Adoptions are final!!!

Well the day we were all waiting for has now come and gone. May 27, 2010 we all became Rowland's legally. Mike adopted Landon and we both adopted Mikaela. It was a special day. I took the whole day off work, My dad and Bonnie were there and Mike's parents were both there.

Here are a few pictures from that morning at the court house.

Landon waiting for our turn to talk to the judge.

The Rowland's with the judge.

After court, everyone left and went their separate ways for the day...so I took the kids and went to Rockwall for some pictures of just the 2 of them on this big day. They both did such a great job.

Well, I am giving up on adding new pictures...more are posted on my facebook or they are all in kodak...message me if you would like to see more pictures.

May was a big and busy month...Landon turned 7 this year on May 14...can't believe that he is already 7, time flies.

T-Ball continued and I think only 1 or 2 games got rained out, which is good compared to past seasons.

At the end of the month, after the adoptions were final, mom, Luke and Luke's girlfriend Beth came to visit us and stayed to visit for Memorial Day weekend.

Well, I guess that is a brief update on what has happened with us.

I will try and do much better at updating this blog.

Time to catch up with the Rowlands!!

Sorry I have not been good at updating this since February. It has been pretty crazy around here and not that school is out for the summer things will slow down a lot.

Mikaela has been enjoying her daycare and all the wonderful ladies that take care of her everyday. She is learning so much and really likes being around the other kids during the day.

Landon has finished 1st grade and now on to 2nd grade. He did great!! He started the year reading below 1st grade level and finished the year at a 3rd grade level. He made all A's for the year on his report card. Those were his goals for the year and he was successful on both.

My first year as a school counselor is now under my belt, not an easy year to say the least, but I did learn a ton and learned and I am pretty sensitive when it comes to my students. That has worked out for me for the most part but not always. I really LOVE what I do and think I have finally found what I want to do when I grow up. Grad classes for my masters degree are over half done...should be Master Rowland by the beginning of the 2011-2012 school year.

Mike has been busy with his sound company earning some extra money for us but gone most weekends working. Still working at the parole office but not really enjoying it.

The big news in our family is that we are all now ROWLANDS!!!! On May 27th we went to the judge to finalize the adoptions of both kids...we both adopted Mikaela and Mike adopted Landon!! It was a very exciting day for all of us.

Now time for some videos and pictures from the last 4 months.

March 2010

The kids on St. Pats Day

We had an egg hunt at Mike and Janet's house the week before easter...here is a picture of the kids from that day.

April 2010

Mikaela at her 6 month check up with her Didi.

Easter Sunday...my two beautiful kids!!

Landon played T-Ball again this year...Mikaela, Mom and Mikey were his biggest fans. He had a GREAT year and next year will move up to baseball.

Big accomplishment for Mikaela

This weekend Mikaela started rolling over. Just to make sure it wasn't an accidental rollover, I kept rolling her back to her belly and she rolled to her back about 4 or 5 more times. Mike and I were both right there watching her and I had the camera handy so I caught one of the rolls as it happened. I tried to move to a different angle to get a better video, but no matter where I was she rolled towards me not away.

She has also started talking a lot, she has figured out that she can make noises and has also learned that she can get louder if she needed to get my attention. She also started to copy some of the faces that her dad makes, it is SUPER cute.

She is growing way to fast for us, tomorrow she will be going for her 4 month appointment at the doctors. Hope to be able to start cereal soon.

Well that is about all the excitement we have right now. You can always see updated pictures and videos on my facebook page.

TIme for an update....Happy Holidays!!

So...it has been a while since I have updated.

Not a ton has changed around our house except that Mikaela is growing and changing a little bit everyday. She is recognizing each of us in our family and smiles a TON!! Brother gets the most smiles from her, she sure does love her brother.

Christmas was pretty relaxing for us. We stayed here in Texas where there was less snow than Nebraska. Christmas Eve we opened gifts at home and Dad, Bonnie and our friend Alex joined us for dinner and the opening gifts. Landon was excited and had a great time opening all of his gifts and Mikaela's gifts. She slept through most of the evening after one of her evening fits. Bonnie took over and did great with her and got her to sleep. She loves her Mimi and Didi!!

Then on Christmas day we opened our gifts from Santa and then went out to Mike and Janet's house for the day of Rowland Family Christmas. Another fun time of opening gifts with the family and again Mikaela slept through that event...morning nap time.

I went back to work for a couple weeks before Christmas break started and Mikaela started daycare. At first it was stressful with many daycare changes for many reasons and prayers were answered and we found an AWESOME daycare for Mikaela to go to. She loves it there. She gets excited in the mornings when dad drops her off and is happy in the afternoon when mom and brother pick her up.

I promise for the new year to do a better job at updating this for you all to enjoy!!

Halloween

Last weekend we went to the pumpkin patch. Landon had a great time feeding the animals, playing around and going on a hay rack ride. Mikaela slept the whole visit. Then one night during the week, Mikey and Landon carved the big pumpkin just as Landon wanted it carved.



We had a great time trick-or-treating over the weekend. Friday night we went to downtown Greenville and went around the square. It was crazy but nice that Mike could go with us to help Landon and we didn't have to have Mikaela in the stroller in the crazy crowds. Landon was Iron Man both nights but Mikaela was just dressed in a pumpkin outfit Friday night and was a Ladybug on Saturday.

Saturday evening we went over and went trick-or-treating with Aiden. They had a great time and Mikaela just hung out in the stroller again and was wide awake most of the time that we were out walking around.

Mikaela in her first outfit on Friday...spit up all over it before we got to go out.
Landon getting some candy downtown with Mikey.

Mikaela hanging out in the stroller while Landon and Aiden were trick-or-treating.


Landon as Iron Man and Aiden as Tin Man going up to get some candy...they are so big that they go up to the door by themselves...it was great!

Mikaela Denice Rowland is here!!!

She was born on October 9, 2009 at 6:52

She weighed in at 7 pounds 1 ounce

She has a beautiful head of black hair

She is a great baby. She did great on our 12 hour trip from NE to TX. When we came to town we went straight to pick up Landon so he could meet his new little sister. It was pretty late at night and he was sleeping, so she tried to wake him up but was not very successful.

Landon is in LOVE with his new sister. He is the best helper that we could ever ask for.

We also had pictures taken at the hospital on Saturday morning. You can look at them for 90 days from the date of the picture on this website.

www.our365.com

here is the info you will need to find us.

Birthday--October 9, 2009
Last name--Rowland
City--Greenville TX

Then you will find her little webpage with pictures. She was born in Lincoln NE.

Sorry to cut this short but I will post again soon. About to head to bed while Mikaela is sleeping for a bit. I will also post pictures on Facebook as we take them too.

Be looking for more updates as things happen around our house. Hoping to schedule a newborn photo shoot and a family photo shoot soon and then in a couple weeks the 2 kids are getting pictures together in their Halloween costumes.

Thanks to everyone for all the kind words to our family during this very exciting time in our lives. We will FOREVER LOVE and RESPECT Mikaela's birth parents and are very grateful that we can have her and them in our family now.

The time is almost here!!!

Just a quick update to let you all know that we have a plan of when Mikaela will be here.

She will be induced on the 14th during the evening and will hopefully here sometime on the 15th.

We are ALL really excited. Landon can't wait for his sister to get here and Mike is working really hard on getting her room ready. It probably won't be ready when she gets home but it will be close. Hopefully by next weekend we will have some of the laminate flooring down and the walls painted. Not to stressed since she will be in our room for a bit to begin with anyway and her furniture isn't here yet either but should be here soon.

So we have a plan ready for us to get our princess home soon. I am going to be leaving Texas about lunch time on the 14th and Mike is going to fly up there on the 16th. His family has some things going on that we decided that he needs to stay back a few days for. Landon is going to be staying here with some friends and with my dad for a bit. We didn't want him to miss to much school while we went to pick her up because we wanted to keep him home a bit while I was off work.

Just wanted to post a quick update on what is going on here with Mikaela Denice Rowland. The next post will be when she is here with us as part of our family!!!

Here are a few pictures of her bedroom furniture that we have ordered for her!!



I will also post again once her bedroom is 100% complete, so be looking for that post too!!!