Our very own personal...

Captain underpants! I've been trying to get Liam not to be scared of the potty so I bribed him that if he sat on it a couple times I would buy him some Thomas the tank engine underpants. So yesterday we bought the underpants and as soon as we got home he put them on--over his pants. Then he had to sleep with them on over his jammies too. This morning I put them on over his diaper (he still has no idea that he has to go potty before he actually goes) and then put his jammie pants on over it. That just wouldn't work for him because he wants to be able to see them...so we had to put them back over the top. Hopefully he'll figure out where they really belong before the actual potty training has to start...

End of another year

Yesterday the kids had their end of year program. I was really good and didn't even cry or anything about my kids finishing elementary school and moving on next year to junior high. I remember when my parents used to say that time flies and I used to wonder what they meant by that, but seriously since having kids I know EXACTLY what they meant. Everything seems to speed up. Now my babies are heading into a new stage in life. (One I personally hated and struggled through--hopefully they'll have a better time than I did)
This is Em at the program.

Jason is a great singer. Then both of the kids with their teachers. I think we had opposite ends of the spectrum in teachers this year and it was great except for a little bit of jealousy from the child who always had homework towards the child who almost never had homework. It was a great year and now we can look forward to a fabulous summer!  Way to go Em and Jason!  Love you!

Black Belt

When Jason was five years old he started taking karate.  He was in a class called little dragons and it was so cute to watch him.  Over the past seven years he has learned a lot and  this morning he had the opportunity to test for his Black Belt in kyuki-do.  He did a fabulous job at his test and really earned his belt.  We are so proud of him.  He has worked hard and even with taking a few breaks here and there (mostly for baseball) he has achieved this goal he made for himself several years ago.  Here are a few pictures.  bowing in at the start of the test. basic punches Forms Jason’s personal weapon form.  He had to make up a form on his own and the weapon he chose was kamas. More forms sparring/take-downs board breaking (axe  kick) board breaking (palm heel) Shaking hands after receiving his Black Belt from Joe Kelly.  Mr. Joe Kelly has been Jason’s instructor since he was a Dragon.  He hasn’t taught much the past year or so and we’ve missed it.  He has some other great instructors though and Jason has learned from all of them. 

We were told the test would be two hours, but it wasn’t much more than an hour.  It was nice that it wasn’t as long, but a bummer because a couple family members were going to come for the second half of the test to watch Jason and by the time they got there he was getting his belt already. 

It was a great experience for him and he looks forward to growing and learning more in martial arts. 

Busy times

The end of the school year is always really busy.  Why does everything have to happen in May?  I mean field trips can happen in April too can’t they?  Our calendar is so full right now there are NO empty days!  Add to that Jason’s extra karate classes and baseball games twice a week and we have been running like crazy.  Tomorrow Jason is testing for his black belt in karate (I’m more nervous than he is!).  You can be certain I will be blogging about it and posting pictures for you all (like it or not) and hopefully once school is out next week my life will be less busy and I’ll have time to blog more again. 

Birthmother celebration walk

Saturday we went to Provo High for the birthmother celebration/walk (we never did do any walking around the track although we saw a few people do a lap or two) Liam still had a blast and here’s a little glimpse of the highlights. 

It was lots of fun.  I even got to meet Mrs. r from the r house blog—briefly and no picture!  Bummer, but I did meet her.  Kristin can vouch for me on that one! 

I am excited to see what Liam’s birthmom thinks of the cute recordable picture frame we sent her.  I had Liam record his voice onto it and I think it’s adorable…I have to say though that I wish it didn’t cost almost as much to mail gifts as it does to buy them…when did postage get so ridiculously expensive??!!

Hope of America

The twins were both in choir again this year at school and their school participated in the annual Hope of America celebration/performance.  They both love performing in it with all their friends.  Afterwards I was asking them if they were sad it was their last year and they informed me that just because they won’t be performing doesn’t mean they don’t want to go see it next year because they want to see it from the audience’s perspective.  Here are a few highlights.Each school has different colored shirts so that when they sit they make the American flag.  They had lots of different dancing groups perform along with the choir.  this one is an island dance that was pretty cool If you know where to look you can see Jason in this photo.  He’s second in from the left on the sixth row up from the bottom. Em is in this one right smack in the middle of the picture. I love this part of the show—it’s the over 55 dancers and after they dance their number this cute lady comes out she’s 92.  My camera battery died right before she did the splits!  At 92!  That’s how I want to age! At the end they sing a song about lights and they all have flashlights and it’s really fun to watch. 

I’m glad my kids love stuff like this…I’m sure I have many more performances ahead of me. 

Join me!

Tomorrow is Birthmother’s day…did you know that?  It’s the day that we celebrate the wonderful women that made the wonderful decision to place their babies into our families. We love Liam’s birthmom, and we love having an open relationship with her.  At least as open as it can be when she lives half way across the country from us…  So to celebrate birthmothers there is a 5K walk at Provo High school tomorrow at 10:00 am. There will be lots of other things besides just the walk like balloons, games, and snacks and it sounds like tons of fun for the little ones.   Its meant for EVERYONE!  If you are a birthmom, adoptee, adoptive family, or if you aren’t any of those if you know someone who is (if nothing else you know ME so that counts!) and if you don’t really know me come anyway!  Chances are that you or someone you love has been touched by adoption in some way so come celebrate with us!  See you tomorrow!

Spring Break fun continued

Thursday we headed to visit some friends of ours in Orem.  I took my camera so I could be sure to get pictures, but once we got there and the kids were playing and we Moms were visiting it completely slipped my mind!  It was a great visit and everyone had a great time.  I love getting to see friends that we don’t see often—especially when they are the kind of friends that you can be instantly comfortable with and it seems like no time at all has passed since the last time you saw one another. 

Friday I seriously can’t remember what we did!  I know we did something…I’ll ask my kids—they’ll remember.  (am I too young to worry about forgetting things all the time?) Okay, Emily reminded me that we went to the park for our weekly playgroup (I dragged the big kids along with us).  Actually there were several other kids their age there too so they did have fun. 

Saturday we headed down south for a quick trip to Arches National park. This picture is in front of balanced rock. 

The drive down was great and even Liam was well behaved in the car.  We spent all day “hiking” the different trails and it was really gorgeous!  I thought this was a fairly decent one of Jason and I.  Em was our photographer.  The kids had a blast climbing to their hearts content. Jason was especially a daredevil. Liam tried to climb and follow them a little too much for my comfort.  Thankfully he was usually pretty far behind them so by the time he got there with Daddy they were on their way down.  This is Jason up way too high looking at one of the arches.  This is the picture he took because he “had a great view Mom!”

Liam was generally much more interested in the dirt, bugs, and rocks on the ground by his feet than the cool arches.  I think he spent more time sitting down in the red dirt than anything. Thankfully it came out of his clothes.   We only did the short trails since we had Liam, but it was still lots of fun especially when he could convince someone to give him a piggy back ride.  The twins and I took a little bit longer hike while Daddy and Liam hung out and looked for bugs.  It was still a pretty easy one, but it was just too long for Liam’s little legs.   This is on our longer hike.  This one is Jason climbing a huge rock on our longer hike.    We didn’t brave the hike to the famous delicate arch because we knew we couldn’t make it with Liam.  In a couple years when he doesn’t have to be carried we’ll go hike that one, but there was a lookout where you could see it from and that’s where this picture was taken from.  It was beautiful even from far away.    It was a great day and we were exhausted when we got to our hotel, but the kids weren’t too tired to swim!  They had a blast and I just tried to keep Liam from drowning himself by jumping into the pool when no one was ready to catch him yet.  It was a great day.