Happy Halloween!

Wonderful Birthday, Wonderful Family

I have to say the older I get, the less I care about birthday presents, the more I enjoy some rare special moments when we're all together. And with Kellen being a junior now, who knows how many more birthdays I can enjoy being all together.

We started off the day watching Kellen run at his league championships. He really enjoyed his first season of cross country, and is looking forward to it again next year. Afterwards we took the kids to a pumpkin patch where we rode a train and dodged the puddles for the perfect pumpkins. Kaia and Jaelyn insisted on carrying their own. Boy, those pumpkins are pretty tough, as they never cracked after being dropped several times. As you can see from the pictures, everyone had a good time. I also posted a picture of Joshua in uniform. This is from last week's game. His season ends on Wednesday. He really learned a lot his first season of football.

As for my birthday, it's not like I don't enjoy presents at all anymore...I got some great gifts, but I especially like the gift the kids gave me. It's a great CD of a group called 12 Girls Band. They are from China, but not your typical Chinese musicians. They play authentic Chinese instruments, but in a modern way. Check them out and let me know what you think.

Evidently they like dance class....

The girls obviously enjoyed their dance class so much last week that they decided to sleep in some of their outfits! Last night they went to bed in their pajamas, but when we checked on them a bit later they had obviously changed! They have been practicing their first position every night so that they have it perfected by this week's class. It is so funny to see two 3 year olds concentrate so hard so they can get their heels together and toes apart.

The bottom two pictures are from their first class last week. Kaia seems to be the Michael Jordan of ballet, because in two of the pictures Mike took of her, she has her tongue out. They will be studying ballet, tap, and Chinese dance in class. Of course, we will post some videos, so check back often!