Friday Changes....

The girls experienced a couple of major changes Friday that they wanted me to share.

First of all, we are thankful for the school vision and hearing screenings, as without them we would've had no idea that Kaia was not using her right eye to see at all, instead, totally relying on her left eye (but we already knew that her left ear was going to fail the hearing test). Now we know she has Amblyopia, so she is now sporting glasses. She is pretty proud of the puppy pawprint frames she picked out:)  We should know in a couple months whether or not glasses alone will be able to train her right eye. If not, eye patching is in order. Glasses are cool in her eyes, but I'm not convinced she would feel the same about covering up her good eye with a patch! For now we just pray this does the trick...

Jaelyn has been commenting now that she wants glasses, but since that's not going to happen any time soon, she competed for attention by pulling her tooth out not half an hour after we got home from the vision center! Always the competitors:)

One more celebration, or is it two?

 Back to Portland for the last of our celebrations, and the halfway point to home. First of all, modeling show to entertain Grandma!

Weiner Dog pajamas, YES!

 It was New Year's Eve, so we stayed up to ring in the New Year (well some of us just barely made it). Josh woke Jaelyn up to wish her a Happy Birthday, to which she sat up, grinned, and laid back down. After opening a couple gifts that morning, we hit the rode home. However, we had a surprise in store for Jaelyn, and met up with Uncle Jeff and Auntie Lorrie at the Rainforest Cafe. I can't remember who told me my girls would love that place, but they were right! To quote Jaelyn, "This is the best birthday ever!"

Yes, silly Jaelyn, once again!

The birthday group...(and boy, do I look tired!)

Always grinning!

The following day we celebrated with more bowling and more Zhu Zhu pets:)

This summer in China I bought another sparkling birthday flower candle so that Jaelyn could have the same excitement that Kaia had on her birthday. It didn't disappoint! Check this out....

We're thankful for wonderful family and memories, but it's good to be home and back in our own beds once again:)

Christmas #2...

Monday morning found us heading south to celebrate Christmas #2, but what really made the day special was that it was Gotcha Day #6, the day we honor Kaia joining our family. The first time we saw the most beautiful brown eyes peeking out from this tiny pink fuzzy ball of fur, we knew our lives were changed forever!

Because this day was a day of travel, we were unable to celebrate with our usual dinner out to Chinese, but many hugs and kisses were given, nonetheless.














The next day we celebrated Christmas #2 with Mike's family, and the kids were all happy that the snow showed up upon our arrival! This was the first time that all the cousins were together in two years, and with them all growing up, who knows how many more of these special times together they will all have. We spent an afternoon bowling too, which was a lot of fun!

Just couldn't get Jaelyn to open her eyes in a single shot. Darn her goofiness!

"The boys" and their madre.

Hours of Risk 2010. Notice no girls!

Girl cousins playing card, puzzles, and coloring:)

Boys and their toys!

 

We made a trip down into California specifically to see Mike's 97 year old grandma, Mammy. She is an amazing lady who still gets around well and lives on her own.

More holiday ramblings to come later....

Christmas #1...

I have started this post several times since we've been home from the holidays, with hopes of having a Slideshow to attach, but for some reason I have been unable to create one. I have used slide.com many times in past posts, so I'm not sure what is going wrong. Every time the photos load to 98%, it goes no further, no matter how long I leave it going. So if anyone has any suggestions or tips, please let me know.

I was originally going to write a different post and make a different slideshow for each event, but now that so much time has gone by, I am just going to post a few pictures and stick with the main events, so here goes....

On Christmas Eve we attended church with my grandpa and parents. Christmas Day was family stockings and dinner with extended family. Kellen had to work on Christmas, so he didn't arrive until Christmas night, after 11:00 pm. Felt a little strange not having him around:(

With Great Grandpa and Grandma, heading to church

Was fun watching my 91 yr. old grandpa get down on the floor and remember how to play marbles!

 The day after Christmas we opened our immediate family gifts, since Kellen was here. Note to myself for next year....be careful to select gifts that travel well. Despite both girls getting the number one item on their Christmas list (Jaelyn a new bicycle, Kaia a Furreal GoGo Walking Pup), there were tears! We were unable to fit Jaelyn's bicycle in either of the vehicles driven down, so we printed off a picture and put it in a gift bag for her to open. What in the world were we thinking???? When she opened it up after Kaia opened her gift (which wasn't even on Jaelyn's list), boy, did the tears flow. Watch the series of photos below. The last is of Joshua trying to console her. He actually did a great job of cheering her up, and shortly afterward she was thanking us for her gift, and back to her normal, always smiling self.

 Evidence of her turnaround shows in this photo. The girls were so over the top excited to give their dad these fake glasses/mustache they picked out at the Dollar Store. The button on the end of the nose even made the mustache move up and down!

Kellen's desperately needed new coat, and personal favorite, nutella!

cousins

New coats, and Jaelyn's impersonation of The Grinch!

 I will try and catch up with Christmas #2 later....

Star Spangled Banner, Six-year old style...

You can tell the girls attend a lot of sporting events, as they have been obsessed with the Star Spangled Banner lately. They ask me to sing it on a regular basis, but I don't oblige when we are in public. However, I ham it up well when we are home. Here is their version of what a six year old hears of the Star Spangled Banner...



I especially like "last dreaming," "rockets mooshing down," and the key change!

Postman's Creed...

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night could keep us from getting our Christmas tree! We made the decision to wait to get our Christmas tree on Sunday, because that was the best forecasted day for the weekend. Instead, this is what we saw as we pulled in to the lot....

Then it turned to this...

Finally we got out of the van to visit with Santa (under cover, of course). The girls brought the Christmas lists they brought for Santa. Well, actually Kaia's was pages from Walmart and Target adds stapled together, favorite toys circled...

After stalling as long as we could, we decided to just go for it...

Here we are all wet (I was the only one who stayed dry by actually using my hood), but feeding the ponies helped make it worth while....

Despite everything it was good family fun. It wasn't until we got home and set the tree up (for 24 hrs to dry before decorating) that we decided that maybe we were a bit too anxious and just grabbed the first tree we saw to get out of the rain. It was worth it though, and not even the weather was able to stop us!

One Tired Girl....

Here's what you get when you mix sledding, tryptophan, and a six-year old after a long day of Thanksgiving...