Father's Day '08

I took the kids shopping on Thursday. The boys had their gifts chosen within the first fifteen minutes but the girls took much longer. Two hours later, we left the store--each child proudly carrying The Perfect Gift! So far not a one of the boys has kept a gift secret until the moment of presentation but this time they made it!

On Father's Day morning, the kids all piled onto Steve in the bed waving their gift bags eagerly. "Open mine first!" they were all shouting cheerfully in unison.

While Steve opened his first gift which was from one of the girls, the boys could wait no longer and each whipped the gift from his bag, not bothering to let Steve do it himself, and waved it in Dad's face. This picture was taken just before the gift explosion!

After church we went to my mom and dad's house. My brother Nathan and his family were there and so were my sister Bethany and her family. Including Steve, my dad, my grandfather, my brother and my brother-in-law there were quite a few fathers there to honor!

My Dad

Misha and Steve.

Great Grandpa and Little Ivy Mae.

It was a good day. I will be posting more pictures on our adoption blog. You'll need to go over there to see my favorite gift, the one from Vitali!

A few random photos

Ivy and Vitali enjoying suckers from Aunt Mary.

My Hannah, age eight for a few more months.

Annette.
One of the last few pictures of her with both front teeth.
They are both wiggly and won't last long!


Swimming at the lake. Our heat wave has finally ended but we took several trips to a little beach that is only moments from our house to cool off. This was the first time we went. All the kids love the water as you can see but no one enjoys it as much as Max! He loves to play in water, be it the lake or a pool or even a little one-foot wading pool, he will play in it until I call him for bed!

Misha is crying because Steve is pushing him to walk out deeper and to trust him. Misha has some "sensory issues"and without going into it, pools and the lake caused hysterics at first. It isn't the same as the two-year-old who spends the first three trips to the pool hanging out on the steps; it's its own kind of hysterical. Anyway, now, only a few weeks since his first foray into a pool, he laughs and asks for more when Steve tosses the kids into the water! In fact, we are seeing less and less of the issues that have plagued him!


More water! Here are all of my children and two of their friends practicing synchronized jumping into the friends' subdivision pool. Kids, left to right: Ivy, Annette, Misha (see how well he is doing now?!), Vitali, our friend Neil, Hannah and her friend Rachel, and finally, Max. Max looks like he's sitting in the chair but it's an illusion; he's really in mid-air! Ivy is the only one still afraid to jump.

Good, clean excitement.

Yahooooo! My new washer is here!!
We ended up getting a front loader that has a huge capacity, a Whirlpool Duet. (although we only have a "solo" since we felt we shouldn't spring for the dryer just yet.) It will use far less water than our old one and that will be good for our septic and our well. It's also stackable which will be great at what time we do end up getting the matching dryer.

That picture of Ivy has nothing to do with this post; but it was funny and I am feeling a bit giddy! I guess that means I am old and responsible since household appliances thrill me so much. ;-)

Today Annette asked me:
"Mom, how can your eyes fall out in your mom's tummy?" Yeah, it didn't make any sense to me, either.
Turns out she was wondering about Uncle Josh's dog, who was born without eyes, or an eye, I don't' know which. So, I explained to her that they don't fall out, they just never grow. Like how some people are born without an arm. It doesn't fall off; it just never grows.
"But Mom!" she queried, alarmed, "What if they get married? How can they hold their bouquet?!!"

In other news:
The washer is broken. I don't think we'll fix it this time. We have been wanting to get out from under this mountain of laundry that is not just from six kids but six kids AND a couple of loads of window washing rags each day! I think we will get a large capacity that is like a front loader but is a top loader and holds even more. I'm not sure. We have a friend who works for whirlpool and he recommends this one called the Cabrio (I don't know if that is spelled right; I didn't look it up)

While putting the kids to bed last night we heard the sound of fireworks screaming outside. Hannah came running down the hall. "MOM!!!! DAD!!!! there are fireworks shooting off IN OUR BACKYARD!!!" Sure enough, there they were-15 ft from the back door!
Uncle Nathan's here. I deduced.
Yep. I was right. And Uncle Evan too. And Simon.

Laurie and Rick's Wedding

Memorial Day weekend, we piled into the Suburban and Ripped a hole in the ozone layer all the way to Washington D.C.! The event of the weekend was Steve's oldest sister Laurie's wedding to the incredibly handsome, lovable, and charming Rick T. (I expect to see Rick say hello here after that introduction!)

The wedding was beautiful. It was outdoors in the park and the weather could not have been more perfect! The reception was right there in the pavilion nearby and we stuffed ourselves with the delicious food!

It was great to see so much of Steve's extended family and all of his immediate family over the weekend. His sister Jenny was even here with her husband all the way from Niger, Africa!

All six kids were in the wedding as well as some of Rick's nieces and two more cousins on the Eimers' side of the family! The children looked so precious in their fancy clothes walking down the aisle. They all did such a great job. Even the baby, who cried for all the pictures afterwards (weddings are so hard on babies, aren't they?) was perfect all throughout the ceremony!
Laurie even bought all the dresses and suits for the girls and boys which made having all our six children being in the wedding no problem at all for us! Thank you, Laurie!

Hannah signed the best-wishes picture on her own. She is getting so independent and young lady-ish lately. It is fun to watch her finding her way in life. Even at eight years old, she is a deep thinker and an obsessive planner.

The girls all loved looking beautiful.

Our boys love to dress up and did their part well even though they probably wondered what was going on! Rick is a fireman and a bunch of his buddies came in firetrucks which, naturally, the boys enjoyed immensely!

I don't have THE picture but Steve took this one as everyone was lining up. The back row, left to right are Steve's three sisters: Jen, Mary and Laurie. Then is Steve's Dad followed by the groom, Rick.

For those of you who might be trying to figure out the identities of these family members:
The couple in the background is Steve's youngest brother Josh and his fiance, Britt.
L>R at the table are, Steve's Mom, Wendy, His oldest brother, Roger Jr. and Roger's wife Laurie is in black in front of him. Annette is there and then "Baby" or "little" Josh as we call Rog and Laurie's youngest ( their other child is Bekah, she is pictured above as the Jr. bridesmaid (white dress) that is the most towards the right.) Daniel's wife Bonita is the one not facing the camera. Their two daughters are also in the group shot above as the two flower girls (Burgundy dresses) that are foremost in the picture.

Here is my favorite flower girl, Ivy Mae with my favorite man, her daddy.

Jenny, all the way from Africa, visiting with Steve.

The three Jr. bridesmaids couldn't resist twirling on the stage that was a part of the pavilion.

Quick snapshot, paparazzi style, of the happy couple! See their aprons? They have childhood pictures on them. Two people thought that the picture on Laurie's apron was Annette. One of the two who were fooled? Annette!

Congratulations, Laurie and Rick!