Weekend of Soccer

Because so much of our time lately seems to have been taken up by the TK's-Teeny Kids, this post is ONLY about the BK's-big kids! We had our first tournament of the soccer season this past weekend. It was in Aiken SC and is put on by the Bulls Soccer Club, which is the club Julia and Sam play on. We had a very jam-packed weekend with LOTS of soccer-going from 8:00am Saturday morning to our last game starting at 4:30 Sunday afernoon. Both teams, the U13 girls and the U9 boys did fantastic! Julia's team won their U13 division and Sam's team won runner-up for the U9 boys division! We all came home with medals!!!!! Somehow that seems to make all the blood, sweat and yes, some tears, worth it! GO BULLS!!!!!!! Good job everybody!

We are still here!

I just realized it has been several weeks since I posted last! We have been doing some more "adjusting" to life as a family of 6, homeschooling in full swing, soccer in full swing, building a pool-finished but lacking landscaping so lots of sweeping and mopping of the floor, having friends over to celebrate the end of summer, and just "life". I hope to get back to "blogging" soon!

Where did the summer go?

Why is it that summer just zooms by? Well actually time itself just seems to fly by these days. School starts ridiculously early around here and even though we home school the TK's (teeny kids) do go to preschool. I love this program that is 1 mile from my house. Honestly, I need the break from my precious little people(is that terrible of me to say), my BK's (big kids) need a break from the TK's and they need a break from each other. So off they went to preschool today. I originally had them in 2 days a week in the same class. I quickly switched that upon arriving home from China..... they now go 3 days a week and to separate classes. Jaida is in pre-k3 and Xin pre-k4. I was worried how Xin would do without his Mei Mei but he did great. He relies so much on her, almost as if they are twins and I truly think he needs to establish his own identity. Julia and Sam started today too and we think we are really going to like our curriculum this year, at least after day 1 all is well. They said they LOVED their teacher-aka Mommy, she was AWESOME!!!! I/we truly love homeschooling and hope that it continues to work for us. Julia started 7th grade and Sam 3rd. It is such a joy to share my day with them. The TK's are going to have their own little workbooks and they are so excited about doing them with the BK's! Let's hope that enthusiasm remains!!!!! Here are a few pics from today, note the lovely garage backdrop in the one photo. I was in a hurry and had forgotten to get the shot of the 2 together. Oh well, the faces are too darn cute!!!!!

China Friends Reunion

As Jaida calls them, we had our 3 year reunion with her "China Friends". This is the fabulous group of people we traveled with 3 years ago to get Jaida. There were 9 families total. Two families brought other children and there were also 3 sets of grandparents. It was truly a remarkable group of people. We shared a huge life changing event with these folks and thankfully we have all stayed in touch and each year since have had at least 6 of the 9 families at our reunions. Year 1 was in Texas, year 2 here in Augusta and this year we went to Orlando. We stayed at the Nickelodeon Hotel and had a ball. Our family visited Disney's Magic Kingdom on Friday and then the rest of the weekend we visited with each other. The girls are all so precious and it is such fun to watch them together. They all will turn 4 this year. Here are a few pictures, well ALOT, that captured this sweet time. Thank you Josh and Heather for putting together this year's reunion....it was WONDERFUL!