Adventures with two...

Halloween 2009!

Two days before Halloween, we carved pumpkins with Daddy. We knew that he was going to Green Bay for the historic Vikings-Packers game this weekend and that we'd miss him on Halloween.

Allow me to introduce my pumpkin...da da ta da! (sound effects were real)

 

Tonight, we had a big party at our house; Grandparents from both sides and Aunties and Uncles from my side. It was so fun!

Two crazy spiders, ready to get some booty!!

Show me your legs!

With baby Brady, our little monster cousin/nephew!

Love this one because everyone's just doing their own thing.

Bug-a-boo!

 

We walked around for about 20 minutes, since it was cold! But he kids have enough candy to last for days.

SCORE!!

 

P.B. Gus

You could have probably guessed that we've already added a new kitty to our house, right? Well, it's true!

A few weeks ago we adopted a flame-point siamese kitty from a local rescue organization. I had looked online and it said that he was calm, easy-going, neutered and declawed. We'll take him!

We talked to the kids about him and asked them what we should name him. Eli had no recommendations, but Emily wanted to call him "Pretty Girl". We laughed and reminded her that this cat was a boy. She said, "Okay, Pretty Boy!"

Tom's vote was Gus. Tom has a list of crazy awful names that he wanted to name our children, so I gave in and told him he could name this cat. Merging the two names, we introduce our newest family member:

Pretty Boy Gus!

He looks petite here, but let me assure you he's not! He's a BIG, BIG boy!!

 

(Eli, mesmerized by the TV)

He really is a sweet cat. He loves to snuggle with everyone and when you pick him up he literally hugs you around the neck and nuzzles his nose into your neck. He can be a bit frisky at times and his playful nips are quite hard. Also, he wants to eat constantly, which leads to the stinkiest gas you've ever smelled. I've never heard of a cat being so toot-y?? Oy!

Either way, we are enjoying having another pretty boy around here!

One week? Did I say that??

So proud of his Tho*mas Tra*in underoonies and yet I still mopped up three puddles today.

Argh! I think I've jinxed this.

Three!!

Today our baby boy turned THREE!!

 

An update of our big boy:

Favorite Toys: Trucks, cars, trains...any mode of transportation will do.

Favorite Book: Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus

Favorite Food: Cereal, Noodles, Candy-a SWEET tooth this boy!

Favorite Activity: Playdough, painting, coloring with markers, playing with soap (argh!)

Favorite pastime: Playing with sis, bothering sis, playing with sis, bothering sis, and on and on...

Favorite Phrase: "...K Mama?"  "...K Daddy?" 

Favorite Game: Memory, hide and seek

Favorite sleeping spot: Wedged between Mom and Dad. Will we ever get our bed back?!

Newest milestone? Potty training-we're almost there! Another week? Yippee!

At three, Eli is still the rough and tumble boy we met 16 months ago. He bonks his head often and throws his body around like a rag doll-I think he'll be a great athlete because he is fearless. 

He has a great sense of humor and loves to try his comedy routine on anyone, not with words, but acting goofy and his physical comedy routines.

Pop on some funky music and this boy will show you the FUNNIEST dance moves!! He has the most hilarious moves, trust me.

He is talking so much more, though we still worry a bit about his language. His teachers rave about what a sweet boy he is at school, they adore him and fawn over him when he arrives.

He has really started to play with Em, rather than just parallel play like they did in the past. He can be a bit shy when around people he doesn't know well, but if he knows you, he will show you just how LOUD and lively he truly is!

He is still breathtakingly gorgeous!

We love you, sweet son! May you know all the days of your life how much you are adored.

Chinese School Summer Show-Aug. 2009

Our kids have been attending the Chinese Immersion Daycare since months after they came home. Emily is VERY fluent at this point in Mandarin and is easily able to translate for us these days. She also loves to sing and do the dances from her school for us. Eli knows the songs too and sings along as best he can. His teachers say that he understands everything, and that he answers in Mandarin, but more and more in English. The same thing happened with Em at one point, so I know it's all part of the language development.

The school seems very traditionally Chinese, as far as art lessons, math, chinese character writing, etc. And twice a year they have a performance for the parents. These are quite amazing! While chaotic and crazy on the one hand with parents packed into a tiny space to watch, the kids all know about 5 (LONG!) dances and often recite several poems as well. Em loves to do these dances! Next year Eli will be a part of the dances too, I imagine that he was still a wee bit hard to sync with the group dance at this point. Ha!

 

Can you see Em below in the sea of faces?! She's the only one looking at the camera. Chaos and yet order!!

The obligatory pose-with-your-brother-after-the-show picture. Such genuine smiles, can't you tell?!

College Friends Campout

At the end of July, we gathered with our college friends/roommates for our annual campout. Due to a lack of planning, we didn't get a cabin to rent as we had hoped, so we made the most of it and wheeled Grandma and Grandpa's camper into our friends driveway for two nights. It was very Griswold-esque! ("That there's an RV!") The kids had a BLAST all weekend, so it didn't matter.

We swam, played at the park, made s'mores, slept in the camper, and hung out with lots of friends.

 

Below, Em is with Lydia, daughter of our friends Ted and Rachel. I met Ted when we were about this age!

Feeding the troops.

 

 

 

There was only one child in the whole group who wouldn't stay put for the photo of our 11 kids (plus one friend). Whose kid was that?!?! Stinker.

More summer fun

On another hot summer day, we met up with another cousin, Ethan. (Really my cousin's son, so what would that make him to the kids, second cousins once removed...ha! I don't know!)

We enjoyed the water park in WiLL*mar. No pics of the slide or the other parts, since I was out swimming!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay, backtracking to summer pictures when it's cold out makes me wish for summer again. Time to head to one of those fancy indoor water parks I think.

Let's start at the very beginning...

...of summer that is! I think I left off at the end of June and haven't posted much since. Bad blogger!! (I want to go back so that if I convert this to a book I have something from these missing months!)

So let me begin with some photos of the fourth of July parade, which we enjoyed with our cousin/nephew Cooper! Isn't he to die for cute?!

The kids had a blast running out for candy and of course chowing on it. Eli couldn't wouldn't stop eating. 

 

 

 

Eli still tells me months later when he sees a fire truck that maybe it will throw candy?! Sorry, not until July 4th, 2010 for more fire truck candy.

Hopefully your mama can post something else here before then. Heh!

Stunned

I've got about 6 blog posts lined up, almost ready, but had to share about our sweet kitty. Remember her?
She passed away today when she was having surgery to be spayed.

It wasn't even something that we worried about...I've never heard of an animal dying from being spayed. But they are speculating that she had a weak heart and had a heart attack during the surgery. CPR and meds couldn't revive her.

We are so sad.

Em had endless questions tonight and since she remembers that our other cat passed away last year (from old age) she asked a few times, "If we get another kitty will she die too?" I kept telling her that no, not all pet die, that this was unusual and that she had a sick heart. She told me,  "Mom, now we have zero pets. Now we only have four people in our family." She also told me that she missed Frida and that she was sad. As she processed all of this she asked, "Mom, did Frida's heart just get stuck?" Tears were flowing down my cheeks and I nodded, "Yeah, I think it must have just gotten stuck." We fumbled around trying to answer more questions as they came. Gosh, death is hard to explain to a child.

The house seems too quiet and still tonight.

Spectacles...

I'm skipping over nearly two months of summer fun to post these pics. I do hope to go back to share some fun pics of what we've been up to. But really...

Check out this boy:

How could I not skip over everything and post these? Is he not the cutest boy with new glasses that you have EVER seen??

Stinker.

He has been doing remarkably well keeping them on, and I know that they help him to see better.

His big sister was very jealous of the fact that everyone in the family had glasses, but Claire's Boutique solved that problem. Clear sunglasses for $5.00.

We're all bunch of "four-eyes" at our house now.