Olivia's Dedication Weekend

On September 13th (yeah, I'm behind on blogging!) Olivia was dedicated to the Lord at our church, Bethlehem Baptist, in downtown Minneapolis. My sister, Janie, flew from San Diego for the dedication and we had a great visit. It also marked the two month anniversary of the date that we met Olivia.

Here is Janie and Olivia.My dad, my sister and I kept the visit a surprise from my mom (she is the BEST person to surprise!) Here she is, seeing my sister for the first time. I wish I had a video, too, as she screamed four times. It was hilarious!

Here are my folks (looking quite fab, I must say!) at our church

We were so surprised and pleased to have our head pastor, John Piper, do the dedication. Other pastors often do them, so we felt honored that it worked out this way!

Olivia and I wore our Chinese outfits

Even though I took this picture of Pastor John and Lee's Aunt Lynn (visiting from Mississippi and a fan of Piper's books), it didn't occur to me to get one of him with Olivia! **sigh** oh well.
Me with my girls! :) (Olivia and her cousins)

Here is a sampling of who was there...once again I missed some great pictures. We had Lee's sister Christy and her family, my two sisters, my parents, Lee's mom and his Aunt Lynn, our dear friend Bev, and Matt and Jenny and the kids.
Lee's sister, Christy, was in town from Phoenix for his other sister's wedding, but we reaped the benefits, too!

"Sooooo big"

Whenever a Shelton child comes home, we will plant a tree in their honor. Here is my bro-in-law, Greg, helping out

and Lee

and my dad

And it's planted! We planted an appropriately named tree: The Rose Tree of China, also known as Flowering Almond or Double-Flowering Plum

Here is a sweet picture of Olivia saying goodbye to her Aunt Janie, who she got to know quite well on the long weekend. We affectionately call this "forehead hugs" or "forehead lovin'".