4 going on 14 and first play!

We are still finishing up summer here since preschool doesn't start until the 9th. Nick has been asking when he can go back so that is a good sign. He starts speech up again tomorrow with the public school district. We have the same therapist as last school year and we love her and are looking forward to big progress this year as he will have a full school year of therapy.


We attended Nick's first play on Sunday and he did great! We were a little worried at first because it started with alot of dialog but once the kids started singing and dancing, he really enjoyed it and sat still! His cousins were a part of the cast (Sebastian the crab and a shark). They did a great job! Our camera shutter got stuck so the pics of the kids did not show up.

We ate dinner at a renovated old time drugstore. It was yummy! Nick would eat ice cream 24/7 if you would allow him which would just horrify the baby house Doctor....NOTHING COLD! He was loving the swirly chairs at the counter and the man behind the counter was quite amused at his energy and enthusiasm for life (that's our Nick!)

We have had several good playdates lately and Nick is really starting to actually play with his friends. He has forever done his own thing but as his english skills and social skills have improved so has his interactions. He loves to pretend pirates and swashbuckle, run from ghosts, lifeguard, put out fires, and cook. We played with his friend Libby today at a huge indoor play place. They had a great time climbing and playing games and even set up housekeeping with a little "house" in the toddler area with big foam blocks. His big accomplishment today was going down the "fire" poles without help and without falling! I am so amazed at his ability to learn physical tasks so quickly. He is very coordinated!

They played a mean game of air hockey and Libby squashed him quickly as Nick thought it was fun to put the puck in his goal so he could get it out the bottom hole. Libby did have some smashing shots though! :)

Nick, ever the character, was impressing Libby with his standing flying skills. She of course thought he was hilarious especially when he chose to just step out of the plane in mid-flight....not sure that one will work for ya in real life bud! ;)

Nick is constantly making me laugh at the goofy things he does (gets this from his father!) and he decided that his rabbit hat was a ghost hood but he still needed his glasses to see. LOL!

Pat and I are amazed that somehow 4 is the new 14! He is a teenager way before his time. His attitude lately is so hard to discipline because we usually are laughing our heads off.

His new phrases as of late are:

- roll eyes...."OK "sigh "what-eveh!

-I guess he has heard us say I told you "X" times that you may not do that so now he tells us...

"I told you 3 "days", I in charge!" We are not sure where the days comes from but it is hilarious!

- I may have mentioned this before but when he wants us to do something and we say no.....he sighs real big (think teenager disgust) "you're not listening to me, I told you "insert demand"! So funny.

It scares me that some of his inflections may be learned from that person with which he spends the most time with.....ummmmm, Amigo? ;)

On our bad days, I get so discouraged that I am not "parenting" perfectly....All those books I read before and still read give such great speeches for such and such occasion. ( I am not convinced these people are really parents!) I want to so badly say all the right things so that he will not be scarred for life AND I have been able to pat myself on the back most days because I always go to the bible first for my not so perfect reactions......"Thou shalt not Kill!" Yes, that is about all I can muster in those moments.......especially when he has decided that after a year and 1/2 of no interest in writing that he wants to try making "letters" with a permanent marker on the sofa. Yeah, book learnin did me no good on that day! ha! I think I said something to the tune of "you are killing me, child".....of course this probably made no sense to him but he understood the attitude as later that night at dinner he proceeded to say to his father after daddy said no to something....."You're killing me child, dad!" with such exasperation. We just cracked up!

Our pastor just finished up teaching on James and one week he spent talking about our "tongues" and the dangerous tool that they can become....oi! have I got some work to do! :)

A day in the life of a future Olympian.....AKA "My first dive"

Preparations started early as team USA warmed up in the practice pool. Fellow team mates helped Nick prepare for his Gold medal day. (Matthew reminds me of a famous statue in Belgium.....the name in belgian was something related to boy peeing! hee, hee!)

Nick continues his pre-dive rinse down with giggles all around!

Tension is high as the diver prepares his platform and directs "the coach" to get out of the way...he wants to do it "all by myself"........

Silence abounds as the diver prepares for the jump. Notice his concentration, his attention to the end of the board.......

The crowd gasps as his perfect leap off the diving board takes him one step closer to the gold!


Perfect lines as he performs the feet out, bottom drop Kitzman......Wow!

Look at that entrance into the water.....barely a splash....could this be the one? It looks like Gold for the youngest diver to ever prepare for the Olympics!

Celebration abounds! Who would of thought........the perfect Olympic story......a diver who barely one and a half years ago hated to take a bath now wins one in the water for his New country!

The Olympian returns to Olympic village but is shadowed by adoring fans who sleep outside the compound just waiting for the diver to rise for another day........

First Movie, First trip with Mom only, and First "real" doctor's appt.

We finished off July by going to our first movie....."The Pirates who don't do anything". Pat took off work as it was a free movie offered by one of our theatres during the day. We thought the movie would be a crazy fun event because of Nick's love of pirates AND veggie tales. As all of our first usually go, not so much.......crazy yes, fun ......well, you decide. Nick was super excited to go in the theatre as seen below pulling dad to get inside.

He was adorable with excitement and amazed by the big seats and big screen and wow, popcorn too!? Things were going well at first......

The previews started and the boys were hilarious at their immediate attention to the large screen. The picture below doesn't do justice to their AWE! The parents were also equally awed but for a different reason. Whispers abounded at the "older" theme of the preview cartoons?? Well, come to find out, they started the wrong movie and previews were for an "older" audience...OK, accidents happen. I don't think Nick's brainpower is forever stunted but apparently the movie theatre personnel's were.....they decided that it would be easier to move the whole packed to the max theatre instead of simply changing the reel????? They said it would take longer? Oi!

So we finally got into the other theatre and the appropriate movie started with big happiness from all and Nick proceeded to get up and leave and state that he wanted to "turn it off" and upon realizing that you could not do this....then "I want to go home". Yes, he was not liking the movie experience whatsoever. If we had not had plans after the movie then we would have gone home. We proceeded to stand in the doorway for the next hour as he thought he would watch it and then he was scared again. Peek and Run were the words of the hour. He would listen for no scary music and then walk up to the front of the aisle and then if scary music came on he would run down the walkway to the door and beg to go out. No, this was not disturbing anyone as the movie was loud and no one could see us unless they were actually going out to the bathroom.


We finished up the movie day with a picnic lunch at the park and had it not been way too hot, the boys would have had a fabulous time but the mom's had maxed out their ability to "just deal"! :)


The picture below is for Aunt Julie! He took out this bunny hat the other day and just played and did the funniest thing with this hat that she gave him. I didn't get the funniest pics of him because he would run away but this was a calm moment looking at flash cards!

We ended the month with a trip for Mama and Nick to St. Louis to visit some high school and former Ky friends and their families. I was horrible with the camera (too busy keeping up with Nick) and did not get but one picture from the whole weekend. We visited my friend Christine and her family and did a big swim date and then pizza from my most favorite and memory laden pizza place, Pirrone's! We had a great day and the boys had a great time.

We stayed all night with Pat's PT school friend Laura and her family. Their daughter Olivia (and Laura and Heath) were amazed and awed at Nick's ability to never sit still and talk all of the time! ha! We had a great Saturday at the Park. It was a new all wheel chair accessible playground which was awesome. It had a huge castle, pirate ship, swings, water feature, and really great mushy comfy turf to walk on (or fall on)!

We spent the remainder of the long weekend with my friend Michele and her family. She has two teenagers and a 4 year old. It was a fun mix. Nick was especially enamored with Michele's sweet 13 year old daughter. She was his "girl best friend"...he could not remember all of the names of everyone that he had met. He would wake up and say, "Where's my girl best friend".....too cute. Two other close family friends came to dinner one night. I spent many an hour at my friend Karen's house growing up and it was good to play games and talk about the good old days......"the 80's!" Karen's mom even joined in on the Wii at 75! too fun! We have all decided that the fact that Karen's son is 17 means that we are officially middle aged ...BUT somehow when we are all together it still feels like the same high school chums that drove around north county for hours on a Friday night singing to Kool and the Gang and The Bangles......

Driving around my old stomping grounds brought back so many memories. I could have never ever in a million years imagined that I would be in Ky married to a professor with a sweet sweet kazakh born son! God is the God of adventures and definitely the Unknown!

Now back to the sweet Kazakh son who has grown soooooo much this year. We had his first real doctor visit for his 4 year old check up. All his other ones were so adoption related or catching up on immunizations related that they didn't even count....well, Nick probably remembered them but for me, it was a joy just to have a 4 year old annual before school check up like everyone else. And, he is very normal! Praise God! Growth has been crazy and our clothing and shoe budget took a big hit this last year. I took the picture of his shoes just to show again how much he has changed in one year......from size 7 1/2 to 11w is quite a jump!

We were in St. Louis 2 years ago on the same exact weekend as Nick and I were this year. We had just started the adoption paper chase and we were picking up some documents in St. Louis to start the process.

1 year later, we had a cute sweet boy who loved to swing......

AUG 2007

another year later......we have a cute kazakh boy who continues to grow and has already lost his sweet baby face from the previous summer. "sigh" But, he now takes on the exuberance (boy does he) of boyhood with a passion and fervor that keeps us laughing, active (always active) and always ready for the unknown.

AUG 2008