Got Wisdom?

Recent thoughts and reflections have led me in discussions with great friends and family to the following resources which I feel have deepened my own personal wisdom.  In fact, it was in the conversation of asking how do I understand _____ better that answers from others have guided my own thoughts.  Perhaps I will have time in the near future to articulate all the thoughts, but for the time being, I find it wise to pass on the following:

The Journey by Brandon Bays
- recommended to me by my sister Jill. I have read through this book in three days very intrigued and embracing a whole new way to look at the connection of self, soul, and physicality.  Bays espouses a new version of healing in the mind-body healing process that resounds with my own philosophy that therapy is not just to bring up old issues, but to resolve them, learn from them and grow into a better sense of self.  She quotes the following from Marianne Wiliamson's book A Return to Love, which I read to Josh and he surprisedly said he had heard it, actually used it as a quote during his mission, cited wrongfully as from Nelson Mandella.  Williamson's book is on my 'to read' list:
     "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.  We ask ourselves, "Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?" Actually, who are you not to be?  You are a child of God.  Your playing small doesn't serve the world.  THere's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you.  We are meant to shine, as children do.  We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.  It's not just in some of us: it's in everyone.  And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.  As we're liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
[side note: this quote is also found in the pinnacle moment of the movie Coach Carter with the omission of reference to God.  The movie is also on my to watch list; Josh had already seen it and says it is similar to "Stand and Deliver," one of my favorite genre of movies.  "Freedom Writers"is in that class, which I also recommend.]

Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who WIll Change the World by Tony Wagner
- Just recently published in 2012 as a report on the most innovative young Americans and where they came from.  Wagner studied kids and then went backwards through their history to figure out the commonalities.  He then boils down the threads to Play, Passion, and Purpose.  I love his repetitive triumverant of P.  His study also critiques modern education and suggests solutions and changes.  I have read the book for the purposes of guiding our own purpose in educating our children at home and through life.  It gives me hope for the future and for my children and faith in the greatness in each of us.

Teaching of the Presidents of the Church: Lorenzo Snow
-soon to be given to all adults in the LDS Church as the curriculum for auxiliory lessons, the next in succession of teachings of the Presidents.  My awesome friend Kristen, who will be teaching from this text, thus having taken an early sneak peak got me hooked right away.  Chapter 1 "Learning by Faith' is such a fantastic introduction to what promises to be a full year of learning from a fantastic learner.  His personal history is fascinating.  This from the first chapter struck me : A little spiritual knowledge is a great deal better than mere opinions and notions and ideas, or even very elaborate arguments; a little spiritual knowledge is very important and of the highest consideration.  Go to the LDS Church on Sunday and you can get a free copy to read, or you can peruse it online at http://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of-presidents-of-the-church-lorenzo-snow?lang=eng

And for the shorter read: 
Reverence for God Is the Beginning of Wisdom by Elder Neil L. Anderson, Ensign Jan 2013
-Before becoming an apostle, Elder Anderson was an astute buisnessman.  His professional experience exudes in this article through his awareness of current trends and economic positions.  Happily for me, he is also a literary man and quotes T.S. Eliot along with Paul and Nephi.  With the specific word 'wisdom' in my personal pursuits I really appreciated Elder Anderson's definition of Godly wisdom, and wordly wisdom in both positive and negative connotations.  For me, the article is summarized in the following: Seek after this wisdom—be reflective, observe carefully, think about what you experience in life.  This article in conjunction with Bays' book clarified a lot for me personally regarding individual understanding and personal growth.

Amazing how much I can read and assimilate while still coming off of the research paper mode and having now assigned readings for a full month!  An inquisitive mind is such a gifts.  As are the silent moments of doing dishes in which all the glorious connections of thought and learning are melded into a personal wisdom and understanding.  

The Next Best Day on the List of our Lives

Saturday December 15th was the next day on the list of the best days of our lives.  Number one on the list was the day that Josh and I were married and sealed in the Idaho Falls temple.  Being married is great, being sealed is awesome.  So it is no question that the day that we had our daughter Viv sealed to us in the Chicago temple is the second day on that list.  

I have been pondering a lot on why that day was so significant; why it made the adoption day seem as only a stepping stone.  It comes down to my core belief, that I share with my eternal companion and we are teaching to our kids: this life is not the point of living.  We do not just wake up in the morning to live one more day and then another with whatever ambition suits us for the time.  We are here on Earth to become the best versions of ourselves so that we can return to a perfect place with the Ones we love dearest: Our Father, Our Savior and Brother Jesus Christ, and our Eternal Families.  

I believe that each person on this earth not only has a destiny to become great, but a purpose in doing so each day.  The best possible way I have learned to reach that potential is in families.  I love the family I came from so dearly.  My parents taught me righteousness and hard work.  My siblings taught me compassion and deep love.  When I met Josh I learned about commitment and willingness to change, and wanted to add him to that circle of amazing people I want to be with for forever.  So Josh and I chose to be sealed in the Temple of our Lord, in the way we know best on this earth to make a commitment to each other that will be honored by God.  That moment in which we made promises to each other and were promised greater blessings from on High started a pattern of life for us that we have continued in.

That life now involves three amazing little people with giant souls.  If I hadn't had a sure knowledge that people came from another sphere before this life before I had children, it has become extremely apparent after.  I know that all the goodness and brilliance that my children have did not come from me.  Sure, we are nurturing the best we know and teaching all the good I can; yet still, Faith, Danny and Viv are so much wiser than I could ever believe I created.  Parenting throws the purpose of life into a whole new belief bracket.  As we get into adult life we begin to learn from "the school of hard knocks." Choosing to become a parent enrolls you into "the school of sweet lessons."  It is still work daily, but it is the sweet lessons of life that come through the purity of innocent eyes and brilliant minds untainted by skepticism or sarcasm.  Kids are amazing.

The more I have gotten to know each of my kids, the more excited I have been to think that having been sealed to Josh on our wedding day ensured that I could have the privilege of being with my kids forever too.  They were already linked through blood, Faith and Danny, and I never worried about their qualification for heaven.  I kept working on my own qualifications for sure so I would be as good as they, who are comfortable in the presence of angels.  So even more true was the feelings I had for Viv. 

The more I have gotten to know Viv, the amazing valiant fighter that she is, the more I was scared spit-less that I wouldn't have her with our family forever.  It sounds a bit like a crazy lady - but my worst fear that haunted me from the day that Viv was legally severed from her biological mother to the day we were sealed was that Viv would die an orphan and her soul would be floating around in heaven, socializing with everyone no doubt, but nevertheless unconnected and lonely.  I am sure she would be wrapped in Jesus's arms, and I believe that all gets sorted out perfectly on the other side, yet in my worst dream I saw her floating away from me in space with a sad look in her eyes that pleaded "Mama, don't you want me?" It gripped my heart daily.  As the adoption process looked like it would get hung up on dumb details of payment this-or-that I nearly clawed at anyone near me to get them to understand that none of that was important to me, I just wanted my daughter!  I couldn't face the image of her little lonely soul floating away into darkness.

Of course, in God's goodness and grace Viv did not die between February and December and I was given moments of peace that all would turn out right in the end.  I cannot say I was always faithful in the great turns of the universe getting paperwork done on time, but I plunged forward as much as possible, pushing and bullying to make sure I felt I had done my best.  Faith and a great deal of dog-faced work got us to a committed adoption date.  As the days neared and others were making plans to join us for the sealing, my fears did increase and I held Viv a little closer.  Half consciously I didn't take the kids out and about much the week before the adoption and sealing finalized.  

I set the date of the sealing as close to the adoption hearing date as I possibly could.  I wanted to be gracious of family members that would be traveling to celebrate the big day with us and so we arranged to go to a temple nearest to us and a major airport.  We spent half a day on Friday after the adoption getting ready to head to Chicago, then picked up Josh and headed for the city.  The main destinations for the weekend were the temple, Legoland, and dolphins.  In that order of importance.  Rain or shine, a child's expectations are a powerful force.  

Friday we headed straight to Legoland discovery center (thanks to our homeschool science lesson unit of "Mom, how do they make....." sponsored by YouTube in which we learned exclusively about legos for three days because the kids were fascinated)  and played until family flew in.  Saturday morning despite freezing rain we headed to the Brookfield zoo to make sure we saw a dolphin show (Danny has recently decided he will be a dolphin trainer) before getting to our appointed time for the sealing in the Chicago LDS Temple.  I was so grateful to have our righteous family surrounding us in that glorious place, reminding me of heaven and giving me a glimpse into the heaven I believe will come.  Both sets of grandparents were there: Dan and Michelle Button and J.D. and Ann Hancock, as well as my two sisters Brooke and Jill.  

Entering the temple as a family was a wondrous experience.  The kids make the monthly temple trips with Josh and I to the temple so that we parents can serve there.  Being children, they do not yet enter the temple to preform the vicarious service.  They are okay with that.  They have so much wisdom to accept things that would be hard to explain to an adult.  The love being at the temple with us though and look forward to our trips.  They were innocently excited to be able to go into the temple for this special occasion.  Admittedly, Viv seemed most excited about wearing her new white dress.  The kids strode into the temple more comfortably than anyone I had ever seen.  It was as if they were visiting their best friend there.  All that big soul wisdom seemed to sustain me in the moment that I was to leave them in the care of temple workers until the time we would meet in the sealing room.  They looked at me with true confidence in the process and assurity that we were all doing just the right thing.

Once dressed and all the paperwork double checked, Josh and I entered the sealing room.  The hush and loving anticipation of guests and family felt very familiar.  I could feel within me that I was certainly seven years older and further on in life, but the newness of that moment was precisely the same as my wedding day.  It was almost perfect.  Almost because my kids were not yet with me.  

The wise sealer spoke with us a moment before the kids came up to clarify our understanding of the sealing ordinance, specifically what it would mean for Viv.  His words were a balm of Giliead to my guilt ridden worried mother's heart.  Viv is a gem and a trial all in one.  I have committed to take full responsibility for her as if she were born of me, and in that bargain I have got a whole lot that I am unfamiliar with or do not understand.  The sealer mentioned that the ordinance of sealing children to families is one of the very few choices that I am able to make for her that will assure her blessings in heaven based on my righteousness.  We all know I can't make her do anything, but I can make sure that there will be the basics of good assured her because of the choices I make.  That's when I cried.  It was the peaceful assurance I needed that I can be an okay Mama for this one.

They then brought the kiddos in.  All in white, they reflected the perfectness of heaven on earth, which is perfection within imperfection.  I couldn't help but notice how Danny's dinosaur print underwear was visible through his white slacks and the embroidered dog emblem on his white shirt was seriously misplaced for the occasion.  But he was happy and comfy.  The girls were lovely and decidedly more aware of how pretty they looked in white.  

The moment of the ordinance was quick and quiet.  Viv, similar to adoption day was more solemnly aware of things.  Contrastingly from the adoption day,  she was beaming. Absolutely radiant.  She was sure of herself and confident that this was all real.  There was no fear lurking behind it, just joy.  It relaxed me to see Viv as her best self.  She didn't ask her usual barrage of questions, she quietly smiled and did just as she was told.  Her tiny hand on mine.  A promise given.  No applause or hurrahs, just happiness.  Softly and quietly, Faith and Danny gathered around us all at the altar, happy and white and TOGETHER.  We looked briefly in the reflection of our family in white, all smiling, all embracing.  Then the moment passed.  As if a still moment when we could all feel what it really meant to be eternal and where happy with that and moved on in life's good blessing.

The kids hugged the rounds and Danny kept pouncing on the chairs like a puppy in his happy silliness. Faith wanted to stroke pretty things.  Viv just stayed near.  Quietly.  The children were escorted out.  Josh and I went to change. 

 I went back into the bridal changing room, which originally I had felt sheepish taking.  I was just changing into my normal temple clothes, but they were making such a big deal out of things.  Then I paused in that beautiful room full of mirrors for a moment of true reflection.  That day was something special and I was absolutely humbled with gratitude for life, love, family and my knowledge of it all.  God's Spirit filled my soul and I sat down for a moment to collect it in.  He had given me a daughter and also given me the tools I need to teach her.  He had given me His daughter.  And Viv is beautiful.  She is amazing and special beyond all I know.  Perhaps beyond allI will ever get to know.  Only in the reflection of eternity and myself could I feel that truth, inside the Lord's Holy House.  

Prior to December 15th we had talked a lot in our family about the reason we were going to the temple for the sealing ordinance.  This was something that most other adoptive families don't do.  We feel blessed to teach our children the truth we know and share with them the joys of revealed ordinances for our continued happiness.  Even when talking with the kids about what 'sealing' is, like welding, like welding a whole bunch of links together.  Once all welded together they they are stronger.  Our family linked together here on Earth and through that veil that separates heaven and earth is vast and strong.  All of those links are lifting me up and supporting me in my choices and failures.  Now my little Viv is linked right in there in the middle.  With all our mighty linked heart and faith we will all lift together in raising this lovely daughter of God.  We can rely on our collective strength that links us, seals us in deed and love, to our Eternal Family.

Our Hero

The day after Christmas Josh got the hero's treatment.

Josh goes to battle for our family every day, he is truly our hero.  Danny gave him this shirt from one Captain America to another.  The kids made their profile pictures for him.  I made him his favorite dinner.  31 is turning out to be the prime of our lives!

The Best Gifts of Christmas 2012

Tis' the season for the holiday looting recap.  In reviewing 'the best' of this year I am awestruck, in all sincerity, of the simplicity of joys that were not packaged.

Those who know me best know that I LOVE to give gifts.  It comes quite close in hand with I love shopping.  Although I don't feel myself to be much of a materialistic person, I do like come stuff (shoes and clothes) in more abundance than others (gadgets and gizmos).  I got closer than ever this year to my touted 3 gifts per person.  Luckily I have been maintaining my education in self-sufficient simplicity and thus was more apt to feel that less really is more.  And it has been!  It also helps that I was a bit more selfishly Scroogish because I am saving up for a big trip for my to NYC in two weeks.  However the means by which I accomplished it this year, I am so grateful!

The kids got their Christmas Eve jammies: ain't they cute.
Beyond that they are supposed to get 3 gifts: one experience, one something homemade and one special toy from Santa.  I always throw in a matching Sunday ensemble for the whole family.  This year was a magical year of belief in Santa.  Danny's eye's popped out of his head when he found legos in his stocking and Faith sat back in amazement when she saw that there was the perfect dolly for her to do its hair from Santa.

Viv was happy to be getting gifts and receiving input on gracious receiving also.  By her last gift she said thank you and some happy words without even being prompted.  She is getting used to the slower pace of group gift opening and experiencing the happiness of shared joys instead of giant looting.

I finally finished the kids' matching quilts, started nearly 2 years ago, thanks to a brain wave of making the girls quilts into duvet covers and thus not having to quilt them.  I was totally gratified when Faith woke up two days later and recounted to me that she had had a bad dream in the night and instead of getting out of bed to come be comforted by me, she just wrapped her quilt around her tighter and felt my love wrapping her up warmly and wasn't scared anymore.

The experience gift this year was to be piano lessons for all, but we ended up giving them all sleeping bags and they are more excited about the upcoming experience of camping a lot this summer. I am too! It is exciting to think of this family phase of life when we are going to make memories that they actually remember without me having to tell them!  Plus it put us one step closer to having our emergency preparedness prepared.

Our family gift was the cats, which has given us all more enjoyment for our dollar.  They are the toy the kids can't get enough time playing with.

Josh and I spent our gift budget on Advent dinners, a tradition that we prefer to share with others.  It helps us get into the true meaning of Christmas better than anything else and well worth the money spent on some fabulous cheese, meats, and company.

Josh as always, just wanted money in the bank for Christmas.  It is always super hard for me not to express my love to him in my love language (gifts), but to just speak in his language (physical touch and words of affirmation).  My gift to him this year was honoring his wish and really not getting him anything.  He got to read through 'his book' which is a journal I try to keep daily of the wonderful things he does for me.  I started it when we got married, forgot/lost it for 6 years and picked back up this year to help focus on the positive things about our marriage.

My gift is forthcoming as a combined birthday and Christmas gift.  What I enjoyed most about this Christmas, which was a true gift for me, was the amount of happiness and energy I felt.  After 3 years of depression and chronic fatigue it was amazing to finally feel myself again.  Josh and I spent Christmas day playing with the kids as much as they wanted to (kids all had influenza) and still made valance curtains for the kitchen windows.  I thought, gee I could do more tomorrow!  For the first time in a long time I am making To-Do lists and feeling as though I can tackle them.  It has been a learning adventure to figure out my own body and how to maximize on my own energy potential: combination of better sleep and understanding how to get it, taking the proper vitamins daily, listening to the input my body is giving me and respecting that, and less exercise.  Life is so positive and upbeat and we are all enjoying it.

Second best gift of this Christmas season: snow the day after Christmas!  I am in wintery heaven.

In an adoption mood..

On Friday December 21st we picked up two new members of our family.  It was significantly easier than what we just went through to adopt a human (and not as significant), and so fun to have pets!

We went down to the animal care and control and 'interacted' with the cats on Thursday.  Our cats pretty much picked us, and it has been a blissful addition.  I was hesitant about getting two cats but have been super glad to see them play together.  It has also been extra nice to have such good companions for the kids this weekend in particular since everyone came down with influenza and the best we could do was cuddle kitties and watch movies.  As you can tell, the cats didn't mind.

The little black guy is Kris Kringle (Kringle was his shelter name) and he is 4 months old.  He is definately Danny's pick and favorite.  Playful as a kitten but oh so cuddly.

This dude rocks - his name is Toggles.  He is one year old and was an abandoned cat. I figured he was the perfect guy to help Viv get over her irrational fear of felines because he is super calm and extra cuddly.  When we were interacting with him in the shelter he didn't car which way the kids picked him up and we have since found that he actually prefers to sleep in his back!  

The cats are our family Christmas gift this year and the kids pitched in their money to as to make it their gift to each other also!  They are a gift that keeps giving.  When watching family movies, everyone is on the couch cuddling together, cats included.

Unsuspecting Intellectual Hopefuls

I have long been a proponent of feminist movements as mothered by Elaine Showalter: to foster intellectual ideas and conversations in which feminist works and individuals will be appreciated for their inherent femininity.

I have equally as long been frustrated with those who use the guise 'feminism' to bludgeon their way into business that has nothing at all to do with celebrating anything feminine but rather fighting against a perceived masculine authority.

I do not purport that there are instances in which things have been traditionally patriarchal and do need some adjustment.  Bra burning, however does not constitute any major social change toward a more feminine lifestyle.  Nor does demanding that you have a right to wear pants.  If you want the girls to ride free and your legs to be encircled by fabric - go ahead!  Just don't continue to misrepresent feminism and lure unsuspecting intellectual hopefuls into believing such is a feminist movement.

12-13-12 Official Add-One Day

I know of a lot of wonderful people who refer to the experience of adopting a child as a journey.  If adoption is a journey, we reached the destination on Thursday, December 13th, 2012.  

Faith Vivianna came to our family as our first foster placement on October 31st, 2010.  I remember the crazy call on a Sunday.  It was a moment of elation filled with a long series of dot...dot...dot....  We knew she was a three year old girl being removed from a domestic violence situation.  Her name was Faith.  The told us where to meet them to pick her up and to be there in approximately 30 minutes.  Josh was out of the house home teaching and I called him with the excited tremor in my voice that we needed to go pick up our daughter.  I look back now and realize that, perhaps because it was our first placement, I believed that getting a foster child would be a wonderful addition to our family, and Viv was our only foster child that I referred to as 'our daughter' from the first moment.

The first few days were filled with caring and confusion, number one, what do with the double Faith issue.  Our first born insisted that we call her princess and the middle Faith.  Luckily, at our 'ice-breaker' meeting with Viv's biological mother we found that she had a middle name and we asked permission to use her middle name in our home.  For the first year and a half that Viv was in the family she was known as 'Vivy' to all.  She was diminutive and so it seemed fitting to keep the 'y' of her culture on.  Just recently she has insisted that she is Viv, without the y, although she is having a hard time figuring out how to write her big name since she learned Vivy.

The interim 2 years from pick-up day to adoption have been somewhat catalogued in this blog.  In February of 2012 all parental rights were severed from her biological mother.   Viv was four and a half and had already been in our home for over eighteen months.  The formality and finality of that last visit with her biological day I remember keenly.  I waited outside a building in downtown Phoenix by our van during the visit so anxious.  The meeting went over and every moment was agony.  I was terrified that something might happen to Viv and I would never see her again.  I wondered how much this last visit would affect her.  I prayed that her biological mother would not try following us.  It felt like a scene from a crazy heist movie where I had to steal away my daughter in disguise.  When she finally came out with the social workers with bags of stuff, smiling and happily confused I was relieved.  Truthfully, I was also angry at the biological for having popped back into the picture with all the showering gifts after all that time so now I was left with the responsibility of explaining to Viv why she would never see that woman again.  It was an age appropriate conversation at the time, but a very vivid moment for me in our transition to this final adoption day.

When we moved to Indiana in April we knew it would put a bit of a kink in the adoption timeline but were happy to be in a new home ALL together.  A new state has been a wonderful space in which to form new memories and solidify our family unit.  No more triggers of the past, just moving forward together.  In this new space we have learned the most about Viv.  She is vibrant and absorbent.  She does her best to learn.  She is quick to translate feeling into picture, a budding artist.  And yes, there are some 'things' that could hold her back.  Yet, praise be for a family and home life that will give her all the opportunity she could want to be her best self!

We finally made it through all the paperwork falderal with Indiana and Arizona, thanks to some persistence on Josh's part and the adoption date was set.  We had begun the dialogue about adoption a bit more after Josh and I took a mandatory class from DES to be licensed adoptive parents.  It was interesting for all of us to start talking openly about making our family official.  Personally, it wasn't comfortable; probably because I have carries so much responsibility for Viv during all her transitions and healings and done so much to keep her from talking of her biological mother.  Biological mother is part of the adoptive conversation and I was confronted with it a lot.  Over time, the conversation got more comfortable for all of us and we looked forward for the day that we got that magical piece of paper from the judge that would make our family official.

On Thursday my thoughts were consumed with the pending adoption.  Our scheduled time was 1:45pm with the judge.  Our attorney has been extremely efficient, has was our adoptive case worker here in Indiana.  We arrived in the extremely ornate Court House and were met by both.  The court house here is lovely and we had to ascend a giant marble staircase to get to the second floor rotunda meeting place.  As I walked up the steps with Viv's little hand in mine I couldn't help but start singing "Together at Last, together forever!" from Annie.  I may not be Daddy Warbucks, but I know what love is.  

Josh and I were able to review some of the official documents that will be in Viv's legal file (which we will not see again because it is closed at finalization of the adoption) that gave us some information we never had had before.  We got some definitive numbers as to how many half siblings Viv has, in case some day she wishes to seek them out.  We learned a bit more medical history of the biological mother.  Best of all to me, I saw the records of her birth.  It was like having a new baby born to me.  All those little facts that you send out in that first announcement were given to me on the day I official got my daughter.  Viv was born at 38 weeks on October 16 at 11:31p.m.  She was 8 lbs 15 ozs and 19 inches long.  That makes her heavier and shorter than my other two babies. 

While we were waiting for our court time Faith and Danny were actively exploring the court house, very much to their liking.  I found it striking that Viv stayed very near me and was wide eyed and solemn.  She has always been very perceptive when case managers are around and knows when she is being talked about.  I know she was paying attention to the details of what was happening.  I was glad we had prepped her for that day being all about her, since that helps her zone in a bit more.  I felt that we were both settling into this new day and all that it would mean for us.  Mounting to this day Viv had been following old patterns of sabotage which is normal for foster children; we all waited patiently through it for the settling affect of the adoption.

Being in front of the judge was the closest I hope to ever come to being on trial.  We were asked a few questions by our attorney that affirmed what was in our adoption petition and then the judge gave her review.  The wave of reality hit me when the judge smiled at me and said "The court states that from this day forward the child shall be known as Vivianna Hope Button."  It still chokes me up a bit.  She is my girl.  We have talked about her name for a long while; it was nearly a year ago that Viv chose her middle name as Hope during a conversation in which we talked about the meaning of names.  Finally, it was official.  I don't ever have to explain to people again that her legal name is one thing but we call her another thing.  Nor do I have to worry about her hearing her 'other' last name and not feeling included in our family.  She is a Button.  Legally.  She is a Button.

Out we marched from the court room with a new child.  Viv is ours and we are calm and peaceful.  I don't worry about being her parent anymore, I am.  I don't have to worry about paperwork or case workers, insurance or visits.  We are scott free and happy.  After all the hype of the day before, 12-12-12, we determined that 12-13-12 would forever be Add -1 day for our family and gave a dollar to each child.  We officially added one more to the family on that day, and it will be celebrated forever more.

The Courthouse doesn't allow anyone to take cameras or phones into the courthouse, so they graciously took this one token indoor photo of the day Viv was officially added to our family.  Sadly, since we parked farther from the Courthouse, it was not easily accessible to get to the camera of our own even for exterior shots....also known as, I was lazy so this is all we got.