Tap Tap House

There's so much to say, and so little time to gather all my thoughts :)
We've been having a great summer. Mid July we took our family vacation where we rent a cottage and relax for the week. The best part of going on vacation was that the friday before we left we found out we bought a house! and we also found a renter for our current house!! Yea---all these pieces are falling into place!! We had been up in the air for a long time about moving, it really was a hard decision. It's not that we needed more room, but yet when we thought about life and what we wanted for our family 'goals', we knew we weren't in the right place. Anyways----we could go and feel like it was done and enjoy the vacation!!
So I was listening to someone talk about Haiti and of course something that gets mentioned are the Tap Taps. They are "buses" that pick up people and bring them to the market or where ever they are going. They are always filled with people, basically if there is a place to hold onto and a place for a foot--you got yourself a ride. I liked what this person said. Tap Taps can be known for "there is always room for one more". I like that analogy and I thought I really want to make our house a Tap Tap house. A place where there is 'always room for one more'. I don't know what that looks like yet. I don't really have specific plans, but that's the exciting part. I think God can use it when we open it up to him. My mind thinks about hosting exchange students or doing foster care. Maybe another adoption or refugee. Who knows.

So this week I'm packing and cleaning---sounds fun, right?!

Start of summer

Wow! We jumped into summer with both feet and were off running right away. I feel like we're getting to the point that we can come up for air again :) It's been good. It's great having the kids home, I LOVE it!!

Some busyness was self induced :) We started right away with some swimming lessons and some rec stuff--but that helped get us going so we didn't get into habits of sleeping in and lounging around! In that time we threw in working extra (which is out of the norm for me), having our 14th anniversary--but literally crossing paths and seeing each other for about 5 minutes that day, looking at houses and putting an offer on one, thinking about what that really looks like to move this summer before Aidan comes home, having my dad's 60th birthday party, making 20 lbs of potato salad (about 19 lbs too much), my sister and brother in law from out of town, making awesome strawberry jelly, and cleaning up wet basements from a storm :) But hey......it's all in a days work ..............actually I think my husband is ready to commit me for insanity :)
Then we had a FANTASTIC week of camping with family. It was the one and only HOT weather week we've had so far this summer, but it was great for us because we were by the pool and beach all day. I'd take that any day over the past cold summer, drizzly days. The pictures can't even discribe how much fun the kids had. They were in their glory to be able to ride their bikes around and play at the park and go to the candy store...........you can't get any better than that! It was perfect!









It was wonderful getting our June update. As I was starting to feel on top of things, I enjoyed looking and imagining him through his pictures. We actually got great pictures of him and some of the nannies that care for him. I think it will be great to have those for him. We even have been able to get pictures of his birth family, which is awesome!! I think it's great for kids to have any info they can about their birth families. No timing news, but didn't expect any either.....at this point I'm glad to know that God has the perfect timing, because I don't think I could plan better than God at this point. I may try, but life sure has had lots of twists and turns lately. :)
Okay--so we get lots of pictures and I just think he keeps getting cuter and cuter!! I absolutely can't wait to just watch him enjoy life.





I also came across this video of GLA doing VBS. I think it's adorable of the kids singing...



Well.........Blessings!