October has been busy!

October has been a full month already for our family! We celebrated Kristen's first birthday with us, which was amazingly special. She was so excited and totally knew that it was "Kiki's birthday!." We made cupcakes for her class treat and even that was fun and such a big deal to her.

The birthday girl!

We celebrated the actual day with dinner at her favorite restaurant - where she can get ic-ee cream!


Then, we went to the mall and rode the merry-go-round (which by the way made Mommy rather ill). Then we visited Build-A-Bear where everyone made a friend. Kristen chose Hello Kitty (yay!), Katie chose a Husky dog, and Daniel chose the most snuggly puppy.




Then we opened her big present from Mommy and Daddy - a new kitchen!


We had an extended party that weekend - here is the birthday girl with her cake!


We went trick-or-treating at the college where Forrest teaches this past Thursday. I love all the costumes the kids picked out this year. They all had very strong feelings about who they wanted - and didn't want to be!
Katie is Rani - one of Tinkerbell's fairy friends.

Kristen is Mulan...and did she ever look like a princess.

And last but not least - Daniel as Nemo! :D :D


Yesterday I ran a half marathon here in GR. It was the longest I have run so far - I working up to running the full in Disney in January. It was WINDY at the end, but I made it! :D I got my first ever medal.
Pre-race family picture - pretty good, actually!

About half-way through, the family came to say hi!

And almost done - I was pooped!

Now, see the black thing in my hands? Here is the funniest thing about the race - and it is so me! I was wearing a cheapo pair of gloves (from the $1 store) that theoretically I could toss if I got hot. Well, I didn't need them by about mile 3. BUT, being the frugal (or stubborn) person that I am, I thought I would carry them until I saw the fam. Well, I forgot to pass them off. :lol: :lol: Now, at this point, I could have tossed them. But, I just couldn't do it! It is hard enough for me to drop the water cups on the ground! So, I kept carrying the gloves. I finished with them, as you can see. When we got into the van I said "WHERE ARE THE GLOVES?" I had carried the darn things all the way through and throught I lost them. I actually just stuck them in the back of my pants. 8)

Up and down...

It looks like Daniel has decided that it is time to potty-train. I didn't expect that my boy would initiate this! We have Pull-Ups and a few pairs of underwear, so I decided to let him try for a while this morning. He has spent the morning pulling his underwear up and down. He will sit on the potty and then get up and put them back on. It is pretty cute.

So far we have only had success when standing up in the bath-tub. We will see if he figures it out more - he seems pretty determined.

What we learned today...

Today Katie took a "personal day" from school. ;) We are all pretty stressed out from waiting for Kristen to come home and I didn't mind the company.

Daniel got a haircut on the deck - finally warm enough and sunny so we wcould make the mess outside. He looks like a totally different little boy - his head is so much smaller! Pictures are coming later. I did pretty well except for the sideburns...those are pretty tricky with a moving target. Katie got her bangs cut...I was not going to attempt her thick, long hair.

The science experiment for the day was making popsicles in our new mold. Katie wanted to use Squirt, which seemed fine to me. Being Katie, she wanted to add blue food coloring. Because I am such a cool mom, I agreed. She had the molds partly filled but I thought they needed more Squirt. I opened the freezer this afternoon to discover that apparently carbonated liquids expand more than water does when it freezes. So, not only was there sticky pop all over the freezer, it was blue as well! It was actually less of a pain to clean up than I thought, although we will probably be finding blue ice in the freezer for a while.

During Daniel's nap, Katie challenged me to Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine on her new Sonic game. I managed to " beat the pants off her" in that game but when we tried the real Sonic game, she "beat the pants off me." She told me that she was ready to be a good sport even if I won.

Forrest finishes his classes today and we are all glad of that! Katie gave him the PS2 game Kingdom Hearts 2 and she is so anxious to play it with her dad! They will have lots of fun with it, I am sure.

B-ball!

Here is Daniel's belated present from his great-grandparents! He has shown a LOVE for balls since he was in Korea and now that he is 2, he thinks he is big stuff! He has a great throwing and shooting arm! This is pretty much all he played with today! "B-ball" is the love of his life!

He is also sporting his first Detroit Tigers shirt. It is a "Pudge" Rodriquez shirt - Uncle Micah's favorite player. Daddy is teaching Daniel to watch the Tigers already. Daniel's favorite thing about baseball is the bat - he thinks it is a great thing to use to whap Katie.

I am going to be banned from Meijer!

Well, we took a family trip to Meijer yesterday. Fun times! We made it half-way through the store before Katie found a bottle of V-8 that she wanted to get. Yes, I know -- a 7 year old that likes V-8. Odd. Anyway, it was a plastic bottle, but we found out that even plastic bottles have a weak point. The lid is hard plastic and will break. Yep, the V-8 ended up all over the aisle and my jeans and shoes. The worst part is what it looked like in a puddle on the floor!

We managed to report the spill and move on. We successfully made it to the checkout when Daniel decided to throw the (plastic again) bottle of kimchi on the ground. Now, for the uninitiated, kimchi is a Korean specialty - pickled cabbage with red pepper paste. VERY smelly and again, very lovely looking splattered all over the floor. At least this missed me!

Katie had to explain what happened to the cashier - I just wanted to get out of there!

The good news is that we didn't think Meijer carried kimchi...at least we found it, even if it didn't make it home with us!

Happy Birthday, Daniel!

My little guy is two today!!!! Oh man - where has my baby gone? Yesterday we went to the Children's Museum and had a great time - they were celebrating the New Year which was cool - we got to eat Asian food, hear Asian music, etc. There were a lot of adoptive families there and we even saw our SW! Daniel loved it - especially the BALLS!



Today we had presents and cake and Super Bowl junk food. True to his junk food loving nature, Daniel loved getting chips and Little Smokies for his birthday! Then it was cupcake time!!!!



Last year, Daniel hated getting any frosting at all on him. This year...well, let's just say it was pretty much the opposite. ;)



I am so in love with my boy! He is talking away and I love getting to spend time with just him right now. He loves trains, balls, ducks, and Elmo. He is really getting into reading books - which I love! His laugh and smile fill our hearts and make our family so much more full! I am so thankful for his birth-mother that chose to give him life. He is a gift like no other.

Happy Birthday, Daniel!