Happy Birthday-Ish

Saturday was a fun day as we held the belated birthday party for Alyssa & Kayleigh.  Alyssa's sweet 16 was while we were away in Ukraine for the adoption, and Kayleigh's 15th birthday was back in September.  We consider that one under our umbrella as well.  When we talked to her the end of July last year and told her we wanted to adopt her and her brother, and she said yes, from that point on we considered her ours.  For the birthday we teamed up with some most excellent friends and birthday party for their daughter AJ, so it was a three for all party!  Games, tubing down the river, swimming, food, friends, gifts.  Lots of smiles.  Awesome birthday cake.  I think my favorite moment was seeing Kayleigh piled on the couch with a bunch of other girls (teenagers tend to pile....) opening gifts and having a great time with friends.  This is so much better than the life she was headed for, and we feel very blessed that God gave our family the privilege of being a part of it.  Today will be a great day as we celebrate the one month anniversary of being their new parents.  It has been an amazing ride so far!