Wednesday, January 18, 2012

More catching up

Okay so I have all of you Grandparents in mind when I take soooo many pictures. I know that you appreciate it though.
 Kenidi:  She finally started school after having a week and a half break for Daddy's homecoming. She ended up starting in the first part of October. She was so excited to take the bus, here she is just getting home after her first fun filled day. She has really adjusted to the public school thing pretty well. I am a little concerned about the behavior of other children in her class but Kenidi is great with communicating and keeps me up to speed pretty well. She was working on some more advance stuff in Arizona so she is kinda taking a step back now since the public school doesn't have as high of expectations. I plan on looking into some extra classes she might take to keep her interested.

Kaden: He is such a lovable little guy, always has a smile on his face and always in a goofy mood just like his daddy. He and I have been having fun spending time together during the days. I am kinda doing the same things I did with Kenidi before she started school. He knows all of his letters and is reading three to four letter words and he writes his name. He loves to draw pictures of cars, trees, power boxes, and his family oh and houses of course. He is a great help with britynn and loves to sing songs about his family and how much he loves us. He just started Primary and LOVES it!! I am very glad that he finally advanced :-) Adam got me some cheese for Christmas, I know it sounds weird but when Adam was on his way back to the states he stopped in Ireland and got me several different kinds of cheese. So he found a Mennonite shop in Philadelphia and bought some as a Christmas gift and Kaden's favorite was the Munster Cheese. He came running into the kitchen and asked if he could please have some "Monster" Cheese!

Britynn: She is a busy little girl and expresses herself very well. She loves baby dolls and books most of all! She loves loves to read books she has been having quite a few ear infections and is actually scheduled to get tubes on the 26th. I am a little nervous but think it will ultimately be the best for her. She loves to watch the squirrels outside and is very attached to her blanket. Her vocabulary is quite large. She repeats almost anything you ask her to say. She can say: Apple,Tree,Baby,Jesus, Water, More, Book, Uh oh, Owie, Thank you and she says it on her own, Blankie, Mouth, Bubble, Got you, Go, Car, Bagel, Peek a Boo, Play, Dog, Nap, Juice, Strawberry, Orange, Horse, Get Down, Truck, Block, Circle, Pretty, Boots, Squeaky, Me, Sleep, Bread, Seat, Tickle, Breakfast, Help, Door, Cranky, Buckle, Hat, Hot, Want more please, Square, Brownie... I pretty much just gave up keeping track. Those babies first year books really make me feel guilty because I can never seem to keep track of everything it is almost impossible! Anyways she is doing really well with her speech considering the fact that she cant hear very well with all of these infections.






                                                      Britynn started to read the dictionary
                                        We discovered that our camera can make distorted pictures. This kept us entertained for hours one night!

  Christmas at the Steimle's was busy and Fun! We did the twelve days of Christmas to a new family in the church  the Cramers and also did a family gift exchange. As tradition we each pick a name out of a hat to see who we will get a gift for. We woke up to find that Santa did in fact come and he ate every last bite of the cookies and a thank you not. We had church at 10 and then rushed home to work on dinner. We had the Cramers and the missionaries over for dinner. We didn't do Turkey because I always make it taste icky, instead we did roast.
             Britynn got daddy a box of his favorite cookie, it is the closest thing to thin mints.
                    Kenidi has decided to become a nurse someday. Here she is checking the vitals on her patients and recording her findings. She cracks me up !

Catching up part two

We decided to take advantage of the warm weather while it lasted. The family picture was taken at the Apple Cider Mill. We went to the old McDonald Farm in Sackets Harbor. It was a blast! They had miniature golf, bunny trails, horse rides, corn mazes, pumpkin patch, bounce houses and a Wizard of Oz Hay ride in which we got to feed some enormous cows at the end. The kids were exhausted by the time we left.














This picture cracks me up! If you look close see what Britynn is doing in the background.






These are some pics I took back in October... I love to look at these pictures. The kids were so thrilled to play with daddy again! This is at the Richard hills community center just a stones throw from us. It is nice because they have an indoor play area so the kids don't go crazy in the winter.





Wednesday, December 14, 2011

catching up part one

I cant believe it has been four months since my last post!!! I feel guilty but at the same time I don't. We are finally a family again and the last thing I have wanted to do is take anytime away from that. We have been enjoying every minute with Adam. The kids are thrilled for him to be home. Since it has been so long I figured I would just try my best to summarize the past few months.
 Before we left for New York we spent a good amount of time hanging out at the Arizona science center. This science center has three levels so you can easily spend several days exploring all that it has to offer.

                                                          Aunt Shanna on a bed of nails

 Waiting with much anticipation to see daddy for the first time in over 8months! The kids were up till about 1:30 that night. It took Britynn a little bit to warm up to daddy, but by the time we got in the car she was already making flirty faces with him. Thank goodness for skype, he remained a familiar face because of it.



                                        OH THE JOY!! It seemed this day would never come

         Our gift for Adam's homecoming was a jar of milk, They didn't have milk in Afghanistan


Adam decorated the house for kenidi's party while Grandma and Grandpa Clement took the kids to the indoor playground. The turnout was great kenidi had about seven kids from her class come. We played games and did face painting and watched a strawberry shortcake movie and popped popcorn. It was a lot of fun, but a bittersweet end to the day since Bob and Marianne had to leave right after all the celebration was over.



                                          Best Friends
                                    I don't care about this big lion suit anymore, I have candy Now!!
                                                  Kenidi finally got her pillow pet

                             We visited the Ives retirement home in watertown for Veterans day, We had a nice visit with the veterans and gave them some yummy lion House rolls. We are now volunteering there and have had a good time getting to know the people there.
                                     As we drove into the Walmart parking lot we noticed seagulls flying onto the parked cars I thought it would be fun to feed them and they all went nuts!
                                                                    I love this one!!
                           making all the parts for the cake, it was a lot of work but also very fun!!


                                                                    Finally finished!! Yay
                                                            Adam Receiving his award


                                                                   The classic spike
                                                                    Hello Handsome!!
                                                                
                                                                 A new wreath I made
The soldiers lined up for the award ceremony

                                                
Our new little Friend

                                                                
Kenidi got the good Citizen award for the month of November.

   
 Britynn LOVES LOVES LOVES books!!
  Best pals sitting in the tractor at daddy's work

                                                   Best Big brother anyone could ask for

              
   Playing in the snow with neighbor friends