Eli turns 7...

Eli had a superhero party for his 7th birthday. For the first time he had a sleep-over party. We brought out 4 mattresses into the living room to make a huge bed and then did a superhero pillow fight. several of the boys exclaimed the next day that it was the best birthday party they had ever been to. The morning of birthdays I make them extra special pancakes for them and this year was my fanciest yet. I made "superman" pancakes. The Spiderman piñata was a "hit". Look at the pics below.

A new Haddox...

Anzo is finally ours! On Dec 27 the decision was made by the Guatemalan courts to call us Anzo's parents. A decree was sent out to the place where he was born to create a new birth certificate with our names on it. We hope to have that document in the next week and then its off to the embassy again to get him immigrated and naturalized. The process is not complete but he IS adoptED. We announced this to Anzo to which he smiled and ran off. He doesn't know what difference a piece of paper makes. We went to Pizza Hut to celebrate.

I love celebrations especially when they celebrate a person. We all need to be celebrated and know we are important. We also need to be humble in celebrating others and showing they are important. To this end I have been searching for new ways to celebrate the kids. Our answer...'Half-Birthdays'! It also just so happens that Anzo's Half-Birthday is Dec 24 but that is a tough day to celebrate so it will move around but because his adoption date is Dec 27 (so close) we can celebrate them together!

Hopefully soon, we can start planning a long overdue trip to Disneyland. He has been anxiously waiting to visit the states. I feel that, albeit subconsiously, he sees us as being from the states and him from Guatemala. A visit to the states will confirm the permanence of things, as to say, We all are now from the states and when we leave we will all leave together.