Family Photos

My mom and dad... I love this photo, it's getting framed on my wall!

My mom, dad and sister..... this one will also be going in a picture frame.

Grandpa and his youngest grandson

All the grandkids with Grandma and Grandpa

More Photos from Thanksgiving

Here are a few more photos of our Thanksgiving festivities. The weather was so nice the day before Thanksgiving that everyone was outside playing in our yard.

Hey how do you work this thing??

Okay, you put your hands on the handle....

I think I'm getting the hang of it....

This is fun!!

Aunt Lisa getting ready.... for what?
To push R. on the rope swing!
One cutie pie!
B. playing some family football!
Uncle Kevin and Jabber Jaw playing football

Tiger Shark and Jabber Jaw
A. being her silly self.... :-)
M. riding her pony....
Grandpa getting ready to walk 3 miles with Small Fry

Tuckered out after the Turkey Trot!

Turkey Trot

For the past three years my mom, dad and sister and her whole family have come down south to visit for Thanksgiving. It is always so good to have them down! I'm getting better with each year on letting go of my compulsive need to have my house immaculate before the guests arrive. Truly when everyone gets here it's chaos anyway, and our focus is on cooking, family and making memories... (not necessarily in that order).

This year we had our littlest guy here to celebrate! Last year we had just met him in Russia a week before Thanksgiving. We are so thankful that he is in our family! He got to celebrate with all his cousins too.... here is one of our traditions.

Each Thanksgiving morning our two families get up early and head to the annual Turkey Trot in our town. This year we were there by 8am so that Jabber Jaw and The King Fish could run the 1 mile fun run, and my niece Rachel could run the Kiddie K. (She won it too!) My dad joined us this year, and walked the 3 mile walk with Small Fry and I. Uncle Kevin, and his daughters Bailee and Anna ran the 3 mile run with our Tiger Shark. My sister Lisa ran the 5 mile. The 5 mile must be frequented by many in the local runner's club, because a LOT of people run it! There are always door prizes afterward and it seems we always win one. Last year two frozen turkeys, and this year a frozen turkey as well! Maybe with this one I might try to fry a turkey. My mom always bakes the turkey in the oven, but so many people down here have told of how good turkey cooked in a fryer is... that I want to try it. Anyway.... here are some photos of our turkey trot time!

Faith as Small as a Mustard Seed

Please read this blog post.... I am amazed at this family and inspired by the faith as small as a mustard seed that their 11 year old daughter Lydia possesses. I promise you, you will be blessed to read it!

http://the30dayjourneyforhope.blogspot.com/2009/11/overwhelmed.html

All Things Football....

This post is dedicated to all things football.... or at least all photos of football.

Here are Tiger Shark and Jabber Jaw at a few games this year. (And a few of Small Fry hanging out, since he was at many many games and practices!)

Jabber Jaw double teaming a gigantic opponent! How old is that kid anyway?

Set to block...

Man- I love football!

A rainy day... don't I look cute??

The King Fish and his team.

Our own little Eagles mascot!

Everybody loves football in a pouring rain!

Mud anyone??

The collge stadium where one game is played and the Super Bowl of our league is played. It's such a treat for the boys!

Thanks to one of our parents Donna for making a sign!

Getting ready to run!

Blasting through!

Heading out for a pass.

This guy was tough!

You're not getting past me!

A little shovin'...

After practice... I still love this game!

Sugar and Spice Award

Barb- Over at Holm Sweet Home tagged me for the "Fabulous Sugar Doll Blogger Award." What does that mean??? Heck, I'm not sure... but it's an award and that I haven't received in a very long time! Thanks Barb! Barb is from Canada originally and is now in Finland. (There's a real northern gal for ya... I love it!) Anyway, this award sounds like it comes from the south doesn't it? I have never heard the term Sugar Doll before..... I think it's a southern saying. Anyway.... I'm assuming it means one sweet blogger... me?? Maybe.... but don't ask my family!

With this new award, I am to list 10 random things about myself: Uh and some of them are definitely not to sweet..... Also unlike most people who list one sentence random things... ummm, that's not me either. No, I tend to be verbose in my writing....so bear with me.

1. I am addicted to potatoes and salt. Mainly french fries and potato chips. It is not good for my cholesterol, as my doctor just informed me upon reviewing my latest blood work. The King Fish and I joke because when my boys were little if Mommy (that's me) chose to share a fry with one of them.... I was "growing in my ability to share". According to my doctor these are not a part of her low fat diet to help me shed weight and reduce my cholesterol. She informed me of this new plan on Monday, and I am taking the weekend to lovingly say goodbye to my best food friends.

2. I have an Ipod and I hardly ever listen to it. Sad but true. When can I find time in my day to listen to that thing?? Between schooling my kids and needing to keep an ear (and an eye) out for our Small Fry and any mischief he might get himself into... I'm just not able.

3. Okay, even sadder than the Ipod, we own many pieces of exercise equipment, and they are unused. So not good! Treadmill, gazelle, recumbent bike, weight bench and free weights, this stability ball that sits in my closet... and countless exercise videos. Sad, sad sad...... I really need to make the time to use those... actually we all need to do that!

4. Here are a bunch of shows I love.... I am not really a reality TV girl, and we only get like 12 channels, so my choices are limited. My current favorite show is The Good Wife. I seriously look forward to it every Tuesday. It goes by too quickly though, and I wish I had a whole season of it to watch when I pleased. The King Fish and I also like The Mentalist. One of my favorite series on DVD that dh and I love is Alias with Jennifer Garner. I think we need to have an Alias month so we can re-watch each season again. They would make fabulous date nights for us. (Are we boring or what?)

5. I hail from the north. Yes, I am a northern girl at heart. Adjusting to the south has been well.... an adjustment. Though I have to say going back to visit up north, I forgot what that was like as well. I guess you could say that now I am a happy mix of the two. You'll find my northern side coming out when I drive my car. But like a good southerner, I refrain from honking my car horn at people for being idiotically slow, or my personal favorite for stopping at a yield sign in a circle when there is no on on the road! No if I must use my horn it is to warn of danger or an impending accident.... but oh if you were inside the car with me! My three year old will yell.... "Come on!", out of the blue while we are driving and I know it's because he has heard me yell it one too many times.

6. I starred (and I use that term loosely) in the high school musical my senior year. Princess Winifred in Once Upon a Mattress. My best friend from high school was Queen Agravaine.... and she sent me the production on DVD. Yes, our production. Do you know how in your mind you remember being all great and talented? Well, this video was not how I remembered it. Apparently my four nieces get a kick out of watching their Aunt sing and perform. They think I'm awesome! (They haven't figured that out yet though.... their still young). ;-)

7. I played Field Hockey in high school and college. Yep, that's right field hockey. That sport with a stick and shin guards and mouth guards. The one that looks quite dangerous? Uh-huh.... that's correct! I loved it, and let's just say my junior year our team won the State Championship. Uh-huh... just a little braggin'......

8. I hate the outdoors. Really I just detest it. I cannot relate to friends who want to go camping. Ick. I really don't like the heat down south and that keeps me indoors all the more. When I was little I remember always pretending to play house. I would find a boulder in the woods at camp with moss growing around it and pretend it was my bed in my house. Really I was a great pretender. Back then I never really noticed the bugs... but now I would notice all the bugs, spiders, etc. that crawl out to greet me. Yuck, yuck, yuck!

9. One regret that I have is never learning Spanish fluently. I was sooo close, and really even 3 months visiting a Spanish speaking country would have put me there. I guess you can never say never.... maybe when I am old grandma I will be traveling on missions trips and I will speak that language. God knows my heart, so it wouldn't surprise me....

10. Finally, I hate to shop... period. I just can't stand it. Well, unless it's maybe something for something like house furniture, or a new kitchen... but that isn't happening anytime soon.

That's it..... More than you ever wanted to know about me! In return I am to list 10 bloggers for this award. I can certainly do that, and tell you a bit why I like them. I hope you enjoy stopping by and meeting some great people out in the blogging world.

1. Kim at The Littlest Tsarina - I love Kim and her family of five! Her boys are awesome and her beautiful daughter adopted from Russia is just precious! Don't believe me? Go look for yourself. She just looks absolutely adorable and full of spunk!

2. Rachel at Journey with the Williams Family- Rachel is one of my most faithful commentors and I love her for that! (Thanks Rachel!) She also adopted her precious son Daniel from Russia probably a year before we did. We are currently navigating the potty training stage together.

3. Nekey- at The Home on a Hill- Nekey is an IRL friend and she is also a faithful commentor. Sometimes I wonder if anyone at all still reads this blog of mine, and then I'll get a comment from Nekey or Rachel. :-) Nekey also homeschools her children and I love reading about her week. She gets so much accomplished! I was informed by Jabber Jaw that her youngest daughter is Small Fry's new girlfriend. He just talked her ear off at a recent get together. True no one really could understand what he was saying.. but he was having a mighty good conversation.

4. Carolynn at Finding Malibu. I came to know Carolynn through our blogs, but also because she used to be with the same adoption agency we were with. We have shared emails back and forth about this process. She and her husband are waiting for the call to go back to court to adopt their precious baby girl in Russia. I hope they hear soon!

5. Kristine- at I Love You More Than Peanut Butter. I met Kristine the same way as Carolynn. She emailed me about our switch from our former agency. (International adoption is a small world). I love Kristine's blog!

6. Barb at Holm Sweet Home- I'm sending this back to her... even though she already has this award. I want everyone to check out her blog. Barb adopted a sweet girl from Russia. This is a family I admire so much as they chose to adopt an older child. (Older children in adoption are adopted much less, and there future once they leave the orphanage system is bleak). Barb and her family have made a life changing impact on this little girl!

7. Flamingo Mama at 1 Crazy Journey! I love her!! I love how real she is.... I love how she shares her heart. She writes with a sense of humor and makes me laugh! I used to live in her city, but I wasn't blogging back then. We actually attended her church for awhile....I wish I had met her when we lived there.

8. Eye on the Prize- This is another IRL friend who homeschools. She has been through a particularly trying period with many trials in her life, she shares her feelings and keeps it real, while relying on God's grace.

9. American Girls in Moscow. You just have to check out this blog. This mom writes so well and it's such an interesting peek into this family's life living in Moscow, Russia for the past four years.

10. The Denoves- This is a blog I totally stalk. (Okay stalk is a strong word- I promise I am so not a stalker.) But it's in my google reader. I came across this blog because we have a mutual friend. I love Heather's heart and humor as she walks by faith through her busy life with her husband.

Before and After

Here is a photo of Small Fry when we met him on our first trip to Russia, and the second is a picture of him celebrating his birthday last month. :-) What a difference huh???

This time last year......

How is it also possible that I am so busy with life in our little family, that I forgot it was the anniversary of the day we met Small Fry?? It was actually yesterday, and somehow I missed it! But by the time I post this, it will be the anniversary of the day we signed the paperwork to request Small Fry as our son. A great day it was!

I went back to re-read our adoption travel blog and the freshness of it all hit me. The lack of sleep, the stress, the tough decision we had to make in turning down a referral. The prayers requested... the traffic..... everything!

Here is my entry from this time last year:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
First, thank you all for your prayers and comments. They really encouraged us a great deal. I never thought this process would be as difficult as it has been, or as stressful. It would have been difficult even if we didn't have to turn down a referral! Maybe in my mind I idealized the entire process, but when people say "International Adoption is not for the faint of heart".... I get what they mean!

I'm finally sleeping better.... I really credit my lack of sleep to the stress. My mind was going a mile a minute, and your adrenaline is up... cortisone levels are probably up too. So, I couldn't sleep if I wanted to... Now, I'm sleeping at night a little better, but I've also managed to also sleep in the car on the hour long drives to the orphanage.

So today we went to visit the little one in the orphanage in the morning. He was so cute! We pointed to a picture of us in the photo album that we will leave with him. We showed him Mama and Dada... (for some reason here they say Dada, but I know that at a lot of orphanages they say Papa). Anyway, by the end of the visit I would ask where's Mama and he would point to my picture, or point to me. He also would say Dada. He's been wary of Chris, because they have no male personnel in the orphanage at all. But today he warmed up to him, with the help of the xylophone. They played musical instruments together and then raced them across the floor. (they're on wheels you know.) They also took turns putting cups on their heads and let them fall to the ground. He and I walked around singing a little tune he made up, and then pretended to feed the toy ducks. It was a very good day.

We officially filled out the notary paperwork to adopt him... Yay! This will start the process for the court documents. Our director will be presenting them in court tomorrow. We are thrilled! (Tired, but thrilled!)

Tomorrow we actually will get a chance to see some of Russia before we leave. We've seen quite a bit of it, from the car driving everywhere. One thing we won't miss, and probably won't forget is the traffic in Moscow. It makes even LA traffic look good. It's the way they make their own lanes, and decide to do a U turn across 5 lanes of traffic. It's truly never fast like our freeways are. (It's city driving, stop and go..... mostly stop) When a road is blocked off it can take 2 and 1/2 hours to travel somewhere that would normally take an hour! The jockeying for position is pretty interesting... You really need to know how to drive, if you want to drive in this city!

So, that is my latest update. We are doing much better, and feel a peace about everything. Thank you again for all your comments and prayers! They have truly been a blessing and an encouragement through this stressful process!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That post seems distant, and yet is so fresh at the same time. It seems like it has been a million years since Small Fry was in an orphanage in Russia.... and it seems like he has been with us forever.

As I think about Thanksgiving this year, I am so thankful for the newest member to celebrate it with us this year! I'm thankful that Small Fry is home.

Vortex...

Friends from back home would always joke with me around this time of year that a vortex comes and sucks you up starting right before Thanksgiving and spits you back out after the New Year. I feel like it's starting even sooner for me!

I have no idea where this week went to. None! All of a sudden I looked at the calendar and it said tomorrow is "Friday". How is that possible? And how is it possible that we have not gotten to half of what I wanted to accomplish in school? Ugh! It seems like I started the week behind the eight ball right from the get-go.

We have been working on the kids co-op work mostly... Creative Writing, Science and Art. It's taken us sometime as both boys did two rough drafts for the writing class. They both will have to read their classroom reports out loud to their peers next week. They practiced on The King Fish this evening and he was pleased with each report. Yay!

The boys are also involved in Lego Robotics in our area. Basically they are programming a Lego Robot to do various tasks and will earn points if they succeed in completing a task. Each task is worth so many points. It has taught the boys a lot, and given them a flavor for computer programming and engineering as they build this small thing. They have less than 3 weeks to pull everything together with 4 other kids in our neighborhood. Then they travel to compete with other teams all across our state! There is still so much to accomplish though! It's crunch time!

As for our regular activities, piano lessons are going well, and soon they will begin practicing for their Christmas program. Lots of practice between then and now! The rest of our week has been consumed by football yet again. This weekend the boys are in the playoffs, and if both their teams win on Saturday, they will have to play on Sunday. If they win on Sunday they are in the Super Bowl final next Saturday. Yikes! I am so torn, as I want them to win, and yet I am sooo ready for the season to be over. Just plain worn out with football these days.

With all of that.... dh has been out of town 4 days this week. He got home at 5:30 this evening, changed his clothes and headed out the door 10 minutes later to coach football. Barely a moment for a brief kiss...
The King Fish: "How was your day?"
Me: "It stunk. How was yours?"
The King Fish: "It stunk."
Okay then.... see you later after practice. :-)

I have family coming in a week and a half. Yes, for Thanksgiving.....Arrrgh! My mind is not ready, and my house is not ready! Have I mentioned that I am also potty training my 3 year old??? (I actually think that isn't that bad considering everything else going on in our lives!)

And so this vortex goes... spinning so quickly as we travel through life at warp speed! Thanks for letting me vent!

Edit: My background is back and all is well with my little blog world. :-)

I'm not sure what's going on with my background hosting site, but hopefully they will have it fixed over the weekend. :-) Until then, no background.

Diapers, potty and carrots

I have to share this funny story of mine. Last week was an incredibly busy week at our house. The boys had a major exhibit for Around the World Day on Russia. It was awesome and they both did a great job sharing about all they saw and learned while in Russia. It was a lot of work though for all of us!! Then we had a big science test at their school on Monday and also a Master Art project due. Two huge things that we worked so hard on all weekend. (I have pictures of the master art work, though I don't think the photos do the pieces justice). Anyway, throw into that football that was scheduled for Saturday and played on Sunday... and well it was crazy! Monday I had to run down to the bank with Small Fry to check the safe deposit box to see about a car title. I first had to drop both kids off at co-op with their art canvases, backpacks, lunch etc. Crazy morning! I drop them off and head downtown to the bank.

I'm in the bank, waiting for the lady to pull our key, while Small Fry plays contently with his cars. He was standing by a couch and driving his cars on the seat of the couch, just like he does at home. The nice lady pulls the key and I tell Small Fry it's time to go in the other room. When he turns around the entire front of his jeans are wet.

I look at him stunned, and say... "What happened?"

He looks at me (like it's so obvious) and says... "I wet."

I again look incredulous and ask the obvious again... "Honey, I know your wet, but how did that happen?"

Small Fry looks at me like "duh" and answers: "I pee."

The nice lady behind me goes "Awwww...", totally in sympathy with him.

I turned around and said, "He's in diapers.". Then she too gets the quizzical look on her face, that reads "Huh??"

So I ask Small Fry to come here so I can check his diaper, perhaps it shifted, or he's pulled it down. Nope. Neither.

No diaper. As in N-o-n-e!

How in the world I did that, I have no idea! But somehow in rushing to get out of the house I changed my little guy and pulled on his pants without putting the diaper on! I still can't believe I did it!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, last evening (four days later) I decided at 5pm that I was going to potty train my son. I quickly got out the underwear, and we had a quick drill in going on the potty. He actually did it too, so small victory. I rushed around the house grabbing the little portable potty and trying to figure out how to set it up. Had Tiger Shark grab 1 pair of undies, and I grabbed a pair of overalls. Then we headed out the door, 40 minutes later. Yes, crash course in potty training... heading to the ball fields with only one change of clothes! What was I thinking??? I wrote on Facebook it was either a brilliant move or I was clearly delusional! Most of my friends wrote delusional! Haha!

He did okay, he actually went #1 in that little portable thing. We were in the car just warming up before our next walk around the whole park, and when we went to get out... guess what? Wet pants. Oh well, I explained that if he feels like he has to go potty to say, "Mommy potty" and I will get him there. He made it through the next hour dry. Yay! We've had a few accidents this morning, but he's doing okay. I know it will take awhile, but he's been interested for a month now, so I think it's time before I miss my window of opportunity. I just paid $37 for a big box of Pampers at Sam's club, so hopefully I won't have to buy another box or if I do, maybe just for bedtime. I'd love to be saving money on diapers. :-)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Another cute Small fry story: This morning I was getting a pot roast together in the crock pot for tonight's dinner. I was peeling the carrots. Now, Small Fry loves carrots, but he needed to eat his cereal and banana. I didn't want to start a meltdown over a carrot. So, he looks at me and says..."Mom, what's that?"

I tried to skirt the issue, so this is what I said... "Umm... it's a cooking vegetable that mommy is getting ready to cook for dinner later."

Small Fry paused a minute to think about that, then looked at me and said.... "Nooooo, Mom. It's a carrot."

LOL! He's too smart for his britches, even if they have Lightning McQueen on them now.

Re-Design

Edit: This is the best I could do for now... I'll leave it for awhile until I can find more time in my days!

I'm totally playing around with my blog design... and I don't have the time to finish it right now. So bear with me as I work on this when I find time over the next few days...
Thanks!