A New Addition

Unless you have been living under a rock (or you don't use Facebook) you already know our exciting news. I kept meaning to update the blog, but having a newborn doesn't leave much time for blog updates. And no, I do not mean the new puppy we got last month. Although, I guess she is a new addition to our family.

This is who I am talking about.

Meet Lukas Alan. Luke was born August 6th and his wonderful birth mother chose us to be his Mom and Dad. Luke was 8lbs 3 oz and 21.5 inches long at birth and 8 lbs 11 oz at his check up the day before we came back to Utah.

We are beyond thrilled and absolutely in love with him. We spent almost 2 weeks in Arizona waiting to be able to bring him home with us and visiting with our family and friends there.

Here's Luke in his new bassinet. It has lots of room for him to stretch out. And he LOVES to stretch. I will need to look at Jonathan's baby pics again, but in this one below I really think Luke looks like Jonathan.Aunt Kerri isn't really spanking him, she was pointing out how he had his little bum in the air.

I have a lot more pictures, but these will have to do for now. Blogger is not very upload friendly and most of the pics are on my laptop, which is currently out of commission.

Jedi Training

Jonathan's favorite thing at Disneyland was Jedi Training. He was lucky to get chosen to participate. They mostly took younger kids, but Jonathan just wanted it so bad.

Gifted?

I can't believe I forgot to blog about this. Jonathan was offered as spot in the ALL (accelerated learning labs) program. He'd been on the wait list so we just found out last week that they had a spot for him. I hope this will be a good thing for him. He is very smart, but also kind of the class clown. Wish us luck!

Grandma's 90th Birthday

All three of us with Grandma at her 90th Birthday party on Memorial Day.

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?

We took Jonathan to meet Spongebob Squarepants at a local furniture store in June.

Driving

Jonathan's favorite thing about Legoland was driving the little Lego cars and getting his Legoland Drivers License.

One picture a day. I think I can handle that.

I got the idea from my friend Adrian. I have a hard time getting Blogger to upload multiple pictures and then I get all frustrated and give up. So I will try to post a picture a day until I am caught up on all that has happened this summer. If I get really motivated I might even post 2 pictures.

This picture is from our trip to Legoland in June. Jonathan's cousin Caden came with us to both Disneyland and Legoland so you will see a lot of Caden in our pictures.

Saying Goodbye

Early in the morning of Friday, July 9th our sweet dog Pumpkin Pie passed away. We knew something was wrong Thursday night, but we thought it could wait until the morning and we would take her to the vet. We were wrong. Pumpkin passed away in my car on the way to the emergency vet. They think it was heart failure. Even if we had gotten her there in time, it is unlikely they would have been able to save her and we would have had to make the heart wrenching decision to put her down.

Pumpkin was our first baby. We adopted her in July of 1999 to keep me company while Russ worked. We were newlyweds and I was not used to being home alone overnight. I needed a dog not only to keep me company, but to make me feel safe. We found her through a newspaper ad for Cockapoos. Since we lived in an apartment at the time we needed a small dog. I think I knew right away that Pumpkin was not a cockapoo, or at least not all cockapoo. She was the most unusual dog I had ever seen, mostly black with a white topcoat and brown speckles on her legs. The white topcoat eventually disappeared leaving her mostly black with some white speckles. We fell in love with her instantly. There was no way I was leaving without her no matter what kind of dog she was.

Fortunately, before Pumpkin was too big to live in our apartment, we bought a house with a big backyard. At our apartment complex there were a lot of tenants with dogs and we would all meet out in the courtyard after work to let them potty and play. When we moved, I worried that Pumpkin would be lonely so we adopted an Australian Shepherd named Dollie. Everyone we asked had a different opinion on Pie's breeding, but one that we heard often was Australian Shepherd. We wanted to get another dog similar in size so they could play together. We later learned that Pumpkin was definitely part Heeler. It wasn't until after her death that we did more research and decided she was probably a Heeler / Cocker Spaniel mix. Dollie ended up being just the right size to play with Pumpkin. Those two never could decide who was the alpha. In the end they compromised; Pie was the alpha when it came to toys and balls, Dollie was the alpha when it came to food.

Pumpkin's great love in life was tennis balls. She would have played ball for hours if we'd let her. We often took her and Dollie to the park by our house to chase balls in the field. Dollie tried to keep up, but I have yet to see a dog who could run like Pie. When I was very pregnant with Jonathan I spent a lot of time lying on the couch. Pie would bring me a ball to throw. I couldn't throw it far inside, so Pumpkin invented a new game. She would catch the ball in the air. Eventually, we perfected this trick so that she could catch a ball thrown all the way across the field.

to be continued...

Pinewood Derby

This was Jonathan's first Pinewood Derby. He and Grandma D. made his car and it was definitely one of the most popular cars there. Unfortunately, this being our first derby, we made a little mistake. Grandma glued small pieces of wood under the car to keep the wheels from falling off. This made the car rub against the track and stop about halfway down. Once we realized the problem we quickly pried the wood off the bottom and the car ran much better. The wheels did fall off, but not until the race was over.

Jonathan's car is the one with Spongebob. He made it to look like a boatmobile.

I don't know who made the Ferb car, but it was one of my favorites.

More AZ fun

Aunt Kerri and Jonathan at the Spring Fling.

Jonathan at Pump it Up. Aunt Kerri took him there to play on all their fun inflatables.

Max and Lola. Aren't they adorable. I want to steal them, but the Utah snow would completely bury them.

Easter in AZ

Jonathan and I spent Easter in Arizona with Grandma & Grandpa D. and Aunts Kerri & Kristen. The Easter Bunny and Aunt Kerri made up a scavenger hunt for Jonathan and me to find our easter baskets. Jonathan's hunt ended at the garage refrigerator where he found 2 overflowing baskets.

The Easter bunny was especially generous this year and left me an iPod touch. It's my new best friend. I can watch movies, play games, and I even downloaded all of General Conference to listen to on the drive home to Utah.

Jon Schmidt concert

Jonathan and I went to a Jon Schmidt concert in March. If you don't know who he is, you really should.
http://www.jonschmidt.com/catalog/index.php

Jonathan says Jon Schmidt is better than Spongebob. That is high praise from an 8 year old boy.

Jonathan's baptism

I am really, late posting about this, but Jonathan was baptized on March 6. It was such a fun day. Family came from all over Utah and Grandma and Grandpa from California. We had a fun lunch at our home afterward. Thanks to everyone who came to the baptism and made it such a special day for Jonathan.

New Adoption Blog

We have a new blog dedicated to our adoption process. The new address is:
http://russkimandjonathan.blogspot.com/

We also have a new adoption button linking to the new blog.

<a href="http://russkimandjonathan.blogspot.com"><img src="http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b88/kimmiesue1106/findbabycopy-1.gif"></img></a>

I am also planning to start a Facebook fan page as well. Thanks to Jenny for the awesome idea! So be looking for an invite if you are on Facebook.

Thanks so much for all your support!

My Baby is Eight!

I can't believe it. I won't allow it! In the end there was nothing I could do about it, except throw him a party.

Russ thought it would be fun to tie a balloon to Pie dog.

Our first game was to guess the number of Legos in the jar. The winner got to take home a box of Mega Blocks (like Legos, but cheaper).

This is the first cake I made on Jonathan's actual bday. It did not make the final cut.This is the cake I bought. My aunt did the writing and placed the Legos. Sadly, one of the Lego men was later attacked by a giant Lego man-eating dog because she wanted the frosting that was stuck inside his leg.

The main event was a treasure hunt. Each team had to collect all their clues (which included pieces to a Lego set).
Once they had all the clues they had to assemble their Lego cars as a team. The first team to finish won a special prize.

Presents! Boy did this boy get spoiled by his friends and family!
Before eating cake and ice cream, we had a building contest. We gave each child a pile of random legos from Jonathan's massive collection and they each had to build an original creature. These kids are good. I was very impressed with what they came up with.
Finally, we had cake and ice cream. Afterwards the kids played with their Lego creations until it was time to go home.

I think a good time was had by all. We really appreciated all the friends who came to the party and especially the help from Colleen, Kathleen and Christina.

A few other things that have been going on...

The morning of his party Jonathan took a test for the ALL (Accelerated Learning Labs) program in our school district. We will find out in 5 - 6 weeks if he is accepted. The testing took 4 hours, but Jonathan was extremely good natured about it.

These are just a couple of things I've made recently.

I made these cute valentines treats for Jonathan's teacher and some other family members.

We had a party for Chinese New Year / our cousin Nic's bday. I decided to bring fortune cookies dipped in chocolate. Everything is better dipped in chocolate.