April Showers bring May fl...uh?

For those of you that are not living in Utah, we have had an abnormally strange April. Here's pictures from just ONE of the snow storms. (Yes...just one... all the others I really didn't wish to go outside in!)

View just outside the door, by the driveway.

Our car, check out the trees in the background- tree branches all over Provo broke from the weight of the snow.

Neighbors roof.

Playground in the front yard.

Overall we received 6 inches here in Provo, my parents in Orem received 11 inches! The Utah snow pack level went from 90% of normal to 120%...and rising.

I love snow, but right now, I wish I was back in California!

In other news:

*The entire family has a nasty spring cold, me, Andrew, Sarah....

*Nebulizers are not fun for tiny.

*My sisters and friend Amy M. threw a baby shower for me! It was wonderful! They had a fountain running with balls for the kids to fish out with a net and win prizes, they had a trivia game with a bunch of questions about my daughter, yummy treats of cookies, cream puffs, veges and strawberry lemonade punch. (this was outside on probably the only nice warm evening!) Several family and friends helped out with getting us a stroller! yea! Sarah loves all the books and toys. (This shower was a bit different because Sarah is older, so she received a lot of fun toys and cute outfits.) I was going to have her open all the gifts, but she preferred to play with all the kids instead. - I forgot my camera...so I don't have any pictures...

*I was outside all day Friday weeding the flowerbeds outside my windows, trimming the bushes, pulling dandelions in the yard...until it started hailing. But the flower beds are ready for the tomato, yellow squash, peas, peppers and basil... when it stops snowing! (I did this before I came down with a fever, sore throat and runny nose.)

*The scouts will finally get to receive the Outdoorsman pin! And the boys introduced me to cheese dogs...they're pretty good.

Happy Easter

Sarah loves to draw. This morning she requested a pen and paper, then proceeded to draw. I asked her, "Tell me about your drawing, who's in the drawing?"

Sarah responded, "Jesus!" then pointing to the drawing, "Jesus eyes, Jesus nose."

Anyway... enjoy the drawing of Jesus and Happy Easter everyone!

Pictures of the Kids

We stayed with our friends Patience and Dallan in California. Patience & Dallan have twin boys, Zach and Marriner who I babysat from the time they were newborn until 19 months old whenever Patience or Dallan were attending classes at BYU. The twins are now a little over 2 1/2 years old. Sarah loved playing with them!

Sarah woke up one morning and found Marriner awake, she said, "Zach, come play!" Marriner responded "Shh! Zach asleep I Marriner." Sarah said, "Zach! UP! UP!" (above, Sarah, Zach in middle, Marriner on right.)

Zach found Andrew's shoes and walked off with the 'Steal Mommy & Daddy's Shoe Club'. I found my shoes later in the storage room.

Welcome to the Blanket Brigade!

Dallan was throwing the blankets high in the air and the kids were catching them.

Still playing Blanket Brigade.

We played outside a lot and even went to the park...but I guess I forgot my camera every time...i only have pictures from inside... oops!

Zach with his blanket.

Patience with her newest little baby boy, Brock!

Baby Brock! He's smiling already!

Marriner!

Patience and Brock.

Dallan, the music teacher!

Playing on the bouncer in the Playroom.

Bounce! Bounce!

Sarah loved playing with the boys, she kept talking about them all the way home on the flight, in the car, at home. "Zach! Marriner! Baby Brock! Patience!"

California Day 4 & 5

Peggy L. our adoption worker. This was taken after court.

When we first arrived at the court building, Sarah was very worried. The last two times she was here she was placed with a different family. She whimpered as we entered the room, but was quickly calmed when she saw the little teddy bear that the Judge had placed on the seat for her.

Being sworn into court.

Signing the final paper with the bailiff standing nearby. Sarah wanted to see it too!

Pictures with the Judge! It's official!

Sunday afternoon was my favorite conference session. I loved the powerful talks by Oaks, Uchtdorf, Bednar and Teixiera(sp?). The messages were inspiring and I loved hearing the messages particularly spoken to influence missionary work and speaking to people not within the LDS faith. Everything was spoken with kindness and love. It was wonderful and we enjoyed a wonderful sabbath. Dallan's parents made tacos for dinner and served freshly picked oranges from their fruit orchard, delcious!

Late sunday evening Andrew and I traveled to San Bernadino for our hotel reservation. Court was scheduled for 7:30 am the following morning. We arrived at the hotel and were told that there was no reservation for us! I called Patience, verified the confirmation number and we tried again. "Oh," the hotel clerk stated, "We have you scheduled for a different night, and it's under the name of Rosevall." oops! oh well! We checked into our hotel room at 10:17 pm. We got ready for bed, tucked Sarah in, turned off the lights and enjoyed two hours of a screaming child. Sarah refused to sleep. We put her on the bed, we layed her back down, we offered her a drink, she sobbed... We finally decided to move all the covers off the bed and have her sleep on top of the bed. I picked her up and placed her on the floor while we moved the covers and she prompty fell asleep on the floor (around midnight)! So...she slept on the floor. She awoke at 6:20am!

We arrived at court, awaited our time (we were first). They sat us down inside the courtroom, a teddy bear is given to all the children who are adopted, Sarah recieved her teddy bear and the judge had one last paper for us to sign. The Judge stood in front of us. We were sworn into court and she asked three questions:

"Do you recognize that with the joy of adoption will also come the responsibilities and obligation to care for this child and that the child has rights to your care and support?"

"yes"

"Do you recognize that this child will become yours fully and legally, and will be treated the same as any natural born child you have or will have?"

"yes"

"With this in mind do you wish to adopt this child?"

"yes"

"With the authority I have as a Judge under the jurisdiction of California, I announce this child to be fully and legally adopted by Amy E. and Andrew M. Rosenvall. Her name from this time forward will be Sarah Ruby Rosenvall. Congratulations!"

!!!!!HIZZAH!!!!!HOORAH!!!!!HUZZAH!!!!HOORAY!!!!!

IT'S A GIRL!

27 lbs. 32 inches tall

23 months old

and

16 months of labor! :) haha!

We took pictures with the judge and adoption worker. The adoption worker Peggy, actually took all the pictures of us being sworn in and signing the final paper.

We left San Bernadino, and found ourselves in backed up traffic from a semi that had tipped over, then got stuck in rush hour (grid locked) traffic and finally made it back to Porterville around 5:30pm.

California Day 3

Andrew and I were able to enjoy a lovely conference. We quite enjoyed Elder Hales talk about Provident living and the way he described wanting to buy a new coat for his wife. But she asked, "where would I wear it?" Meaning that the places she went were in the service of others where she didn't need a fancy coat. The money for the coat would be better spent for others.

In between sessions Patience and Dallan's ward hosts a luncheon. Families bring different dishes to share and the entire ward fit around four regular (rectangle) church tables. We ate hamburgers/hotdogs, oriental salad, chips, veges and strawberry dessert. Sue DeMasters (sister from the ward) sat next to me, she fostered around 59 drug affected babies and helped them overcome the addictions from having a drug birth. She and her husband adopted several kids who are now varied in age from 24-35. She personally adopted eight kids: Caucasian, Hispanic, black and mixed. Each were affected by drugs some were removed at birth and others at older ages(5 & 11). Sue has raised all of her children in the gospel and handled each adoption differently. The first child the adoption was closed, after seeing the affect it had on her daughter she has allowed the rest to remain open adoptions. "Having an open adoption," she said, "allows the child to recognize that there was never any problem with themselves(the child). Instead the problem was always with the parent and the parent put themselves in the situation which caused them to be unable to care for a child." Sue tells all of her kids that they are required to attend and graduate from a University and the boys serve missions. Her youngest son just left on a mission for the West Indies. She was able to tell me the different signs exhibited by children based on which drugs they were exposed to and pointers to watch for later in Sarah's life so Andrew and I will be able to get the help she may need. Sue commented, "The main problem is with processing. The children exhibit normal intelligence their entire life, however, in about 3rd-4th grade they may start failing exams (they can tell you all about a story) but cannot process the information they read and answer questions about it. This can be helped by reading the story aloud or allowing an oral exam." (All of her adopted children exhibited this struggle and all were helped by Sue's persistence in recognizing when they needed help.)

Andrew attended priesthood session at the church building, which is literally next door. He loved President Uchtdorf's talk about not getting distracted.

Sarah mainly sat on our laps or played upstairs in the playroom with Zach and Marriner. She loves to help with little baby Brock too.

Love you all! Hope my sisters enjoyed Ladies Night Out!! They don't have anything like that here! :)

California Day 2

Sequoia National Park

We passed these gorgeous purple bushes all the way up and down.

This is actually the trip down the mountain, looking into the valley.

By the tree you can walk through.

Inside the gigantic tree.

Midway through the tree.

Entering the tree.

A cut section of a tree.

Ooh! Look another tree!

"Big Tree!" Sarah said.

Starting our first hike...yes it was snowing a little bit.

This was the ride up! It was incredibly foggy and hard to see!

April 3: We woke up bright and early with the sunrise. Andrew decided to take a walk outside and promptly set of he house alarm! Oops! Sarah played outside with Zach and Marriner in the sand pit and on the tricycles.

BUCKET LIST #1: Visit Sequoia National Park :)

Around 11am we left for Sequoia. Going up the road the fog was thick and you couldn't see the 3000 foot drops off the sides of the road. After we passed 5000 feet the air cleared and we were above the clouds looking at the tops of them. We drove to see General Sherman and General Grant Trees as well as the California, Oregon etc. Sarah loved walking through the tree at the Grant site. Snow on the sides of the road was 4-5 feet deep and an occasional snow flurry dotted the ground for a few minutes. We dressed warmly mostly and wrapped Sarah in Andrew's coat for extra warmth. For lunch we stopped at Lodgepole Market for provolone, salami, crackers, milk, bananas and a large chocolate brownie peanut butter cookie. On the way down the mountain the clouds had completely cleared allowing for a spetacular view of the valley and surrounding mountains.

We returned to Porterville around 7pm. Sarah played with the boys in the playroom while Patience and I talked and I got to hold tiny Brock.

(We have plenty of pictures, but it will have to be loaded when we get back!)

California Day 1

Rew and I spent the night before packing for California. We cleaned up the house, emptied our fridge and made sure we had all the papers, car rental, and flights ready.

April 2nd: We left at 8:30am and Rew's brother Mark drove us to the airport. We arrived super early for our flight, since they had misspelled our last name on the ticket: ROSEVALL...instead of the correct spelling ROSENVALL. (The social worker booked the flight two days before and the travel agency couldn't change the name.) After waiting through two different lines we were told that we would be charged $50 each for the change in the name... we refused, printed our tickets and went through security. We weren't stopped, no one questioned the name and no one asked for our daughters ID. (I hope we'll be as lucky coming back to Utah.)

Our flight was scheduled for 11:26 am! And was delayed until 11:50am. Sarah danced around at the airport and waved 'hi' to everyone she met. On the flight ticketed infants are required to have the window seat. This time Sarah discovered that the window can close! Which she promptly closed and demanded that it remain closed for about half of the flight. (If you are not aware, I get claustrophobic in closed spaces...) The other half of the flight I demanded that it remain open! Upon seeing the flight attendant Sarah pointed and yelled, "DRINK, PLEASE!" They gave her apple juice and a ginger cookie. She feel asleep in the last 5 minutes of the flight.

We landed in Fresno. (The short nap refueled Sarah and she was happy again.) (Our car is a White 2010 Mazda.) We drove to Porterville where we will be staying with Patience and Dallan (our friends from Wymount); we are at Dallan's parents house (P&D are living here too while working and looking for a house). Patience told me: it's the large house on the left.... large is too small of a word. HUGE house. With an even bigger yard.

It is so good to see Patience again! I didn't think that we'd get the chance after leaving Wymount. She has a month old little boy, Brock, who looks like his older brother Marriner. And the twins, Zach and Marriner! The twins are talking in complete sentences and are about 2.5 inches taller than Sarah. The introduced her to the sand pit and lemon, orange, peach, pomelos, grapefruit, pomegranates, apricots, etc, etc, etc. bike trail and basketball hoop.

I helped Patience decorate tomato plants for a relief society meeting while we let the kids run and play outside in 82 degree beautiful sunny weather! We were all rather tired and fell asleep around 10pm. Goodnight!