At their first meeting, Sherrie said one of the things that she was worried about was that he would just want to meet her once and then never see her again. Her family told her that was a possibility but she would at least get to meet him this time and have that memory if he decided he didn’t want to see her again. I was touched by her honesty and vulnerability. Ryan told her he didn’t know how the future looked or where to go from there but he did want to see her again and wanted to get to know her and her family better.
It has now been a few months since all the pieces of finding and talking to Sherrie for the first time fell into place. Sherrie and Ryan talk or text fairly often on the phone. Ryan has video chatted and or texted with all of his half siblings. I went to Utah to see my Grandma Jones and spent an afternoon meeting David, his wife Jen, and Giselle. Sherrie and Genevieve, her son Eric, Grandpa Perry and Sherrie’s husband David have stopped by our house at different times when they were coming by Kansas City.
About a week ago all of the siblings came out to have a vacation together in Branson Missouri. David and Austin stopped by our house on their way. We went to dinner, they came to one of Matthew’s games, and we had them and David and his wife and kids at our house for dinner. Ryan and I went to Branson for a day and met them all together. It was a little overwhelming for Ryan but he was glad to finally meet all of them in person and spend a few hours with them.
The following weekend we took the kids and went to Sherrie’s house and spent the weekend with them. David’s family was still there, our kids seemed to get a long with his kids pretty well. The kids loved having cousins to play with and lots of fun activities to do. We were able to meet Vanitta, Sherrie’s mom. The person that Kenny found and was able to finally find the link to Sherrie. We played games, grilled food, Ryan went golfing, we drove around Dardanelle, went to church with them, and took pictures on the top of Mt Nebo. It was a fun weekend. I felt like I was just meeting my in-laws for the first time even though I have been married for 19 years. Not quite sure how I fit in yet. Sherrie and her whole family are so kind and welcoming though. I am excited to have them added to our family. Ryan is too. I love the changes in him the past few months. I have always loved him and he has always been a good man. He has grown spiritually and emotionally the past few months and I love him even more.
It feels like all the ice has been broken now. Everyone has met and the initial relationships have started to form. One of our concerns when Ryan was debating on looking for his biological mom was how it would affect our family. We didn’t know all the possible scenarios but we had many that we came up with-good and bad. We decided to trust that Heavenly Father would guide us and things would happen the way that would be best for Ryan, our kids, Rhonda and Roger, and the people we discovered along the way. We had no idea how it would turn out but so far it has been pretty amazing.
Vanitta 
Robert, Gen, Kit, Eric 
Scarlett, PJ, Lizzy, Jen, David, Maggie, Parker, David 
David, Ryan, Sherrie, David, Gen 
Lizzy, David, Emilee 
My Monkey’s 
Mount Nebo 
Austin, Giselle, Gen, David, Ryan, Sherrie, David