Valentine's Day in Alabama

Here is our Valentine's Day snow storm!! OK, I know some of you are thinking, "Yeah, RRRRIGHT! She doesn't have a clue!" Well, hey...it's a big deal here!! When I came out of my room Wednesday morning, they boys had their coats on and couldn't wait to take me outside to show me the snow. This is the first time the boys have ever seen snow. Fernanda had asked Jeannine to send some video clips of it snowing there, so the boys would know what it looked like coming down - thinking that they would never see it here. Now I must admit that the flakes were very tiny. One talk-show host said he had seen bigger flakes on his shoulders! At one time it was really coming down - for a very short time. If fact, it is a good thing I took the pictures when I did, because by the time I turned around twice, it was only a few drops of water on Mark's car.


I got the boys cupcakes with pink and red sprinkles on them. I think Chris enjoyed his the most - or at least we enjoyed watching him eat his the most. (You can click on the picture to really see his face.) I never made it a habit of having dessert for our meals, but since the boys have come, I try to have a little treat for them. I started by telling them that if they ate all their food, I would have a surprise for them. Now, after every meal, they want to know if I have a surprise. Dylan will always ask what the surprise is. I always say, "Well, it wouldn't be a surpise if I told you!" They have come to think that the words "surprise" and "dessert" are synonomous.

Here is the video of Chris and his Valentine cupcake. When Grandpa takes a bite, you can hear Dylan gasping in the background.

It's going to be a girl!!!

Jeannine had her 20-week sonogram yesterday, and it's a girl!!! She was just sure she was carrying a boy, because this pregnancy felt so different from when she was carrying Maya. I asked if the baby was in a good position to see. She said that she was not in the best position, but the lady said she had only been wrong once in 16 years. You know, sometimes these girls turn out to be surprise boys. Boys are seldom misdiagnosed, but sometimes the girls are boys that are just hiding. But being wrong only once in 16 years is pretty good.

I was all set to get out my blue fabric and start on those baby quilts this weekend. But I guess I'll hold onto it a little longer. I've made so many quilts for Maya, they hardly have room to store them. Jeannine is very excited. She said that it truly didn't matter, because she just adores Maya, and thinks that little sweet cuddly girls are wonderful. She didn't think she was quite ready for a rowdy little boy anyway. I reminded her that sometimes little girls can be rowdy, too! :) Mark told her she wasn't a real parent until she had raised a little boy. :) Either way, we are just thrilled!!! We're glad to finally be able to refer to the baby as "her" now rather than "it."

They checked out the rest of the baby, too - the legs, arms, spine - and all seemed to me just fine. I think we've all been a little anxious about that with all the medication she has had to take for her migraines. She is really battling them with this pregnancy. She can't take the preventative medication or the meds she takes when she usually gets them. Boths of those medications are incompatible with pregnancy. I just hope they don't continue the whole pregnancy. As the last pregnancy progressed, they lessened.

They have had a lot of snow in Bozeman, and it has been extrememly cold. Earlier in the week, she went out to drive the jeep and it wouldn't start. She hates to drive her Civic in the snow. She just doesn't feel safe in it. Today she got the jeep out of the shop after $400-$500 worth of work. She stopped at a store, came out to get in the jeep, and it wouldn't start!!! AARRGGHH!! I don't know how many times they have had that vehicle worked on, and nearly every time, it continues to act just like it did when she took it in. It is a 1994 and has over 200,000 miles, so I guess it might be on its last leg. She really depends on it though because they have so much snow there, and she just feels safer in a big 4-wheel-drive vehicle. With two little ones, a husband and a dog, she is going to need more than a little Civic. I know after driving my SUV for nearly a year, I don't think I can ever go back to a car. For one thing, they are soooo much easier to get in and out of. You sit up higher, so your view is better. Mine drives just like a car. Acura builds theirs on a car frame. I understand why the SUV is so popular.

Just Trying to Catch Up

Whew! I can't believe it has nearly been a month since I added anything here. I got several new pictures and thought at times I should post them, but just too much else to do.



These are some pictures Jeannine sent of Maya at 14 months. She got a big kick out of wearing her daddy's boots. I think Mama and Daddy got a bigger kick out of it!




Here she is reading again. She really loves her books. I enjoy so much the little videos of her reading. Of course you can't understand a word of it, but she sure is intent.





Here she is at 15 months, and Jeannine at 19 weeks.



Here is Jeannine and Maya (reading, of course) on their new leather sofa. I think it is the first new piece of furniture she has ever had. There is a love seat to match. They are beginning to see an end to this long tunnel of school and a job for Charles just around the corner. It was one of those 12 or 18 months of no interest things. That's the only way we buy things, too. Several years ago Guy and I were all set to order a new leather sofa, love seat and easy chair. Just as we were about to place the order, we got the results of our taxes for that year. We owed nearly to the penny what the furniture cost, so, needless to say, we are not sitting on leather furniture today!



A couple of weeks ago, Mark took the boys to enroll them in soccer. Here is Dylan playing in the park beside the enrollment place.

Here is Chris. It was terribly cold that day with the wind blowing, so they didn't stay long. They went into the outfield of a nearby baseball field and kicked the soccer ball for awhile.

Here are all four of them. Even though it was a very pretty sunny day, they were about to freeze.


Mark told the guy at the soccer signup that even though Dylan was 5, he had been playing soccer in Brazil for 2 years, so they signed him up to play with the 7-8 year olds. Then a week later they all went to this big field to try out. There were about a hundred boys there. The main guy over the whole program was really impressed with Dylan even though he was the smallest one out there. The man's friend, who is going to be an assistant coach, had his wife there watching, too. She said to her husband, "Did you see that little Dylan??!!!!" Apparently he made quite a showing. They won't start the actual practices until March. Hopefully it will be much warmer then. Mark is going to coach also. He is really looking forward to that. He went to all of Dylan practices and lessons in Brazil, so he knows all about how to coach. If you know anything at all about Brazil, you know that Brazil and soccer are nearly synonyms. Chris was too small to even play in Brazil, so he will jsut be learning to basics. I'm looking forward to watching them practice and play their games. I've heard of "soccer moms", but I guess I'm going to be a "soccer grandma."




This is a picture of Dylan and his soccer class in Brazil. He's the one on the left and as you can see, he is the smallest in his class there, too. This was taken about a year ago. I couldn't find the picture of him guarding the goal. That picture is so cute because his shirt is waaaay too big for him, and his shorts come down over the top of his knee socks. His socks are so big that the heels can be seen coming up the back of his lower leg above his shoes tops.

Bike Riding Videos

Hey, I've learned how to put some videos on the site here. It is a round-about-way, but it works. Here is Dylan the day he learned to ride his bike without the training wheels.



Here he is a little later doing it all by himself.



Mark drew a big figure-8 on the drive for Dylan to follow to get him to learn to turn both ways. By the end of the afternoon, he was riding like a pro!

Winter in Bozeman

Winter arrived in Bozeman loooong before it ever got here. They have winter there about 9 months out of the year. I don't think I could ever get aclimated to that! But Maya is ready with the hat I knitted for her for Christmas. At first, she didn't like it.








Then she realized how soft it was and began to smile.














Here she is in a little fuzzy jacket and jeans outfit I got her. So she is ready for winter.

Winter Has Arrived Here

This past week winter finally arrived. Now, I know it is not the winter much of the country has been immersed in, but, nevertheless, it is winter for us! And I don't like it one bit!! I'm already ready for spring. Today it has been cold and rainy. I'm really thankful that it is not below freezing causing ice. Our entire city would be literally paralized if we had ice. With all our hills, no one could drive further than the end of the driveway. We wouldn't even be able to do that. Our drive is not nearly as steep as many others, but if we headed down out of ours, we would end up in the neighbor's yard across the street.

As you can see in these pictures, the boys had to bundle up. They are not used to this kind of cold either since winters in Brazil are very mild.

One day this past week as I pulled into the drive, Chris came running all wide-eyed telling me something in Portuguese that of course I could not understand - all except the word "jeep." I thought that he had gotten a new little toy car, because he loooooves to play with cars. But, NO, it was one of those little battery-powered two-seater cars. I see so many kids riding in those as I pass by yards. In fact the children in the house next to ours has one. I've looked at them before, but they are quite expensive. Fernanda found one drastically reduced at WalMart and got it for the boys. For the rest of that day until bedtime (except during supper), they were sitting in it as it sat in our garage. They couldn't ride it because the battery was charging. It finally got so cold out there, they had to come in.

They've been going to preschool from 9:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. They really enjoy it. The first day Dylan was a little shy, but Chris walked right in like he belonged there. I wonder how the teachers do with him since he doesn't speak English. He is starting to say a few things in English now if you ask him to. It is amazing how you eventually learn to communicate with him by facial expressions, body language, me picking up bits of Portuguese and him picking up bits of English. Most of the time I can figure out what he is saying - or at least the gist of it. The rest of the time, I just ask Dylan what he said. Dylan is getting to the place where he just goes ahead and tells me before I have a chance to ask him. :)

My Birthday

This post is a little out of order since my birthday was on the 5th, but maybe I've just been trying to forget that I turned another year older. :) It started with Guy bringing me a dozen roses, and Fernanda and the boys getting me a chocolate cake and ice cream.


Before we dug into the cake and ice cream, we went out to supper at a Japanese restaurant where they cook it in front of you. The boys really enjoyed that. I don't think I've ever seen them eat that much meat. They loved using the chop sticks and dipping their chicken in that sauce!



We had to walk around the shopping area for awhile to walk off some of the food before we could go home to have cake and ice cream. I found me a pair of new shoes for half price.

Dylan absolutely looooves anything chocolate.



Dylan had to help me blow out the candle.




Aren't these two cute little faces?





How 'bout these cute faces? :)