Happy Birthday, Aunt Meli

Here's a big, "Happy Birthday" going all the way to Alaska for our wonderful sister-in-law, Melissa!! We continue to be amazed by her. Currently she's in Alaska chasing my brother around while he fulfills a lifetime dream to hunt and fish for everything possible. What amazes us though, is that she jumps right in and joins him on his adventures, usually bringing home the larger kill, and manages to look like a supermodel while doing it.

Wish we could be there to celebrate with you! We love you, Meli!!!

(While I do mean everything I just said, as you can see by the picture below, I was under some, shall we say "pressure" to say something nice.)
(Of course I'm kidding! This is just another one of her supermodel shots. No pun intended!)

Adoption Blog

We've put a new post on our adoption blog: www.our-china-doll.blogspot.com. Grab a tissue and check it out!!!

National Lampoon's New Mexico Vacation

What started out to be a week of vacationing and seeing family, turned out to be a week of vacationing and seeing family, as well as a broken vehicle, that didn't even make it back with us, and a few nasty bugs that caused fever and throw up. Other than that, we had a great time with family. The following posts are some of the highlights of our trip. Enjoy!!

Family, start your engines!!

Although Mom and Hud never let up on the gas, they were just no match for Dad and Han. Especially because they kept cutting us off at the corners, and bumping them wasn't helping.

PaPaw still has some speed in him! Hud quickly figured out that his steering wheel had nothing to do with where the go-cart actually went. On the next race, he wanted to be in the drivers seat!

Aunt Su and MiKay are in the lead here.

Even though Grandma D has been banned from rollerskating, she still manages to roll on the wild side pretty regularly!

Real Cowboys Now!

Hud's been dying to ride a horse for a long time now, so when we saw these pony rides, he went into cowboy mode. PaPaw even let him wear one of his cowboy hats. Surprisingly, once we got to the horses, Hud wasn't letting anyone talk him into riding. Thankfully, there was a veteran pony person there, who eased Hud into his ride. Whew! We were starting to wonder if he was going to make a Cowboy after all. "Red" was a good little horse for a boy's first ride!

Now he's riding!!! You look good on a horse, Hud!

Han, on the other hand, was the first in the coral, and the first on her horse. She marched out there like she'd been in the saddle before!

Her horse's name was, "Lady," pretty fitting for two little ladies! She's even getting the rodeo princess wave down!!

PaPaw's cabin

Most of our time with Russ's family was spent in the mountains in PaPaw's beautiful log home. Here's Hud with his cousin, Cade. We're all glad that Hud will have a boy around.
Cade, and our bro-in-law who is also named, Russ.

Han followed MiKay around like a little puppy the whole time.

Hud and Gent's had fun together too!

Here's PaPaw with all the kiddos minus baby Cade.

The cousins!! They're going to have lots of fun together in the years to come!! Thanks PaPaw and Grandma D for all of the fun and food!

Go ACU Cowboys!!!

On the way into New Mexico, the kids and I met family in Canyon, TX to watch my cousin, Caleb play football. (Russ had a speaking engagement, and wasn't able to stay for the game).

Caleb plays for Abilene Christian, who was undefeated and ranked #20 that night. They played the West Texas A&M Buffs who were also undefeated and ranked #6. You could just feel the tension!!!

Hud sat like this on Grandpa's lap most of the game. He thoroughly enjoyed it!

Here is Caleb's fan club, complete with signs, purple shirts and pom poms. Also there was my Aunt Debbie, Uncle Carlous, and cousin Carly.

Good thing we brought all the paraphenalia, because he scored his first touchdown of the season. If you were watching the game on tv that night you might have seen us go crazy with excitement!

The Cats took the victory when Abilene Christian overcame an early deficit and handed WTAMU its first loss of the season, 49-33, in front of 13,641 fans at Kimbrough Memorial Stadium.

Caleb gets a hug, from his favorite coach and dad, Carlous.

Yea, Caleb!! The kids were pretty amazed/leary of my 6'6" cousin. It was a lot of fun to get to see this big game!

The Fireman and the Arsonist

Saturday was Hud's big, exciting day! His most recent fascination has been with firetrucks and firemen. He loves to sing the song "Hurry, hurry, drive the firetruck," and when he hears the sirens, he'll say, "Somebody, huut!" When I noticed that the fire station down the street was having an open house with "food and fun," I thought that we had better make plans to be there! A couple of days before the big open house, I happened to find a firefighter's helmet at the goodwill store (don't worry about headlice, it was brand new, still had the clear plastic on it). Of course, Hud wore it to the station. On the way, we were talking to the kids about what firemen do... put fires out and save people... do you want to be a fireman someday, Hud?.. "yep!!" Then Han pipes up and says, "I want to put fires IN when I grow up!" As you can see from the pics, we had lots of fun. Hopefully we have a few years to mold Han's future aspirations!

Disney On Ice

All dressed up for our night out!
Han and Cora... probably more excited to see each other than the show!

The Little Mermaid

101 Dalmations

Peter Pan

Some friends of ours gave Han and I free tickets to go see Disney on Ice. We went with another mother and daughter from church. It was quite a fun adventure!! I managed to find a Minnie Mouse outfit and a Tinker Bell t-shirt at the last minute at Wal-mart for Han and I to wear for our special date. When I was helping Han get her clothes on, I told her that I thought Minnie would really like her shirt. Well, when Minnie came out on the ice, Han sat up straight and pulled her shirt out of her jacket and said, "See my shuut, Minnie? Like my shuut?" She was a bit disappointed that Minnie couldn't see her shuut from so far away. Guess next time I'll be more careful what I say! We had a lot of fun with our friends that night. I think it was the beginning of a great friendship between Han and "Kowah" (Cora)!

Our Week

We rode our bikes over to the pond one afternoon. Hud caught 3 good sized catfish and a few small bluegills. He quickly realized that he was the "fishing expert" that afternoon, as the rest of us were not having such good luck. He started going around and telling us to "watch ouw bobbuhs." (watch our bobbers)
Oh yeah, he also managed to catch a snapping turtle.

Han caught a fish all by herself after Rusty cast her line in. She waited for quite awhile, and saw the bobber go under, then reeled it in. She's quite a bit more patient than her sibling! He usually runs around telling the rest of us how to fish while his pole is laying on the ground with his line in the water.

I managed to find this vintage horse at a garage sale this week for $8. It is quite a hit around here, and Hud has named him, "Wocket" (Rocket).

This pic of Han was taken after an attempt to go "poo poo" in the potty. PTL, she had her first success in 6 months later that afternoon. This achievement merited a family trip to the grocery store so that she could pick out some ice cream treats. She shared them with all of us, and then wanted to take some home to save for her "baby sistuh." She had already told us after she poo pooed that she was going to teach her "baby sistuh how to poop!"

Hud was wearing his bathrobe around, so Russ decided to teach him a few boxing poses.

Hud's still really into tools, building and "big tucks." Thursday we went to a playgroup at Barnes and Noble. The theme that day was construction. When I told Hud that we were going to be talking about building, he insisted on taking his "hammuh" with him. They had hard hats for all the kids and lots of building toys and books. It was quite fun! Later that day, I bought him a cube of styrofoam so that he can pound golf tees into it to practice his nailing skills.

Russ and I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary last night. Hud and Han got to spend the night with their Uncle Kyle and Aunt Carly. We had a really fun time! Today we were telling the kids that we were married, and that we had an anniversary... Han piped up and said, "I want to mawwy my Huddie." (Huddie is what she calls Hud) How precious!! They are such a blessing wrapped up in a lot of fun!!

Bake me a cake as fast as you can....But quit growing up so fast!!

I recently started writing down some of the sayings that Han has been using in her everyday conversations. (I have nooo idea where she comes up with these (ha!)). Here's a little sample.... Sometimes she'll start with, "Mom, I have kestion." After I answer she'll say, "Oh IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII see!" After I've told her about an upcoming plan for the day, she likes to pull this one out...."That be puhfectttt!" And, during some of her "projects" I'll hear her saying, "Let's see heeuh." When she wants something she likes to try, "Peeze can IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII," (add extra nasal sound to the IIIIIIIIIIII, and tilt the head a bit to add to the cute factor). The other day in the store she wanted some gum. After I said, "no," she said, "Go head (ahead), Mom, go head!" As if she was giving me permission to buy some. Her latest one, that she hasn't quite found the appropriate context for, but likes to use anyway is, "You kiddin' me!!" Yesterday she copied one of mine that I would prefer she forget..."Shooooooooooooooooot!"