We had our second adoption home study meeting on Wednesday afternoon. It went well. We were there for 3 1/2 hours. At this meeting she had to talk with us each individually. She asked the same questions to both of us. But we had to answer on our own. It's not like we were really separate either. She asked us questions in the dining room while the other person was in the connecting living room, like 8 feet away. I was pretending to be listening to the Ipod while Stephanie went first. But I was really listening to everything they were saying. I wanted to hear the questions so I would know how to answer. I knew I was in trouble when she asked Stephanie where her parents worked when she was born. I had no idea where my parents worked when I was born. Or I couldn't remember. So when she asked me we called them on the cell phone to ask. I went pretty well though. Our last home study meeting is scheduled for next Thursday at 4ish. 

Stephanie is on her way over to Mankato this evening. Her sister, Nicole, is in the hospital about ready to have a baby. She's a month early. So Stephanie's watching her kids tonight and tomorrow. She's not working tomorrow. And then tomorrow afternoon we'll be going camping for the rest of the weekend. Should be fun. 

TJ

Great Album

I downloaded a new album on Itunes last week - Bart Millard, "Hymned Again". I have the first Hymned album from MercyMe front-man, Bart Millard and really enjoyed it. So I was looking forward to the new one. I love it. From the beginning to the end. What's nice about it is the fresh, new take on each hymn. For instance, I've never heard "What A Day That Will Be" with a horn-driven rock sound. It's great. Out of all the cd's I have, I have never heard a saw on any of them, until now. There is a saw solo on "What A Friend We Have In Jesus". Yep, that's right. A saw. And somehow it works. Other highlights include: "I Stand Amazed", "Brethren We Have Met To Worship", "Victory In Jesus", and the newly written song, "Jesus Cares For Me", a duet with Vince Gill. This albums a mixture of dixieland jazz, country, rock, bluegrass, blues and pop. And it all flows together flawlessly. If you enjoy the old hymns and would love a new take on them, I highly recommend this album.

Track Listing

1. Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus 2. What a Day that Will Be 3. I Saw the Light 4. What a Friend We Have in Jesus 5. I Stand Amazed 6. Jesus Cares for Me 7. Victory in Jesus 8. Brethren We Have Met to Worship 9. Leaning on the Everlasting Arms 10. Down at the Cross 11. Grace that Is Greater

Laugh

If you put me with the right person and we start laughing there is no end to it. One example would be Jeremy(Washow). And it's always at the worst times. You know, in the middle of church, or class, or somewhere really quiet. Once, in Music class at Faith, Jeremy pulled out a mini ping-pong net, paddles and ball out of his suit coat and asked me if I wanted to play. In the middle of class! Then you start laughing and can't stop. And you're trying to hold it in so no one notices your laughing. That just makes it worse. I always liked to try and make Jeremy laugh while he was talking to someone. I would stand in the background and do something to get him going. That was the best. After he'd kinda start laughing he would use the line, "I was just thinking of a joke someone told me earlier." So at Sage Glass now there is someone else like that. Not quite to the extent of Jeremy but it's still pretty good. This other guy and me work together pretty much everyday. I wouldn't say we're good friends or anything, but for some reason when he starts laughing, I loose it too. It always happens in the break room. Our break room is pretty large and everyone pretty much sits together on break or lunch. The problem is that it's so quiet in there. There is no TV or radio. It's silent unless people are talking. What's worse is that there are tile floors.  For some reason there is only one lady that wears heels and whenever she walks on it she sounds like a horse.  She's one of the "big wigs" in the company, and when she walks in we start laughing. Obviously we are trying to hold it in cause there are a bunch of people around. One day she decides to walk right up to me and say something. AHH! I did pretty good holding in though. Now, the other time we laughed really hard is terrible. We were just in a laughing mood. One of the other people "up there" in the company has a speech problem. I've never heard it before. It's kinda like stuttering but a little different. He'll start a sentence like"How are thiiiiiiiiiiiiings in Owatonna?" He will hold out a word for like 5 seconds. A long time. I've heard him talk many times before and it's never bothered me. A little different, but it's never made me laugh. Well, of course, we were on lunch and he was sitting at the table next to us and he said something and did that thing really bad. We just lost it. We were trying so hard to hold it in. Tears were streaming down our faces. It was bad! I don't know what it was. I'm terrible. It's a good thing Jeremy doesn't work there.

TJ

Snow Cones

Yo. What up dogs. The Neighbors Night Out went pretty well. We had a good turnout. The only bad part was the snow cone machine we rented. I thought all bigger snow cone machines were the same. You know, like this picture. Well, I was wrong. The rental place gave us a machine that, I swear, was from 1970.

Never seen anything like it.

Here's a few pictures of it. You could only make a

 couple cups at a time and it didn't crush the ice very well. There was supposed to be a knob to adjust how fine it chops the ice but that was gone. It was a piece of junk. So we ended up having ice cream instead. The worked out great. 

Nothing new on the adoption front. We have our first meeting this Saturday at 6pm.

TJ

Update

At 9:15 last night we got a call from our social worker! That's good. We have to do 3 meetings with her as part of our home study. Our first meeting is scheduled for next Saturday evening. She said normally it takes 2 to 3 months to finish it. She said she schedules a meeting about every other week. But we told her our situation and we're going to try and get it done a lot faster. We already scheduled our second meeting for the Wed. after our first meeting. And she also said that she could write a letter to the Nebraska Department of Human Services and let them know we are interested in Nathen and Chyann even before we finished our home study. That would be a plus. We also got an update today from the Nebraska Department of Human Services and Nathen and Chyann are still on the website. So that's another plus. 

So there is an actual update.

TJ

Now what...I don't know

Waiting. Still waiting. Nothing yet. We sent them an email cause we're just curious what's next. 

We went to the Steele County Fair last night. That was fun. A lot of good food. We had a gyro, kabob, cheese curds, mini doughnuts, and a quesadilla. Good times. I like walking through the RV's. That was fun. We put a down payment on a couple of em. 

This weekend at our church in Faribault is our Neighbor's Night Out where we invite all the neighbors around the church and others to come for supper and different games. Stephanie and I are in charge so we're busy getting all of that stuff together. It'll be fun, but I'll be glad when it's over. Then I can put more attention on adoption. 

We are also going to be finishing off our basement in the VERY near future, hopefully. We only have two bedrooms right now upstairs, so we figured if we're going to adopt a boy and a girl(Lord willing) we better get the basement finished so we have more rooms. 

So there's a lot going on right now. We'll be happy when it's over- the wait that is. 

TJ

Fingerprints....now what.

On Saturday morning Stephanie and I went to the Detention Center. I just can't handle Stephanie any longer. I figured I would just bring her there and I could visit her on Thursday evenings or something. Thankfully, she started behaving though and I didn't have to drop her off. But while we were there we decided to do our fingerprints. We walked in the front door and no one was there. The cage was down on the front window in the entry and it was empty. This is when and where they told us to go. Between 8-10am on Saturday. But over in the far corner of the entry was a speaker on a one-way window that we couldn't see through with a sign that said "push for help". So we pushed the button. This lady answered. We told her we were there to get our fingerprints done for adoption paperwork. She told us it would be just a minute. After, what seemed like an eternity. No, seriously, an eternity. We sat there forever. A detention center guard came out and did our fingerprints. So we went and got that sent in to the adoption agency right away. Now, we play the waiting game again. We're not really sure what's next. We'll see what they send us or do. There are some people in the process of writing referral letters for us, too. So I guess we kinda waiting on that too. I heard one of the longest waiting parts is when you send your fingerprints in to the state to get them checked out. So pray that that will go extra quickly. 

We will keep you up to date. 

TJ

Latest

So here's the latest.... Today we got some more stuff to fill out for the adoption people. We have to make copies of birth certificates, our marriage license and some other stuff. Plus, we have to go do our fingerprints so they can make sure we're not criminals. I hope they don't find out about Stephanie (HA!). That's a joke. Pretty funny, huh? We've got to wait till Saturday morning to do the fingerprints. Then we'll get the stuff sent out right away. That's the latest. Thanks for praying, we'll keep you up to date. 

Camping

We had a fun weekend camping at the Ledges in Iowa. The weather was saying it was going to be so hot on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Friday and Saturday were beautiful. Sunday was hot, but thankfully, we were leaving then. Friday evening we had Walking Tacos and just hung out and had s'mores. Saturday we had some delicious pancakes and bacon cooked over the fire. Mmmm. Then we went on a hike into Ledges State Park. The road getting into it was closed to vehicles cause of the storms so we walked. In the afternoon we had a fun time swimming at the Boone Pool and then eating at Pizza Hut. It was really a lot of fun. We even had a visitor Friday night. A raccoon. It stole our Taco meat, hamburgers and cheese right out of our cooler. It woke Stephanie up so we watched it with a flashlight. I moved our tote with bread and stuff in it to the back of our vehicle. But, I didn't think about the cooler.