Because I can't let Thanksgiving come without posting at least one Halloween photo

Updates on Liberia

I haven't mentioned anything about Liberia lately, and there have been some recent developments that you should check out:

Update on adoptions in Liberia here

Current and past updates on the Daniel Hoover Children's Village Mission Boarding School here

Charlotte Families on Oprah's "Fascinating Families" episode here

These are our sponsor kids, H (girl) and M (boy). I'm not going to publish their names. Would you pray for them and the other children in Liberia? Pray for their current situation and for a hopeful future. Maybe you can consider being part of that hopeful future. There are many other children at the orphanage (now mission school) who still need sponsors.

Just a Little Something Funny

I have been waiting for this segment to come up on youtube since this episode of "Parks and Recreation" last week. Mark and I hit rewind and watched it at least 5 times when it was on.

California Pics

Beach Trip and Birthdays

The weekend after Labor Day, we met up with Mark's parents in North Myrtle Beach for a few days. The weather was perfect, which was nice because when we went last year, the weather was cool and overcast. We barely got to play on the beach, so we enjoyed multiple opportunities this time.

We played a few rounds of mini golf -- once with Papaw and once while we were out on a date. The place we played with Papaw was part of a group of three courses that we played two of them last year. One of the fun things about the courses is that they have these spinners at several of the holes that instructs each person to do something different such as putting with your eyes shut, putting between your legs or using one of the other players as an obstacle. I think it makes the round more fun.

We also met up with Mark's aunt and uncle, George and Hazel, in Calabash for lunch one day. They live in Carolina beach, and our plans to see them last year fell through, so we were happy that everything worked out this year. As you can see in the pictures, Catherine warmed up to them quickly!

Catherine made a new friend at Build-A-Bear, and she now totes Pup Pup around almost as much as her Flopsy Bunny. Weeks later, she is still playing with that box!

Mark and I enjoyed a date one evening. We saw an IMAX film, played mini-golf, had a great dinner, and Mark showed me the "real" Myrtle Beach. I'm glad we don't stay there. :) Catherine stayed back at the condo with Granny and Papaw, who played Little People with her and made a tiara and other things with some craft supplies I brought. They also took Catherine to the beach while we went shopping one morning, too. We were able to find some great stuff in a short amount of time without toting Catherine around with us!

We introduced Granny and Papaw to Five Guys on the first night we got there, and they liked it so much that they had it again on the night we were on our date! I think they'll be visiting the one in Winston-Salem now that they know how good it is. They also brought their Wii, and we had the most fun bowling. We played a new game called Bananagrams, which is quickly becoming a favorite.

Beach time

This is love because I do NOT like playing in the sand.

With George and Hazel outside Callahan's in Calabash

Fun with George and Hazel

Between the legs shot at Molten Mountain

More beach time with Papaw and Granny

Catherine made a little friend on the beach.

Mini-golf on our date

Just being silly

Catherine made this tiara.

Catherine loves to play in PupPup's house.

Peek-a-Boo!

We surprised Granny and Makayla during their birthday celebration at Granny and Papaw's house. It couldn't have been more perfectly timed. The mailman was delivering the mail just as we were sneaking up to the door to ring the doorbell and leave Catherine on the porch. The mailman caught on to what we were doing, so when they answered the door he said, "I just found this little girl in your yard and thought she might be yours." Granny was so surprised, and Catherine had fun playing with her cousins.

Earrings for Makayla

Catherine eyes the presents.

Fun Field Trips, Part 3

Marisa came to visit the last week of September/first week of October. It was great to have her here! We had fun hitting the Dillard's fall clearance and even made it to a movie. I finally saw The Proposal, which I really liked. We also made the trek to the North Carolina Zoo. Becky (also a friend from CA who moved to Raleigh this year) and I were planning to meet up there in late September, so we decided to do it while Marisa was here. The zoo is, but it's very spread out and requires a lot of walking. I don't mind all the walking, but at times it felt like we were going in circles. I'm a pretty decent map reader, and I felt like we were lost all the time. If we had been there when it was hot and muggy, then it might have been miserable. However, it was a gorgeous day! We brought a picnic and enjoyed a few hours together while the kids ran around looking at the animals.

"Auntie Misa" and Catherine

Reading the map in search of giraffes

There they are!

She got really attached to that map.

Josiah and Catherine check out some animals.

Then they climbed some monkeys.

Becky points out an animal.

Marisa, Catherine and Ashley check things out.

A seal soaks up some sun.

Fun Field Trips, Part 2

In late August, our neighbor Stacey and her younger daughter Ena and I visited Lazy 5 ranch in Mooresville. I had been wanting to make the trip there for at least a year, and I'm so glad we finally made it! As with EdVenture (see previous post), the timing was great. We went the first week of school for Charlotte public schools, so the place was practically empty. We had gorgeous weather, too!

Lazy 5 is a wild animal park where you can either ride a wagon (hot and sunny) or drive your own car through on the roads. Stacey drove and wanted to take her minivan through, which worked out well because the girls could either sit on our laps or stand up in the van. As you'll see in the pictures, the animals literally walk right up to your car! I'm sure that's partially due to the bucket of feed we were holding out the window. However, the ostriches needed to coaxing. They were bold! A couple of them freaked me out when they stealthily made their way to the window around the back of the car.

Lazy 5 also has an area that's more like a petting zoo. We walked through there pretty quickly, so the girl mostly just saw the goats. There's a playground and picnic area that the girls enjoyed, too. I imagine this place gets really busy on the weekends and with field trips during the school year, so it was such a treat to have the run of the place! It was worth the hour-long drive.

That ostrich is coming for us. Can't you tell?

I'm holding out a bucket of feed.

Some of the animals are sweet, like these deer.

A llama (or alpaca, not sure which) greets Stacey and Ena.

Sitting on mommy's lap. Catherine loved that!

The giraffes were behind fences in their own area.

The taller ones could bend over the fence to eat.

I see we have another visitor.

Catherine doing her own animal impression. Heaven only knows which animal!

Catherine and Ena check out the camel.

Petting the goats

Fun Field Trips, Part 1

Future Dentist?

Lexi, Emily, Lainey and Catherine in front of the giant kid

Catherine, Daniel and Lainey "riding" a camel

Catherine the firefighter

And the driver

And the shopper

Oh, how they shopped

And shopped some more

That make-believe store was a HUGE hit

Right after Catherine started school in August, my friend Megan and I took all the kids to EdVenture, which is the children's museum down in Columbia. What a great place! It's definitely the best children's museum I've visited. The timing turned out to be perfect as well. School had just returned to session in South Carolina, so we practically had the place to ourselves. Catherine had so much fun, and she had friends to ride with in the car and to run around with! Megan and I both enjoyed adult conversation while the kids talked and, at times, screamed and inflicted bodily harm. :) I foresee many trips to EdVenture in our future!

Momma's Got a New 'Do

I think this is the end of the 18 month drama for my hair. It goes like this: Butchering in April 2008; grow it out for approximately a year; cut, color, highlights and re-cut and re-highlight in the spring to get something I liked (although not as severe as I wanted); another butchering in July; a clean-up later in July by my mom's hairdresser in CA; and finally, FINALLY, a great cut by a friend's hairdresser in Pineville. I love it!!! I took in 3 pics of Victoria Beckham (when she had this hairstyle), and it's a perfect replica. Whitney (the hairdresser) was so confused as to why no one seemed to understand that I wanted this. It was a piece of cake for her. Trust me, I took pictures in to the others. I'm so excited that after almost 4 years, I may finally have found a hairdresser.

Degenerate Blogger

I have been such a slacker on the blogging. It's not that we haven't been doing anything fun or have anything to share. I've just been highly unmotivated to put it to words, convert the pics and get stuff posted. In a word: LAZY! We're planning to stay home ALL DAY today (see #10 for the reason why), so I hope to post more than this highlights list. I actually started this more than a month ago and forgot about it, so I made some revisions.

1. Recently, as we were pulling out of the parking lot after some children's ministry training at church, Catherine exclaimed, "Mommy, look at the moon! Look at the moon! Look at the moon!" It was a big, bright beautiful moon, and we would have missed it if she hadn't pointed it out to us.

2. Catherine got put in timeout at preschool during the second week of school back in August. I've gotten over the horror of my child committing serious enough acts to get in trouble at school, but I was horrified at the time! I'm sure this will be the first of many (let's hope not too many!!!) times that a teacher will tell me she's been up to no good. I thought I'd make it through more than 2 weeks before that would happen, though. :)

3. Other than the timeout, Catherine has been enjoying preschool. She's produced several works of art that could be classified as Picassos, of course. A paper detailing their activities is sent home each day, and there has been lots of signing, playing and learning to share. In September they started some of the "academic" learning, which mostly consists of learning colors, body parts, senses, etc. They have started Spanish, too. She clearly knows a handful of body parts in Spanish now and says cabeza (head) and ojos (eyes) pretty clearly. The first 2 or 3 weeks of school, I feared that naps were on their way out because she was wired when we got home from school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I'm happy to report that she's used to the schedule and back to a good 2-hour nap.

4. Catherine has a couple of DVDs from a series called "Hermie," which uses the life and interactions of a little caterpillar to teach moral concepts and biblical truth. I think Tim Conway is the voice of Hermie, and in one episode, he has a friend played by Don Knotts. One weekend afternoon recently, there was a Scooby-Doo movie on Cartoon Network (it was actually on for me, hee hee). We weren't paying much attention to it, and Catherine was just playing with her toys, so when she started saying, "Hermie! Hermie!" and pointing to the TV, we didn't know what she was talking about. After listening for a minute, we realized that Don Knotts was one of the voices of one of the characters. She recognized his voice and connected in her little brain that it was the voice from Hermie! I don't know much about child development, but even if that's normal for a 2-year-old, I'm impressed.

5. We took away Catherine's pacifier back in August, and she didn't even fight it that much. She only had it at bedtime and naptime, but we thought it was time anyway. Well, I only lasted 2 or 3 weeks because she started waking up earlier and taking shorter naps, and I was convinced it was the absence of the paci. So I gave it back. She didn't even ask for it. What a crummy mother I am!!! Now I'll probably never get it away from her. I do think it has helped, though.

6. I'm certain that Catherine would live on yogurt and peanut butter if we let her. And cookies. And ice cream milk. What's ice cream milk, you say? When we were in California, my dear mother began giving Catherine milk with a little dash of flavored creamer in it and called ice cream milk. Now we field daily requests for ice cream milk, which really is pretty harmless. It's a very small amount or creamer, but I don't want her to refuse to drink regular milk. Trust me, she can tell the difference, too. I've tried to trick her. We've been trying to make it just a treat, but if you ask her, she can't live without it!

7. Catherine is just a little bit bossy (No comment on which parent she gets that from. It couldn't possibly be me). She hasn't gotten in trouble for it (yet) at school, but the teacher did mention last week that she was particularly bossy that day.

8. Like many toddlers, Catherine loves to dance around the living room and even does a little groove in her carseat. Two dances that I've been trying to catch on video are when she dances to me new "Don't Stop Believin'" (Glee cast version) when the phone rings in the car and when she grooves with the dancing cow on the Maola milk commercial.

9. We are in the midst of a six-week stretch without visitors and without one of us getting on a plane. Woo hoo! Not that we don't love the visitors and travel. A little break just helps me get things done (like blogging!). Once mid-November hits, though, it's going to be a crazy month or so: business trip to Texas for Mark; Thanksgiving in Texas for all of us at my aunt and uncle's (Nonna and Grandpa Jim, too!); a weeklong visit from Nonno; a CRAZY 2-day, 1-night trip to Disneyworld for my birthday; and Matt, Gwyn and the kids for Christmas. It's going to be a fun several weeks, but I think I need this down time to prepare for it.

10. POTTY TRAINING!!!!!!!!! Catherine had been going on the potty before bath time pretty consistently for awhile, and last weekend, she just decided she was ready to go for it. I'm still using pull-ups because I just don't want to deal with poopy panties yet, and she has refused to poop on the potty. However, after I told the teacher about the potty training on Tuesday, she asked that I bring Catherine in panties on Thursday. And what happened? A poop accident. I sure am glad I didn't have to clean up that one. Some friends have told me that once they have a poop accident, they rarely do again. Here's hoping ... We're staying home all day today in panties to give it a trial run.

Birthday and Preschool (Updated)

Posing for the camera before we leave for school


Out front before we went inside

Holding her princess lunchbox (she calls it her backpack)

Ready to be picked up

Playing with fake food in her classroom during orientation last week

Today is a big day in our house: it's Mark's birthday and Catherine started preschool! She's just going 2 mornings a week, but both she and I were ready for it. It seems like an outstanding program, and I think she will really thrive in that environment. Drop-off was a breeze. She walked right in and said, "Bye!" When I came back to pick her up, she excitedly ran over and didn't cry. What, you say? Didn't cry when you left? Why would that happen? Well, last week when we went to her orientation, she was having such a great time that she cried and cried when we left. I was concerned that she would do that again. She was fine, though. She did have a meltdown later on the way home, but I think she was just pooped from the exciting day.

At the end of each day, Catherine will come home with a sheet that tells what they did that day. Today's activites included: making a picture with dot markers, singing, learning about body parts and playing outside and in the playroom. They talked about sharing, read "Spot Goes to School" and learned about thanking God for friends.

After Mark and I dropped Catherine off this morning, we enjoyed breakfast ALONE at The Flying Biscuit to celebrate Mark's birthday. After a leisurely stroll through the dollar store, I decided to make my way home for a couple of hours before going back to get Catherine. It was so funny, I kept thinking I needed to be quiet, like she was upstairs sleeping! I honestly don't recall when I've been at home alone without her there. I get out of the house without her all the time, but being home alone felt so unfamiliar. I guess I had forgotten what it was like!

I enjoyed the quiet, did a little Bible study and started brainstorming all I can accomplish with my new free time. I've got plenty to do, and come mid-September, I'll have Bible study at church on Tuesdays, so I'll really just have Thursdays.

Mark's parents came over the weekend, and we celebrated Mark's birthday with them. Below are some pictures. Mark and I spent the afternoon out together, which was a nice treat.

I'm a total slacker. I didn't even make him a cake this year.

Mexico, Part 2

Waterfall inside the butterfly sanctuary

Catherine would have loved the aquarium

Special shot for those with an unusual fear of sharks (a.k.a. Heidi!)

Stingrays

Big turtles. There were some adorable little ones, too.

Those clouds stayed off shore, and we had great weather the rest of the day.

A Mayan ceremony

Getting ready to play an ancient Mayan game

EEEK!

Yes, the ball was on fire.

Replica of a Mayan cemetery

Mark HAD to take a picture of this urinal. It went all the way along the wall.

A puma (above) and Mark trying to look fierce like the puma (below)

Iguanas walked around all over the place.

The day after we arrived in Playa, we visited an eco-waterpark called Xcaret. I'm sure there are some who would say it's too much of a tourist destination, but we thought it was great. For reasons stated in the previous post, it was pretty much dead. In fact, we only wish we would have arrived later in the day. We got there right when it opened in case it was busy, but by the time the evening rolled around, we were so pooped that we decided to leave before the big nighttime show.

Still, we had a great time there. Of course, there's a ton of water. You can sit on the beach, swim in a pool, float in a underground river, go snorkeling and more. I chose to do Snuba, which is a cross between SCUBA and snorkeling. Mark isn't a very strong swimmer, so he spent an extra hour on the beach. I used an underwater camera, but I haven't scanned those in yet. I'll post them once I do. They're just on a waterproof disposable, so they're not the finest quality. :)

There's a lot to learn about Mayan culture there, too. While everything (buildings, exhibits, shows, ruins) is just a replica, you can still get a good idea. Personally, I liked how it combined recreation, leisure and learning all in the same place. It was a great way to kick off our week!

Still to come: Chichen Itza, zip line tour and more (including those underwater camera photos) ...

Mexico, Part 1

Hanging out in our suite

On the beach in Playa del Carmen

An AWESOME breakfast at La Cueva del Chango

A towel swan left by the housekeeper

Mark standing by one of the pools

More from the hotel

Mexico? Didn't Catherine and I just get back from California? Well, I just couldn't move on to posting about California until I got this finished. I'll break it up into separate posts, maybe 2 or 3.

We had an AMAZING time in Playa del Carmen! We really couldn't have asked for a better trip. Our hotel was prefect for us in size, location, price and comfort level. The weather was almost flawless. Every meal was delicious and inexpensive, which was a huge bonus. The whole trip was a perfect balance between rest and activity. The only two downers were a delay on the flight home and the lack of people around Playa. I know a lack of crowds might seem like a strange thing to be a downer, but we went from Saturday til the following Thursday without having a social conversation with anyone. It was obvious that the economy and the swine flu scare was having an enormous impact on the area. On the one hand, we got a lot of time to talk to each other. On the other hand, we like to hear about what others are doing and experiencing.

We stayed at a little locally-owned hotel called Hotel Aventura Mexicana. I had done a TON of research beforehand, and I could barely find a negative comment about this place on the internet. It's a great little place with 40 or so rooms and is located less than a block off the main drag, Fifth Avenue (a pedestrian-only street with shops and restaurants). There are 2 small pools, a small bar and restaurant (with a continental breakfast included), beach towels, a free internet terminal and a discount at a couple of the beach clubs (stretches of beach where you can rent a chaise lounge, use a pool and restrooms, bar service, etc.) The regular rooms are pretty standard in size, but we stayed in a suite (I think it's called a King Delux). The room was shaped like an "L," with a small living room, a bedroom, and a bathroom in the corner that had a 3/4 wall separating it from the rest of the suite. The room had a small refrigerator, microwave, safe and a 5-gallon bottle water dispenser. The water was a pleasant surprise because all we did was buy a six-pack of smaller bottles the day we got there and continued to refill them every day. The TV had a number of English stations, which we mostly just used to listen to the news. The price couldn't be beat. Let's just say it would have cost us more to stay at most hotels in Charlotte than to stay at Aventura Mexicana.

We wanted to stay somewhere right in town as opposed to a huge resort that we would have to take a taxi from to get anywhere. When we're on vacation, we aren't apt to just hang out by the pool or beach and read, so we've learned to make our travel arrangements accordingly. We still got plenty of sleep and moved at what seemed like a leisurely pace. We find that planning major activities in advance while being flexible with the rest of the time works really well. That's another reason we don't stay in ultra-luxurious hotels very often either. We just don't spend much time in them.

The food was soooooo good. Again, I did a lot of research, so we at at places that were off the main drag. I would classify a few of the places as literal holes-in-the-wall, but they were so highly rated, we had to try them. Three of them were right next door to each other and were populated almost solely by locals. We feasted on awesome tacos al pastor, aracherra (grilled marinated steak), huevos rancheros, chilaquiles, fried plantains, Mayan chocolate and more. We even had one Italian meal that was actually pretty good.

Catherine stayed with Mark's parents and had a great time without us. Check out the post "Fun Times with Papaw and Granny" to see pictures of what she was up to while we were gone.

More to come (including lots of pictures) on the rest of our week in Playa ...

This Bud's for Poo

Pardon the pun in the post title. I couldn't resist.

Some people may have heard of a recipe for Beer Can Chicken, where you stand a whole chicken on a can of beer and grill it. On an average weeknight at Macy's in Stockton, it's more like Beer Can Toilet. That's right. Not Wal-Mart (although I saw a naked toddler in a just a diaper there one night). This was at Macy's.

Absentee Blogger, UPDATED

I haven't dropped off the planet, although Catherine and I are on the other side of the country. We've been in California for almost 2 weeks and get back on Wednesday morning. We're having a great time! I had hoped to post while we were here, but I somehow forgot the cord that connects the camera to the computer, and my mom's computer doesn't have a memory car slot. Sigh ... I'll try to get it together when we get back. The weather has been AMAZING, and even the couple of 100-plus days weren't so bad. We've gotten together with countless friends and family, eaten like pigs and spent plenty of time in the pool.

My mom was prepared to start potty-training Catherine while we were here, but Catherine will have NOTHING to do with it. She thinks the princess potty seat is fun to look at but screams when we try to put her on it. I guess I'll just save all of the fun rewards my mom had ready for her and try again later. :)

More to come when we get back!

UPDATE: So I sit down this afternoon to set up and load my mom's photo key chain, and what did it come with? A cord that works perfectly with my camera!! Of course I would discover this on the the last day here. A lot of good that does!

Check this out

Mark and I attended a benefit event this evening for a friend's ministry called Weaving Families. It provides support to those in all stages of the adoption process, mostly in the form of education and counseling (both pre- and post-adoption). My friend, Rebecca, and her husband, RJ, have 4 children adopted from Guatemala and Ghana, and have followed God's leading to use their experience to help others.

Tonight's benefit featured Carolina Panther, Mushin Muhammad and his wife, Christa. The couple (who have 4 biological children) adopted 2 children from Ethiopia a couple of years ago. WCNC ran a story on them this evening as well. Click below to see the story.

One-on-one with Muhsin Muhammad | WCNC.com | Local News for Charlotte, North Carolina | Top Stories

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Broccoli Bandit

Mark was a little later than usual tonight, so I fed Catherine before he ever got home. Her meal included broccoli, which she ASKED FOR! We have been struggling with her eating vegetables for a few months but recently rediscovered broccoli. In fact, later on when Mark and I were eating, she stood at my feet and begged (and I mean begged) me for more broccoli. Apparently she still hadn't gotten enough because she climbed up next to Mark and swiped some of his when he got up to get something to drink. When he returned to his seat, she was stuffing a big floret into her mouth.

I guess you could say he caught her green handed.

Bits and Pieces

Can't start too early!

How many times do I have to do this?

Below: The empty drawer Above: Some of Catherine's favorite "toys" from the drawer

Catherine's name in Jell-O jigglers

These are just a few recent photos. We went to Matt & Gwyn's for July 4th, and of course I barely took any photos. We brought Carlo back to spend the week with us and had a great time with him. Again, almost no photos. Catherine and I spent the day with my dear, old friend (not old in age) Becky in Raleigh when we went to meet Gwyn to exchange Carlo. Yep, not a single photo. Catherine was a complete cranky pants that day, but I sure enjoyed spending several hours with Becky and her children (and Brent for a short while before we hit the road).

Computer Blessings and Woes

Long story short:

- Our Dell laptop is a piece of junk and has been since about 6 months after we bought it.
- Mark's parents had an extra laptop that they have given to us. Thank you!!!!!
- I now can print documents (after MONTHS of not being able to) and chat and surf the internet without crashing!
- The old laptop took offense that we were replacing it and now refuses to connect to the internet, so for now I can't post any pictures that I already had on that computer. That includes Mexico. The USB ports don't recognize anything either, so I can't transfer them. I don't have the patience to put all of the pics and video on CDs at this point.

Ugh.

So while I am jumping for joy about the new laptop, the old one continues to haunt me.

Delay

I had a much busier weekend than I expected. Good, but busy.

I brought the laptop upstairs to put together something about Mexico, but then I got sucked in. I was getting all caught up on Angel and Ellen's trip to Liberia. I had been keeping up with Angel's blog, but I didn't even realize that Ellen had been posting!

So it's midnight. I didn't even start on the Mexico post.

I'll try again in the morning ...