Copper Falls State Park

We went camping this weekend with Andrew's parents, uncle, aunt, and cousins. Andrew and his dad participated in a 46 mile bike race on Saturday morning in which Andrew placed 5th and his dad placed 3rd! Kudos to them. Later that day some of us went hiking (Andrew and his dad were too worn out though), and we all had a campfire in the evening where we made s'mores and pudgy pies. Today, Andrew, Rose (our dog) and I (Katie) went for a fun mountain bike ride while the rest of the group hiked a trail that dogs aren't allowed on. It was a really fun weekend spending time with family and nature.

I hope you all are having a great summer! :-)

Facebook: www.facebook.com/hopingtoadoptAndrewAndKatie

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Vacations!

The last couple of weeks have been a blur of fun activity! Thursday July 12th until Sunday July 15th, I, Katie, was at Lifest Christian Concert Festival in Oshkosh, WI with my parents, sister, and sister’s boyfriend. I also saw a bunch of our friends from church and their kids who were there, too. Lifest is always so amazing and I look forward to someday bringing our kids along with me and my family! It isn’t really Andrew’s favorite thing, so he usually just stays home. We do a lot of activities together, and we think it’s ok to do things separately that we don’t both particularly enjoy. :-)

On Sunday, I came home from Lifest, did some laundry and unpacking/repacking and then Andrew, Rose and I headed down to my parents’ place (about a 2 hour drive). My Uncle, Aunt, and 3 teenage cousins had just arrived for a visit from New York state! We had so much fun this week. We went to Noah’s Ark Waterpark, went to the Milwaukee County Zoo, visited Pike Lake State Park, went canoeing and kayaking at a lake near my parents’, played board games, played Rockband, went to an arcade, made homemade pizza, etc. It was a great time. Our relatives left to drive home this past Sunday (the 22nd). It’s always sad to see them go. Hopefully we can find a time for us to drive out there next year.

Now it’s back to work and daily life for the week, and then we get to go camping with Andrew’s parents this weekend! There is a bike race that Andrew plans to participate in that is about 4 hours away from our home, so we decided to make a weekend out of it and camp at a Wisconsin state park in the area. Andrew’s parents plan to meet us there to hang out and so that his dad can participate in the race with him on Saturday.

We hope to one day be able to bring our children along on our adventures, and to hopefully have some fun adventures with their first parents, too. We believe that having an open adoption is a good thing for the child (having more people to love and support them) and for us (more friends are always good, and we want our children to be happy and healthy).

Feel free email us at KatieMArends@gmail.com or call/text us at 262-707-5361.

If you’d like more pictures, feel free to check out our facebook (www.facebook.com/hopingtoadoptAndrewAndKatie) or instagram (www.instagram.com/andrew_katie_hopingtoadopt). I tend to update those more frequently since it’s easy to do on my phone.

Thank you for considering us as adoptive parents for your child. :-)

Here are some pictures from the past couple of weeks:

Lifest Christian Concert Festival

Picture on the left: Katie's parents, Katie, Katie's sister and her sister's boyfriend

Middle picture is a band called For King and Country. Right picture is Toby Mac and "DiverseCity".

Pictures from when Katie's relatives were out visiting.

Upper Left: Gooseberries, blackberries, blueberries, currents, an a few raspberries all picked from Katie's parents' yard. Hopefully one day we will have more fruit-bearing bushes in our yard, too. We currently have a few raspberry plants, 2 very young blueberry bushes, a current bush, and some apple trees.

Upper Right: 2 of our 4 homemade pizzas.

Lower Left: A game called "Ticket to Ride". We played quite a few board games while they were visiting.

Lower Right: Playing Rockband. Andrew is quite good (in my opinion) at singing. :-) He prefers classic country type songs.

The two top pictures are hiking at Pike Lake State Park and the tower at the top of the hiking trail. Katie, her mom, and Rose (our dog) went on the hike; the others went right to the beach. :-)

Bottom left is Andrew climbing a tree, and bottom right is Andrew at the dog beach. Rose isn't allowed at the regular beach.

Pictures from the arcade. I (Katie) got top score on this game! I figure it must not be very popular, haha! Middle picture is one of my cousins and my dad playing a game, and on the right is my parents playing air hockey. They love being grandparents to my brother's kids and are very excited for us to adopt.

Above are a couple of pictures from the Milwaukee County Zoo. The animals were being kinda funny and entertaining when we went. The above elephant was dancing. The Grizzly bears were fighting. And this lion has a birthday present. There was a second one in the cage, too, that was partially opened. I do feel bad for some of the animals that have small enclosures, but am happy to see that the zoo is constantly working on improving that. They are currently working on a massive elephant enclosure, predicted to be done in spring of 2019!

Katie's Birthday and some Vacations!

Last Saturday was my (Katie's) 34th Birthday! I actually worked and got caught up on some things around the house for most of the day, because we have so much coming up in these next couple of weeks! On Sunday, we hung out more. :-) Andrew participated in a local bike race, and then we hung out with some friends and their kids at a nearby lake. It was a good day.

I am just about to leave today to go to a Christian concert festival in Oshkosh, Wisconsin! Andrew isn't interested in going, so he and Rose are staying home and I am attending with some family. A few of our friends are planning to go as well, so I might try to meet up with them at some point. There are a variety of bands at all different stages throughout the festival grounds. One of the stages is the 'Kidzone'. They have family-friendly comedians and musicians for kids, as well as kid-friendly activities such as a petting zoo, coloring and other crafts, and this year even a fire engine stopping in one day. Someday I hope to take our kids to be able to participate in these activities.

On the day that I get back from the concert festival we will have some family visiting from out of state. My dad grew up in New York State and still has family that live there. All growing up we would drive out there every other year, and my uncle would drive or fly out here the other every other. It has evolved over time and isn't quite as consistent, but I am looking forward to seeing my uncle, aunt, and 3 cousins that will be visiting next week!

We hope to someday have a little one to bring with us on these adventures! If you or someone you know is pregnant and considering placing your child for adoption, feel free to contact us to chat. You can also find out more about us by checking out our Facebook page: www.facebook.com/hopingtoadoptAndrewAndKatie

or Instagram: www.instagram.com/andrew_katie_hopingtoadopt

Thank you and we hope that you have a great day!