Kaylee's 2nd bush flight
At the beginning of this week we had a little snow storm. Tuesday school was let out early because all of the roads were drifting over and they needed to get the kids home while the buses could still make it to the school. Tim thought that he would take the opportunity to stay at the school and get some extra work finished. He tried to come home around 5:30 pm and found the school road completely drifted in. He wasn't able to get the 4-wheeler through. He had to leave it at the school and walk home.
Thursday Tim, Kaylee, and I were able to leave for Anchorage. This is our first family trip (well, as long as you don't count our coming home from the hospital as a family trip, but I guess it really was.) I wouldn't call it a vacation, because it's not. Tim is on professional leave from work to attend the ASTE (Alaska Society of Technology and Education) conference. About a month ago he asked if Kaylee and I wanted to come with him. Since may work is wherever Kaylee is, we have the freedom to do that. We figured the only additional cost was a plane ticket (Tim would already have to get a hotel room and rent a car) and we could use miles. To make the trip even better, my long term substitute offered to let us stay in his condo for free and use his car. It has worked out really nicely.
We left Togiak on Thursday afternoon and flew to Dillingham. Kaylee did well on the plane. Tim and I were a bit chilly, but I think she stayed nice and toasty under all her layers of blankets. We were able to stay in the district bunkhouse on Thursday night. In Kaylee's 2.5 months of life she has already been to Dillingham and stayed in the district bunkhouse twice.
Friday morning we were able to catch a ride with some colleagues from district office to the airport. Once again, Kaylee did awesome on the flight. She didn't protest or cry one bit, but she was actually awake for a lot of the flight. Once we got to Anchorage we got a cab to the condo and started settling in. Rich Hartman, from LDSFS, and his wife came over shortly after we arrived. We had scheduled a meeting with them. Before we can finalize our adoption we have to meet several times with our adoption agency so they can check up on us and make sure that we're really fit to be Kaylee's parents. The meeting went well and Rich said that he is going to contact the attorney and request that he petition the court of a hearing date so we can finalize the adoption. Hopefully, we'll get a date as early as April.
Friday evening we were able to go to dinner with Pat Manning and some of his colleagues from the Lake & Peninsula school district. Pat Manning serves in the Elders Quorum Presidency with Tim. It turns out that Tim was getting an unofficial interview. Some of the people we were meeting with are hoping to convince the superintendent to open another tech position in the district and they had heard good things about Tim. It will be fun to see if anything ever develops from this little meet and greet.
Saturday Tim and I were able to go to the Anchorage temple. We haven't been to the temple since last summer and I was very grateful for the opportunity to go. The Petersen's were kind enough to watch Kaylee for us for a few hours so that we were able to go. After our temple session and retrieving Kaylee we went off to Costco to do some of our grocery shopping for the next 3 months. It didn't take us too long to finish the Costco portion of the list. I'll have to go back next week to do the Wal-Mart portion.
Saturday evening we had dinner with several people from our branch: Swensons, Reidels, Stringhams, and Pat Manning. Tim and I had never met the Stringhams in person before. It was fun to see what they look like and get to visit with them one on one.
Thursday Tim, Kaylee, and I were able to leave for Anchorage. This is our first family trip (well, as long as you don't count our coming home from the hospital as a family trip, but I guess it really was.) I wouldn't call it a vacation, because it's not. Tim is on professional leave from work to attend the ASTE (Alaska Society of Technology and Education) conference. About a month ago he asked if Kaylee and I wanted to come with him. Since may work is wherever Kaylee is, we have the freedom to do that. We figured the only additional cost was a plane ticket (Tim would already have to get a hotel room and rent a car) and we could use miles. To make the trip even better, my long term substitute offered to let us stay in his condo for free and use his car. It has worked out really nicely.
We left Togiak on Thursday afternoon and flew to Dillingham. Kaylee did well on the plane. Tim and I were a bit chilly, but I think she stayed nice and toasty under all her layers of blankets. We were able to stay in the district bunkhouse on Thursday night. In Kaylee's 2.5 months of life she has already been to Dillingham and stayed in the district bunkhouse twice.
Friday morning we were able to catch a ride with some colleagues from district office to the airport. Once again, Kaylee did awesome on the flight. She didn't protest or cry one bit, but she was actually awake for a lot of the flight. Once we got to Anchorage we got a cab to the condo and started settling in. Rich Hartman, from LDSFS, and his wife came over shortly after we arrived. We had scheduled a meeting with them. Before we can finalize our adoption we have to meet several times with our adoption agency so they can check up on us and make sure that we're really fit to be Kaylee's parents. The meeting went well and Rich said that he is going to contact the attorney and request that he petition the court of a hearing date so we can finalize the adoption. Hopefully, we'll get a date as early as April.
Friday evening we were able to go to dinner with Pat Manning and some of his colleagues from the Lake & Peninsula school district. Pat Manning serves in the Elders Quorum Presidency with Tim. It turns out that Tim was getting an unofficial interview. Some of the people we were meeting with are hoping to convince the superintendent to open another tech position in the district and they had heard good things about Tim. It will be fun to see if anything ever develops from this little meet and greet.
Saturday Tim and I were able to go to the Anchorage temple. We haven't been to the temple since last summer and I was very grateful for the opportunity to go. The Petersen's were kind enough to watch Kaylee for us for a few hours so that we were able to go. After our temple session and retrieving Kaylee we went off to Costco to do some of our grocery shopping for the next 3 months. It didn't take us too long to finish the Costco portion of the list. I'll have to go back next week to do the Wal-Mart portion.
Saturday evening we had dinner with several people from our branch: Swensons, Reidels, Stringhams, and Pat Manning. Tim and I had never met the Stringhams in person before. It was fun to see what they look like and get to visit with them one on one.
McKennah (Kaylee's biological sister) holding Kaylee
Today Tim attended the ASTE conference while Kaylee and I went to church. I'm not sure how much any of us actually got out of the lessons and talks because we were all too busy holding and passing around Kaylee. I particularly enjoyed watching Brother Reidel with her. He really seemed to love holding her.
Just as I was ready to leave the church I ran into Kris, Kaylee's biological Grandmother. She invited me to attend Relief Society with her, so I did. I figured, if nothing else it would give Kris an opportunity to hold Kaylee for awhile. I was really glad that I went. Not only was the lesson good, but it was also good to spend sometime with her.
This evening, Tim and I had dinner with Kaylee's birth-family. Jessika made us all dinner and we visited for a couple of hours. I felt bad, because our normally very content baby cried quite a bit, but I know that Jessika and her family appreciated getting to see her. McKennah was particularly excited to see Kaylee. She presented Kaylee with a couple of gifts within minutes of us arriving and just wanted to help Kaylee play with them. She also gave to us an afghan from GG (Kaylee's biological great-grandmother). We are definitely blessed that Kaylee has such a supportive birth family. We are so grateful that Jessika loved Kaylee enough to allow us to adopt her. We definitely love our little girl.
Just as I was ready to leave the church I ran into Kris, Kaylee's biological Grandmother. She invited me to attend Relief Society with her, so I did. I figured, if nothing else it would give Kris an opportunity to hold Kaylee for awhile. I was really glad that I went. Not only was the lesson good, but it was also good to spend sometime with her.
This evening, Tim and I had dinner with Kaylee's birth-family. Jessika made us all dinner and we visited for a couple of hours. I felt bad, because our normally very content baby cried quite a bit, but I know that Jessika and her family appreciated getting to see her. McKennah was particularly excited to see Kaylee. She presented Kaylee with a couple of gifts within minutes of us arriving and just wanted to help Kaylee play with them. She also gave to us an afghan from GG (Kaylee's biological great-grandmother). We are definitely blessed that Kaylee has such a supportive birth family. We are so grateful that Jessika loved Kaylee enough to allow us to adopt her. We definitely love our little girl.
