Pumpkin Patch~2012

One of my favorite traditions of the whole year is going to the pumpkin patch! 

This morning, we visited one of the pumpkin patches in Flower Mound.

my favorite pumpkins of all
(Can you tell that Isaac was very anxious for picture-taking to be over so he could start jumping in the bounce houses?)

Going on a hayride--I love the (rare) moments when Isaac snuggles right next to me!

Emma's first visit to the pumpkin patch~I think it's a tradition to take a picture of your baby in this pumpkin! 

Here's Isaac in the same pumpkin in October of 2010. 
Of course, he was trying to get out of the pumpkin and keep moving!

Isaac had a blast in the hay maze.  There were a few times when I couldn't see the top of his head that made me a little nervous, but each time he found his way out quickly.  The exit to the hay maze was a slide--as he was sliding down, he'd say, "I want to do it again!"  It's very fun, but also bittersweet, to see how independent he's becoming.

I love seeing pictures of favorite traditions over the years...

2010

2011

2012

Hope you are enjoying some fall fun, too!

A Texas Christmas

I feel like I am still catching up from Christmas, but I wanted to share our Christmas memories.

Isaac's birthgrandmother sent a huge box of Christmas presents for him!  She had individually wrapped each gift in the box, and he had so much fun opening each one.  (He also had fun climbing in the box to find more gifts!)

Can you tell Isaac was very excited about Christmas and his gifts this year?  :)

One of the gifts she sent was a collection of miniature Elmo books.  They were perfect for taking on the airplane, too!

We are so thankful that Isaac's birthgrandma continues to stay in touch with us and Isaac.  She is so kind, gracious, and giving.  She always writes him the most touching letters, which we are saving for him to read and keep for his own someday.

I feel like it took me most of December to get all my decorations up!  Next year I am going to start much sooner....maybe November 1st?  ;)

We celebrated Christmas with my mom, dad, and Emily the night before we flew to Colorado.

We were so happy that Emily flew home to Texas for Christmas!  We only got to see her for a day before we flew to Colorado, but we had a great time.  Isaac loves his "Aunt EmEm"...here he had the giggles as she was reading to him.  :)

We opened stockings before eating our Christmas dinner.  This little helicopter (or "hel-i-do" as Isaac says)that Mom-o put in Isaac's stocking was one of his favorites!

Isaac helped everyone open their stockings. 
"What do you mean--we already opened everything in your stocking?"  :)

 And, after we were done opening stockings, this is what Isaac did.  :)

Christmas dinner!  My mom made my (our!) favorite...her Swedish meatballs!

I love this family!!

Waiting to open presents

 We had so much fun sitting around the tree and opening gifts. 



Dave was pretty excited about new tools that he got, and Isaac was equally excited about this tent with tunnel!  :)  What a fun Christmas with my family!  After this, we raced home and madly packed for our flight the next morning to Colorado!  I can't wait to share those pictures, either!  :)

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

See this little guy's smile?!?  I love it! 

To say that he is excited about anything and everything Christmas is an understatement! 

This is a (small) sampling of what I hear each day:

"Mommy, Christmas tree!  Mommy, more Christmas tree!  Mommy, snowman!  Mommy, big snowman!" :)

My mom taught Isaac how to build "trains" out of kitchen chairs.  A few weeks ago when I was at work, she texted me a picture of all her kitchen chairs lined up.  My old dolls, bears, and stuffed animals, and Isaac were all sitting on the chairs.  :) She taught him to give each "passenger" a ticket (aka--Post It notes).  :) 

One morning last week, I came out of my room to find that Isaac had pushed our kitchen chairs into a train, too.  It was adorable.  Santa, reindeer, a Christmas moose, and our Elf were the passengers.  Isaac even found his mitten clips, which he calls "seat belts" and had placed the "seat belts" on top of some of the passengers.  :)  My favorite part is when he stands up on the back chair, like in the picture above, and yells, "Hi people!  Hi people!"  This is one happy Christmas train!  :)

On  Sunday, Isaac and I baked sugar cookies.  I didn't have an apron for him, so I put this bib on him and then tied a white dish cloth around his waist.  As soon as I did, he started pointing at himself and saying "An angel, Mommy!  An angel, Mommy!" 

The next day, Isaac decorated them with his little friend, Ellie. 

Let's just say he spent just as much time eating as he did decorating!  :) 

I was so excited about doing Elf on the Shelf with Isaac this December, too.  Between how much I was at school this month combined with December's general busyness, I just haven't done it as much as I'd planned.  But, Isaac does get very excited on the mornings I do hide the Elf.  It's so fun to see him look and try to find him.  ;)  (Here's the Elf "hiding" on the train.)

A new tradition for our family this year is our Advent Calendar, which we've tried to after supper each night.  My sister and I grew up doing an Advent Calendar each December, and it's sweet for me to now do one with Isaac.  Each day's pocket has a short sentence from the Christmas story in it and also a character or animal that Isaac puts up in the stable.   I love hearing Isaac say the names of all the Christmas characters, but my favorite is how he says Joseph ("Jo-shesh"). 

Speaking of the Christmas characters, the other day Isaac put all his Fisher Price Nativity characters and animals in a line and told them to say "cheese!"  (Maybe I take his picture a bit too much?!?)

One more picture of this sweet boy...he truly does give David and me so much joy!

What's in a Name, Part II

In some of our early marriage talks about baby names, both Dave & I discovered that we loved the name Isaac. Of course, when we picked the name Isaac for our firstborn son, we had no idea of the journey that was ahead of us as we sought to grow our family. Once we decided to adopt, were matched with our birthmom, and found out that Baby Rinn was a boy, the name Isaac took on an even greater meaning to us.

In the Old Testament, Abraham and Sarah named their long-awaited son "Isaac" because it means "he laughs" or "he will laugh." Sarah laughed at God when she heard that God had promised she and Abraham a son in their old age. After her Isaac's birth, she said

"God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me." (Genesis 21:6)

Throughout our struggle with infertility, I was hurting so badly, and I wasn't seeing God's goodness through our pain. We yearned for the sound of a child's laughter in our family...so, the main reason that we love the name Isaac is that we knew this sweet boy would bring that long-awaited laughter!

Obviously, we had no idea of the story that our little Isaac was going to have. As we left the hospital without our Isaac on Sunday, October 18, we sat in the parking lot & called our parents, who were all weeping right along with us. During those terrible hours of waiting to find out what was going to happen that afternoon, God had reminded Dave of the story of Abraham & Isaac. As Abraham was walking up the mountain to sacrifice, Isaac asked, "Where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" Abraham replied, "God Himself will provide." Another of our dear friends put it this way: That even while Abraham and Isaac were walking up one side of the mountain, God's provision (the ram) was walking up the other side. Though Abraham could not see the ram, he had faith that God would provide for him. Even in the pain of coming home without Isaac, we believed that God Himself would provide for us...and little did we know how incredible His provision would be!

Since I love names so much, I am always asking my grandparents about the history of their extended family members' names. While talking with my Grandma Joan awhile ago, she shared that her grandfather was named Isaac...immediately my ears perked up and I started taking notes. Isaac Theodore Edman was my Grandma Joan's paternal grandfather, which makes him my great-great-grandfather. Isaac Edman immigrated to America from Sweden. While we had already chosen the name Isaac for our firstborn son, we think it's extra special that his name has a link to our family's heritage.

We chose "David" as Isaac's middle name based on Rinn family tradition. The firstborn son in each Rinn family has his father's name as his middle name.

Isaac's great-great-grandpa--Roy Nelson Rinn
Isaac's great-grandpa--Benjamin Roy Rinn
Isaac's grandpa--Timothy Benjamin Rinn,
Isaac's dad--David Timothy Rinn

As far as we could tell in our research on the Rinn family geneology, Great-great-grandpa Roy seems to be the first Rinn who gave his firstborn son his first name as a middle name. But still, that's a tradition that's lasted 4 generations so far, and so it's noe one that we wanted to break!

So...needless to say, we had our own ideas on why we picked the name Isaac, but God had a far greater plan for this sweet baby boy's name! We are still in awe that God brought our Isaac home to us!

What's in a Name?

I have always been one of those people who loves names! I bought my first baby name book when I was in middle school, and ever since then, I have been (nearly) obsessed with the meaning, history, and heritage of names. My middle school journals contain lists of names that I loved at that point....don't laugh too hard, but here's a sample of one of my entries:

July 29, 1994
I want to have 12 girls. Perhaps if I have a few boys it will be okay. I will never make any of my children endure the pain of having a popular name. (I guess I was "slightly" dramatic even back then!) Here are names I like:
Mary Rose
Victoria Lynn
Tricia Joy (this was the name of a senior at my high school whom I completely idolized)
Theresa Hope

Thank goodness that my tastes have changed since then! ;) I think that some of my interest in names came from my own middle name, Victoria. My parents chose it simply because they liked how it flowed with Bethany. But, after I was born, they discovered that Victoria was also the middle name of two of my great-grandmothers, Emma Victoria & Clara Victoria. I love that my name is linked to my family's heritage, even though that was a sweet surprise that my parents didn't plan on!

Ever since I bought that first baby name book, my name book collection has only grown and now includes these titles, plus a few others (including a collection of Swedish names that is completely printed in Swedish). The Baby Name Wizard is definitely my favorite baby name book. Each name entry in this book contains a graph showing which decade the name was most popular. It also includes 5 complementary boy & girl names as possible sibling names. The author, Laura Wattenberg, created an interactive website called the NameVoyager that also shows the popularity of each name per decade. A new feature on this website is a U.S. map which shows how relatively popular a name is in each state. Don't go to this website unless you're ready to spend at least a half hour checking out all your favorite names!!

Thankfully, Dave willingly puts up with my interest in baby names. We even have a tradition of playing a "game" called "Name of the Night"--also known in our home as NOTN. NOTN involves me proposing a baby name late at night (usually when I can't sleep) and Dave (who's usually half-asleep) telling me the first thought that pops into his mind when he hears the name (which is usually either a grunt or a "Are you kidding me?"). This has been a very successful way for us to "weed out" a lot of names! ;) (Perhaps you could play NOTN, too, in order to discover your next baby's name.)

Needless to say...we are very excited about sharing Baby Rinn's name as soon as he's here! We love its meaning and link to our family heritage...but there's no way you'll get it out of us now! Any guesses, though?

Girls' Weekend in Chicago

Last Friday morning, my mom & I flew to Chicago to visit my sister. We had planned a "Girls' Weekend" as soon as Emily decided to move there....after all, Chicago's the perfect location for a Girls' Weekend--who can pass up the Magnificent Mile?

It was great to see the cute apartment where Emily is living with 2 other friends. I still can't believe that my little sister is old enough to live on her own! But, it was so fun to see what her life in Chicago is like! She's very close to the train & bus routes, so we spent most of the weekend using public transportation to get around. Let's just say that there were some VERY funny moments with my mom on the train...she wasn't exactly "comfortable" riding the train. In fact, she even told a guy whom she was sitting next to (and who was using quite "colorful" language) "You're scaring me!"--HA!

Our activities mostly consisted of lots of shopping, playing Scrabble, trying out some great restaurants, and staying up late every night talking! Of course, we had to take a picture by this dala in Andersonville, a neighborhood of Chicago that was originally a Swedish settlement. We also ate at a cute Swedish restaurant, Tre Kronor, on Sunday afternoon. And, what would a trip to Chicago be without Chicago-style pizza from Giordanos?












Our weekend was such a blast that we decided to make it an annual tradition. Even though I wish Em were closer, I'm excited that she'll be home soon to see her new nephew!

Christmas Cookie Exchange

This morning I hosted a Christmas Cookie Exchange at our house! It was such a fun morning filled with delicious treats & great friends. Several girls from church, my school, and support group came, along with my mom and sister!
My sweet friend Tiffany--so fun to see her right before her miracle arrives! Mary Jo & Corrie filling their cookie containers:
Only one word to describe this: YUM-O! I'm not sure who was more excited about the cookie exchange, Dave or me!--he is SO happy to have so many different kinds of cookies in the house! We decided this will definitely have to become a tradition!