We were able to bless Levi in church on Sunday, July 5th. For any who doesn’t know, we bless our children as babies during our church services. Mainly, this is to let the church know their name and also for them to receive a blessing from Heavenly Father. This is done by those who hold the priesthood (the authority to act in God’s name). Brad was able to bless Levi. Normally this is done a little earlier in a baby's life than we did it, since Levi is almost three months old. However, we waited until we moved back to Missouri so more of our family would be able to attend. Standing in on the blessing was: Great-Grandpa Cox, Grandpa Smith, Grandpa Jones, Uncle Russ, Uncle Dustin, Brad, and Uncle Joey. Several of the uncles were out of town and unfortunately, Charlie just barely missed being in on the circle due to some troubles on their drive up from Arkansas. It was so nice to have so much family to celebrate Levi’s birth and to participate in the blessing. Levi did great and didn’t make a sound!


We borrowed Levi’s blessing outfit from Dan and Jennifer – thanks guys! He looked so cute in it. (Oh, and congrats Dan & Jenn on a cute new girl in your family!)

Afterwards, Angie and Carley’s families were at my parents’ house. Brad got a picture of Jacob, Zoey, and Nate playing outside. It was a great weekend and was a lot of fun to see our families again.

New Job

Since graduation, our life has been a bit hectic. We’ve been looking for a house to purchase, since we’re currently living in my parents’ basement. We have really enjoyed living with them, but they’ll probably be ready pretty soon to have their place back to themselves. We actually found a beautiful home and have a contract on it. We are hoping to close the end of July. When we do, I’ll post more about that.

Brad officially started work on July 1st! He is still waiting on his Missouri license, but for now he’s shadowing the other podiatrist at the hospital and learning how their clinic and computer system is run. I’m so proud of him for accomplishing this major goal. He’s wanted to be a doctor for such a long time and he’s finally achieved it!

As you can see, though, he’s kind of worn out from everything we’ve done lately, so he decided to take a nap with Levi :)

Graduation

After a week of being settled at my parents’ house, we turned around and headed back to Louisville for Brad’s official graduation! I can’t believe he’s actually graduated three times (undergrad, podiatry school, and now residency) since we got married. He’s sure learned a lot and come a long way from the beginning when he was a roofer to now being a full fledged doctor! The trip back to Louisville was much more enjoyable than when we moved. We traveled with Rebecca’s parents who have a DVD player in the backseat. Jacob pretty much just watched Bob the Builder the whole way. Both kids did great and we made the trip in pretty good time.

We arrived Sunday night and got up Monday morning and headed to the splash park. We had a pretty good time enjoying the sun and water. Jacob had fun running around and splashing Grandpa! Even Levi got to enjoy a little bit of the sun.

That night, we all got dressed up and went to Brad’s graduation. It was more like mingling and then the presentation of the diploma, but that’s what we’d come for and we weren’t about to leave without that very important piece of paper.

Accepting his diploma from the residency director.

Brad and Adam together with the residency director and a couple of the attendings.

Jacob thought he should be in the picture, too.

We were able to see our friends, the Hicks family. Jacob and Madelyn have been friends since birth (like that’s such a long time ago…I know) and they had fun running around and playing together in the hallway of the conference room we were having graduation in. We sure do miss our friends and hope they’re doing well. Unfortunately, the only picture we got with the Hicks family is blurry, but at least we’ll be able to remember them.

Brad, we’re so proud of you and are glad that you were able to finally obtain your goal of finishing residency. We are grateful that you put in so much hard work to be able to support our family. Thank you and we love you!