Arianna at 9 months

Wow we can't believe that soon our little girl will be turning 1 year old! Time sure goes by so quickly. Our little girl is now rolling, trying to crawl and sitting up on her own. Today Arianna started clapping her hands together when we sing pattycakes! She's so cute, we get so many comments about what a beautiful daughter we have :-)
Arianna has had quite the social life this past month. Arianna has been to an Erie Otters hockey game and three Erie Bayhawks basketball games. She was sitting center court at one of the games pictured above. Several players came over to play with her in the pregame warm-ups. After the game a few players signing autographs commented seeing her dancing and cheering them on.
We can't wait until summer so we can do all the fun summertime activities with her.

The past 9 months have been the best of our lives and look forward to spending every second we can with Arianna. I love finally being called Daddy :-)

7 MONTHS!!!!!

WOW Arianna is 7 months old already!!! We can't believe in just a few short months she'll be a year old. The Kelley Family is doing great. We just wish winter would end so we can get Arianna out for more walks around the neighborhood. We get so many comments about how pretty she is when we're out and about. She's so good for us and always has a smile on her face. No matter how bad the day was she always makes my day when I come home and see her smileing face as soon as she sees me.
Arianna is rolling around and holds herself up, soon she should be crawling around.
No teeth yet but the way she has been chewing on her pacifiyer I believe she'll have some breaking through soon.
Arianna spoke her 1st word and it was DADA :-) we are still working on MAMA. Her laugh is so cute she is everything we ever dreamed about.
Well sorry about taking so long to post I promise to post more pictures each week.

A HAPPY ENDING A NEW BEGINNING

Daddy and Arianna
Tuesday December 21, 2010 3:00PM became the happiest day of our lives!!!! 15 Years WOW 15 years finally came to a perfect ending. Just 6 months ago I never ever thought I'd be finalizing the Adoption of a little girl just days before Christmas. Both of our families where there,Sandys nephew even flew in early to be there. There wasn't a dry eye in the house when the judge announced the Adoption was approved. Arianna even got to sit in the judge's chair and bang her gavel. The judge even gave her a childrens 1st numbers book signed and dated.
Everything when great, the entire court staff couldn't stop commenting how cute Arianna is and they could see why we wanted to adopt her so badly. I held her the entire time and she was so good just looking around and wondered what all the fuss was about. We were asked several questions and the judge got a real laugh when she found out we were married in a McDonalds. The entire hearing took about 1/2 hour and at 3:00 PM our dreams finally came true we are offically Arianna's Mommy and Daddy.
Today our Certificate of Adoption just arrived and soon we'll be getting her birth certificate.
This Christmas was the greatest ever, Sandy and I got the most wonderful gift of our lives our little girl we've dreamt so long about.
As for Arianna she made out like a bandit. Every time a gift came my way her name was on it. We're looking forward to the years ahead watching her grow and the many Christmas yet to come.

Happy Holidays to EVERYONE!!!!

Brian Sandy and Arianna Kelley

Hours away

Tommorow is the big day, the day we've been waiting 15 years for! Our dream is about to come true.

Final Countdown

Only 3 more days until we finalize our adoption of Arianna!!!!!
Our computer bit the dust last week so if Santa gets us a new computer I'll post Arianna's Christmas pictures. They turned out beautiful!! She's getting so big and she's so pretty we're such lucky parents. Sandy and I are so excited that after 15 years our dream is about to come true and so close to Christmas. I'll post pics next week.
Happy Holidays
Brian, Sandy and Arianna

Arianna

Here's finally some pictures of Arianna isn't she BEAUTIFUL!!!!

A little Christmas Magic

In less than 1 month our adoption of Arianna will be finalized!!!!!!!!!!! One week ago today the birth parents signed off on their parental rights and we were told it would be a 30 day wait before we could get a court date to finalize the adoption. We really didn't expect to get a date until next year but to our delight the lawyer called and said Merry Christmas your court date will be Dec. 21st !! What a great Christmas present!!!!!
Last monday was hard being there with the birth parents as they signed off. Our lawyer told us usually we wouldn't have to be there but there was just a case in which the BP's signed off and two weeks later the adoptive parents had a falling out and divorced and didn't want to adopt. So the judge just wanted to question us to make sure the marriage was strong and that we still wanted to adopt. Sandy was brought to tears when the judge asked how would feel if something happened and we couldn't Adopt Arianna. The judge was really nice and told us what a cute couple we are and she can't wait to see again in in a month.
After we finished answering questions, The birth parents went in and signed off. There were lots of tears as they came out of the courtroom to leave, we gave hugs and all just cried.
We are so blessed to have meet them and they're giving us the greatest gift of all something that we have been working so hard to become for the past 15 years- Mommy and Daddy to a BEAUTIFUL little Girl ARIANNA!!

So we are counting down the days and enjoying every minute we have with her and look forward to the years ahead.
People have been telling me its fate that the adoption will be finalized just days before Christmas. Two years ago our attorney told us a story a story of a couple that adopted and the baby was born on Christmas eve. Sadly for us the mother lost the child we were to adopt.
When we tried to adopt through the state they kept telling us forget about a baby all the children are older. I told them we didn't care if the child was a newborn we just wanted to have a child young enough to still believe in Santa. We just wanted a little Christmas magic.
Little did we know years later after we had totally given up all hope of ever becoming parents that there was to be some CHRISTMAS MAGIC for us and we'll finally have our little Arianna.
We have been praying and wishing for so long and have cried so many tears and now we are only days away from reaching our dream. This will be the best Christmas of our lives, and our 1st as a FAMILY.
Sandy Arianna and I want to wish everyone a HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

We have plenty to be Thankful for this year.

Brian

Ones best success comes after their greatest disappointments.
Henry Ward Beecher