Nine

Our sweet Elijah turned 9 on Saturday. He is an amazing kid and we are blessed to have him as part of our family.  He's funny and sweet and has such a thoughtful side to him.

He doesn't like pictures so I'll spare him the pictures I took of him that day...except for this one!
This is his "Ok, Ok....I'm looking and I'm smiling like a crazy man...will you please stop taking pictures of me now!" face.  

Our family has been hit pretty hard lately with more obstacles than I can count...many of which I would rather not blog about.  Its been bad...I'm telling you, the evil one has been having a field day with our family the past couple weeks.  One disaster after another.  I guess he's finally figured out that we're not giving up on this adoption no matter how hard he makes things!  We had a big father/son  trip planned for Elijah's birthday but Dan came down with a horrible case of what seemed like food poisioning the night before the big trip and it had to be canceled.  This is one of many, many strange illnesses that have hit our family along with all the other hurdles we've hit lately.  Luckily, Elijah is a sweet soul and we came up with some alternate activities to do later that weekend for his birthday after Dan had started to recover with medication.  Elijah still had a great time.  He enjoyed his presents and still got to have fun!

So...we're digging in our heels even deeper...or should I say our knees are hitting the floor even harder as we pray for protection.  And in thanksgiving for having a great son that is growing into a great young man.