IT'S A BOY.....AND A GIRL!!!!!!!!

Well, our adoption of Autumn and Treyton finally happened today!!!!! It has been a long awaited day! It's hard to believe that I met the kids four years ago this next month. When I first met them, they came to my home on weekends from out of town in order to visit their biological family. What started out as an every other weekend thing, then turned in to a weekly weekend thing, then turned in to moving in with me for what we thought would be 5-6 months. Autumn came first in December 2004. Two weeks later in January 2005, Treyton came along. Needless to say days turned in to weeks, weeks turned in to months and months turned in to years. And here we are today adopting them! I need to post a pic of them when they first came. Treyton looks so tiny! Maybe that's cuz he was....what 14 year old boy wears a size 10-12 boys!!! TINY!! As you can tell....he's grown a bit! :) It has been an amazing journey to watch them grow up. We are so blessed to have them!



So here's the pics of our day.......



This is us waiting in the lobby for our turn with the judge......

We didn't have to wait alone as we brought our posse along! Front left is my mom. She came up from Norton for the big festivities. My dad was unable to make it as he was out all last week from work so couldn't miss today. Next to my mom is my mother-in-law Nancy. You can't see her very well and then she is hiding her husband Bob behind her! Then of course is Treyton, myself, Zachy, Donnie and Autumn. Next to Autumn is our foster care worker Cindy. Without Cindy our adoption would probably not happened today! Or maybe ever! She worked a ton along with another gal, Christy, to make sure we got Trey's adoption done before his 18th birthday! We made it with a whole 3 days to spare! Next to Cindy is Donnie's and I's neice Sylvia. Front and center is our nephew Zeke. Sylvia and Zeke belong to Donnie's sister Dori. And behind the camera is my good friend Sheri. She and two of her kids, Addie and Aiden joined us as well!

This is us in the courtroom with our attorney Doug. He as well had to rush our paperwork through in order to make our adoption happen before Trey's birthday. He absolutely HATES to have his photo taken, but Sheri was our photographer for the day and she was NOT taking no for an anwer! Look closely in the background and you can see my father-in-law!

This is us with Judge Flaigle as he is signing our adoption paperwork. He was very personable and spent quite a bit of time talking with us. He has been the judge on the kids' case since they entered foster care 4 1/2 years ago. Next to Judge Flaigle is Jackie the kids' court service officer. She's also been on the kids' case since the beginning!

Close-up of the signing as it is oh so important!

Here is a final pic of us with the Judge AFTER the adoption was finalized! So meet my new official kids. They've always been my kids, just now it's official! We have Autumn Marie-Kay Thacker. She decided to keep her last name, which is fine. We did add to her middle name. Kay is my grandfather's middle name, my mom's middle name and my middle name. So given she is my first and only daughter we thought we would give that to her too! We also have Treyton Michael-Robert Jones. We added Robert to Trey's middle name and of course changed his last name. Robert is Donnie's dad's name as well as Donnie's middle name. I won't include their height and weight as you would on a typical birth announcement! I don't know that they would appreciate that! Although Treyton would like it known he is oh so close to being taller than Donnie. It is a goal he has in life! :)

I personally love our new family photo! Hopefully in the next 60 days, we will be able to announce that Zach is also "officially" ours! He embarrassed me a bit today. While Sheri was taking the above photo of us with the judge in front of the bench, Jackie was also taking a court photo. Well, she snapped her pic a bit earlier and Zach had taken his hand, well really his arm and shoved in down the front of my shirt! My arm that isn't holding him was around Treyton's waist, thus I couldn't do anything to stop him. Soooo, in our official court photo, Zach's being a bit inappropriate! They got a good laugh and did take a 2nd picture. However when printing the pics out, they printed the inappropriate pic and said they were going to hang it up in their hallway with several other memorable adoption photos! NICE!

After court, we went out for brunch with the whole crew that came along for the shindig. We went to Copper Oven who joined in the celebration by giving everyone free cookies.....which are huge and to die for. Which reminds me I only ate half of mine and I'm going to go eat the rest of my cookie! What a fun yet maybe not most appropriate bedtime snack!

Off to get some rest as I gave birth to 2 VERY LARGE children today! Dannon