Lots of camps this week ...

This week has been a little bit crazy. Sarah is doing basketball camp at the college in the mornings while Almira and her friend Amanda are doing VBS at the church. In the evenings Almira and Amanda are doing soccer camp at the college.

This week Almira also started her English tutoring at a learning center. Since she will be jumping a grade, I was hoping to get her caught up in English and getting her ready for 8th grade. Last week we received a letter telling us that Almira had been nominated for Honors Math for next year. She started reviewing for math and particularly Algebra getting ready for the test. She took the test on Tuesday morning and we'll have to wait and see how she did. This will determine if the school officials think she is ready for this kind of challenging class next year. While I'm excited for her, I do have reservations about her jumping a grade and then going into an advanced math class.

We know that Almira will be playing soccer this fall and she mentioned to me about playing basketball as well. I was suprised as she has never played before. I told her I thought one sport a year would be enough. I didn't want her to get too overwhelmed with so many new things in the fall.

Sarah will be going to her first away from home camp with the church in 2 weeks. I'm excited for her as I remember how much fun those were, but anxious to let my baby go off on her own. I know all the grownups going and I know she'll be fine, but I'm still anxious.

Some friends of ours lost their son a few weeks bad. It was a horrible and tragic accident. He was 15 years old and was riding a jet ski with some friends. Somehow the jet ski turned over and he was either knocked unconcious or something else. His friends came up, but he didn't. Unfortunately none of the kids had on a life jacket. This was a great kid, honor student and just wonderful from all accounts. He died 1 week before his 16th birthday. Hid dad was his best friend and I can't imagine the loss in his life. His Mom and Dad are both doctors and that probably had to make it even worse, knowing they couldn't save him.

We took Almira and Sarah to the wake as the dad is our dermatologist and we see him often. They did not know Trey well, but we just had just seen him a few months ago. There were so many people there it was a 2 hour wait to go speak to the family. Just a terrible accident, but it does make me hold my kids just a little closer.

We now only have 2 kittens left in our house. The lady that came last week to look at one of the kittens saw the 2 sisters together jumping and playing and said she just couldn't separate them. So both little girl kittens went home with her as a suprise for her daughter. I've been getting updates on them when I got to therapy for my foot. Their names are Duchess and Tinkerbell and are very loved by her daughter and quite spoiled from what I understand. They have a soft kitty bed, crystal bowls to each out of and lots of kitty toys. I'm so happy they are going to have a good home and stay together.

Talk to you later,
Kathy

Summer has started ...

Sorry it took me a whole week to update. Sarah had a good awards day as well. She got second place in the Spelling Bee and got a trophy. She also got an award for Honor Roll. This is her first year to not get Principal's club (all A's), but that darn math got her. I told her she still did really well and we were very proud of her too. We left Wednesday afternoon after awards.

Sarah, Almira and I headed to Choctaw, MS and went to the big water park on Thursday. I did something I've never done before, I rented a cabana at the water park and it was wonderful. We got there Wednesday night, had dinner and walked around the hotel. Then Thursday morning got up had breakfast and headed to the water park at 10AM. We opened it up that morning. By 10:30 we were in our cabana and the girls left me to do the park. They were back by 11:45 and had rode everything. I loved the cabana. It was covered, with a ceiling fan, a couch and two chairs. The couch was really comfortable and was out over the water of a big zero entry swimming pool. I sat and read most of the morning. I had packed a swimsuit and at lunch went and put my suit on. After lunch I went and hit the water slides with the girls. It really was fun and I had not done that in a long time.

It was not a huge park, but the slides were really good, there was a lazy river and lots of fun stuff. Here is the link in case anyone wants to try it. http://www.geyserfalls.com/

I would love to go to Schlitterbahn, but that is so far away in New Braunsfels, TX, which would probably be 6 to 8 hours away. Maybe one day we can make that trip.

Summer has started and the girls are doing kitten baby sitting. They are six weeks old now and growing. We got two more last week. On Tuesday morning after Almira's awards day a lady came to me and said the last two kittens were outside with their mom (the wild kitty at work). We waited until the afternoon and another lady here at work and I caught them and she took them home. We knew this was our last chance to prevent 2 more wild kitties here in front of our building. There was a little boy and a little girl.

It is so much fun watching all 4 of the kittens playing, jumping, hiding and attacking each other. They are just adorable, but we can't keep all these kittens. I have one lady coming today to look at one of them, but I don't know what I'm going to do with the last 3. I don't want to take them to a shelter, it would break my heart. Thank goodness I have a husband with a big soft heart who wants to take care of them. He has fallen for the little boy kitten.

I'll post some pictures soon.

Kathy B.

End of the school year ...

Today was a very exciting day that began with one very nervous 15 year old. Today was awards day for the middle school for Almira. She was so nervous. You would have thought she was going to have to stand up and give a verbal rendition of her first year of school or something. I assured her that she would be getting one award for Principal's Club (all A's for the year) and she would not be on the stage by herself. So much for Mom's promises. She did receive an award for Principal's club ... then she received an award for highest GPA in Bible class for the 6th grade girls ... then she received Most Christ Like for a 6th grade girl. Then the principal kept her up on the stage by herself and presented her the Soaring Eagle Award for middle school (the last award for the day). He explained her story about how she had only been home less than a year and was adopted from (he said Russia - but that's okay). He talked about how she had made so much progress and excelled in the classroom and adjusted so well to school. He said this is a special award for a middle school student that goes above and beyond what is expected of them. I was shaking so much I barely got it all on camera.

Needless to say we are so proud of her. She has done remarkably well and is just growing up into such a fine young lady. I will attach some pictures of her awards day today.

Also, we took in some baby kittens about 3 weeks ago, when they were just 2 weeks old. They are now getting close to 6 weeks old and the time has come for us to find a home for them. We got them off the bottle this weekend and eating solid food. They are just adorable. So if anyone knows of a really good home for them. We can't do 5 cats in our house. Besides our 3 big kitties are rebelling, none of them are happy right now. As I type this both kittens are snuggled up next to Jon on their backs with their little feet in the air, sound asleep.

Good night to everyone! Sarah's awards day is tomorrow so I'll post after that.

Kathy B.

Good bye Katherine ...

Today was a very sad day. Katherine returned to Moldova. Her time here as a student has ended and she had to return home. She will be missed terribly. Our family has come to think of her as another daughter. I'm so happy that we had the time with her that we had. Her contract for her scholarship said she must return to Moldova and cannot come back to the US for 2 years. We will be counting the days.

Right now our plans are to travel there next summer, me and my girls. Our church does a mission trip to the Ukraine every summer and I'm hoping we can make that trip and visit Katherine while we're there, since they are so close.

I know that her family will be so glad to have her home, but right now we are missing her.

Much love to you, our sweet Katherine. We'll talk with you soon.

Kathy

Happy Mother's Day

Today has been a wonderful Mother's Day. But I'll start with yesterday. I graduated from college yesterday. I will post pictures. I finally finished my finance degree. I now have a BSBF, that is Bachelor of Science in Business Finance. Sounds awfully official. The best was having the whole family there. Jon, Sarah and I headed up Friday afternoon after work. Almira stayed with Mom and Dad because they have Katherine for just a few more days. We wanted the girls to have one last sleep over together. Katherine is flying back to Moldova on Monday and we are all terribly sad.

My brother, Doug drove up in his suburban and brought Mom, Dad, Katherine and Almira on Saturday morning. After graduation we went and ate at the Flying Fish, a great restaurant in Little Rock. We really wanted something nicer (or I did), but nothing was serving dinner at 4PM on Saturday. The Flying Fish is a dive, but with great food. The picture with Almira holding something was her first attempt at eating raw oysters. Katherine loves them and fixed her one. It barely got down, I think.

The last picture is of all my girls together for Mother's Day lunch. We had a really good time and Katherine is still here playing with Sarah and Almira.

Well enough with all that, here are the pictures.

Enjoy.

Kathy

P. S. Did you notice the name change, I decided since Almira has been home almost one year (June 1st) it was time to change the name from an adoption blog to the chronicles. Since I am out of school I will try to do better updating my blog. Sometimes I think I'm the only one to read it and I just enjoy journaling.

More birthday pictures

A few pictures from Almira's birthday dinner with family.

Happy Birthday Almira!

Today is Almira's 15th birthday! We had a little party at Kiroli Park for her on Saturday and she had three friends come, Devin, Amanda and Julianna. They ran and played tennis, soccer and walked on the trails. We had pizza, birthday cake and ice cream. I think everyone had a really good time. We were there for over 4 hours. Here are some pictures.

Tonight we will have a family dinner and she'll open gifts. I hope she has a great day!

Kathy