and the winner is...

vanilla ice cream, dizzle of caramel & chocolate sauce, 'twix' magic shell, light whipped cream, rainbow sprinkles, caramel & chocolate sauce drizzle again, topped with 4 cherries!! and the verdict is... PERFECTION!

COMFORT FOOD

for some, this would be enough. plain ice cream.

again. here we are, lookin' good but... oh no, not enough for me...

my "helper(s)"...

BEAT THE HEAT!
for ten bucks, you too can beat the heat. (i recommend to set up on more level ground)... the float was onle ONE dollar so... you can't really beat that with a stick, can you? I hope you all have a 'cool' labor day weekend!
-L

NEW PLACE FOR POSTING ADOPTION NEWS

check it out HERE. we will keep my business stuff for business now. i hope you enjoy our life... sorry for the longwinded stories below. it's "what i do". smile. the posts with the beginning to the current adoption saga begin on my business blog: http://www.lilaschopshop.blogspot.com/ and start on Aug 9th or 10th, I believe.

When one of our TN nieces, Brooke, found out we were adopting, she wrote a little diddly about it. I hope you love it as much as we do.... (p.s. we're going to Gulf Shores, Alabama for Thanksgiving with Mike's Family) click on the letter to make it bigger.

ADOPTION

So, we started out our marriage like most (LDS) couples. Dreaming about the parents eachother would one day be. We picked out some names and planned when we would start trying to have babies.. we had a perfect plan: We would go off the pill after we were married 2 years and guessed it would take up to a year to get pregnant. We have had a wonderful relationship, giving and taking... easy to say 11 years later. smile. In preparation, I convinced Michael to move from Nashville Tennessee to live with my parents in Camarillo, California (where I was raised from 6-19). I wanted to be near my mom when I had my first baby or two (I have always planned on 6 - still do). So when we weren't successful on our own, we sought out professional help from an Infertility Doctor. After multiple humiliating and expensive tests (Michael by my side for support), I was found to have Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome, PCOS as I had various manifestations of the symdrome. We began a willing but tiring process of fertility for the next 3 years. I was medicated, probed, ultrasounded, exrayed and in the end, mentally spent. I admitted defeat for the time being and after almost 4yrs in California, I asked Michael if he was ready to go back to Tennessee. We were both ready. We needed to lick our wounds and come to our new home in Murfreesboro. After lamely attempting fertility drugs again once back in Tennessee, it got to be too much and we stopped. Mentally I was in no place to consider anything else for awhile.

When I came to, months later, Michael was still there, ready to do what was next. I had always been interested in Adoption, never feeling worthy of it until I tired myself from failed fertility efforts (not wanting to adopt unless I 'needed to'). My friend Christi (Adopted herself) and her family, including having both thier beautiful sons through adoption, counceled with me in California through some of my hardest grief. I used her example and wisdom to push me forward with earnest to 'find our children' through adoption. After taking almost a year to fill out the paperwork (some procrastination in between), we filed with LDS family services in November 2006. Our then caseworker Matt said, it can take and average of 6mo - 2 years before recieving an infant in your home. We prepared ourselves hoping it wouldn't take that long. We have been very blessed during this process, reminding ourselves who is in control and our faith in God has surely lifted us through. Sometimes we borrowed from eachother if we had no more ourselves, sometimes it was a gift from a friend or stranger. Either way, we find ourselves here, on the brink of hopeful parenthood, feeling more blessed than ever to have eachother and everyone we know, no matter what happens. Thank you.

We look forward to raising our children righteously. Teaching them to know that their Heavenly Father loves them and sent them to this earth in a special way, whether born to us or placed with us, they are the same to us and Heavenly Father. We are ALL his children. We have a duty to teach them righteous principles then let them govern themselves. We look forward to the many things they will teach us over the years as well.