NeW MaC!!

I am currently typing this message from my brand new MacBook!! I cannot even say how excited I am to have a new computer, and one that isn't going to constantly give me problems. Ye-haW! You can tell we are already have fun with photo booth. Hee...hee. Doesn't Sadie look cute? She is 5 weeks!!! We are having so much fun with her.

Sweet Sadie

Wow-these past two weeks have been, crazy and wonderful! Sadie is darling! We are having so much fun with her. She had a rough few night at first,but is now getting into a really good routine. I only get up with her twice during the night! She really is a great baby and only cries when she is hungry. Peyton and Connor are thrilled with her! When Peyton comes home from school the first thing he does is wash his hands so he can come hold Sadie. Connor loves her as well and frequently come up to her throughout the day to give her a kiss on her forehead. Sadie has Shane wrapped around her little finger. He just loves to hold her and I can tell he is a great daddy to this little one. I am in love. What more can I say? Sadie has the sweetest disposition and has brought such a sweet spirit and calmness into our home. I am having such fun dressing her and fussing over a little princess. I can't say thank-you enough for all the visits, well-wishes, and presents that have been given to us. We are so thankful for adoption and the miracle that Sadie is.                                 This is Peyton holding Sadie's hand. You can tell how little tiny she is!

Our new arrival!!!!

Surprise! Surprise!

We are the proud parents of a new baby GIRL!!!

Sadie (middle name pending) Kjar

Nov. 23, 2008

7:09 PM

6lbs, 2 oz. 19 inches long

This was a total surprise! We found out about cute little Sadie yesterday and had her in our arms by 8:30 PM! What a way to start the week! It was honestly a whirl wind experience and one that Heavenly Father had a hand it. Situations like this just don't work out on their own. Sadie is healthy and looks great. We are so thrilled to be her parents and our boys can't believe they finally have a little sister. Words cannot express how happy and grateful we are this Thanksgiving!

Labor Day

For Labor Day this year we met Shane's parents up at Solider Hollow to see the annual sheep herding competition. Yes-I said sheep herding. Shane's parents have a friend who herds sheep for a living and gave them some free tickets. I must admit it was a really fun, cold day! It was quite interesting to see the dogs go up the mountain and bring down 2 different groups of sheep. The other cool thing they had up there was: splash dogs. Seriously it was so funny. They had this huge pool with a long ramp going into it. The dog owners would get their dogs all excited and then get them to jump off the ramp into a pool. The competition was to see which dog could jump the farthest. One dog jumped something like 21 feet! It was amazing and so funny. As I said, it was pretty cold and rainy, but the kids had a blast and even got their faces painted. Thanks Gay and Merwin for a fun day!!!

First Day of preschool

Connor is finally old enough to go to preschool! He has been so excited to go to school like his big brother, Peyton. After quite a search, I got him enrolled in a preschool that is in a home near our neighborhood. Miss Heidi-his teacher is so sweet. Connor just loves her and can't wait for his next day of preschool!!!! Here is Connor with his best buddy Dillon on their 1st day of preschool-Sept. 2nd 2008. What a big boy!

just some thoughts

My sister Jenni put this amazing quote on her blog and dedicated the post to me. Thanks Jen. It was exactly what I needed to hear. For the past few weeks Shane and I have been trying to explore ways to get our family out there and have birth mothers look at our file. About a month ago we had to opportunity to speak to a ward on their 5th Sunday combined RS/Priesthood. It was such a great experience. Of course I bawled my way through my whole talk. I was suppose to talk about how adoption has changed my life. Hello? It's turned it upside down and inside out in the best way possible. I will confess that at times I still struggle with why I can't get pregnant. I'm sure we could try in-vitro again and maybe even achieve a pregnancy, but the odds are so slim and it's so expensive. I will be glad when I have a clearer picture in the next life why I was chosen to be an adoptive mother. Not that I am complaining, Peyton and Connor are the greatest blessings I could ask for! Still, when I hear of couples who are able to plan out their families (you know, I want to have summer baby so I need to go of b/c in this month so I can get prego and they seriously get pregnant the 1st month) I hope they are grateful for the ease of their conception. Ok-sorry for that tanget. All these crazy thoughts have been going through my head lately. I called a local hospital and spoke to the medical director over labor and delivery with no success, however she was super nice and referred me to a OB office that handles adoptions only to find out they only use three agencies and LDS is not one of them. In talking to our social worker, adoption has changed so much in the past year. They are just not getting the volume of birth mothers coming in and those that do come in only about 1/3 of them place, and out of that amount most have a birth plan already in place. That means they have already been online and chosen a family or been referred by friends and family to look at a specific family. It's been frustrating since there are about 500 families on LDS' website! Do you see my frustrations??? I try to be positive and remember we've only been approved for about 6 months, but it's hard.

Anywho, back to the quote that my sister left on her blog...... it came at the right time. I love it!!!

"Something still grows inside a woman who doesn't conceive a baby. In her grows character that is consumed with confidence, humility and desire. A symbolic embryo that is hers to nurture and others to behold. And it's birth is phenomenal." -courtney (last name unknown)

At these times when I am feeling so down, and weak, it's nice to remember that Heavenly Father is in charge. He wants me to learn and grow from this. I hope that I am doing my best, and that I am making Him proud. I can say that from adoption I have learned that there is a special kind of love that develops between an adoptive family and a birth family. I am so grateful that I have had the opportunity to experience that. It is truly amazing. I am in awe of the strength displayed by both of our birth moms. They are truly amazing women.

I love this quote too-it may be a little cliche , but it's true:

My cup runneth over

The dreaded smoke detector

why do smoke detectors always run out of batteries in the middle of night and decide to chirp? This happened this morning at 5:15 am in Connor's room. Both boys were sleeping in there. I HAD to get up and change the battery. I cannot sleep with the chirping. I just can't. So I asked Shane to get up b/c the smoke detector is located on the small vaulted part of his ceiling. Why do home builders put it where it's hard to get to? The stool from the kitchen wasn't' quite tall enough, so I had to get the ladder from the garage and haul it into the house. Shane was having trouble getting the battery in, meanwhile Connor and Peyton are sleeping with lights blazing. I got up on the top on the ladder to put the battery in. I looked outside only to realize that I am standing in my g's in front on the arched window in Connor's room that has no blinds. Nice. I'm sure it was quite a nice show. I finally got the battery in only then to lay awake for another hour and then finally fall asleep for an hour and then have to get up to get Peyton ready for school. I am tired. I'm thankful for smoke detectors, but why oh why can't they start the chirping in the middle of the day????

Parent Profiles

Yeah!! We are finally online at Parentprofiles.com!!! I can't even begin to say what a relief it is that our profile is finally on another website that hopefully will give us more exposure to birthparents. The hurdles that we have gone through with this adoption have been so different than Peyton and Connor's. We have been so frustrated with lost paperwork, lost mail, individuals unwilling to help us out, I could go on. However in talking with a friend of ours who has two adopted children from Ethiopia, I know that there is a reason for the delays, the frustrations, and the "doors" that seems to be closed to us. I am not sure the reason for the stumbling blocks we have faced thus far, and there will probably be more, but at least there was a door opened today. A big thank-you for everyone that has been encouraging us and keeping us in your prayers! Keep the prayers coming that a birthmom will find our family and that we can be guided to her as well. Thanks!!!

embarassing photos

so ya know when someone (er-your cute sister) does a really nice post on her blog to say happy birthday, and the intent was so sweet, and thoughtful, but she posted a picture of you and her with your mom and other sister trying to be nice and cute, but you look HIDEOUS and FAT in that picture. Yeah-that just happened to me. So in defence of bad angles in a picture I decided to post a more flattering picture of myself in the hopes that a few people that read her blog actually will read mine too and be like "Oh-Rochie's not as fat as that other picture made her look". Ok, I feel better now.


(this is Shaner and I at the Richard Marx concert, and it rocked!!! We had a blast!)

In other news here are some things I am loving and not loving so much

Loving:

1-Mama Mia soundtrack-love it!!! Shane is diggin' it too.
2-my new calling in Primary. Surprisingly- I love it!!!
3-The Pioneer Woman-blog, love the story "From Black Heels to Tractor Wheels" a fun read!
4-Facebook-ok seriously this is fun and addicting!
5-Jason Mraz-Loving with Colby Calliat (see new additions to my play list below)

Not Loving:

1-Summer heat-alright, already, can we be back into the 80's please?
2-Watering flowers-it is the end of the summer and I have had it with watering flower pots. Whose bright idea was it to plant 16 flower pots this year?
3-Migraines-I got one yesterday and had to leave church right after the sacrament (not the meeting, but the actual sacrament) the whole flashing lights, followed by a pounding headache. It's been about 6 months since my last one and honestly I could wait at least that long again before my body decides to pull that again. Ouch.
4-changing clothes-Connor feels it is his duty to test my patience by putting on long pants and long sleeves when it's 100 degrees and then he proceeds to change about 3-4 times throughout the day. Stop changing clothes and will you please wear shorts and a t-shirt?

Happy 7th Peyton

Peyton turned 7 on Aug. 9th. We had a great time this year for his birthday. The night before his b-day was Friday and he had some friends over for a "late-night" party. They watched a movie in our backyard (Ben10: Race Against Time). We borrowed our neighbor's popcorn cart and had popcorn, movie candy and snowcones for the kids. You would have thought they were in heaven!!! For a small thank-you I got the boys Spiderman watches at the dollar store and they were a huge hit! This is probably the most low-key party we have ever done with the best results! We heard from a few parents that their boys came home saying "that party was awesome!". Score one for Mom!

This is the boys at the party....

I wanted to share 7 things about Peyton:

1-He is very sweet and caring. He still will give us the biggest and best hugs and isn't afraid to kiss us on the lips. He and I "touch noses" each night before bed. It's something that started when he was just little and he still loves it!

2-He is a rough and tumble boy. He loves to wrestle and fight. He loves to play with light sabers, guns, and swords.

3-He is a great reader! Honestly he really had no problems learning to read. It came very naturally to him and he is just really good at it.

4-He is a great artist! Peyton loves to draw on clean, white, never-been-written-on paper. He draws very intricately and is quite a perfectionist when it comes to art work.

5-He is developing a testimony of Jesus Christ. He is really understanding what is going on at church and knows right from wrong. He is a great friend and doesn't want to hurt others' feelings.

6-He loves Connor! Peyton is a great big brother and would probably rather play with Connor than anyone else. He is quick to include Connor in anything that we have going on, and is very sensitive towards his "big brother" role.

7-He is our Peytino, the great bambino, the monsterino, the one that we know, the cappachino and all those thingo's. We love him so much!!!

Happy Birthday Peyton!!!

tagged

My sister Jenni tagged me...

Ten years ago....
1. Living in West Des Moines, IA. working for Principal Financial Group
2. Trying to get pregnant!!!!
3. Missing my family and being very lonely
4. Driving the missionaries to Winterset, IA so they could save gas money
5. ending a hot, humid summer in Des Moines.


Tomorrow's to do list...
1. Finish sharing time for Sunday (my 1st...eek!)
2. clean the bathrooms
3. go to a couple of the Parade of Homes houses with Hollie
4. water my flower pots
5. probably another load of laundry


Places I have lived...
1. Sandy, UT
2. Ephraim, UT
3. SLC, UT
4. West Des Moines, IA
5. Midvale, UT
6. Riverton, UT


If I were a millionarie.....
1. I would pay off our house and student loans
2. Pay off all of our siblings mortgages
3. Put money in the bank
4. Take our whole family to Hawaii
5. Hopefully do a bunch of philanthropic stuff to help out other people
6. Travel... I would visit all my friends that live outside of Utah and I would go to all the fun places in the world that seem impossible to see because it's too expensive to get there.

Snacks I love
1. String Cheese
2. Jello Pudding Sugar Free Chocolate pudding...only 60 calories!!!
3. Pringles
4. almonds
5. Yoplait yougurt
6. frozen grapes


I tag: Shana, Kim G, Jacy, Holly, Kara, Sandee, and Elisa.....anyone that wants to.

finally...we can access the storage room

I didn't think I would ever be so excited about a storage room, but really it's probably my favorite room in our house right now. I love the organization! Our storage room has been done for a few months, but we had to cram a bunch of stuff in there and seal it off so we could have a sheet rock hung in the rest of the basement. Today I was determined to clean it out so we could have access to it and continue building up our year supply of food. My awesome father in law, Merwin built the shelves for us, along with Shane. We've slowly been finishing our basement since we moved in to our house almost 4 years ago. Merwin did two rooms downstairs right after we moved in. He did a great job on the play room and our office/guest room. My in-laws are great sports about staying in our messy (oh and I do mean messy) office. There is so much furniture in there right now because we had to empty the rest of the basement a couple of months ago to sheet rock. Before we did the sheet rock, Shane and Merwin did the storage room, and I love it! If you know Merwin, you know his work is top notch and he is a perfectionist. I didn't care if we had shelves made out of 2x4's and mdf, but noooo, that just wouldn't do. I'm so glad he told us we would be much happier if we spent the extra money to do laminate shelves trimmed in wood. They look awesome, are so easy to clean, and you could hang from them, they are so strong. I just want to give a shout out to Merwin-I think you are awesome! Thanks for being the best father-in-law ever! I didn't mention, all of the finishing to get our basement ready for sheet rock, and finishing the storage room was done while Merwin was going through Chemo. He is truly amazing and doesn't let anything get him down. He's a great grandpa and such an example to our whole family! We love you! (on a happy note, Merwin is done with Chemo and has no cancer after 6 months!!!)




This is one of the main shelves we have for food. Don't you love all the cereal??? Gotta love it!





We have a barrel in our storage room floor that is in the corner that we can install a sump pump if we felt like we needed one. Anyway, we couldn't really build shelves over it because we wanted to have access to it, so we did two hanging rods. They work out great for extra coats, etc. We do NOT have enough room in our tiny coat closet upstairs.




Here's a closer look at the shelves. We are tying to reserve at least 1/2 of the shelving for food, etc. We've done a pretty good job of getting rid of extras we don't need. One thing that is taking up so much room is our giant Christmas tree that I wasn't smart enough to keep the box and now I can't find a box big enough to fit all three pieces. We also have a ton of baby stuff that is bulky and hard to store, but we don't want to get rid of it...........we need a baby!





This lower shelf is right under our electrical panel. We couldn't put shelves in front of it for obvious reasons and weren't going to do anything thing there but a small raised shelf on the floor to store flour, sugar, etc. I saw my friend, Diane's storage room and she had this idea. It is a wrapping station! I don't have it fully functional yet, but I plan to soon! You can't see it in the picture because of the honkin' baby toys, but I have a three drawer plastic bin under the desktop that will hold, ribbon, bags, tags, scissors, tape, tissue paper, you name it.





We were able to get a can holder that rotates your canned food for you. I am proud to say that I put this baby together almost by myself. Shane helped me with the main frame work and then I finished..it was a beast, but I love it! Peyton loves to go down and get me corn, or soups. You can barely seen in the picture, but it came with magnets that say the name of what you are storing in each row. How clever!!! You can look these up at http://www.shelfreliance.com/ They have all sorts of different options to fit your needs. We got ours at Costco when they were having an event there, but I have seen them at Walmart. I think ours is The Harvest which holds up to 460 soups cans. To be honest if we had room I think I would have bought two of them since I still have to put cans on shelves.



And now the man responsible for it all....Merwin. Thanks again!!!! I love, love, love it!

First Day of 2nd Grade

Yesterday was Peyton's 1st day of 2nd grade!! I can't believe my baby is getting so big. He loves his new teacher and was really excited to start school again. He is a great student, and loves to learn. He is interested in math and is a great reader! We are so proud of him! When he got home from school on his 1st day he was exhausted! We sent him to bed early the night before, but apparently school was longer than he remembered. Doesn't he look cute? He was darling and said he wanted to wear his "best clothes" on the 1st day. What a sweetie!

Tim 2008

Here is Lisa and I next to one of the Tim signs at the concert. We usually always take a picture by the larger than life posters they have hanging up.

This is the group I went with. It's me, Lisa, her sister Candice, and her daughter Hadley, her other friend, Jenn and Lisa's other sister, Andrea.


Here is our classic "tim" picture.

We're just hanging out waiting for Tim to come out. The concert was at USANA, which I love! The atmosphere is so fun and light and the sounds is great!

We had such great seats!!!! We kept walking further up on the floor and Lisa was dying. She thought I was going up too far. When we sat down we realized we were about 8 rows from the front on the side. Lisa, and I sat by her sister Andrea. We all said that we would run up by the stage if we could get through when Tim came out. There was no one to stop us and we ended up touching the stage the whole concert!! After 5 years of going to Tim, this was the best ever!

This one is right after we touched Tim. Can you see the excitment on our faces? My heart was seriously racing!!!!

This is one of my favortie pictures I got of Tim. He was singing "I like, I love it" and when he says "Can't get enough of that little gal's lovin'..." he tapped his arm where he has his "Faith" tatoo. Now I'm not a fan of tatoo's at all, but can we have a big..."ahhhhhh". It was so fun to be so close and see so many little gestures like that!

Here is Lisa holding her autographed ticket!!!! I held mine up too, but there were too many hands and she was so lucky that he grabbed her ticket and signed it. What a night to remember!!

update

it's been such a long time since I updated. I have a ton to post about, but my computer is so slow at uploading pictures. Here is a quick re-cap w/o pictures. I will try to post them later this week.
#1-I went to Tim McGraw at the end of June and are you ready for this....I-touched-Tim-McGraw!!! Lest you are scared that I was throw out for inappropriate behavior let me just say he was right by us grabbing fans hands and I was able to touch his knee and forearm. I was dying. Lisa and I were screaming so hard and loud it was hilarious and really so exciting!!!
#2-I surprised Shane the next night and took him to see Richard Marx at the Sandy Amphitheather. I know-total 80's, but it was so much fun. We got Quizno's and sat on the grass and just hung out before the concert started. He was very good and so funny. Great concert!
#3-4th of July. We spent it in Moroni and had so much fun. I will post pictures later.
#4-I have a new calling in our ward. I got released as Enrichment leader and got called to.......2nd counselor in the Primary!! I am really excited about it and was ready for a change.

Peyton starts school in one week, and let me say we are ready for school to start. Connor starts pre-school the 1st of Sept and is so excited. It's been a fun summer and we are ending it this week with a trip to Lagoon. Our kids are really excited, and frankly so am I. It's been YEARS since I went to Lagoon, or as we used to call it..Galoon.

I've been working on getting our profile on another adoption website: Parentprofiles.com It's a ton of work and I feel like we are trying to get approved all over again, but hopefully it will get us some more exposure to birthmoms.

So now....at least I'm updated.

Wasatch Back 2009

My sister in law Krisi signed up for the Wasatch Back for next year. She is hoping to put together a family team. I just told my brother Kevin that I would be on the relay team. So far,my sister Jenni, brother Kevin, sis-in-law Kristi, Aunt Pauline and maybe my sis Hollie and I are doing it. I told Kev I dubbs the #7 spot. It's a total of 12 miles. For those that don't know what this is, it a race from Logan to Park City done in relay with 12 people over a 24 hr period. The total mileage is 178 with each person running 3 legs of the race anywhere from about 3.9 miles up to 9'ish miles. I really need to get it out there that I AM doing this. So there-everyone knows, now I must train. Kevin did it this year and said it was really great, but he's a total triathlete so I don't know how much I trust his take on ease-of-race. Any other takers in the family?????

baby names and chores according to Peyton

Peyton is soooooo excited to have a new baby in our family. For his sake, I hope it doesn't take too long. Yesterday he asked me to list some things he could do to help me with the baby when it comes. (don't freak out just yet, we haven't been picked, we're just talking about the future) I told him he could make a list of what he thought he could help with. Here is a list of what he wants to help out with: changing diapers (yahoo-he can have all the dirty ones), feeding the baby a bottle, bathing in the kitchen sink (too funny), burping the baby, tell the baby how to talk, play with the baby, get the baby to sleep (he can have the 3am time slot!)

After he was done making the list of chores he came up with his own list of names.
Boys: Rex, Indyana, Brant, Cory (the last two are names of boys in Peyton's class at school). Girls: Trixi, Savana, Vicy, Haley, Maria.

These are spelled according to his "list". He said the funniest thing about Vicy-it's "V" with and "icy" on the end. Oh my-where oh where do they get this stuff. I'm sure it's more me than anyone, but my kids crack me up! Lovin' the names Peyton!

Just call me Spiderman

Connor has been loving his Spiderman costume lately and puts it on most days to wear for awhile. When he puts it on he tell me "Mom, you call me Spiderman." I love his imagination and love that he is getting so into characters like Peyton. It's fun to see Peyton and Connor play so cute with each other and be intrested in the same things. Connor put on his costume the other day and sat down to watch Spiderman on TV. It was around 4:00-4:30ish when I came back into the family room to find Spidey sound asleep in the big chair. So cute! And by the way-no Spidey costume is complete without green gloves...where do they get this stuff??

summer fun in the backyard

who needs to go to the pool when you have so much fun in your own backyard? This week Peyton and Connor had a fun day in the backyard with our blow-up pool and a picnic on their playset. It was so impromptu and yet so much fun. They were bored so I got the pool out for them and made them a picnic. They ended up playing outside from 11-5 that day! They were so tired and ready for bed early. I didn't take any pictures of the pool (I don't know why) but here are a couple of the picnic. Ahh I love summer!!!

Baseball 2008-Detroit Tigers

Peyton finshed his 3rd year of baseball recently. This was his first year of machine pitch baseball. He is a great player! He has really improved his baseball skills this year and really enjoys playing. He was the only "lefty" on his team. We got some great pictures from a professional photographer that comes to one game each year and takes about 5-10 pictures of each player for you to buy. Peyton was so photogenic and had so many great poses that we ended up with 15 5x7 pictures for only $35! I can see a collage on baseball pictures in his room in the near future. Here are some of the pictures I took throughout the season.

Rise Award/Attendance Award

Congratulations goes to Peyton! This past week I got to go to an assembly at his school where he was awarded the Rise Award for Academic Excellence. It is an award that is voluntary. The kids have to complete 8 of 12 possible goals throughout the year at home to achieve this award. Some of the goals he accomplished are: read 100 books, 1000 minutes of exercise, recite 3 poems to his class, get 100% on 10 or more spelling tests, write his name phone number and address from memory, draw color and label a detailed map of his room with using a compass for directions. Anyway he did a great job, way to go Peyton! The other award he got was an Attendance Award for missing less than 3 days of school all year! Way to go little buddy! He is a trooper when he comes to school. He loves it! He loves learning and is a great reader. We have loved his teacher, Miss Green. She has been so loving and kind and a great teacher. Watch out 2nd grade...Peyton is ready!

what's up

so what is up with shirts getting holes in the stomach? You know the kind I mean....cotton shirts that get tiny little holes right on your lower tummy. What's up with that? Does anyone know the cause? I can't tell you how many shirts that I have had to get rid of because of this. I just got a new cute shirt from Anchor Blue and after one wear...a hole. Arghhhhhh. Please, please tell me if you know why this happens and how to prevent. Oh how I hate the holes!!!!

baby????

As many of you know we are trying to adopt our 3rd child. We've had such great experiences with our other two adoptions and can't wait for a sweet new baby to be added to our family. Our social worker has told us that word of mouth is the best way to find our birth mom, or rather, help her find our family. I put directions on my sidebar on how to look at our profile. If you know anyone who is considering placing a baby for adoption, let them know about us! We just ask that you keep our last name private until we are ready to let them know that information. Thanks everyone for being sensitive to our situation and for keeping us in your prayers!

new season.....new purse

ok so if you know anything about me, you know that I have a ridiculous love of purses and let me tell ya, once you start into the expensive realm, it's hard to go back. It's a sickness really, but one that I whole-heartily embrace. So my friend Ashley has the cutest purses you have EVER seen. It seems like every time I see her at our son(s) baseball and soccer games she has a new fab purse. I spotted a really cute cream purse on her about 2 months ago and fell in love. I of course asked her where she scored such a cute thing and she told me Dillards. I promptly went to the mall only to find out it was a Kate Landry and it was $229. Holy cow! I wasn't expecting that price tag. I sadly said goodbye to that purse and have been on the search for a new summer purse ever since. I did purchase a cute canvas with white patent leather (fake) purse from Target that is white, black and purple that I have been carrying around since April. I really have loved it, but it still wasn't fulfilling my Kate Landry dreams. I wanted something a solid color that had a bit of an edge to it, but was still classy. I have looked and looked and just couldn't find what I was looking for (I wanted the Kate Landry cream patent purse)! So fast forward to today when I went to the mall to help my little sis, Hollie get pictures of my new niece, Aleah. I had about 15 mins to spare so I thought I would stop by Dillards and see if I could see a cute purse. What??? I found the Kate Landry purse on sale for $114! 50% off! I was so excited so I put it on hold so I could call Shane to make sure I could spend that much on a purse and I wanted Hollie's opinion. My Mom showed up at the mall(shocking, I know) and she loved the purse too, and offered to give me my b-day money early (way early-my b-day isn't until aug). So with my Mom subsidizing, I got my purse. Isn't it cute? Don't you love the lining? Thanks Mom and Shane!! It's big, it's chunky, and I love it!!