Bumpin' the fund raising...

My Friday Fun for you is merging my love for Bump-It sightings with our fund raising efforts.

The only way to start the weekend.

You're welcome.

2 great things I love love love about my blog community is your support of our family and your equal support of Bump-It findings.

1. I got an email from my cyber friend Emily. (first of all, go to her blog and see her new little man, he's C.U.T.E.) Even better than the pic is the email that came with it.

"A little over a week ago a woman with one of the best "bump its" I have ever seen appeared on my tv screen. I have never seen anything like it.
I immediately thought of you. So I started taking a picture of the tv screen. My husband was totally confused. It didn't help when I told him I had to send this photo to a woman I have never met. :)"


2. Fund raising: Yesterday I spent all day holding tears back at work as Jodie texted me with how many mini-sessions were filling up. Today I cried pretty much the entire way to work. I can NOT believe the response from you guys over the last 48 hours on our first fund raiser. God is so good and we are crazy blessed by all of you. Thank you thank you thank you and thank you!

3. The youngest Bump-it on record:

That sweet baby girl, N, could teach us all a little something...

4. Fund raiser #2: At this very moment Russ is in the studio recording another worship album. To make the up-front investment smaller on our parts, we will only be selling it for download, we're not producing any actual CDs. I will let you know the minute that project is finished and ready for download.

I'm going into this weekend so absolutely blessed, you have no idea. Thank you for everything!

FUNdraiser Announcement!

**Edited to add: If you're new here coming over from Fresh Art Photography, welcome! The first thing you should know is that those pictures Jodie keeps posting of me were test shots for lighting for someone else's shoot. It was cold and I was moving to fight hypothermia. Don't judge. Also, if you're looking for our story on this adoption, click here.

I'm so tired I've looked at the word "announcement" 12 times like I've never seen it before.

Why am I so tired? I've spent all evening making props-ish type things for our FIRST FUNDRAISER for Baby Mohr #2!

Saturday, March 26th we're partnering with Fresh Art Photography (you may have heard of them on here before? maybe? Have I mentioned them?) to host a day of mini-sessions. All the deets are over on their blog and Jodie spent 9 years writing the post, so I'll send you there to read how to get involved. =) Click here for the all the deets.

Also, the fun part? I get to style them all. My mind has been racing like Lightening McQueen, people. Ooh, I have plans...

And to be honest, I can't believe they're doing this. I know I'm working for it, too, but their generosity overwhelms me and I can't thank them enough. They're good peeps and I'm blessed to know (and work with!) them!

Wordless Wednesday: edition Elf on the Shelf

The Bean Club

First Rule of Bean Club? You do not talk about Bean Club.

Second Rule: When you follow directions the first time, you get to put a bean in the jar.

Third Rule: When your parents have to repeat themselves, you remove a bean from the jar.

Fourth Rule: When your parents have to repeat themselves, you remove a bean from the jar.

Fifth Rule: When the beans fill the jar to the Hallowed Black Line of Triumph, you get a special activity as decided by said parents.

Sixth Rule: Your parents will break themselves of giving you warnings before action is taken. It's a bean, for pete's sake. If you lose one, or 6, you lose it.

Seventh Rule: Your mother's attempt at keeping your head warm this winter has turned into a Guatemullet, so you will be getting your summer buzz earlier than planned. This has nothing to do with The Bean Club, you just needed a formal notice.

***************************


Welcome to the new club at the Mohr's house. Not sure if it's this age, this crazy weather for the last few months, human nature, our lazy culture, the fall of man, or what, but it's surely not our parental habits* that have caused a certain child to need to hear something 12 times before deciding he should follow directions. It might be driving a certain couple cra cra. Enter The Bean Club. So far, it's working like a charm (sucker!) I'll keep you updated.



*Yes, I'm fully aware we created this monster. He wouldn't need 12 times if we didn't give him 12. I heard once that there was a study done and employer's number one complaint of our generation's work habits is having to repeat themselves in order to get anyone to get anything done. That's just not going to fly for this house. Hammer drop in the form of beans. You gotta start somewhere?

Schmupdate

Things are *kind of* moving along on the adoption. Slowly, sort of. (I'm a master of the English language, I know.)

We found a lawyer and an agency we love. (yes, we need them, two sets of them actually. Who knew?!) Now we need to find the same for another state. I'm realizing even "easy" adoptions are a lot of work. Pretty sure there isn't really such a thing, actually.

We're still all over the place on estimated costs. Each day it seems to change. It has already cost us some and I feel like it'll be either way cheaper than we thought or way more expensive. And, as in all adoptions, there's no guarantee it'll actually happen. We're on board as is the birth mom. But we're becoming aware of some other potential hiccups. And there's no way to determine the outcome of those hiccups without proceeding full force ahead.

It's a risk. It's handing our hearts, time, future and money to strangers we may never meet. There's no time for it to be otherwise. We're down to about 2 months. (No pressure.)

Thanks for praying, continue to do so. Thanks for your offers to help, our fundraisers are slowly coming together. Thanks for your offers for baby stuff. I'm still taking inventory on what we have and what we need so will be getting back to all those generous offers soon. Thanks for being patient!

Somebody's anxious for Spring...

Valentines throw back...

A little '07 action for ya...

Solemate

Kinda funny I'm posting about this on Valentines Day. Not because there's not posts worth of good stuff about the Mister but this is focused more on loving me, specifically future me.

Over the last year (at least) (maybe 3 years?) I've not been taking care of myself. Eating, sleeping, exercise...all self-sabotage-like habits.

In the fall there was a groupon for a local running store. I combined that with some Christmas money and invested in an old habit. The sales guy actually kinda laughed as he held my old shoe like an antique saying, "This is version 5! The new ones are already up to version 11." chump.

(For those that are curious, they're Brooks Since I'm a card-carrying member of the pronating club, these are my besties.)

Also, little known fact: I quit drinking soda a few months ago. I don't even remember when because it wasn't a big decision. It wasn't a resolution, a dare, a goal or anything. I just quit drinking it. I started hating the way it made me feel.

I had already made the decision to treat myself healthier (is that a thing?) with a more consistent working out schedule when this adoption fell into our path. Knowing how much energy is needed w/ a newborn-then-toddler and changing from an independent 5 year old to a newborn, I knew it was time. No soda + newborn = time to get serious.

I need the energy that comes from taking care of myself. I have a lot to do in the next 2 months and I'm not sure I can do it all without adding this one more thing.

I'm tired of taking a shower just because it's the next day, not because I'm sweaty from a good workout.

I'm sick of being tired because I'm not taking care of myself instead of being tired because I pushed my run further and faster.

I'm tired of wincing when I put my jeans on, hoping they still fit.

So, it's happened. Again, not because it's almost shorts season, not because of a New Years resolution, whathaveyou. Just because it's time.

Blog fail.

I haven't blogged in a full week.

Forgive me? More this weekend, I promise.

A mother's love for her son...

as told by 5 minutes of photobooth time.

almost there...

Got him!

"Love me?"

"I shall force the weirdness out of you!"

Fine, I will choose another, more passive subject.

Buckling up.

As I see it, there's 3 areas we need to hit in order to be prepared.

1. Legally
2. Financially
3. Domestically

1. Legally: We haven't done this before. Obvs. To be honest, when I first talked to a lawyer, I got super overwhelmed. Which is funny to me considering we've conquered a dossier (not pronounced dozzier, just an fyi. Not that I did that for a good 6 months or anything.) for Guatemala using specific ink, watching every single letter typed onto every document. I guess just because it's new. and unfamiliar. The good news is, there's people who know how to do this. That's where the next area comes from:

2. Financially: Egads. Lawyers, paperwork, traveling expenses, etc. This part gets sticky for us. We hate asking for money and all that goes with it, however we're not working w/ a lot of time to be able to build up the savings or anything. Not complaining, trust me, just getting my mind around what needs to be done.

We're brainstorming fundraisers but trying to be mindful of A) not spreading ourselves too thin given there's more going on in life, B) We don't want to keep offering the same people/groups of people ways to support us. "Hey, thanks for coming to trivia night! Now do you want to buy a t-shirt and order coffee and ___ and ___, mkay, thanks." We don't want to add ourselves to your monthly budget. The front runner on the list? Getting people to sponsor me on how many bowls of ice cream I can eat in a month. That and a 'high-five' booth for Eliot. Oh...I kid, I kid.

3. Domestically: This is the fun part. Baby stuff! Yip yip! We need to get the room ready. In order to do that, we need to organize some stuff. The room is still full of 18mos+ stuff from the T-rex season. Another thing we need to consider is not just newborn clothes, but Eliot didn't start wearing winter gear until 18 mos+. I'm not super worried about it, I doubt he'll go naked. And I *might* be praying someone was just packing up their Dr. Brown's, hoping to give them to another family. What? It's possible.
****Edited to add: I already got 3 offers for Dr. Browns! Yes! People are great.

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around this, sorry this got so wordy. It's becoming more real each day. There's a whole lot that needs to happen in 80 days or less. No pressure...

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Snowcations are sneet.

First of all, I have to tell you how humbled we are at the love burst via blog and facebook comments, emails, texts, vms, etc concerning Mr. Pricklepants (Eliot's latest name for the baby, thank you TS3). There's so much more to share and that will come soon.

Today, however, we had a Snowcation. St. Louis has a whole bunch of this:

One news guy called it "Sneet" and I wanted to hug him for stepping out on that weatherman verbiage ledge.

While there is much to do to prepare for Mr. Pricklepants, we decided to suck the life out of being trapped in the house. First step? Chocolate chip pumpkin bread love.


Next step? Sheet fort. Complete w/ egg carton spy glasses. You just never know when your house will be overtaken by stormtroopers. Always be prepared, people.


(Eliot requested alien spy glasses as well. Can you tell we're in a Toy Story phase?)

*insert maniacal laughter* I've got them right where I want them.


Before nap? We squeezed in some finger painting. Yeah, we did. Jealous?


After E's 2 hour nap (when I spent time w/ both Laura Ingalls and Dylan and Brenda) we ventured outside. This might be my fav shot of the day. Eliot lied down the minute we got outside to make a snow angel like he does every time and got so confused by what was under him. The majority was ice pellets disguised as snow. Just plain weird.


Helping the neibs try the suddenly tricky job of parking a car...

And amidst the snow falling, the sky was an eerie shade of purple. But if you're reading this, chances are we're all still alive...