Caleb Shaun's 1st Birthday!

Because of sharing a birthday with both Cadence and Slang, we pretty much put off Caleb Shaun's celebration until the end of the week. We figured he didn't mind :)

This picture was taken on his actual birthday as he got up - bed head and all!

Opening a couple of presents from KayKay and yellow GiGi on the morning of his birthday (with help from Cadence of course)

On Friday, before his party, we started him out opening up another present from GiGi because we knew it had his birthday bib and crown for the party. He definitely was into the paper!

My sister, April, came up with the brilliant idea to have a Super Mario Bros. party. And although we didn't do everything we could have with a themed party, it was still pretty cute. Thankfully Christa, my cousin, lives up here now and so I asked her to make the cake. She's fabulous with cakes so it made lots of sense for her to tackle Mario instead of me attempting it.

See?

We headed to Bellingham Park for his party on Friday evening. We were a little concerned about the heat and rain with an outside party but thankfully, dark clouds blew in and kept on blowing and just cooled everything off to where it was actually a pretty pleasant evening for August.

The impromtu decorating crew taking care of things

The cake/food table all set up. Chris made the flags on the cupcakes. We were really happy with how all the Mario stuff turned out!

The Birthday Boy in his birthday bib and crown :)

Lighting his cupcake. We were a little concerned about the cake part of this party since we have a little boy who doesn't eat with his mouth. However, he loved the fire and singing, and being the center of attention so it still worked out pretty well. And since he does put food in his mouth and then spits it out, the end result looked much like other 1 year olds eating their birthday cake!

Singing Happy Birthday

Pretty Proud of his cupcake

talking to Uncle Evan about the whole experience

See? You'd never know by looking at him that he has an aversion to food in his mouth

The present table. We made the mistake of waiting until it was too late in the evening to open presents so it wasn't the most pleasant of experiences, but that's OK because he's loved playing with everything today even if opening it last night wasn't much fun.

Caleb Shaun in his new birthday ride!

As Chris and I debriefed the birthday week today, we were talking about how much of a miracle it is that this little boy has even made it thru his first year of life. 2 open heart surgeries, along with a couple of other surgeries on his stomach, a product of the foster care system, having no idea of who his biological father is, having a mom who chose to terminate her parental rights because of the amount of work he will be to raise long-term, feeding and physical therapy, and now waiting to become a permanent Andersen. What a year! Yeah, we're pretty much going to celebrate daily the fact that the Lord has given us this child to train up and have the honor to tell about the Gospel.

So, Caleb Shaun, along with praying for you for all your physical stuff and just normal growing up stuff, you can believe with everything in you that your Daddy and I are believing that you will absolutely live up to your name and choose at an early age, and for the rest of your life, to follow the Lord with your whole heart (or as much of a heart as the Lord has given you) and look forward to celebrating as many birthdays and everydays as the Lord chooses to give you.

Numbers 14:24 But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit and has followed me wholeheartedly, I will bring into the land into which he went, and his descendants shall possess it. NRSV

Opening presents with Mommy and Daddy

Cadence was way into her birthday this year. It's like she's finally figured out that it's a day that centers around her AND she gets presents! What could be better than than in the mind of a 4 year old? :) So, when she woke up on August 3rd, we had her presents out on the table. She was so excited and couldn't wait to start opening them. So, Chris and I drug ourselves out of bed and let the present opening begin.

There was lots of princess stuff this year. An apron/oven mitt set, a pillowcase to be colored, a snow globe, a couple of barbies, a ballet stage for her princesses, etc. and of course the ever practical "school clothes" from Mommy and Daddy. They weren't nearly as exciting :)

Here she is looking at the back of the box.

A disclaimer here:

I hate the back of the box. All it does is show a kid what they don't have and still need. Why can't we just be grateful for the toy in the box? No, everything that was opened and photographed, when she held it up for the picture - she could see the back of the box and it shows everything in the collection that she didn't get!. It should be illegal for toy makers to put anything on the back of a box that a toy comes in.

and yes, she is kissing Prince Eric she was so excited to have a new boy! Now Prince Navine doesn't have to marry all the girls.

Shae's 4 year old Party

For Cadence's "party" this year we decided to just invite some friends along to have our nails done and go to lunch. It was way fun - and completely exhausting - to have a few hours with Cadence and her friends but completely worth it because of all the fun that was had.

After picking everyone up and delivering Caleb Shaun, we were off to the nail place. Everyone picked their color and the ladies got to work painting nails.

The dryer station proved to be lots of fun for all the girls. They were so big to sit there while their nails dried.

After the nail adventures, Cadence wanted to have pizza for lunch so we headed to Tony's Pizza for the rest of the party. After ordering our cheese pizza and getting everyone's drink, we settled in to being opening presents. The other people in the restaurant that all the girls were cute but I'm sure heard they heard more dialogue about princesses than they had bargained for during their lunch break :)

The pizza was finally finished (according to the girls who had to wait so long) and it was quite impressive to me how 5 little girls killed a medium pizza!

Thankfully tho, there was still room for cupcakes! Cadence had requested sparkly blue cupcakes - one of her favorite colors right now - and so this is what we came up with.

These little girls were so much fun and truly made me laugh most of the time. I'm so glad that Cadence has such great friends that she is growing up with and can't wait to see what their friendships look like as they continue to grow up.

Everyone showing off their Ariel toy :)

Happy Birthday to Everyone!

10 years ago this dog was born in the backwoods of FL. We were not even married at the time but somehow Slangnasty Andersen showed up and began to change our world.

4 years ago today this super sweet baby was brought into our world and changed us forever.


1 year ago today, another sweet baby was born and even tho he didn't come into our world until almost 2 months later, we were again changed forever.

Today we celebrate both of our sweet babies (and Slang) as they turn 10, 4 and 1! The verse that has come to my mind over and over again as I've thought about how God has put our family together is Proverbs 16:9
In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.

We would have never been able to take a guess 10 years ago when I gave Slang to Chris as a Christmas present that 10 years later we would live in Mooresville NC with, not only Slang, but 2 incredible children given to us from 2 incredible girls. Adoption has literally changed our lives. The fact that these 2 children, along with Slang, all share a birthday is certainly comical on lots of levels yet at the same time, I think how perfect that it bonds our 2 children who come from completely different people with completely different DNA and join them together in a way that only God Himself would be thoughtful enough to come up with.




HAPPY BIRTHDAY CADENCE SHAE AND CALEB SHAUN!

Daddy and I are so glad that God chose to give the 2 of you to us to be our children and look forward to lots of years juggling how to have 2 birthdays on the same day and make you both feel like the special blessings that you are.

Guess who's mobile?!?

We've been on our way to crawling for about a week now and in physical therapy, Ms. Ruthie has been working specifically to get Caleb Shaun up on all fours. Well, this week he has decided that it is worth his while to crawl. So, we are now well on our way to being age-appropriate! The pictures above are of him getting up on all fours in therapy. You can click HERE to watch a video of him crawling. and the bottom 2 pictures are just because our crazy boy is so cute! :)