Ward Christmas Party

I was in charge of the ward Christmas party again this year.  Well, it was the first time in our new ward, but my second time ever being put in charge of a ward Christmas party.  And I was pretty pleased with how it turned out, even though I was completely stressed leading up to it.  My budget was significantly smaller than the first time I did it and I didn't have somebody with decor know-how to delegate that aspect of the party to.  But the ward had a storage shed and a closet that ended up having quite a lot of Christmas things in it that I was able to use decoration wise.  I kept things as simple as I could and did the same BBQ brisket recipe that I used the last time I was in charge of the ward party and bought all the meat in bulk at Costco for $2.38/pound (and got about 100 pounds of meat, which was perfect for the 250 people who showed up since everybody got plenty but there were practically no leftovers).  One of the most stressful parts of this kind of large scale event is knowing how much food you will need and not wanting to be over or under!  Then there were rolls, butter, green beans and glazed carrots.  The rolls were just from Costco but the vegetables and meat were all farmed out to members of the ward who signed up to make them using the same recipe (and supplies) that I provided them with, including spice packets that I prepared beforehand in individual ziploc bags so all they had to do was rub the seasoning onto the meat and then cook it on a low temperature for several hours.

The other thing we did was ask ward members A-L to bring a potato side dish and provided the recipe for Cheesy Potluck Potatoes that Ginny Miller gave me a few years ago.  It is such a great recipe and I debated whether it was pretentious to ask people to make my potato recipe and not leave it open ended, but I was hoping for consistency and the only way to get close to that is to provide the same recipe to everybody.  Most people used it and their potatoes turned out great and everybody said how much they loved them, which made me really glad because I know that the go-to standard at these kind of functions is usually the "funeral potato" dish, but I feel like those so often turn out bland.  The green onions and parboiled chunks of yukon gold potatoes in Ginny Miller's recipe take the cheesy potato dish in a more flavorful direction, in my opinion.  Anyway, we also asked families M-Z to bring a dessert that was chocolate, mint, or both, again hoping for a sort of consistent dessert table by giving guidance while still leaving it open to interpretation.  This was the one area where my planning fell short - we didn't have nearly enough dessert.  I don't know if alphabetically our ward is just front-loaded or what, but the dessert went super fast.  Next time I think I would take a similar approach but supplement by asking a few specific families to bring additional dessert as backup, even just something like trays of mint brownies that would make up for any shortage of dessert.  But the table sure looked pretty in dark chocolate cookies and brownies or frosted white cupcakes and peppermint striped goodies.  So the dessert table looked every bit as beautiful as things tasted.

For this particular ward building, we maxed out the tables and chairs by using every single one that was under the stage and it just met our need with the approximately 250 people who came.  I didn't do a "themed" dinner or anything and just went with red and white alternating plastic table cloths using rolls of plastic covering instead of individual table cloths (so glad we went this route).  Then down the white tables we laid clippings of pine branches that I picked up for free from a local Christmas tree lot and those electric flickering candles  that you can get at Costco.  For the red tables, we laid red and silver ornaments and small packages and baubles that were in a couple of boxes in the storage sheds.  They weren't fancy or complicated as table decor goes, but they were free and prettied things up quite nicely, I thought.  Then for the stage I used 2 rolls of wide sparkly mesh stuff to gussy it up and brought my 4 poinsettias (and had 2 from a friend) to go in front of the screen for the program to provide kind of a focal area.  I wish we could have strung lights or hung snowflakes or something overhead but the amount of work and stress involved in that turned out to be just too much.

For the program, we did a silhouette puppet light show that I remembered from my childhood.  When I was little, I remember my dad building a light box for my mom with white fabric and a light behind it that she then used with figures attached to wooden dowels which, when pressed against the fabric with the light shining behind them, created a dark silhouette.  A short, rhyming account of the nativity story was told from both the perspective of the Bible and the Book of Mormon, accompanied by music.  It was something she found in the 1988 Friend magazine and I think she was Primary president at the time and did it for a sharing time.  It was so moving for me that I still remember how beautiful and magical it was, all these years later.  I remember wanting to help with the puppets and asking to perform it over and over, for at least a few years in a row.  So I immediately knew what I wanted to do for a program this time around, only I didn't know if I could make it work on a large scale because my mom's light box was very small.  But then I came up with the idea of using a photography frame and stretching a queen size white sheet across it for a scrim and cutting out much larger shapes by taking the original images to a copy center and having them blown up as cutting guides before sticking them onto really sturdy cardboard and cutting them out with an exacto knife.  Paul was a lifesaver through all of this - not complaining about my vision and instead helping me to figure out how to make it work by pulling out his work lights and setting up frames and doing at least half of the cutting for me.  And when it came to the show he helped out behind stage, directing the puppeteers and filling in as a third puppeteer for the final nativity scene where a few extra hands were needed to hold up all the pieces.  And I chose a few ward members to help with the program as readers (2 adults and 2 children) and just did congregational singing instead of musical numbers.

I wish I had a picture when the program was happening.  We turned off all the lights except for the candles on the table and the twinkly lights lining the stage and with the glowing screen there was plenty of light to see by.  Nobody really knew what was coming and we started with music and the speaking parts but man, as soon as that first silhouette went up, the hall went silent.  I mean, every single primary age kid was riveted to what was happening.  Because it is so different and unusual and low tech and magical and simple all at once!  Since I was up front leading the music during the singing parts, I could watch the audience reacting and I was so pleased with how well it went over.  And it was a good length, I think, at only about 10 minutes, which seemed to fly by.  In fact, I think I should have timed it out beforehand because it probably could have gone on a little bit longer.  Afterwards a friend mentioned that her kids were asking her "how did they do that?" at the same time as another family's kids were asking the same thing and they just told them, "magic".  The link to the program in the original Friend is here:  https://www.lds.org/friend/1988/12/sharing-time-two-witnesses-of-jesus-birth?lang=eng&query=babe.

The ward had a really large and prelit Christmas tree in the shed that just hadn't been brought out, so we unpackaged that and set it up in the overflow seating section where the dessert table was.  I used green tablecloths from the Relief Society Activities cupboard to cover the dinner serving area and red tablecloths from the cupboard for the dessert area, which I then adorned with some large Christmas decorations I brought from home like a glass apothecary jar filled with candy canes, a large white lantern, and some holly berry conical trees that I picked up at Target a couple of years ago.  It was just enough to make it look special and provide a backdrop for the desserts.

I had great help getting things ready to go - from the people who showed up Saturday morning and helped arrange tables and chairs and put out decorations (took about 2 1/2 hours), to the high priests who worked in the kitchen carving brisket as it arrived and serving it from behind the serving tables once the dinner started, to the family who handled the Santa area, letting one family in at a time so that the kids could have a more quiet, personal visit with Mr. Claus.  That is another thing I would change for future years - we started visits with Santa at 5:30, expecting to do dinner at 6:00, but the line was so long that even with short visits we needed more than 30 minutes.  Next year I would start that 45 minutes in advance, or do it afterwards, although personally I think it worked out well to get that out of the way first.

The ward has a Santa costume in the activities cupboard and my visiting teaching companion's husband agreed to be Santa for us.  Another cool thing that we found in the shed was a giganitic wooden fireplace prop that Paul and I carried in (barely - it was really heavy and bulky!) and set up in the primary room, along with another Christmas tree we found in the shed and our stockings from home to create a little backdrop.  Clara did great with Santa, although Rose was not having it.  This was her first Santa experience of the season and she did not want anything to do with him.

I just love this next progression of pictures.  First Rose complains, then throws a fit, then makes the biggest pout ever, and finally resigns herself to whatever she is being forced to deal with, all over the course of about 10 seconds.  She's at an emotional stage right now, lol.

And that was that!  Cleanup went pretty fast with everybody pitching in and it seems like everybody had a good time.  And I am SO glad it is over.  

Taking Rose to the Temple

On Saturday, November 29th, we were able to take Rose to the temple to be sealed to us as part of our eternal family.  It was such a special, sacred day for us, just like when we took Clara to the temple to be sealed to us almost 3 years ago.  We had wonderful friends and family join us at the Oakland temple for the ceremony, which went well.  Rose was a little upset when she and Clara were first brought into the room for the sealing because apparently a temple worker had offered to carry her up and had taken her from Paul's mom who had been in the nursery with the girls.  Rose was none too happy about that but calmed down a bit once they got in the room and I was able to hold and comfort her.  My favorite part of the ceremony was when the sealer mentioned Rose being sealed to her father and Rose turned and stared at Paul for a few seconds, as if on cue, and then the sealer spoke about Rose being sealed to her mother and Rose turned her head to look right at me.  It was so sweet and like she knew exactly what was happening and what it meant. 

 

Afterwards we took a few pictures in front of the temple in our white temple clothes.  Clara was so excited about her white dress that Grandma Cece had brought for her from Utah.  Every Family Home Evening for a month now we have been talking about what it would be like to go to the temple as a family or why temples were so important, so hopefully Clara was prepared for the experience and maybe she will even have a memory of it as she grows up.  Rose was going to wear the dress that Clara wore when she was sealed to us but when it came down to it, that dress was just so tight on Rose that my mom found a new dress for her in a larger size that fit her so much better.  Both girls looked so beautiful.

We were so grateful to have so much support, especially over Thanksgiving weekend, with friends and family coming to join us.  We only wish we could have had the rest of our family members there too. 

 

Our good friend Lisa took photos for us afterwards.  She was my visiting teaching companion for years in San Jose and is a budding photographer in the South Bay.  She did such a great job and we really appreciate her talent and generosity in getting these images for us to help us remember our special day as a family. 

 

We are so very and eternally grateful to have our little Rosie as part of our forever family. 

Two Family Home Evening Ideas

One of my New Years Resolutions was to do Family Home Evening (FHE) each week.  Clara is definitely old enough to really participate and learn from it so even though we have tried doing it in the past and been okay about it, I would say that last year we only did it maybe 50% of the time.  But this year it has been going really well so I thought I would post two of our most recent FHEs for the record since they were right on target as far as what I would feel is a successful FHE.  And just so you know, these totally weren't my ideas.  I have been searching Pinterest for inspiration, which has been amazingly helpful. 

 

Jesus Calms the Storm

 

Song: Master the Tempest Is Raging

Scripture: Luke 8:25 "for he commandeth even the winds and water, and they obey him."

Activity: First we told her the story about Jesus calming the water from Luke 8 in really simple terms.  Then we laid a blanket out on the floor in the living room and had Clara sit in the middle of it.  Paul and I each grabbed the corners and shook it to create a storm and Clara was the boat in the water.  We told her that when we are in trouble we can ask Heavenly Father to help us and he can calm the storms.  So when she would say "help me Heavenly Father!" my mom (who was there with us) would hold up a picture of Jesus and say "Peace, be still." and Paul and I would stop shaking the blanket.  Clara thought this was awesome fun and made everybody take a turn being the boat and holding up the picture of Jesus to say "Peace, be still."  Clara even took a couple of turns being the one to hold up the picture. 

 

The original inspiration for this FHE went even further by creating a storm using a rain stick, musical instruments, and turning lights on and off to make lightning and talking about how the winds and the waves obey Jesus and how we should obey Jesus too.  I just sort of forgot all those extras but we will probably repeat this one in the future because it went over so well. 

 

Valentine's Day "Love" FHE

 

Song: Love at Home or Love One Another

Scripture: John 13:34

Lesson: I cut out paper hearts beforehand for each of us, then we took turns standing up and everybody else would say something we love about each other and I would write it on our hearts.

Activity: I hid a heart in each room of our house and we went on a hunt to find each of them.  Then we said that love can always be found at our house.   

Treat: Heart shaped apple and cherry pocket pies.  These turned out so yummy.

 

The original inspiration for this FHE mentioned that several studies show it is important for kids to know their family story (and I have read a lot about this in adoption studies as well) and gave some good alternate lesson ideas like telling children how their parents met and fell in love or how we felt when each child joined our family and what it was like when we first 'met' them.  Again, this is a lesson that I can see us repeating using some of these variations.

 

A year ago today...

We went to the temple as a little family to be sealed together for eternity.  Since we happened to be in Utah on the same day this year, we decided to take Clara to the same temple in downtown Salt Lake City to commemorate that special day.  It was FREEZING cold so we didn't do much more than walk around for just a little bit looking at some of the lights and taking a few photos, but it was still a wonderful thing for us to do together.

 

Ward Christmas Party

About a month and a half ago, Paul came home from a church meeting and mentioned that the bishop (what we call the leader of our congregation) had asked if I would be willing to head-up the committee for our ward Christmas party this year.  My first reaction was "No way!" but after some consideration of the fact that if I didn't do it someone else would have to and as I started to think about the other potential people in the ward to head the committee I realized that I was a very reasonable candidate since I have the fewest kids, I am a SAHM who-while busy-has enough time to tackle such a responsibility, my calling as gospel doctrine teacher isn't all the demanding, etc.  So I said I would do it. 

 

I got really lucky in that I had an AMAZING committee of women who helped me put everything together and had super ideas and input.  One of my committee members - my friend Hailey - pretty much took on all the decor herself when another committee member had to back out due to a surgery.  We went with a loose Polar Express theme (tickets for invitations, a "believe" sort of message, and a train set for decorations) and it turned out really well.  Hailey came up with beautiful centerpieces and arranged everything so beautifully.  We were able to get 5 6+foot live trees for $15 each which we decorated with Christmas lights and then gave away at the end of the night. 

 

There is an older couple (actually, they really aren't all that old but all their kids are grown so that is what I really mean) in our ward who have beautiful Santa and Mrs. Claus costumes and they did a great job with all the kids.  I was all about delegating for this party so I asked our Primary President to print Christmas coloring pages and order small boxes of crayons (like the kind you get at restaurants) for Santa to give out rather than candy canes since we had Santa come before dinner and I wanted the kids to have something to do before the food was served and not spoil appetites with peppermint sugar sticks.  Clara did much better with mom and dad in the picture with her.  I may look put together in this picture but I seriously was running all night long managing food levels and making sure the little program we put together happened, etc.  I literally dashed from the kitchen and tore off my apron to take this picture, then headed right back in.  Paul was such a huge help and played with Clara and engaged with our friends all night while I was all frazzled.

We had a good turnout - we were planning for 350 and by my estimate (based on numbers of chairs that we put out) we had almost 300.  The main dish was Barbeque Beef Brisket (my mom's recipe that she got years and years ago when we lived in St. Louis, MO from a guy in their ward who my mom always describes as "a bachelor").  It is SO easy and SO yummy and my mom has made this probably over a hundred times, especially when we have large dinner parties.  I'm including the recipe at the bottom of this post.  I pre-ordered 90 pounds of brisket from Costco (a full crate of meat actually) which meant that I was charged $3.99/lb instead of $5.99/lb (which is what they sell individual briskets for).  Then we farmed out the cooking of the briskets along with the ingredients and recipes to various ward members since we needed a number of ovens but we wanted uniform results.  It worked out great.  We also had baked mac & cheese from Costco's deli - I seriously love this stuff but this was the one thing we had too much of, although my estimates weren't too far off.  I bought 30 pans of it and we ended up with 6-8 leftover I think.  For vegetables we had orange-ginger glazed roasted carrots and french green beans tossed with lemon juice, butter and sea salt.  There were also rolls and for dessert we set up a table with hot chocolate and cupcakes.  The cupcakes (chocolate/chocolate and white/white) were just from Safeway (a local grocery store) but they were actually quite good and I had ordered old-fashioned peppermint sticks to stick in them so that they would be "North Pole Cupcakes" and that made them look extra fancy.

One of the families in the ward brought this incredible toy train set up for part of the decor which gave the kids something fun to look at before and after dinner.  The Young Man in the blue jacket is Evan and he is our home teacher and made sure that the train kept operating in the event that little fingers derailed it.

I had so much amazing help and I couldn't have done it without some of the women in the photos above.  A number of people spent Saturday morning at the church helping to decorate, my committee members worked so hard getting things together beforehand, and we had such great help in the kitchen getting all the meat sliced as it was received and making sure the serving tables were never empty.  It was EXHAUSTING being in charge of such a large event (remind me to never, EVER agree to taking on this responsibility again) but I was very pleased with how the evening turned out and that there was such a feeling of friendship and love and Christmas at the party.

Barbeque Beef Brisket

5 lbs. brisket
2 tsp garlic salt, divided
2 tsp celery salt, divided
2 tsp onion salt, divided
2 tsp sugar, divided
3 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce

SAUCE:
3/4 cup brown sugar
20 oz. hickory flavored barbeque sauce

Moisten meat with Worcestershire sauce. In a little bowl, mix 1 teaspoon each of the garlic, celery, and onion salts, with 1 teaspoon of the sugar.  Rub in dry ingredients. Marinate overnight. Repeat process with the remaining spices the next morning. Place meat in aluminum foil allowing plenty of room for meat to steam inside. Bake at 250 degrees for one hour for each pound of meat. Remove from oven and tear away foil. Pour off broth. Pour sauce over meat. Return to oven uncovered and bake one more hour at 350 degrees.  Remove from oven and slice to serve.

* All of the briskets we cooked were actually between 8-10 pounds - you just need to make sure to increase the amount of your sauce and spices accordingly.

Our ward's adoption dynamic

The other day Paul and I were talking about how fortunate we feel to be part of such a great ward (our local church congregation).  It is a really big ward yet somehow it still feels like people really know each other and care about each other and it really does feel like a "ward family".  We have a HUGE nursery (at least for the Bay Area) with 27 kids between the ages of 18 months and 3 years, with three more kids (including Clara) who are entering nursery by the end of the year.  And something like over 1/3 of the ward works in the primary because there are just so many kids. 

But our ward is incredibly special because of the impact adoption has had on the makeup of many of the families in our ward.  Paul and I realized that there are four different families that we are aware of off the top of our heads whose children were adopted.  That is eight kids, including Clara, in our ward who were adopted.  The adoptions occurred through domestic adoption, international adoption, and foster care adoption.  Some of them are open adoptions and some are closed.  Some of these families have a mix of both biological and adopted children, while others, like ours, grew solely through adoption.  We are also aware of two adults in our ward who were adopted when they were children, which further adds to adoption diversity of our ward.  Our families are diverse and vibrant and loving. 

It has been such a blessing to be a part of a ward that has such strong adoption ties and we are grateful not just to be a part of the adoption community at large, but part of this smaller ward community that has so much adoption experience.  We are so glad that our children will grow up knowing other families created through adoption and that the old-fashioned stigma sometimes associated with adoption will be diminished in a community such as ours.   

Ego Tripping

On Saturday afternoon we got home from an FSA (Families Supporting Adoption) Lunch to find a cute little bag on the front porch with oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and the sweetest messages from some of the Young Women for me.  I really did enjoy being in Young Womens and I am totally going to miss these girls but I know that they have great new leaders.  And I am weirdly looking forward to teaching the Gospel Doctrine class this Sunday for the first time. 

I just had to share a few of the notes (not all because there were quite a few and some had both first and last names on them and I don't want to post identifying information about my Young Women for privacy reasons) I received on the blog because they made me smile so much. 

It's true - the "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" movie activity was probably the biggest hit activity of the summer and the young women (it was combined so all the young women ages 12-18) were in heaven since none of them (and most of the leaders too!) had ever seen it before.  I was all astonishment at that since I probably watched that movie a hundred times if I watched it once while I was in Young Womens. 

Nothing feels quite as good as being told by one of our super fashionable young women that you have good fashion sense.  Totally prideful of me to think that, but it is true.

Ahh, the "old disney color music" - one of my nerdier moments slipped out one summer night after our activity was over and the young women were hanging out in the parking lot waiting for parents to show up for rides home.  A bunch of my beehives (the 12-13 year old girls) were sharing songs on their phones and talking about what awesome songs they are (they are all completely obsessed with the band One Direction) and I jumped in on the conversation and told them they had to listen to my current favorite song.  They quieted down and I played Disney's Ludwig Von Drake's "The Spectrum Song" that my sister Jessica has all of her nieces (including Clara) hooked on.  And yes, I totally danced to it using my dorkiest moves which I think initially embarassed the girls until they decided I was awesome for not caring, which is probably why Dakota said my dance moves are boss.  You know you want to hear the song now, don't you?

 

 

I am really going to miss those girls.

Contacts and new church callings

On our walk tonight Paul commented to me that it was time for a new post.  "After all," he said with mock affrontery, "I got contacts last week and you haven't even mentioned that yet!"  Which is true.  Nine years ago when Paul and I were engaged, Paul decided to try out contacts.  He only got glasses for the first time shortly after we started dating but he thought he might as well give contacts a go. 

It was a fiasco.  I remember him struggling with those suckers to get them in and out of his eyes and I recall breaking the rule about "no girls allowed past the living room" to go back and help Paul in front of the bathroom mirror as he got more and more upset when one of the flimsy lenses got stuck in the crevice of his upper eyelid and he panicked while trying to get it out.  His brief stint with contacts is one of the reasons we have only one picture from our honeymoon - his manual film camera had been calibrated to his diminished eyesight and everytime he looked through the lense while we were in Costa Rica he thought that the high humidity was causing the blurriiness in the frame so he just put the camera away out of frustration.  Needless to say, he has worn glasses for the vast majority of our marriage and it is a little weird for me still to see him without them and I miss them.

There is one reason Pablo decided to try out contacts again of his own volition:  trout.  Paul is planning on fishing in Yellowstone next week and has a big fishing trip planned with his dad for September and he can't wear his polarized sunglasses and still have the clarity of vision that he needs to land the coveted trout that he has been dreaming about unless he is sporting contact lenses.  It tickles my funny bone that Paul would brave contacts again (especially when I remember how traumatizing contacts were for him the first go-around) for a little fly-fishing but that is one of the quirks that I love about him.

Another change that has happened in the last week is that Paul and I were both released from our callings and asked to take on new responsibilities in our ward.  I am sad that I don't get to work with the Beehives any more but am strangely looking forward to being a gospel doctrine teacher.  When I told my mom she said that she would have been in tears to be given that calling, but I sort of like being in front of a group of people imparting knowledge to them.  Besides, I always want to have more in depth, meaningful scripture study and this calling will certainly require that of me. 

My new calling and release were actually occasioned by both the fact that the entire Young Women's presidency was being reorganized and due to Paul being called to be the ward executive secretary, which is a much more demanding calling than ward employment specialist, which was his previous calling.  As ward executive secretary, Paul is now a member of the bishopric and has more demands on his time than he had before, including early morning planning meetings on Sunday before our regular three-hour block, ward council meetings after the three-hour block on Sunday, and Tuesday evening bishopric meetings in addition to his other responsibilities like scheduling, etc.  I still don't know what all his calling entails but I think that Paul, while a little intimidated, is looking forward to the working with the bishop and his counselors.

White Christmas (or in other words, the day we took Clara to the temple)

Part of me wanted to wait to write this post until we had photos back from the photographer we hired to take our pictures after Clara's sealing, but another part of me figured that I could just use the photos my sister took for us with our camera and either do a separate post or add the photos later so that I can at least get my thoughts down about this wonderful day before I get back home from our Christmas vacation and get bogged down in work again. 

For those who are not of our faith, a little explanation might be in order: When any couple gets married, there is both a legal aspect (obtaining a marriage license) and a religious aspect (for many or most couples) where they make vows to each other, usually under the authority of a religious leader. With adoption, there is also a legal aspect where a family is created on the day of finalization in court, but in our faith, we are also able to go to the temple and have the religious aspect called a "temple sealing" completed where Clara is sealed to me and Paul for eternity.

In many ways, it felt like a continuation of our wedding day, which might seem strange to some people but it didn't seem that way at all to me. Most of the same people who were there on our wedding day were there on Tuesday. We dressed in white (which is how everyone dresses in the temple and how Paul and I were dressed when we got married - Paul only changed into his tuxedo for the reception afterwards on our wedding day) and received blessings of eternal consequence as Clara was sealed to us as our daughter as though she had been born to us. There was so much joy and peace and comfort in the knowledge that we have a Heavenly Father who has a plan for His children and that he wants only our happiness. I am grateful for the knowledge that families can be together forever. We celebrated afterwards with cherished friends and family.



Paul and I woke up early on Tuesday morning, December 27th, and got dressed so that when Clara woke up, we didn't have to rush getting all three of us ready and out the door. By 7:45, Paul, Clara, my mom and I were dressed in our Sunday best and we headed to the Salt Lake Temple in the 20 degree Utah weather. My mom stayed with Clara in the temple nursery and fed her a bottle and got her dressed in her white dress while Paul and I were changing into our temple clothes and taking care of the business end of things with the temple records office. When my mom brought Clara in a little white stroller into the temple sealing room where everyone was waiting for them, Clara's eyes lit up and her mouth formed a round little "O" and she said "oooohh!" and then smiled her brilliant smile. Every heart melted and it was perfection.



We were so glad that Kayli, her mom, and all four of Kayli's grandparents were able to be in the temple with us - this is a very rare thing for an adoptive couple to have their birthmom present in the temple at the sealing. In fact, I have never heard of it before. Kayli is truly just a remarkable person and our love for her just grows more and more each day.

Clara was radiant in her white temple dress with white embroidered details and small pearl beads with a soft, white cardigan with white bows on it that my mom found for her after much searching. After the temple ceremony was finished, Paul and I were allowed to go outside in our "temple whites" with Clara to take pictures. First we did a big group shot with everybody who came to the temple with us (except for Kayli's mom and grandparents who had already left), and then our photographer showed up and took photos of Paul, Clara and I alone, while my mom, my sister Jessica, and Kayli followed us around carrying blankets to keep Clara warm and getting her attention so that she would look at the camera. 



After taking photos on the temple grounds in our white clothes, we went back inside and changed into our church clothes again and then took more family photos outside. My mom also bought Clara's plaid and cream Christmas dress with her red dress coat and black patent leather shoes. I wore my cream colored coat with my green scarf and Paul wore a red sweater that perfectly matched Clara's coat. Clara was such a good girl and grinned and looked at the camera and didn't once complain or fuss even though it was awfully chilly and her little nose turned bright red from the cold.

Once we were all done with photos, Paul, Clara, my mom, Jessica, Kayli and I piled into the suburban and drove back home to my parents' house where Paul gave Clara a baby blessing and then we had a very nice lunch of lasagna, ceasar's salad, garlic bread, and some delicious desserts, which I need to post recipes for soon since I had a number of people ask for my cherry cheesecake tart recipe. Paul did a great job with Clara's blessing even though he had worried beforehand that he would be too emotional to get through it without blubbering to the point of incoherency. Over baked lasanga and bread, conversation flowed, relationships were strengthened, and everyone seemed to have a great time.

Some of our very best friends who also happened to be two of the couples who wrote recommendation letters for us at the outset of our process to adopt Clara were able to be there with us in the temple and at the luncheon afterwards. We so wish that they lived close by so we could see them all the time like we used to be able to!

It was a wonderful day and we are so happy to have completed this last and most important of adoption milestones.  I will post the professional photos when our photographer gets them to me.