Kassy's Moves

Today Allen and I both watched as Kassy stood up on her own and began working on her basketball moves. She kept one foot in place and pivoted around in a circle with the other. A girl after her mother's heart! Let's play ball!

Happy Thanksgiving!

What a great day! We got phone calls today from Grandma Linda and Grandma Pam wishing us a Happy Thanksgiving. They both made me feel so good--they are glad that we are a part of their lives! I shed a few happy tears today over those phone calls. We are very thankful for both of our kids' birthfamilies. They shared the blessings of two babies with us so that we could be Dad and Mom. Thank you, thank you, thank you! We love you!!!

Three Whoo Hoo-s!

Whoo Hoo #1:  Kassy has a new tooth! Top right side began just peeking through today. The one on the left tooth won't be too far behind. She said "Momma" on September 29 (her first real word) and "E-I-E-I-O" last weekend on November 16th. According to my mom and sister-in-law, Kassy started saying "up" this past Saturday. I haven't heard her say it though, so maybe they are pulling my leg......(wink, wink).

Whoo Hoo #2: David has been doing a fabulous job with potty training lately, and today's big celebration revolves around a bribe for a "big" candy bar. He did pretty well this morning with only one accident (of course it would be on the couch--fortunately, he had taken the cushions off so it was on the plastic/mesh part of the hide-a-bed). He even headed to the bathroom on his own one time. We've been using M E M's as the bribe candy of choice (candy corn also works) but today David insisted that he wanted something out of his Halloween stash (no, Allen and I haven't eaten it all). On two different occasions he chose the fun size Snickers bars, which made it pretty easy for me to offer him a big candy bar if he went poop in the potty. I was very serious about giving him a regular-sized Snickers when I made the bribe, but I was surprised that my smart little boy was actually pondering my offer. Much to my pleasure, this evening at my parent's house, David earned his Snickers! Whoo Hoo!!!

Whoo Hoo#3: Rapid City Beth Moore conference November 19-20 with great friends and lots of new friends! Thanks ladies for late night pizza and lots and lots of laughs! Thanks for the photo, Jodi and Lynda!

Tricia, Lynda, me, Jodi

Here's a video of Allen and David having fun at my folk's.

Just in case you are interested, I added a couple of videos to the end of the "2 Little Monkeys" entry. 

Two Little Monkeys and More!

Today we were invited to Grandma Pickard's for playtime and lunch with Conrad and Johanna. The boys enjoyed playing with Grandma's train while the girls tried to take the train track apart. They have fun when they are together, and I'm glad that David and Kassy will grow up playing with their cousins.



One of David's favorite songs is "5 Little Monkeys" which is the song he and Conrad are singing as they jump up and down on Grandpa and Grandma's bed.

Kassy's first popsicle was thoroughly enjoyed!


Sunday evening we went to the Community Harvest Festival at the Broadland United Methodist Church, which is the church I grew up attending and where my parents still attend. There was a lot of good food and a lot of folks to visit with.

David and Kassy climbing the stairs at BUMC. Kassy would have kept going up if I hadn't "rescued" her.

Saturday we were in Sioux Falls celebrating Grandma Pam's birthday. It's so much fun to see how much David's birthfamily loves him! They all do a great job loving both of our wonderful kids. We had supper at Pizza Ranch and both kids ate very well. We even spent some time playing basketball (yeah!) in the little court at the restaurant. Of course David also loves the video games and enjoys pretending that he's driving the car. Somehow he figured out that the lever under the seat moves the seat back and forth. How did he figure that one out?!?! The kids fell asleep on the way home. They have both been doing very well at sleeping through the night. Kassy can sleep from 10:30 p.m. to 7:00 a.m.!

Grandma Pam, Kassy, and David driving the race car.

Kassy began waving "hello" and "bye-bye" this past week. Its been fun watching her learn how different parts of her body work. I can make two tiny pig tails on top of her head now, and even use little butterfly clips across the top. The clips are a little more difficult as she is an active little girl and it's hard to tame her tight curls.

David had a fun morning "helping" with laundry. He was totally content for 15 minutes taking laundry out of one basket and putting it in another. Back and forth, back and forth....He also may grow up to be a track star!

M E M's for David!

M E M's are David's way of saying M&M's, which are pretty much his favorite candy. We've been bribing him to use the potty or toilet with them. Today was a great day for him, too! Only two accidents at home this morning. We had dinner with Daddy at The Valley in Volga then to Brookings. He fell asleep in a dry pull-up and when he woke up at my friend's house, he was still dry and managed to pee in the toilet!!! Yippee! We played outside in the new sandbox that Daddy built yesterday (8' x 8') and he was still dry when we came back into the house. David was doing the potty dance a few minutes ago and VERY insistant that he didn't have to go pee but Daddy took him anyway and, as it turns out, he DID have to go. Needless to say, he's gotten his fair share of M E M's today.

Sandbox Boys!

Notice Allen's face--it's his trademark look whenever he's concentrating on something. Definately one of my favorite faces!

Kassy loves to swing! What a happy girl.

Kassy is getting closer to walking. I think I need to be a little more proactive with her and walk around the house with her. She does terriffic going forwards and backwards in the walker and can pull herself up on just about anything. She'll stand on her own for quite a while (did it for the first time on October 15!) but still opts to crawl when she wants to go someplace. I'm sure she'd win the championship if there were a speed crawling contest.

Cheese!

We were at home all day today! Wish I could say that I was done with the laundry and that the floor got swept (by me, not by David, bless his heart!). I spent most of the morning going potty with David or cleaning up "accidents." I've been doing some research on potty training and the recommendation was to put the kid in real underwear and he wouldn't like the feeling of  being wet or dirty so he would learn to use the potty faster. This method makes sense on paper. Also implies that there are no other children to distrupt the flow. I can only remember three specific "accidents" and none really involved the rug in the living room. I did discover that David does not like to be wet but playing is still more important---until it's too late. Then it's, "Mommy, you change me!" Overall, David did pretty well and did pee in the potty chair a couple of times. I will be glad when this lesson gets learned. Am already glad that we have limited carpet!

For lunch we had homemade mac and cheese. Both kids ate pretty well, and as expected, Kassy got into her food. She's pretty comical to watch when she's eating. Even if the previous bite did not meet her taste expectations and she spits it out she will still put bites of the same thing into her mouth over and over again. After breakfast this morning I found she had a lap full of watermelon! As you can see, she does like mac and cheese--there's not much that she won't eat except onions and peas. Carrots aren't a favorite yet but we need to try them a few more times before they are ruled out.

Say "cheese!" Kassy!

Kassy went down for a nap around 1:00 p.m. and I tried to lay David down shortly after that. The builders hadn't been here all morning but chose to come by at naptime. David played in his room until 1:45 when Kassy woke up. I knew he'd never go to sleep with all the noise from the air nailer, so we took a 5 minute ride and he was out. It began to rain about the time we were leaving for the nap ride, so the builders packed up. I carried David in and laid him in his bed downstairs. It rained for a couple of hours and unbeknownst to us, the water ran in through the hole in the concrete wall (plywood is a poor sealant!) in the room next to David's and came right into his room. Allen mopped the mess up with towels as best he could. Guess the floor heat will have to handle the drying-out part. Hope it's done raining soon!

Kassy Caught the Cups

Went to Bible Study this morning and then we met my folks for lunch at Culver's. Mom and Dad were heading to Sioux Falls for a doctor appointment, so the kids and I tagged along too. The time change has been a bit stressful from the napping standpoint, because David "thinks" it's 1:00 p.m. when it's only noon. He fell asleep about 2 minutes after we got on the road. Kassy didn't fall asleep quite so fast, but she's a good traveler and also succombed to dreamy dream land.

Mom and Dad went to their appointment while the kids napped and I returned phone calls. Barb, our adoption case worker called about the baby we had been expecting to do cradle care for. Everything is working out great with the birth family of Baby and they want the adoptive parents to take Baby home from the hospital. Us providing cradle care was a last resort and part of me is a little disappointed but most of me is relieved that Baby won't have to lose two sets of parents before going to his/her forever family. By far this is the best option! I also talked to my brother about tickets for the Newsboys/Newsong concert at the Swiftel Center on December 5th. We are excited to go to the concert! The kids woke up about 10 minutes before Mom and Dad were done, so a few minutes of "Bob the Builder" helped ease the wait.

Next stop was at Sam's Club. David got a box of Cheez-It crackers, which, as it turns out, Kassy also liked. David also ate an entire apple (really, I do feed the kid!) seeds and all. Mom got a few paper products for the Broadland United Methodist Church Community Harvest Festival on November 14th. I packed the back end of the excursion while Grandma and Grandpa settled the kids and we headed for home. We dropped Dad off at their car in Brookings and we headed to our house. At one point, I stepped on the breaks and a package of cups slid over the back seat into Kassy's seat. I watched this happen, so I saw the look of surprise on her face, and I laughingly commented that, "Kassy caught the cups!" David found this statement to be hilarious, because he laughed and laughed, making Mom and me laugh too. When our laughter began to die down, he repeated "Kassy caught the cups!" and laugh some more, which of course, made us laugh too. Poor Kassy had no idea what was so funny!

The builders have the outside walls framed when we got home today. They sure do make a lot of progress in a short amount of time! Here's a video of David enjoying the basement on November 6th.

Skid steer David

Windy Afternoon

This afternoon after the kids woke up from their naps, we bundled up and went outside to play. It was windy! I put two sweatshirts on each kid along with stocking hats. Kassy had mittens on but I knew that David wouldn't leave them on his hands, so I didn't bother to take any outside for him. Kassy and I headed for the swings while David went to check on his tractor, backhoe, and bull dozer in the sandbox. It wasn't long and he wanted me to push him in the swing. I helped him in and asked him how he was doing. He told me his hands were cold, so I put my cheapie one-size-fits-all with holes in three of the fingers on him. He was satisfied with that as long as he was in the swing.

Eventually David wanted to play in the sandbox, so I helped him out of the swing and re-adjusted the gloves on his hands. He quickly realized that the gloves didn't work very well for him so I told him I'd go in the house and get his mittens. I wasn't gone one minute, but by the time I got back outside, he was running across the yard and I could hear him crying--crying hard. I couldn't see anything wrong and figured it was too cold for snakes, so I chased him down. He tearfully told me that he lost the gloves and was trying to catch them as they blew away. I told him that they were only gloves and he didn't have to feel too bad. We put his mittens on and fastened them to his sweatshirt, which quickly became an annoyance for him. I distracted him by asking him to help me find the gloves. Caught in the bottom of the fence was a large maple leaf which is what I suspect he thought was that "glove" that the wind blew away. While he messed around with his mittens, I found both gloves by the sandbox.

Sandbox Kids

Both of the kids enjoyed the time outside, but Kassy didn't appreciate the wind. She does, however, like to eat rocks. When we came inside her face looked like she'd been eating chocolate pudding. She was more interested in having a sippy cup of milk (she officially left the bottle behind on October 24th) than having me wipe her face off.

Mmmm....dirt!

David never did wear his mittens. When he finally came up to the house for a drink, his hands were like ice cubes. He was unhappy that I made him come inside but quickly changed his tune for a couple of pieces of his halloween treats.