Baby Miles

Miles Jay Holmes

7 lbs 2 oz

20 in long

August 24th

11:56 am

Perfect in every way! We love you little man. :)

Almost Baby Time

We are so excited to welcome baby Miles into our home. I have been watching the baby ticker at the top of my blog for months now and I swear it has taken much longer than it should have. But now I can look at it and know that he will actually be here sooner than it says. Our birthmother is going to be induced early, so we get to meet baby Miles even earlier than we thought!

I have been enjoying my last week alone before I go back to school and finishing the last few things so that I'm ready for him to come home. I have been thinking a lot lately about how things are going to change and be different. The other day I was at the grocery store and the lady in front of me was complaining to the cashier about how much harder it is to go to the store now that she has kids. I know that she was frustrated and I don't want to judge her in any way, but it made me think about that and how things will be different. I guess it just made me think about how many times I have been to the store in the past and it felt like there were moms all around me helping their kids and getting frustrated and doing all those normal things that moms do and how it made me feel sad that I couldn't be doing that right then. It is hard to go somewhere and feel like it is always in front of you that you are alone and you don't have kids yet. So now I am so so excited to be able to have this change come into our lives. Everyone always tells us: "Your life is going to change!" I know it isn't going to be easy and that a lot of change is coming, but because of what we have been through, I really believe that when those hard days come around, I will be able to tolerate it and look back to a time when I would give anything for the hard days. We can't wait for our lives to change! This has given us the opportunity to be so much more grateful to have a child in our family and to appreciate the opportunity to be a mother and a father much more than if we were able to get pregnant without any trouble.

So here we are ready and waiting for the CHANGE :)

Here are some pictures of his nursery so far :)

New York!

I can't believe July is basically over already! July practically flew by...which is good, because that means we are that much closer to adopting :) July started out great with a trip to New York with my family. Colby decided to stay home to save money and his vacation days for when the baby comes. So I went solo, but I still had a great time.

We went to New York to tour my little brother's mission. He came home in October and has wanted to go back and visit all of the people he got to know so well. So most of this trip included a lot of driving. We basically covered the whole state of New York in only 4 days and we stayed in a different hotel room each night (kinda crazy). But we still had a great time! Here are some fun pictures of our adventures in the big apple.

Flying there my parents and Brittany went on a separate flight so Bryce and Cassie were my travel buddies. This was a really cool tunnel that lights up in the Detroit airport.

The first day, we stopped and ate breakfast at a park in Ithica. As we were walking to the car to leave, we turned around and this is what we found. It was so cute and we all laughed :)

The Palmyra Temple

The Sacred Grove: It was so peaceful!

I was really amazed that it looked just like all the pictures and paintings you see of it.

Before we went to the Hill Cumorah pageant, we stopped to get a pizza for dinner. Before the pizza came out, my dad bought flowers for my mom and gave them to her.

This was the HUGE pizza "sheet" we got.

Brittany, Me, and Cassie waiting for the pageant to begin.

Hill Cumorah Pageant

The next day we pretty much traveled through a bunch of towns. This was at a little diner we stopped at for lunch called "The Golden Unicorn." It was kinda creepy with little unicorns all over the restaurant. But Bryce really wanted to come here to do the "Pancake Challenge." They give you 2 super extra large pancakes and if you eat them all, you get a t-shirt that says "I survived the pancake challenge at the Golden Unicorn." (He didn't do it)

They also had these fun little games called "The Original IQ Tester." You had to move the pegs until there was only one left. We all tried and tried and tried, but no one could do it. Then my dad grabbed one and did it on his first try! We were all so shocked!

One night we stayed at a hotel on the historical registry called "Hotel Utica." I loved all the fancy wood work. This was above the lobby.

This was the whole travel group on the front steps of the mission president's home.

Left to Right - Top: Brittany, Mom, Dad

Bottom: Me, Cassie, Bryce, and Abigail in the background

Another place we stopped to eat. I really liked this quote they had.

In Albany at the "egg." It's kinda hard to see but this was on the roof of a building and on the left and right behind me there were two big ponds. In the winter they freeze and use them for ice skating. It would be so fun to be there in the winter!

Downtown NYC.

It was good, but I didn't like how smelly and dirty it was. Nothing like home!

Statue of Liberty

I found this at one of the little stands on the street. I was so amazed because whenever you see anything like key chains or magnets with names, my name is NEVER there, and if it is, it definitely isn't ever spelled right. So when I saw this I was so excited I had to take a picture of it!

At the top of the Empire State Building

Thanks Mom and Dad for a great trip!

It was a lot of fun and we made many memories we'll cherish for a long time.

Draft Party, Baby-sitting, and Baby Stuff

As many of you know, we are big JAZZ fans. Well, Colby is I guess....and I just follow :). So last week he was so excited for the draft so he invited his dad and Dwight & Ashley's family over to watch it. It was a good time.

The girls played UNO while we watched the Draft.

The other day I watched Capri's boys while she worked. Her step-son, Kaldyr, doesn't get to come over very often so it was a lot of fun to have him. One of the first things he did was look at all my pictures on my fridge and then he asked me why I didn't have a picture of him. I told him I didn't have one and felt bad so I told him we should take a picture right now. So this is the picture that will go on the fridge :)

And then we had to take a picture of Daxon too.

So I have been searching and searching to find a dresser for the baby's room. I finally found one that I love! I wanted a longer one like this because I am also going to use it for my changning table. I am so excited! Now I finally have a place to put all the baby clothes I've been collecting.

In my spare time (that I have grundles of now since it's summertime) I have been cleaning out the storage room so that we could add more furniture to it to make room for the baby's room. We moved our computer and Colby's gun case and hunting stuff into our spare bedroom and got rid of the TV and entertainment center we had in there. Now I have just baby stuff in the baby room. :)

We have the crib put together and I just bought the crib set yesterday! I can't wait to have it all come together. People have been so generous already. We really appreciate your thoughtfulness and all you have done for us. We received many cute outfits for the little boy, as well as diapers. I have also been trying to stock up by getting a package each time I go to the store. We're getting there!