Guess Who We Had Dinner With?

Uncle Mark and Richard were on their way home to Palm Beach from Colorado and had a layover in Atlanta so I picked K up from camp and told her that I had a surprise for dinner. We met Mark and Richard at the airport and had a fun dinner. Richard just spent 3 weeks in Wyoming and Colorado at Outward Bound so he had a lot of great stories to tell. Uncle Mark had been in Aspen working-his stories weren't so great! As we were walking out of the airport K said that she missed them already. Me too!

Poolgirl

Yesterday evening K had one of her kindergarten friends, Anna, over for swimming and dinner. Last night as I was tucking her in we had the following converasation.

K-I want to be a poolman when I grow up.

Me-Good idea but what will you do in the winter?

K-(Huge sigh) Count my money.

Shoes!

I confess that I am a shoe-a-holic. Louboutin, Manolo, Prada, Chanel, you name it, I cannot get enough. My justification is that I have very few clothes-I like to think that I have one of those carefully edited European closets. In reality, I am really small and it is so hard to find things that fit that look good on me. Plus I really don't like to clothes shop-I don't like trying things on and dealing with alterations. K on the other hand wears the same smelly, yucky pair of shoes every day. She loves these horrible shoes. They have been discontinued but I lucked out and found them on Zappos so I bought them in every size. I swear when we go someplace I have to wrestle these shoes off her feet. I bought her darling Jack Rogers sandals for summer-when I make her wear them she takes them off and runs around barefoot. You have no idea how hard it was to resist buying the Jack Rogers in lime green, navy, hot pink and silver. Glad I fought the urge. Sigh!

She wears these every day!

She could be wearing these.....

Kitt Kittredge-An American Girl

Yesterday we had a girls day out with our friends Catherine and Olivia and Sheila and Helen. I can't believe that Olivia is six years old-I was her first visitor six years ago when she was born. We went to see Kitt Kittredge-An American Girl. The movie was sweetly enjoyable with real substance. I loved the wonderful period costumes, settings and music. After the movie, we went out for an early dinner. Catherine and I are cooking up a plan to spend the summer in Paris next summer-I checked out camps for the girls when I was recently in Paris. More on that later. K and Olivia took their Kit dolls to the movie (Catherine and I ended up carrying the dolls the whole time-nice look for the two of us.) Olivia and K are "bestest friends." And a special thank you to Beverly-one of my "bestest friends" who gave K her Kit doll.

4th of July

I can't believe that this was K's 3rd 4th of July in America! We went to a couple of parties. The first party was at Trevor and Lachlan's house-K had a ton of fun with the boys. Then we went to Sheila and Elliot's house. No fireworks this year-the kids watched a video instead. Go figure!

Building a zip line with the boys

Selena

Sheila

Lucy begging for a little snack

Helen and Dylan

Katie and Molly

No fireworks for these kids

Lisa V K and the Kids

When I was in the process of adopting K, I corresponded with a woman in one of my Kazakhstan Yahoo groups who was having a lot of delays like I was. Turns out she lives in Atlanta and even better right around the corner from me. Our kids go to the same school! Lisa has become a wonderful friend-an incredible source of inspiration and support. She really "gets" older kid adoption. And K and I adore her kids! She came home with Ruslan and Veneyra a few months after I came home from Kazakhstan with K. This past December she adopted Betheham from Ethiopia.

Yesterday evening Lisa and the kids came over for dinner and swimming. We ended the evening with the perfect summer time desert-chocolate fondue. Nice and messy but no problem since we were outside. Yum!

Big Bubbles And A Frog

I surprised K with a giant container of bubbles and a big bubble wand yesterday after camp. She loved the bubbles but quickly lost interest when she spotted a frog in the pool. She loves frogs! She asked if she could get in the pool in her clothes and she was surprised when I told her she could. She played with the frog for quite a while, gave him a ride on her head and, of course, had to give him a kiss. Alas, no prince!