Love & Diving or is that Love of Diving?

Jay definately loves diving. Districts was really fun for him. It was great for him to accomplish his goal of going to districts this year. Four guys from his team went to districts which were held in Ellensburg which is just over an hour from here. He went over with the team on Friday but the divers didn't actually compete until Saturday. That gave them Friday to warm up and have fun! They spent the night in a hotel and then were ready to compete first thing Saturday morning. We all traveled over Saturday morning to watch him. He was competing against 20 other guys in 11 dives. Jay did such a fantastic job. Not only did he accomplish his goal of qualifiing for districts, he made his personal best score. Diving is now over, but Jay has plunged right into gymnastics. Not only is he taking classes, the gymnastics center has hired him to teach two classes of boys tumbling per week. Jay is also working on his lifeguard certification so he can be a lifeguard at the pool this summer.



Jay at districts with his friend Chad. Notice the bleached hair! The district boys either bleached their hair or shaved their heads. I'm glad Jay chose the bleaching. We are getting used to it now.


Love was in the air yesterday! I hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's Day. We have a family tradition of sending the kids on a scavenger hunt for a present. When Jay was 3, I sent Jay on his first scavenger hunt for a Valentine present. He loved it so we have kept the tradition. This was very simple was Jay was 3, now it is a complex process. The hunt took me a few hours to put together. Each child gets their own hunt, with the clues getting harder for each child. I am happy to report that I was able to stump the oldest 3 with some of my clues. Usually, each child does their hunt seperately but this year the 4 oldest wanted to compete with each other so they all went at the same time in a race. Mitchell was the winner. We had a lot of fun.


Mitchell looking through his bag of Valentine goodies from school.


Jamae opening her Valentine present after going on her scavenger hunt. After opening the present, she wanted to go on another hunt for another present. Wouldn't we all like to do that.



Chinese New Year is Sunday. The year of the pig! We spent last Saturday night celebrating the new year with the other chinese adoptive families in our community. Jamae enjoyed having another excuse to wear her chinese silks.


Jamae and her friend Susannah


We send you all our love this Valentine week!

N-O-V-E-L-I-S-T

Madison had the opportunity to represent her class in the 5th grade spelling bee today at her school. She is quite the speller and her teacher felt like she had a wonderful chance to win and go on to represent her school in the city spelling bee. With only a few students left in the bee, Madison got hung up on the word novelist. I thought for sure she would spell it right, but as Madison told me afterwards, "I always forget if novel has an a or an e in it". She picked the a and she ended up spelling it wrong. Madison's goal was to get farther than she did last year and she far exceeded her goal. Congratulations Madison! We are so proud of you!

Diving into Districts

What an exciting weekend we had! Jay's goal this year in diving has been to qualify for districts. This weekend he had his last dive meet for the regular season. It was an 11 dive meet and that meet would determine if he qualified for districts or not. He went into the meet .50 points ahead of the other diver that he was competing against for the spot on the district team.


Jay had a terrific dive meet. He had 11 dives to complete and he did a great job on each one. I feel like it was the best meet that he has had. He really gave it his all. He ended up beating the other diver by 31.85 points. It was a very fun moment after the meet when Jay's coach included his name on the list of divers competing in districts. Now Jay has 4 days of practice before he heads to districts on Friday. Competition is this Saturday, February 3. He will again be performing 11 dives. We are so proud of him and this opportunity he has this weekend. On to Districts!

Saturday Survival

A look at how we spent our day on Saturday:
7:00 - Wake up Jesse.
7:30 - Jesse picked up for a day of skiing and sledding with his youth group.
8:50 - Jesse knocking at the door because his trip got cancelled due to bad roads.
9:30 - Drive Jay to his dive meet warm-ups.
10:15 - Leave home with Madison and her friend and take them to soccer scrimmage.
10:40 - After dropping Madison off at soccer, hurry over to Jay's dive meet.
11:00 - Arrive just in time to watch Jay in his meet. He once again did an awesome job.
11:45 - Jump back in the car to bring Jesse to the ice skating rink - alternative since ski trip was cancelled.
12:15 - Arrive home for lunch, gift wrapping, and a quick nap for Jamae.
2:00 - Jay calls to ask if he can go home with him friend. Say yes and grateful I don't have to run out to get him.
2:30 - Madison arrive home after 2 soccer scrimmages, tired but happy. Thankfully she had a ride home.
3:15 - Put Mitchell and Jamae in the car and drive Mitchell to his friend's birthday party.
3:30 - Drop Mitchell off at the batting cages for his party.
3:35 - Walk next door and pick up Jesse and his friend from the ice skating rink.
3:58 - Drop Jesse and his friend off at home. Watch Jesse hobble up the driveway because his feet hurt so bad.
4:00 - Drive 2 blocks down and accompany Jamae to her friend's 3 year old birthday party.
5:45 - Arrive home thankful that Mitchell has a ride home and I don't have to turn around and pick him up.
6:00 - Make dinner. eat dinner, clean up.
6:30 - Mitchell arrives home safely.
7:30 - Bathe and put Jamae to bed.
8:00 - Play board game with Jesse, Madison, and Mitchell.
9:00 - Bend the house rules and let Jay spend the night on a Saturday night so that I don't have to make the hour round trip
drive on slippery roads to pick him up.
10:00 - Realize all the kids are accounted for and go to bed.

How did you spend your day?

Ice Skating

We decided to take the family ice skating! It sounded like a good idea. Our town had just completed a new ice rink and we were eager to try it out. Never mind that none of the kids had ever skated before, it had been about 20 years since Jody and I had skated, and the weather was only about 20 degrees outside. We were up for the adventure. Once we got there and got everyone into skates (they even had skates Jamae's size), we started off on the ice. Jamae went 1/4 of the way around and declared she DOES NOT LIKE ICE SKATING. She has continued to tell me that all week. She spent the next hour crying because she was so cold. I ended up hanging up my skates early to take her and Madison inside to stay warm. (I didn't really mind since my feet were hurting so much). Jesse and Madison got horrible blisters within the first 15 minutes. Madison decided that she then didn't want to skate anymore but Jesse, after bandages and more socks, got back out and loved it. Mitchell (7) who had never been on the ice, absolutely had a blast. He got the hang of it quickly and never stopped. He was the big surprise of the day. I wasn't sure he would like it. Jay, the high schooler, much to his surprise, I think, had a good time. He wasn't sure if ice skating with his little siblings was going to be much fun but he realized it was fun. As we were driving home, Jody and I weighed the pros with the cons and decided it was a successful outing, especially since Jay, Jesse, and Mitchell were asking me on the way home to take them back the next day. Next time we will just leave Jamae home.

Go Bucks!

...20 hours and counting!

Jamae's 3rd birthday

Jamae came downstairs on the day after Christmas and told us that she wanted more presents under the tree. I guess one of the advantages of having a birthday the day after Christmas is that when the presents are gone under the tree, your mom brings out all of your birthday presents. Jamae sure enjoyed her birthday and her week of celebrations. Tuesday was her birthday, Wednesday was the 2nd anniversary of the day we got her, coined "gotcha day", Thursday was the 2nd anniversary of her adoption day. We celebrated by seeing Charlotte's Web. And on Saturday her 4 favorite friends came over for a My Little Pony party. Oh what fun!


Jamae getting ready to open her presents!



Jamae loving on Dora.



Blowing out her candles.



Jamae being a pony at her party.

Christmas 2006

We wanted to post a few pictures of Christmas. We sure wish we could have been with you.

Jamae on Christmas Eve.



Snickers waiting for the kids to come down Christmas morning.



The kids wanting to come downstairs.



Jamae taking her baby for a walk.



Madison showing you the gingerbread house she made.