Settling In

The biggest news is Brigham slept through the night in his own bed!! He slept from 8:30pm to 8:00am, way to go Brigham!

The children did really well here today. They are adjusting to our home and the way we do things very quickly. And our love is growing stronger everyday. It seems to me they get cuter and cuter everyday too!

Some of you have been wondering about the children's names- why we chose them etc. So, the following is my attempt to explain. Along with some cute pictures of today.
Brigham is named after the second prophet of our church, Brigham Young. Out of all the modern day prophets, Brigham Young was the one who served the longest. He was the one who took charge and led the persecuted saints from Illinois to the Utah valley in 1846-1847 . He was a great man and one that I respect very much. For our little Brigham's sake we were trying to think of a name we liked that William so that he could get used to it easily. We prayed about it and both felt (after meeting him) that he was our Brigham. We think it fits him well! He's such a sweet and obedient child.

Rebekah is young enough that we figured she'd get used to new name pretty quickly even if it wasn't similar. We wanted to use a name from the Bible or church history. One day about 7 years ago in Sunday School class we were reading about the story of Rebekah in the Bible. We decided there in class that Rebekah was such a neat person we wanted to name a daughter after her. Well, here she is and the name fits her well. We debated over the spelling for several days "Rebecca" or "Rebekah" But we finally decided on the K since that's the biblical spelling and the K adds a little spice to the name- she's our sweet, spicy girl. We feel her name really fits her as well.
And Hyrum's name we decided before the others. From the beginning we knew we were going to change his name. (Shawn is his given name.) One day before our adoption committee I was talking with the wife of our Bishop. She has been so supportive in our adoption, and she was telling me a story from church history about Joseph and Hyrum Smith and how they were sick on Zion's camp and they decided to go into the woods to take turns praying until they received a revelation that they would be healed. After much prayer, as Hyrum was praying, he saw "Mother Smith" (their mother) praying that she would see her sons again in the flesh. And from that moment he knew they would be healed. (And they were healed.) Now, back to the story of Bishop's wife. She said that as you're praying for these little ones to join your family, think of all of us who are praying for you as well. Later that day as I was thinking about that story. I received a personal revelation that our baby's name should be Hyrum. So it is and it fits him well.