that is NO excuse!!!!  During the time I have not been here, Camryn celebrated her first Easter, hit the 3 month milestone, and was Christened.  As for Isaiah, he celebrated all these milestones with his little sister, played tee ball for the first time, and also became a (drumroll please...)  PRE K GRADUATE!!!!!  I am now the mother of a Kindergartner.  Wow, time has really, really flown.  Paul and I are both doing well, I am on maternity leave until school starts up in mid august, and I am enjoying my time with the kiddos.  Isaiah has lots planned during this time.  First up...BASEBALL CAMP!  He is excited to spend a week playing his favorite sport.  Then we have plans for him to visit his grandparents, and maybe attend a swimming camp too.  We shall see!  All I know is, it is summer and it is time to relax and enjoy eachother. Oh, and Paul and I are both enrolled in Graduate school.  I know, when do we even have the time?  Paul is starting on his MBA, and I am doing a second Master's Degree in Educational Leadership.  Phew!  Hopefully, we will survive and be successful with our respective programs!!!!!   

Pics are of Isaiah's Graduation, Cami's Christening, Easter and Isaiah's tee ball!  The last two pics are Camryn at the BEGINNING of tee ball season, and then at the END!

More to come soon!

Love, US!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

So, it is the day for the Irish to be lucky!!  Haha!  Funny, my due date for Camryn was actually tomorrow!!  Crazy!  She will be six weeks old!  Time sure does fly.  My (non Irish) Hubby would like corned beef and cabbage (ew) for dinner, and I (1/4 Irish) would like a green beer (yum) so we are headed out to get some later with the kiddos.  Happy St. Patricks Day!

OMGOSH! So MUCH in so little TIME!

So, it seems the last time I posted was January 11!  That really was NOT that long ago, but for us, so much has happened in that short amount of time!  I returned to work about a week prior to January 11.  I was only at work for a couple of weeks before BAM!  I was put on bed rest for high blood pressure.  The first time I was sent to the ER by my doctor because of high blood pressure.  This was on Friday January 15.  I had been at a guidance counselor's quarterly meeting for work, when i began to feel really ill.  When I got home I took my blood pressure and it was really high.  I called my doc and he sent me to the Labor and Delivery ER.  They monitored me until it went down.  The on call doc told me to stay off my feet until I saw my regular doctor that Wed.  Hopefully, I would get the okay to return to work.  Well, at THAT appt, my blood pressure was high STILL, so he kept me out of work and ordered me to see him weekly.  We would decide at each appt if I could return to work on a modified work schedule.  The next Friday (My darling Isaiah's 5th birthday!!) my blood pressure was the highest it had ever been.  The doc admitted me to the hospital, where he played around with my medications to see if he could get it under control.  He released me late the following evening.  He had grave words for me...strict bed rest or I would end up having to be induced early (as early as 35 weeks) if my blood pressure did not remain under control.  How scary!  That was literally only a few weeks away!

Apparently, Camryn had other plans for us!  My wonderful in laws had taken Isaiah on a Disney Cruise (lucky kid!) for his 5th birthday!  He returned on Thursday January 29.  I remember my mother in law telling me that I needed to get the last few items I needed for the baby.  We didn't have the car seat, and the nursery was not 100% finished yet.  We worked hard (or rather, my wonderful husband and father in law did), and by Sat night, February 4 at 10 pm, it was done.  I jokingly sat on the couch and said, "Great!  Now she can come!"  I was only 33 weeks and 6 days pregnant.  My water broke literally less than 3 hrs later at 1245 am.  I could hardly believe it!  She was going to be so early!  I knew she would be OK, but she was going to be a preemie, and I knew that was going to possibly buy her some time in the NICU.

At 7:42 PM (right after the Patriot's scored their first touchdown of the Super Bowl, and literally minutes before Half-Time), our Super Bowl Baby, Camryn Noelle, was born.  She weighed a TEENY 5 lbs, 3 oz.  I got to hold her for a minute, but then she was whisked off to the NICU where they would monitor her. 

She was perfect.  She did spend a week in the NICU (which was the hardest thing I have done besides losing my father), and the single hardest thing I have ever done is be discharged from the hospital without my Cami Bears.  But, she did GREAT and is now home and....FIVE WEEKS OLD!  Holy cow.  Time sure does fly.  She is growing everyday and literally gets bigger by the minute.  Isaiah adores her!  Here are some more pics to enjoy!!

  ENJOY!

Nursery...CHECK!

One of the things we have slowly been working on for the new baby is her nursery.  We had completed the painting and now the decorations are done too!

 And who could forget sweet Isaiah??  Here he is with his new Bumblebee wall decal in his room!