Enjoying Summer Break with Velcro Toss and Catch!

  So, I guess it's safe to say our kids are thoroughly enjoying their summer break from school!  Interestingly, it seems that now that school is on break they are much better at being creative and playing together.

  On furlough, a family gave this set of Velcro Toss and Catch to our kids but I'd been keeping it packed away until a nice day like today!  The kids sure had fun with it!

Both of the kids developed their own pitching style - quite intimidating, obviously! 

YAY!!!!

Passport Photo Renewals

Well, it’s almost time to renew our kids’ passport photos, which of course means new passport photos.  I thought I’d let you see what I go through to try to get one good shot of both kids! (we try to keep it fun!)

Mahalia and Friend

   So, the other day I was scheduled to do a photoshoot for a couple twin 1-yr-old boys who have never had their picture taken with anything more than a cell phone, but they had to cancel at the last minute.

   However, right at the scheduled time, a different neighbor family dropped in to visit us and so I got to do an impromptu photo shoot for them, just for the fun of it!  Their two daughters are really good friends with our kids and love to play together in our back yard.  Here's a picture of their 8-yr-old with Mahalia.

Vala's Pumpkin Patch - Furlough Days

   Well, though our schedule has been very full with visiting our supporting churches, I thought I'd post some pictures and let you know that we are able to get out and do some fun activities once in a while.  

    We recently got to visit Vala's Pumpkin Patch near Omaha, NE.  Of course the kids loved it and we all had a great time!

  And what good would a pumpkin patch be without a pumpkin-eating dragon, right!?!!

Thought this was interesting: this is a string of all the pacifiers that they have found on the premises since 2002!

The kids also enjoyed playing all kinds of neat things including a giant spiderweb, slide, and bouncing pad!

 

Then we got to take a little train ride tour of some of the other parts of the patch.  They even had an old-west town set up for us!

Then they had this awesome machine: a mannequin stuffed pumpkins into the machine on one end and pumpkin pies came out the other!  Wow!  If this were real, I would pay whatever the price to get one! :)

Nice little signpost here in case you need directions to get to any major international city!

Wow! So many kinds of apples throughout the years!

 And finally we got to rest in a rocking chair!  I've always known we are "small" but this was extreme! :)

John 3:16 in Portuguese!

      Our kids memorized John 3:16 in Portuguese for their Sunday School class!  This is really a tribute to Tracy's patience and time spent to reach this goal!  I'm proud of all of them!

Mahalia's Prayer

Mahalia enjoys praying, though we can rarely understand more than, "Dear Jesus . . . . AMEN!" (Of course, she prounces, "Amen" just like she hears the Brazilians in church) :)

They Just Keep Growing....

Well, here's a little update on our chillins.  Omar got a chance to take a few pictures of the kids this past weekend, so here's a peek:  

Mahalia is about as ornery as they come - no REALLY - she has quite a stubborn streak in her that will hopefully one day be aimed in the right direction.  Until then....she's ornery.  

But she is fun, loving, and very, very girlie.  She LOVES getting dressed up with dresses,  hair bows, and bracelets.  

She loves her dollies, and drags them all over the house and yard, whether they like it or not :)  

Johnathan is growing up so much already.  He is his daddy's and my big helper, and his sister's protector.  

And he's getting to that "please stop taking so many pictures of me, Dad.  I'm only going to make silly faces for your camera now" phase. (As you can clearly see below.)

He is starting to learn his alphabet, and loves to "read" books all day.  

That is, when he's not outside riding his tricycle, aka: motorcycle.

By the way, if you were wondering, this is his "tough guy" look.  Try not to laugh be frightened.

Mahalia's Christmas Gift

A little walking narrative of Mahalia opening her Christmas Gift:

Oh, wow!  A present for me!

I wonder what it could be? 

oooh...  colorful!

Aaagh!  Someone gave me an upside-down, backward doll!

Oh, I see!  Hee-hee, my fault! :)

Oh, she's sooo preeetty!

I will love her,  and hug her, forever and ever!