Fall Fun!

What would we do without our blogger friends? It was such a blast to take a break from work last Friday so that we could get together with Kentucky Karen, her adorable son Nick, and Karen's parents. And, the extremely famous Chicago Kaz mom Muriel was in Cincinnati visiting family, so she joined us with Kaz beauty Sophia, and newborn son Jack. Muriel's great friend Gina and her stunning daughter Teagan (the most amazing curls you've ever seen!) also joined in for the fun. Once again, my brilliant mother skills were in full mode as we got turned around not once but twice on the way to the park, only to arrive and find out that many of the "festivities" closed at 2:00 PM (as we arrived at 1:50PM). Some day, I swear I am going to be an organized Mama! (And, more in a minute about the practically abandoned mall that I dragged everyone to after the park, just certain that there was an indoor play area ... not). I adore Muriel, Karen, and Gina, as they just rolled with the flow and the kids still had plenty of fun.

As you'll see from the pics below, we did manage to get the kids on the pony ride. Thanks, Muriel, for rushing the ticket booth. :-) The park had a huge play set, and Max joined the older kids and climbed almost all of the way to the top over and over again. He would then slide down a spiral slide all by himself. He is so brave -- even on the pony -- as I don't think he has yet figured out that some of these things should scare the X&%# out of him! HA!



The kids also had alot of fun looking at the animals -- a huge sheep, an even bigger pig, a couple of goats, a donkey, lots of ponies, and a few other odds and ends. It was cool to see Max point to a real live sheep and say "baaaaaa." It's good to know that he gets that there are actual real farm animals -- not just puzzle pieces or 2-D renderings in a book!






The kids let us know "we're hungry" (although it was slightly more non-verbal), so we headed to the above-mentioned nearly-abandoned-but-very-close-by mall. For some reason, I thought it had an indoor play area with a huge carousel. Instead, it had the teeny tiniest little merry-go-round ever made. We fed the kids, rounded up our quarters, and headed to the merry-go-round. It kept everyone sufficiently entertained. and eventually lulled Max into his no-nap-fog. He was happy to sit in his stroller for the last few rounds of quarters.



Max is really babbling up a storm now, and seemingly streaming words together to form thoughts and sentences, but it's all still pretty garbled. We're just starting to approach a stage where frustration sets in with him because we can't understand what he is saying. He generally resorts to taking us by the hand, or getting behind one of us and pushing us along, to get us near to whatever it is that he is trying to talk about or tell us. It's so dang cute, although we hope that his words come soon enough before intensified melt-downs commence.

We also took the leap, and we sent in our check to begin the home study update process. And, we obtained the new contract from our placement agency. We will slowly but surely start working our way through the process with the hope of adopting a little brother for Max. We still diligently follow all of the "new" stories, and we know it will be challenging. But, we love Kazakhstan, and we hope very much to humbly return and adopt from there again.

In the meantime, we are loving every single minute with Max. We are enjoying our first "season change" with him (turtlenecks and sweatshirts -- love it!), and of course preparing for our first Halloween. We are also all headed on a vacation in early November to the Bahamas -- Max even has his own US passport with the cutest little picture. A Caribbean vacation with a toddler -- somehow I think this might be slightly different than our previous treks to tikki-bar locales.

Happy Fall, everyone!

Making Strides Against Breast Cancer

October -- Breast Cancer Awareness Month -- will always be a special month for us, as breast cancer awareness and continuous research into the cause is extremely important and valued in our family, given that my mother and I are both BC survivors. I am so humbled by the fact that my friend Mindy gathers up our closest girlfriends and encourages us to walk together in the annual Making Strides Against Breast Cancer 5-mile walk. This year, we added Max and his BFF Ellie, in their strollers, to the Pink Floyd team. (I have so many aliases out in the yahoo world, but in reality, my last name is Floyd – which is not Glenn’s last name or Max’s last name, as if anyone cares. LOL.)

This year, I also challenged my Cincinnati work colleagues to wear pink on the Thursday before the walk, ensuring them all that I would make a donation in their honor to the American Cancer Society, for each person swathed in pink. More than 2/3 of my colleagues showed up in pink that day. As you’ll see below, I gathered up 50 of them for a photo at the end of the day – and there were many others in full pink regalia who were unable to be in the photo.


And, as an additional tribute to the Pink Floyd team, I dressed Max in pink for the Making Strides walk. This is probably the one and only year that I can get away with that, as he hasn’t yet figured out that he was in girls’ clothing. Given that he already has a stroller with pink trim (that I swear was labeled “red” on the Internet ordering form), his clothing and the pink balloon tied to his stroller blended in nicely. We did our best to keep Max and Ellie entertained for 5 miles, but as my aching back can attest, we did have to take turns carrying each of them a few times when the stroller surrounded by thousands of people just became too overwhelming for the youngest members of our team.


Sunday was the most gorgeous October day, and we strided along with 10,000 other people, raising more than $800,000. We finished the morning with a girlfriends’ breakfast, during which Mindy taught Max how to balance a spoon on his nose.



Seriously, could there be a better morning?

Ben Franklin, My Hero

We’re back. Thank you so much for all of the supportive (and funny) comments. I never thought we'd share something else in common -- hurricanes -- with Matt and Suz and Joe and Susan and Sandi and our other Florida friends! Our electricity came back on Thursday night at 9 PM, so we were without power for 4 ½ days. We watched the utility men repair the “blown fuse” at the end of our street --- it took 10 minutes to repair. So, when we share our power outage story (as everyone in this city is doing this week), our story is “four and a half days plus 10 minutes.” We have so much compassion for the families and businesses in the Houston and Galveston area. I hugged my refrigerator for an hour (okay, maybe a minute) after the power came back on (as did Max, since he mimics EVERYTHING I do) – I cannot imagine the challenges for our friends down south who are STILL without power. They are all in our thoughts.

So, back to our lives …. If you’re an avid blog stalker, you’ve already read about two of our highlights at the end of this summer – meeting two families who we came to know through this amazing blogging sub-culture. Of the three Karens – Kentucky Karen, Minnesota Karen, and Ohio Karen – I am the blog slacker, so while they both were great about posting stories about our get-togethers immediately thereafter, here I sit FINALLY telling my side to the story! ☺

Kentucky Karen and I have been trying to get together for months, even having something on our calendars last winter (which was to include the also famous Muriel and her beloved Sophie). Mother Nature intervened with those plans, dumping a blizzard’s worth of snow on Cincinnati that weekend. We didn’t give up (or should I say, Karen didn’t give up on ME!), and Karen and Nick headed our way in the week following Labor Day. Karen and husband Pat have been such an inspiration for not only Glenn and me, but for many other families who have any connection to Kazakhstan or toddler adoption. Her blog entries are a perfect combination of honesty and humor – just enough honesty to help us all keep our eyes wide open, but just enough humor to keep us all from giving up. I felt like I already knew Nick, but of course, he is a gazillion times more impressive and cute and FUNNY in person than could ever be represented in print. It is so much fun to talk to him, and he communicates with so much imagination and flair. Of course, at that age, you can also pick up nuggets of insight that you can be relatively certain were planted by parents. For example, as we were driving, Nick announced, “I not scream – it hard to drive when I scream.” Gee, I wonder who told him that?! ☺

Max was enamored with Nick. He literally could not take his eyes off of him. So, in most of our pics, Nick is looking at least somewhat towards the camera, and Max is looking at Nick. Karen posted a couple of photos on her site, but I don’t think she caught any pictures while they played the piano together. (If I recall, that is when she was completing the monstrous job of moving Nick’s car seat to my car – something I am so thankful she was willing to do, as our car time turned out to be great conversation time).

I think Nick was telling me, "You have two more chances to get a picture of both of us looking at you." It didn't matter if I had 100 chances -- I never did get a perfect shot!

I wish they were looking at the camera, but aren't they adorable just the same?

What Karen was so generous NOT to mention on her blog is that I pulled one of my many “not going to be mother of the year” moments when she was in town. I made these big plans for all of us to go to a park with a bunch of water features for a picnic lunch and play (after visiting Jungle Jim’s, Cincinnati’s famous international grocery store – yummy!). It never occurred to me – given that I am only now getting into “mother mode” – that these types of water park places close after Labor Day. Ooops! I am not kidding when I say that we drove half-way around Cincinnati to get to the park, only to find it closed for the season. Being the brilliant mother that she is, Karen just whispered to me, “Don’t mention water”, and we got out of the car, ate our picnic lunches under a tree near a playground set, and pretended we were never going to a water park (despite having talked about it A LOT with the kids prior to arriving). Nick did catch on, but Karen in her brilliance re-directed his attention to the playground equipment and we carried on with our day. I was so embarrassed, but was simultaneously further reminded why Karen and I clicked from the beginning. She’s amazing, insightful, forgiving, and downright fun, and it’s no wonder that Nick is the coolest kid. (We can’t wait to meet Pat during our next get-together).

Having had such a wonderful time hanging with a blogger friend whom I'd never met before, I decided to post a comment on Minnesota Karen’s blog a few days later. Max and I were about to travel to Minnesota for the memorial service for my Aunt Barb, who passed away in late July. (My aunt had been a teacher in the same district since the early 80s, so her friends and our family purposely delayed her service until the school year began, giving more people the chance to share their memories. I’ll blog separately about that beautiful service soon). I knew that Max and I would have a free evening in the Minneapolis area, so I suggested in my comment on Karen’s blog that perhaps we could all get together.

And, of course, Minnesota Karen, wife to fabulous Bob and Mom to the gorgeous Garrett, wrote back to me immediately. She generously offered to meet us at our hotel, and the plans were solidified.

I fell in love with Garrett the second he came running into the hotel lobby. Karen has posted before about how she thinks Garrett is cuter in person than in pics, which I found impossible to believe, as he is adorable in photos! Well, I now have first-hand knowledge that he is stunning. He has the most amazing eyes and an infectious smile and the most beautiful skin. He is going to have the girls flocking all over him. (I already have a crush on him – HA!) As was the case with Nick, it’s almost too hard to believe how quickly Garrett has learned to communicate in English. These kids are mini-miracles, every one of them. We headed off to Chili’s, where our usually flexible child became Melt-Down Max. We keep Max on a pretty tight nap schedule, but we’d flown in that day, and other than a quick nap in the car on the way to the hotel from the airport, he was nap-less. And, it showed.

I am convinced that if your child is having a melt-down, you can be in no better company than another Kazak adoptive family. I think we have all developed an extra layer of empathy and compassion that otherwise may not exist. Bob (who will here-to-fore be known as Bob-The-Great) helped keep an eye on Max, who was only happy being either half-way under the table, tangled within the wood-slat window blinds, or affixed to Bob’s side with a hand on his leg. Bob seemed to have the better angle for viewing some of this, and it gave Karen and me slightly more opportunity for eye contact across the table while sharing stories. And what was Garrett doing? Eating, playing, talking, and otherwise being the best behaved child on the planet. I still smile as I type this – despite the Max chaos, it was such a fantastic evening out. Our trip to Minnesota was so bittersweet, as we continue to mourn my Aunt’s unexpected death, and I am so thankful that our trip included our time with the KaBobs.

Happy Garrett.

Happy Garrett scooting as far away as possible from the screaming, crying Max. I think I saw a few other patrons doing just the same. HA!

I am certain that Bob and Glenn would get along famously, and I want the KaBobs to move to Cincinnati tomorrow. ☺



As a new season is upon us, we, too, have entered into the next chapter of our journey. I’m back at work full-time, and we’re all settling in to the routine that is likely to be our “normal” for awhile (which is much easier to do with electricity). Like millions of working moms before me, I have daily struggles with the balance. I’ve been a work-a-holic for over 20 years, and it is just plain weird to come to terms with the fact that I can’t “finish that up tonight” or “work all day Sunday”, as I’ve been able to do for my entire career. Of course, there’s no greater joy than walking through the door to hugs, kisses, and “MaMa!” (which is actually more like “PaMa”), but to be honest I am still feeling discombobulated as I readjust to my new routine.

And then, there is our sweet, adorable, now 21-month-old Max, who….

• Has started to give us the biggest tightest hugs, just because…I sometimes come close to crying, as these are just the sweetest moments ever.
• Loves to sit and read books together. This is new – he liked to turn pages before, but now he really seems to get into the story.
• Loves school – he is truly happy to arrive, and not all that happy to leave (they definitely have more toys than we do -- HA!)
• Will sleep until 9:30 on the weekends (don’t hate me), especially if he has been up a bit late the evening before.
• Says a new word almost every day, and even speaks now when he signs (vs. ONLY signing in the beginning – which worried me enough that I quit teaching him new signs).
• Loves to kick a soccer ball around the house. The cat sometimes plays along.
• Favors his left-hand for eating, throwing, etc.
• Knows more toddler songs than I do, because they sing a lot at school. I hadn’t gotten around to adding “Wheels on the Bus” yet to my budding repertoire, but I put a CD in the other day that included that song, and he knew every single hand motion. Great news -- he’s already smarter than I am.
• Is a very unpredictable eater. There are three things he’ll never turn down – milk infused with Carnation Instant Breakfast (at every meal, as encouraged by the pediatrician, since it's spiked with nutrients), mashed potatoes, and oatmeal. Otherwise, one never knows. He’ll eat three big meals one day, and the next day he’ll lose all interest in food (other than his milk) from breakfast onward. We try not to let him survive on mashed potatoes alone, but some days it’s tempting. ☺
• Will still ride in his jogging stroller forever, humming along to the IPod tunes (we carry a speaker), pointing out nature, and waving to all who we pass. Just this week, I met up with my NCSU/Raleigh friend Dawn, who was in Columbus on business – we met halfway between Cinci and Columbus, at an abandoned outlet mall, and we walked and walked and walked for almost three hours around and around this parking area, giving us a chance to catch up and nab some exercise at the same time. He chatted along with us, pointed out airplanes (and eventually stars), drank from his sippy cup, played with his shoes and socks, and was the trooper that he typically is, for all that time, without ever so much as one unhappy moment. (I think he was also riding high because Dawn brought him the cutest little NCSU t-shirt, and he already loves the Wolfpack like his Mama).
• Is the absolute joy of our lives.

P.S. Regarding the title to this post ... I know that Ben Franklin didn't necessarily "invent" electricity, but in my little world, he did enough to ensure that I'd have power last week, so I'm giving him the credit just the same. ☺

Where are we?!

We have so much to write about, so why haven't we written? Hurricane Ike in Cincinnati, that's why! Seriously, who would have thought that we'd have to worry about a hurricane in Ohio, but the winds whipped through here with such severity and sustainability on Sunday that it knocked out power to 85% of Cincinnati and the surrounding area. And, we happen to be one of those homes that is still without power -- four days and counting.

I have so much to write about -- the meeting of the Karens (and families), my aunt's amazing memorial service, my first week back at work full-time, the woeful Bengals ... and oh right, the reason you check in to begin with -- the amazing Max! Max, by the way, doesn't seem to mind walking around in the dark. He's just an amazing kid who goes with the flow -- even if that means eating strange dinners and reading books by candlelight.

As the storm blew through (no rain, just wind), we were at the Bengals game, having hired a babysitter for THE FIRST TIME EVER. She hunkered down inside of the house with Max as the winds howled, the limbs crashed into our house, and the electricity went out. We had NO IDEA how bad it was, since we were in the stadium -- until we were on our way home. It wasn't until she texted me, "Is it bad if there are wires down in your front yard?" that we realized we needed to come home. (We may never see her again -- although I did give her alot of extra $ for the stress we put her through!)

So, we have no cable, no Internet, no lights, etc., and my evenings of blog updating and stalking are on hold for the time being. I am trying to keep my nose to the grindstone at work so I can rush home in a timely fashion while I still have a few hours of daylight to get anything accomplished, so not much personal time at work, either.

We're making due with our gas grill, and primarily canned goods. The grocery stores have little "fresh" food since they all lost power, too, and they had to toss anything that required refrigeration. We tossed the contents of the refrigerator and freezer yesterday, but it's still quite easy to cook canned soup in a pot on the grill. :-) We're keeping milk on ice in the cooler, so Max has his comfort drink and all is fine in his world.

As soon as our camping experience comes to a close, we promise to catch up with everyone.

Two Months Already?

It's true. We've been home for two months. Where does the time go? Things are really settling into "normal" here -- as normal as it can be when you've gone from a carefree, do-whatever-you-want-whenever-you-want lifestyle to one that involves ensuring your toddler doesn't swallow poison or strangle the cat. :-) Seriously, life is good, and we continue to try to stick to a routine that keeps us all sane.

We selected a day-care "school" for Max, and so far, we are very happy. It is a well-known franchised chain, and there happens to be a brand new school that opened in late July near our home. For now, he is attending on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and we are "winging it" on Tuesdays and Thursdays. That generally involves me staying home with Max in the morning, and Glenn coming home in the afternoon so I can either head to my home office or into the office to work. I am still able to spend some time at home as I still have some vacation to use. I know I will kick myself later if I do not take advantage of this time now with Max, so we try to work in some "quality" play time during those times together.

We have also "taken to the road" together most evenings, and Max and I head to a nearby five-mile walking path and make the loop together (I continue to love our jogging stroller, and Max seems to like it because it is roomy, he has plenty of area to rest his feet, etc.) We bring the Ipod and speakers, so as I jog and walk my way around the path, Max is jamming to tunes and taking in the scenery. Last night, we saw a deer and two rabbits on the trail, although I think I was more excited about those sightings than Max was! I am already dreading the daylight savings time change, as I am really enjoying this opportunity to get some exercise while Max is with me.

We have already noted an amazing increase in Max's speech since he has been in school. It is so funny to observe some of his new words and behaviors that we're pretty certain are being developed at school. He is definitely LOUDER now than before! Now that we can compare him to the other children in his class, it is relatively clear that he is behind in speech, but we will watch him continue to catch up and we will have him evaluated again in December. In the meantime, we do not worry and we are just having the best time ever as his parents.

We are carefully following the Kazakhstan adoption scene, both to support so many of those who supported us throughout the process, and because we are already considering starting the process again. We still cannot believe how blessed we are to have completed our adoption in one year, and we can't help but to plant kisses all over Max every time he is near because we know how fortunate we are. We are trying to carve out time to follow as many blogs as we can so that we can support those families with our comments and prayers. We'll close with a few photos -- lots of additional "firsts." We love this little guy!

It was "Olympics Day" at school, so Max proudly wore his USA gear, and I sewed a little Kazakhstan flag on the back of his t-shirt so he could brag to his peeps about Kazakhstan's medal haul as well!

We have a great county park nearby with a fun water area. Max and his BFF Eric had fun running through all of the water (thank you, Wendy, for the great day!). I thought Max's swim trunks had a drawstring, but I remebered once we were there that the string is for show. So, he spent most of the day with his swim trunks down around his ankles. Mother of the Year, I am not. :-) I remember reading on someone else's blog how they were discovering an entirely new side to their city now that they have a child. That is so true for us! I had no idea this park even existed until Wendy introduced it to us.

Taking in the sights at the Toledo Zoo -- a great visit with my family.

Max's first Happy Meal. I'm a bit of a fast food junkie, so it's somewhat of a miracle that we made it six weeks before he had his first bite of a McDonald's hamburger. Notice I did get the apple dippers instead of the fries. (Points for trying...) He ate the entire container of caramel sauce using the same slice of apple as his dipper -- without ever taking a bite from the apple. Did he have his fair share of apples at the baby house?
He won't eat them, now.
Max at his first Bengals game (a pre-season game), with two of my closest friends, Ben and Jerry (alas, not the famous ice cream dudes). Ben and Jerry moved to Rhode Island when Hasbro shut down its Cincinnati operations, and I miss them -- and the entire Hasbro gang -- so much. It was so great to introduce them to Max when they were in town for Ben's "bachelor party" weekend. Max won't be attending any other Bengals games -- it's just too loud, and given that it looks to be shaping up to be a dismal season, I can only imagine the obscene insults that will be slinging throughout the stadium this year.
Instead, Max will be enjoying his nap during the games (and if the season drags on, I may find myself napping with him come November and December!)

Godspeed, Ryan

We rarely blog about Jessica and Tyler, Glenn’s children from his first marriage, as we want to wholly respect their privacy. Also, we have had our share of “blended family” challenges over the last several years, and those experiences are often just too raw and personal to share on a public forum. We did everything we could to openly discuss the challenges that could accompany Max’s addition to our family, and the entire family is assimilating better than we could have ever imagined. Our prayers in that regard have been answered.

Jessica is 20 years old, and she and her boyfriend Ryan were planning a large wedding to take place in January, 2009. But, Ryan’s naval reserve unit was notified of its imminent deployment to Iraq, so they moved their wedding up and had a very small, private, but beautiful ceremony a few weeks ago. We’ve struggled with their interest in being married at such young ages, but they are both wonderful young adults and they love each other dearly, and we are surrounding them with love and support.

Max loves his brother and sister, but he loves AND idolizes his brother-in-law Ryan. Undoubtedly, it started because Ryan carries the hippest coolest cell phone and he lets Max play with it. Max even figured out how to make it play videos! But, Max has come to truly just adore Ryan, even when he isn’t carrying around Ryan’s cool phone.

Ryan left yesterday morning for Mississippi, where he will join his unit for final preparations before deploying to Iraq. We woke Max up at 5 AM to ensure that he would be a part of Ryan’s loving send-off at the Cincinnati airport. Ryan and Max shared the tightest hugs ever. We are so sad that Jessica has had to say good-bye to her husband, just weeks into their newlywed bliss, but we are so proud of Ryan for his commitment to helping Iraq rebuild. (He will likely be constructing new infrastructure). Max is already preparing to send his first of what will be regular care packages and updates to his idol. Max also looks forward to spending lots of time with his big sister Jessica, hoping to bring a smile to her face even while she misses her husband terribly.

Godspeed, Ryan. Max misses you already, and we will be praying for your unit’s safe and speedy return.

Catching Up - Our Fave Travel Items

We've been meaning to post a list of the items that we were happy to have packed for our first trip to Kaz. As a reminder, we were in The Shiny River Hotel in Ust for just about a month during our first trip. MUCH of this (unless otherwise noted) can be found eventually in a market or a store, but we were glad to have the items from the beginning.

• Clothes line and lots of clothes pins; had we stayed longer, we would have searched out the local laundry, but we got by with hand washing and hanging our clothes to dry.
  
• Crystal Light -- we drank tons and tons of bottled water (we'd go through a 5 liter bottle each day), and it was nice to have these mixes if you like them. We never saw anything like these in any store.
  
• Tide Pen To Go -- you can easily find detergent, etc., but not a Tide To Go Pen for emergencies.
• Duct tape.
  
• Big, big jar of peanut butter. Absolutely no peanut butter in Ust!
  
• Plastic forks and spoons -- We did not have easy access to utensils in our hotel room, and if we ever "borrowed" silver ware from the hotel restaurant, the housekeeper always confiscated it from us when she cleaned the room. :-)
  
• Mac and cheese envelopes, the kind you make in a microwave. We managed to make due with just boiling water, as we had an electric tea kettle in our room.
• Granola bars -- wish we would have taken even more than we did, and we took ALOT. We did find a granola bar-like item in the "Costco" store in Ust, but they were not the same.
  
• Two EuroSurger converters -- between charging cameras, camcorder, blackberry, and two laptops, both were in use constantly. We bought the converters from Magellan -- not cheap, but they never let us down.
  
• 50 foot phone cord. This enabled us to move the phone from next to the bed, to the other side of the room by the desk. Just your basic phone cord from WalMart, Target, etc., will be fine.
  
• Ice cube tray. If you have a refrigerator, it is nice to be able to make your own bottled water ice cubes.
  
• Lots of movies, but we also took alot of "sitcom" seasons on DVD. Many nights, we just wanted to wind down with an episode or two of Everyone Loves Raymond or something along those lines, vs. an entire movie.
• Phillips head screwdriver (for removing and installing batteries in kids' toys).
• Ziploc bags. We were always using them for something or another, but definitely available in the stores.
  
• IPod and IPod portable speakers.
• Safety pins.
• Sweet and Low or other types of artificial sweetener. If you use it, we never saw it in Ust.
  
• Febreeze -- the fabric kind. We used it as both an air freshener when our hotel room because a bit "stale" and as a "fabric" freshener for our bedspread, curtains, etc.
• Small notebook -- arrive with one, as you will be taking notes long before you get your bearings.
  
• Bug spray.
• Screen material. We ended up having screens in our windows, but if we hadn't, we would have taped screening material to our windows, as it was great to have the windows open in the Spring when we were there.