Swimming

 These 3 have become quite the swimmers. I am so proud of how brave they have been. We have completed one section and will start the next section of classes in a couple of weeks.

.

Gymnasts

 The girls have been in gymnastics for a few months and are really loving it. In addition to being fun, it is helping them, especially Anavy with occupational therapy goals and skills that she is working on.

.

Shocked!

In October, we will be the parents of 4 kids!! I am pregnant!!!

This was by far, the hugest surprise I have ever had in my life.

I was feeling very sick in late February. I was nausious all day long, very tired, and have a few other pregnancy symptoms. After a week, it was not getting any better so I was getting worried about what could be wrong with me. My sister urged me to take a pregnanacy test just to rule it out. I thought it was a stupid idea because there was no way I could be pregnant. I took the test anyway and it was negative. 3 days later I was very worried so I made an appt with an OB. I am quite unfortunate, medically speaking. And I was wondering what I would soon add to this long expanding list. Plus I was due for my routiene checkup anyway.

My OB-GYN is very nice and I instantly liked her. We went over my fertility problems and my family history. She was confused about the symptoms as well and quickly left again to go test my urine sample. She walked back in and asked me if I wanted to be pregnant. What a funny question. For 7 years, that is what I had wanted. But it didn't really matter what I wanted. Now, I had gotten my family another way. I never thought I would be faced with this question anymore. And frankly, I did not know how to answer it.

She handed me a pregnancy test with 2 very distictive lines through it. "You're pregnant." I looked up at her and asked her if she was kidding. Then I preceded to cry like a little baby.

I scheduled my ultrasound for 3 weeks later and another appt with her 4 weeks later and left. Completly in shock.

Kellen was watching my girls at home so I quickly went to get them and drove to Brett's work.
He came down to meet us in the car. I handed him the test and the box of prenatal vitamins she gave me.
"seriously?" is what he said. He was shocked as well. This was the LAST thing we ever expected to happen to us.

The next few weeks, we still could not believe what was going on. I was still incredably nausious. It was hard for me to stand up some days, it was so bad. I was so tired. I took close to a 3 hour nap everyday (during kids school and Savannah's nap time) because I could not keep my eyes open. I was having pregnancy symptoms to the extreme.

We told our families this past weekend. Everyone is so so excited and we can;t wait!



.

What?!?! We are having a baby!

We have a bit of an update for everyone. We have been enjoying our forever family and doing a lot of really fun things. The girls are involved in gymnastics and swimming lessons and are just waiting for the snow to melt so they can start soccer and set up our new trampoline. They love spending time with their cousins (Trevor and Elise's kids) who have become their best friends. We are planning a big fun trip to California to take them to Disneyland and the beach this summer.  Our lives are fantastic and we are all so happy. 

Our next bit of news is not a rare story. I have heard it countless times but I never dreamed it would happen to us. It has not been too long since we adopted our beautiful kids and a couple weeks ago we found out that miraculously we are expecting our first little baby of our own!!! I am currently about 9 weeks along. Medically, there is no reason why this finally happened for us. We both have our problems in that area, and have been told that it would not happen for us in the normal way but God was able to help us do what we  nor any fertility doctor could help us do. :) And we are so grateful! All we had to do is wait for it to be the right time, even if we did have to wait more than 7 years.

We know that we were supposed to adopt our girls. A million little paths lead us to them and them to us and I really believe that if we were able to conceive on our own earlier, we would not have made that decision to become foster parents and would never have met our sweet girls. Things happen for a reason. We are so grateful for this miracle that we have been blessed with. 

I have no right to complain, but the pregnancy has been pretty hard on me so far. I am hoping that the sickness and symptoms go away quickly and I will be able to go back to normal. I feel like my home has been neglected and my kids are most days, stuck in the house while I am stuck on the couch or in bed.

We have an ultrasound this coming Monday to get an exact due date and we will probably find out the sex of the baby in May. (thinking blue thoughts) I can't believe we will have 4 kids.... wow.

Thank you all for your support and love. We really do have the best family and friends around.  We have had an exciting year and it is just getting better.

Cali, Brett, Anavy, Khloe, Savannah and Baby Smith .