Abby's first camping trip - and first time to Oklahoma

In April of 2012 Ryan and I planned on going camping at Chickasaw National Recreation Area in Oklahoma. We were going to go on Good Friday since Ryan gets it off work. I was excited. I love camping, had only been in an airport in Oklahoma, and had heard how nice Chickasaw was.
Two days before that, on Wednesday evening, I got the email that changed our lives. It was from Abby's biological grandma (Cathy) telling me about her and asking if we may be interested in adopting her (she was 9 days old at the time.) The next day, Thursday, I met with Cathy and learned more about Abby and the whole situation, and on Friday morning we went and met Abby and Cheyenne. Our camping plans got thrown out the window as we embarked on the adventure of becoming parents.
We of course have never regretted the decision to change our plans, Abby is way better than a million camping trips, but I've still really wanted to do it sometime.
Well, we finally did. My birthday happened to land on Good Friday and I decided I wanted to spend my birthday camping at Chickasaw. And I'm glad we did. We had a great campsite right on the lake and secluded from other sites, perfect! Ryan's parents came too - they stayed in a hotel but spent a lot of time at our campsite with us. His mom prepared tin foil dinners for everyone so I didn't have to cook dinner - nice! In the morning we made breakfast, but that was no big deal. We spent time walking along the lake, flying kites, and just talking at the site. The only downsides were Abby was sick (which may have actually helped with her sleeping) and Penny kept barking at animals moving around outside our tent (so that was annoying.) But we had a lot of fun.

Just some more of her cuteness

Happy Birthday Princess!!!!!!

My Abby is growing up. She is a 2 year old!!!! We had so much fun celebrating her birthday, several times!

My parents and sister and her boys had a birthday party for Abby right before we left Las Vegas - complete with fruit "cake". She loved it!

On the day of Abby's birthday we took Cheyenne with us to the zoo. They loved feeding the birds together! And then we found these hippos totally going at it. They were so loud! I've been to the zoo a ton, several zoos - I have seen tons of hippos in the wild in Kenya - but I've never seen this behavior before. It was fascinating! What a show for Abby's birthday - so kind of them!

Abby is super in to trains now, and has always been into her daddy, so the day after her birthday we met Daddy at his work (he works for the railroad), and not only looked around and tons of train stuff, but actually got to eat lunch in a train car! So fun!

Friday night we celebrated her birthday with her biological grandparents. They made that cute kitchen for her out of a bedside table. We love it! And I so loved watching Michael, her grandpa, playing with her with it. It was awesome! They give the best gifts!

On Saturday we had Abby's actual birthday party - Ryan's parents and his sister Heather came as well as Cheyenne and her friend May. A train fruit "cake" :). And fun at the park.

Sunday morning we summed up Abby's birthday celebration with her birthday breakfast (banana oat pancakes and berries) and her gifts from us. I think she really enjoyed all her birthday celebrating - at least I hope she did! Happy birthday my princess - I love you absolutely, completely, for ever!