My Family, by: Caroline

Caroline had to do a Kindergarten project this past week that involved doing a construction paper quilt square of her family. This is going to be displayed in the hallway of her school. It is hard to believe that just eight short weeks ago, that page would have been totally empty, not one family member to put on the paper; and today, we ran out of space there were so many pictures. We worked on it this weekend and although she did need some coaching from me, she did a lot of the work on her own. She picked the pictures she wanted in the square, she cut them out, I arranged them and she told me what to label them, she also glued all of them (she loves to use glue!). As a little added touch, I translated all her labels into Russian, I think that makes her very special and unique and I like for her to stand out, surely no other kindergartner will have Russian on theirs!

Here is how it turned out:

Chase's 4th Birthday

BubbleShare: Share photos - halloween photos

Chase turned 4 years old on Friday, October 12th. I don't think he has ever celebrated his birthday before. In the orphanage they would have a cake 1 day a month for all the birthdays that occurred in that particular month, but never has he alone been celebrated. He had a great birthday celebration, his cousin Chris came down from Chicago, they played in the pool, we went out for pizza on his birthday and had a fun party on Saturday

We went to the Texas State Fair on Sunday and the kids had a blast! I got pictures of them eating "sausage on a stick", but I forgot to take pictures of them eating funnel cakes, pizza and fudge! What a great mom I am, such nutritious meals!

Jane


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This Morning

Today, Caroline is going on her field trip to the Dallas Arboretum. I don't know if she even knows what an "Arboretum" is, but she was so excited to wear her new Halloween outfit and also to ride the "auto-bus". She is usually sooo slow in the morning to get dressed, but this morning, she jumped out of bed and had her clothes on in about 2 minutes flat! Here she is in her new outfit:

Just Hanging Out

Not too much is new in our "dom". Caroline and Chase both had dental appts. this morning and both did so well. No tantrums, meltdowns, fright or anything! Neither has any cavities, which I find unbelievable since they were eating candy like crazy when we were at the orphanage. Both kids were brushing their teeth when I got them, so that actually was a surprise as I really didn't think that Russia was that into oral hygiene! Although we did see lots of people who were really proud to show off their gold teeth!

Caroline is still loving school, her teacher says she is participating more and speaking English more as well. Caroline has her first field trip this Friday to the Dallas Arboretum, she will get to ride a school bus for the first time, she is so excited, I can't wait to hear how she did. Chase is picking up so much from what his sister does and says. Chase is going to be starting therapy for sensory integration disorder in a few weeks. What we finally figured out was that his bad behavior when we are out stems from sensory overload. Sights, sounds, smells that he has never experienced before just drive his little brain into overload and he reacts by pinching, biting and screaming. Needless to say it is not a real treat to take him anywhere so we are really counting on therapy helping so we are not prisoners in our own home. From what I have read, it seems that this therapy for SID is highly effective if begun early and is intensive.

Chase's 4th birthday is next week Friday, my nephew Chris is coming down and we will have a small party on Saturday with family and friends. This will be the first time Chase has ever celebrated his birthday, so we hope to make it special.

This weekend we took care of our neighbor's cats, Caroline loved the cats and is now begging for a "koska", not gonna happen! Here's a few pictures.