When we had Melissa for just over 24 hours we wrote our
first letter to her birth mom. We wrote
one every week for the first several months of her life. We did the same after Mia, although I’m sorry
to say we were not quite as diligent much to my chagrin. At first I thought nothing of these
letters. But as the years passed I
realized what a precious gift they truly are.
They are a journal, a chronicle of how our kids have grown, our love for
them, and our love for their birth mothers.
Some of them hold dear and precious feelings. Now-a-days we still send letters usually
accompanied by pictures, artwork and the like.
It’s not every week, and not even every month, but several times a
year. And while I feel guilty that we
don’t write more often and it usually balloons into a much bigger project than
I feel I ever have the time for, I cherish these letters. For it forces me to take a moment and reflect
on all the moments in our lives, to take some time to record what our kids are
up to, how they’ve grow what they like, what trouble they cause. It has been a huge blessing in my life that
adoption has given me in such an unexpected way. These letter usually start as one generic
letter that we write about the happenings of our lives, and then we personalize
them to the individual we are sending them to.
While Beth’s brother was serving in Afganastain we took to sending him a
version of these letters every time we wrote one, now that he is home our
nephew and soon our niece will receive one while they serve on their full time
missions. While writing this addition I
realize I should be posting the generic parts for all to enjoy. So all, enjoy.
Aug 20, 2013
Dear Family,
It’s that time again, for a Cottam family update. School starts Monday, August 26th
which means that the summer is almost officially over. It has gone by so fast. Time seems to be speeding up; I wish I could
slow it down just a bit.
Missa will be starting FIRST grade. I know this fact freaks me out a bit! It seems like just a couple of years ago that
she was born. How do they grow up so
fast? She got accepted to the Spanish
dual immersion program in our school district.
So not only will she be going to school all day long, but half of her
day will be taught exclusively in Spanish.
It will be a big adjustment, for us.
She is a little sad to be switching school (mom is too, maybe more so than
her), it was a great school and she made some good friends in kindergarten last
year. But she is excited for Spanish
class and it will be a great opportunity for her. One of her friends that lives near us will
also be attending so that will be very beneficial. Poor Beth has been spending all summer
adjusting to the fact mom will have to start thinking about lunch at school and
now she will be learning Spanish! But
she is excited about it as well. Kent is
convinced that he should be out buying Rosetta Stone language program so he can
learn along with Missa.
Mia will also be starting school this year. She is enrolled a preschool twice a
week. She is so excited to be going to
school like her big sister. She will do
amazing I’m sure.
Summer has been VERY busy for us and lots of fun! For the first 6 weeks or so we had swim
lesson 3 times a week. It was a lot of
swimming. But both girls learned SOOOO
much. Missa is now a very confident
swimmer. She can swim the length of a
pool, while taking breaths, she is completely confident to jump off diving
boards by herself. It was really nice to
be able to take her swimming and not have to keep a close eye on her. Mia also learned a ton. She can now swim short distances by herself,
when she wants to. She is not as
confident in her abilities yet and sometimes forgets what she needs to do but
she LOVES LOVES to go swimming so it won’t take long before she is off on her
own as well. Mia loves to jump off
diving boards and go down water slides with a life jacket on.
Speaking of swimming one of our trips this summer was to
Cherry Hill, (a camping/water park/other awesome activities/park/playground)
which is a tradition/family reunion with Kent’s family. The girls had a great time. Mom and Dad loved playing with kids, cousins,
family, and eating yummy food. It was a
very enjoyable weekend.
We also were able to go camping and ATV riding with Beth’s
family this summer. We found a bunch of
Geo Caches and even hid our own. We had
a great time up in the mountains. We
happened to go just as the wild flowers were blooming and they were
amazing! It was so pretty up there.
Missa has also been busy with sports. She played soccer in the spring, then coach
pitch baseball over the summer, and she has started soccer again in the fall.
She really enjoys it and she is pretty good.
She has such long legs she can out run most of the kids her age if she
puts her mind to it. Coach pitch was
where the coach throws the ball while they try and hit it. Missa got pretty good at hitting by the end
of the season. He first fall soccer game
was this week and she scored one of the three goal the whole game.
Mia continues to crack us up and make us laugh. She LOVES to talk, dance, sing, climb on
things, and thinks she can do whatever her big sister is doing. Early in the summer/late spring she fell off
our swing and cut the back of her head.
Luckily it wasn’t that bad, didn’t even need stitches. I cannot believe she will be turning 4 next
month. I swear she was born last year
wasn’t it?! When we were at Cherry Hill
she wanted us to announce her so she could sing and play air guitar. She was quite the performer.
Speaking of performing, this summer also brought dance
classes. Some teenage girls in the
neighborhood get together every summer to teach dance class to little
girls. The loved it. Mia was so excited to finally get to “dance
on the big stage like Melissa”! They
both did fantastic and it was really cute.
As school start they will both be
starting dance class through the community education program. They are excited to be dancing again as
well.
Beth has enjoyed having them both home all summer (well okay
sometime they drove me crazy but for the most part we have had fun). She will miss them when they are both in
school. Whatever will I do with two
whole hours to myself without any kiddos, oh ya sleep, I will sleep. ;) This
summer I was also called to be the assistant girl’s camp director. It was hard to leave Missa and Mia for a few
days but I had so much fun with young women in our ward and my testimony was
truly strengthened by the experience. I
am so grateful to God that He called me to help. Kent continues to stay busy between work and
chasing kids when Beth is at work. He
has had some trying cases lately but he keeps on going and makes our house a
home. We recently celebrated our 13 yr
wedding anniversary. (Technically I was
at girls camp so we celebrated a month and a half early). Which Kent figured out means that he has
known me almost as long as he has not.
What a journey we have had. It
has been amazing and we look forward to many many more to
come.
We are still looking forward to our trip to Disneyland in
October. It feels like we’ve been
planning it for years, oh well maybe that’s because we kinda have. HAHA .
We love you and miss you.
