Nicknames

We have had numerous nicknames for Amelia in the past year. My first one was

sister girl

which morphed to

sissy

which morphed to sissy pie

and now we are pretty stuck on mimi, because this is what she calls herself.

When she's being cute I call her my P-Pumpkin....when she's grouchy we call the P-Pickle

Jimmy and I also have what we call our spanish names and our mobster names:

Spanish names:

Jimmy---Julio

Cindy---Consuela

Amelia ---Juanita

Our Mobster names are....

Jimmy---Jimmy bag of donuts

Cindy---Cindy bag of peanuts

Amelia---Sticky fingers Bennett

Do you think we have too much time on our hands????

CCAI Open House 2007

Moving on..........

I started this blog at the very beginning of my paper chase. Part time capsule, part networking tool, part pass the time during the wait...........it served alot of purposes. I have met new friends, had a creative outlet, and an avenue of communication with friends and family from far away......but mostly this blog was just incredibly cathartic.

I have poured out my heart, and processed my emotions as I wrote, sometimes discovering unspoken feelings along the way.

I have cataloged and documented the most momentous, soul lurching experience of my life. An experience that will forever divide my life into sections of ----before Amelia or after Amelia.

Now that she is approaching her second year, I am more conscious of her privacy, and as a mom, her safety is of course my first and foremost priority. We'll continue posting pictures and updates of our family life on a password protected site, since we've discovered that blogging is a great way to traverse the miles between friends and relatives who are spread all over the country!

If you are a family member, friend, or an online adoption friend that I have conversed with, please e-mail me at jandcbennett@yahoo.com for the address and password to the new site.

see you on the other side!

CCAI 15th Anniversary and Open House

I travelled to Denver this past weekend, with Amelia and my mom, for the CCAI National Reunion and open house

picnic with my baby

My girly girl's favorite prize at the carnival--a girly necklace, of course!

Sarah and Pam from the waiting child dept. I took a picture of Amelia with Deniece(who made my match call) as well, but that photo is on the disposable camera, not yet developed.

Julie and Tess, we looked for you Friday afternoon and Saturday, but never ran across you guys again! hope you had a great time.

It was so great to meet other waiting child families, some of whom have followed my blog, just as I have followed theirs. What an amazing community of people.

....and then we were a family

Gotcha!

One year ago today, we became a family of three.

Hubby and I have been blessed with love, and family, and friends, and happiness, even before we had a child.

....But bringing Amelia into our family, has added a depth of emotion and experience that is beyond verbal expression............ Because sandwiched in between the daily hum of work and house cleaning and bill paying and traffic...............have been moments upon moments of the most exquisite joy.

A year later, and we still marvel that she's ours.

Some of my friends may think I'm a little silly with my documentation of EVERY SINGLE THING! first this.... and first that..........but I don't care! :))))) We are having the time of our lives! I want to look back on my life and know that I never took it for granted, that I embraced to my core, every beautiful experience---and of course, adopting Amelia is the most beautiful experience we ever expect to have! Before we know it, she'll be off to college, on to carve out a life all her own, and we'll wonder where the time went.

We love you Amelia! We are so thankful to have you for our daughter!

You are the QUEEN OF FUN!

(and we hold court every day:)))

For our first Gotcha celebration, we went to our favorite Chinese restaurant (original, huh? wink) but we had a great time.For our first Gotcha gift, we gave her the Shoey and Dot book (which is the biggest tear jerker of an adoption book I've ever read) and a Year of the Rooster Christmas tree ornament. (She was born in the year of the rooster) We plan to give her a Chinese made and/or themed ornament every year, so that by the time she has her first Christmas tree, she'll have quite a collection!

During Dinner, I told her a very abreviated (and simplified) version of her adoption story. Of course, it took a lot of animation to keep her attention. She just sat there with a bemused smile, thought for a minute, and yelled............."BITE!!!!" which translates to...."lets eat!"

First Pig Tails

------------For her first trip to the library! Amelia loves books, and I mean LOVES books. she brings us a book about 50 trillion times per day and says "up!" meaning.....I want you to set me in your lap and read this book! AGAIN! Mommy was going a little crazy reading the same books over and over, so off we went to the library. A checked out 5 books that she picked out herself. (with mama's help of course :) She was very proud of her haul, as you can see above.
This book was almost as big as she was, and I got quite a kick watching her try to carry all 5 of the books at once.

Self Portrait

Dancing

2nd self portrait. Amelia is clearly taking this task very seriously, as evidenced by the look of stone cold concentration, as I aimed the camera at our faces. She loves to do this....she will pat the camera, and say "Mama....MeMe" (she calls herself MeMe) This is her command for me to take our picture.

First pig tails---a big day all around :)