Compromise.......Possibly!

So I think John and I have a name compromise. I wasn't and still am not crazy about Tessa Leigh so I think we are going to compromise with Ariel Tessa. She may be called both or just Ariel or maybe Ariel Tess. I really like the name Tessa and to me she has always been Ariel so joining the two makes sense.

On the Chirstmas front John bought John-Cole a laptop so he should be happy. He and Landi broke up so I'm not sure who he's liking now. Could be Emily or Charlie or who knows. He's such a good kid. He deserves someone who knows what they have when they have him.

I'm hoping to save enough money to get John a membership at the Municipal Golf Course. I just have to stop spending money on Ariel. I've found myself getting back interested in dolls and have bought three more for our collection. They are all 3 Middleton's and are so cute.

Thanksgiving 2007 is almost here and I hope and pray that by this time next year we will be having Thanksgiving with one more member of our family. As always we are praying for our baby girl and can't wait to go and get her!

More later....

Pictures of John-Cole and School 2007 10th grade 1st Half.

Pictures from John Cole's Sophomore Year! I so freakin love these kids! First is John Cole and his gorgeous girlfriend Landi. I just love her! They are so good for each other. This is Homecoming 2007!

Next we have some of our Sophomore Girls. Chelsea, Abbie, Kaitlyn, Allison and Sam!

Here is John and our cousin Holly looking gorgeous just like always. She had the most gorgeous dress I have ever seen. She also made court her first year to be eligible and I have no doubt she will be back on her senior year! Gorgeous Girl!

John Cole at his 16th birthday party. Three of his best friends, Charlie, Morgan and Mallory trying to give him a kiss.

John Cole and one of his BFF's Chelsea. They have been together forever! I think this was Rock Star day which explains the red or pink haircolor and the stars.

John Cole and Jared on the Golf Course. Their team came in 2nd and Jared said it was all because of John Cole. He loves golf!

Finally the 3 most awesome 10th grade football players ever! John Cole, Nathan and Matt. These boys are super amazing!

John and John-Cole have lost their mind about our baby girl's name!

Here is a pic of the doll I bought our baby girl for Christmas. Isn't she gorgeous!! Her name is Shu Ning and she is by artist Ping Lau.

I was reading the name boards night before last and saw a name I liked, Tessa. It's feminine, cute and beautiful at the same time. I really like it. So I mentioned it to John. I said something like Tessa, I really like that. You know like Tessa Beth or Tessa Leigh. John screams, "THAT'S IT!!!!!!" I said "What?" "Tessa Leigh, that's our baby, that's her name, that's her." Well John-Cole feel in love with it too and now they won't even hear of another name. It's Tessa Leigh or nothing. Now I love Tessa, I really, really like it. Leigh, however I don't like. I never liked my name being Leigh. It's to masculine for me. Tessa Leigh is cute but I just haven't given up on Ariel. Or even Arielle! So what about Ariel-Tessa, it's cute! It compromises both names! Nope John won't hear of it, his baby is Tessa Leigh. I think he's been around Emily Mobley's daughter Chrislee to long. So I don't know how this is going to turn out. I do really like Tessa so I'm hoping for Ariel Tessa. Then as she gets older if she would rather be one or the other then she could choose.

Of course John has all the kids at the school loving Tessa Leigh too. So we shall see.

John Cole had their first high school basketball game tonight. The Jr. High and High School Girls both won but the Jr. High and High School boys both lost by all of 3 points each. I think if they will slow down and take their time we could really have a good boy's team this year.

Coach Stompes said tonight that he was really going to start working with John Cole with kicking in football. John Cole loves Coach Stompes and it's so great that he is taking the time with the kids that he does. He also is going to put John Cole on a weight program and some protein to help him gain some muscle and some weight. He honestly is about the best thing that has happened to GCS in a long time.

I got to watch Coach Morgan tonight too and I'm impressed. He's very intense but there isn't a doubt that he knows what he's doing and that's great for our boys. I haven't heard him say anything about staying for a long time but I'm really hoping that he makes the boys the kind of promise that Coach Stompes did that he isn't going to be here a year and then leave them. They really seem to like him too! It almost seems to good to be true that we have a SUPER respected football coach and now the basketball coach seems good too. Heck I even like Mr. O'Rear the new headmaster! So I will say GCS seems to really be going in an upward direction and I'm so so happy. It's really the only thing that I'm going to hate to leave when we move. I would love to take the school with me and have the baby girl go to GCS. I know God will provide a good school for her though wherever we end up.

No new news on the adoption front in the last few days since December 8th was referred. It looks like we will be looking for referrals again at the end of the month or maybe the first few days of December. I am going to pay for one of her Christmas Presents tomorrow. It's an Asian doll and it's so cute. I added a pic at the top of this post.

So as always I'll close with a small prayer. Dear Lord please watch over our baby girl. Please watch over our family and keep us healthy. Please be with John Cole as he goes through these tough teenage years. We love you and thank you for giving us this wonderful family.

Oh I forgot to add.....

Oh I forgot to add that Kevie, our social worker in Oxford retired in order to Home School her kids so we have been moved to Jackson. Peggy is our new social worker and she is great! John and I both really like her! It's been great having two great Social Workers in Kevie and now Peggy.

We do like traveling to Jackson better since it is about an hour closer to us then Oxford was. Of course anything for our baby girl!!

We will have to go have our fingerprints done again in December in Memphis for hopefully the last time! I don't think we will have to redo our 171 thank goodness! Anyway wanted to add this!

November

Well it's November! Referrels finally made it into December! Yay!! Right now the CCAA has referred families through December 8th. Thank goodness November is over! It took 5 months to finish November. Praying that it won't take that long with December or January!

Let's see whats going on with us. Football season is over! We had a terrific year and Coach Stomps is just the best! We scored more this year then we have in years and years. Now we are moving on to Basketball which starts this Thursday! I can't wait!

We are still up in the air about names. Our baby girl has been named about 3 times but we are revisiting all the names just to make sure we have the right name. Of course like John says we probably won't know exactly what to name her until we see her beautiful face! Right now some of the names in the running are,
Keira-Beth
Katey-Beth
Karleigh-Beth
Kara-Beth
Ariel-Beth
Alayna or Laney-Beth
Savannah
We just don't know! I found myself looking and browsing name sights. Just anything to do to help deal with the wait.

Of course we know God has our daughter and she isn't ready yet. He has the perfect little girl for our family picked out and in HIS time we will have our referrel.

Oh we added another pet to the family. One night I noticed something black near John's shop and it was a kitten. It was so funny, John rigged the cage for me and I put food and water in there and then we ran a rope into the den and when she went in we caught her. That's been quite a few months ago and she is now part of the family. Her name is Isabelle and she is so mischevious! She can be so mean but then at night she is so loving. We made the mistake of letting her out the other day and she went under the fence next door. Well the neighbor's sheepdog was out and chased her about 40 feet up a pine tree. Of course once she was up that high she was terrified and had no intentions of coming back down. So John had to pull the bucket truck into the backyard and go up and get her.

Back to the adoption, I've had so many dreams of travel lately. I am still so scared of flying for 17+ hours but I know God will get me through it. I'm so ready just to get her and get home and start her life here. I can't wait to see her at the football and basketball games.

I guess thats it for now. As always I thank God so much for leading us to our babygirl! We love her so much and think about her constantly. I know God is watching over her until we can get there to get her. Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!