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erently the first is something two adults should be able to handle amicably but the latter is harder to work around it is avoidable and a failure on both parts unlike death at the end of a long life it s parting by choice not something that had to happen 1 comment posted in uncategorized party on garth posted on november 12 2012 leave a comment after oleg s actual birthday the rest of the week got a little weird eric s grandmother died so he had to make plans quickly to travel to iowa and be with his family for the memorial he left on wednesday and came home on friday night due to the boys school and the cost of last minute flights the boys and i stayed home i also needed to be home to prepare for oleg s party on saturday the first order of business to prepare for the party was to deep clean the house because that is something i pretty much hadn t done since coming home with the boys most of the time it is just about maintenance so at best the house gets tidied and those areas most likely to get gross will get cleaned as needed but rarely is there time or desire to do things like dusting washing curtains etc so those things were in need of doing the payoff for all the cleaning was that i received the ultimate compliment for any control freak with kids wow it hardly even looks like kids live here though that s actually kind of unfair to them since they are pretty tidy as kids go max even makes his bed every morning without being asked because he just likes it that way they trained him well at detsky dom 5 he experimented briefly with not doing it over the summer but it didn t agree with his felix unger tendencies oleg on the other hand is more of an oscar but even so he is a good helper he likes to vacuum and wash windows and they are both pretty good about putting away their laundry which is more than i can say for eric and i least favorite job in the whole house and neither of us can explain why we hate it we just do anyway the house got cleaned eric came home and then it was time for the party everything went about as well as you can expect when you are throwing a party and are not sure how many people will attend we got about 30 people which is what we had guesstimated so i bought enough food for twice that many because that is just how i roll the party was a lot of fun for both boys i let max invite a friend from school and a bunch of our friends with kids came i invited a couple of local russian moms with their little guys and that was fun too we think everyone had a good time and i know oleg did leave a comment posted in uncategorized oleg s big day posted on november 8 2012 leave a comment we may not all remember turning four but if oleg s demeanor the last few days is any indication it is a big deal for one thing he can actually count to 4 all by himself which is cool because when he was 3 he couldn t count at all now he knows how many 4 is he can even show you how many it is with the fingers he also knows that his next birthday he will be 5 which to his mind means he will be a big kid although the odd thing is that if you ask him to count without it being about birthdays he says 1 2 3 4 9 anyway if 5 is big then 4 is almost big which means maybe he doesn t have to listen to grown ups anymore that was his theory for a couple of days anyway monday was the big day and an exciting day it was the first present he opened was his new backpack he was so happy to have a backpack that was his very own just like mommy and big brother max the next gift he opened was a set of curious george books from totya betsy which was actually for both boys i always remind them that books are for sharing as far as they know that is true so no problems there then he opened his magnadoodle from grandma the magnadoodle immediately became a bone of contention between the boys because they both thought it extremely cool however they are doing a good job working things out those were the presents opened before breakfast and then it was time to get ready for school this week was the first week that oleg was old enough to go for a longer day at school as well as adding an additional day he is now going to school from 9 until 1245 on mondays tuesdays and wednesdays after dropping max and oleg at school i had parent teacher conference at preschool where his teacher told me what a little angel oleg is how smart he is and all the wonderful things he can do and what a great cleanup helper he is and then she told me how she thought he might even be ready for early entrance to kindergarten meanwhile i was sitting there thinking are you sure we are talking about the same kid because he is a great kid and definitely whip smart but an angel he is not neither is he a little devil just a regular kid with a lot of brains who likes to get into a little mischief here and there that is the oleg i know and he has only been speaking english since january so has a lot of catching up to do academically in my opinion however evidently he is a little sponge at school and is picking things up really quickly also as of monday he was the only kid who had never been sent to the naughty chair and it was clear to me that he had managed to ingratiate himself in a big way with his teacher ms tatiana after school we opened the next present a three wheel scooter oleg was very excited to try it out but unfortunately he quickly developed a love hate relationship with the scooter that soon evolved into outright verbal abuse at one point i found oleg screaming at it in the alley and calling it stupid it s gonna take some practice after papa got home from work we opened a few more gifts including pajamas and clothes a spider man action figure that rides a truck and some hot wheels cars with a wall mounted track the boys were in absolute heaven about the hot wheels but the clothes and pajamas elicited this reaction i believe that is what they call a stone face at the end of all the present wrapping when the living room was knee deep in wrapping paper oleg showed himself to be a true american by looking around the room and asking is that it yup it was he took the news of no more presents well and when i asked if he was happy with everything he got he said yes which made me feel good that his first real birthday was a success after presents were opened we ate a special dinner of macaroni and cheese peas and birthday cake oleg was a fan of the cake and suffered gallantly through the rest of the meal to get to the best part then too soon the fun was over and it was time for bed the next morning oleg had school again all was well but when i arrived for pickup a very frazzled looking ms tatiana met me at the door to let me know my little angel had started showing his horns for the first time i let her know i thought it was probably all the birthday excitement but she told me she would still be keeping an eye on him to make sure that adding an extra day and more hours to his school schedule wasn t too much too soon for him so i was a little concerned on tuesday that maybe we would have to be dialing back the school but then today wednesday she let me know that he was back to the angelic helpful self that he had been previously and i could tell she was relieved leave a comment posted in uncategorized after halloween the sugar rush posted on november 4 2012 leave a comment at the end of my last post the boys were all dressed up and ready to go trick or treating they were pretty excited about it and it seems that the experience itself did not disappoint our first house we trick or treated at was hunterann s because she had jokingly posted on facebook that she was worried they wouldn t get anybody to come by then we went to alderwood mall because the stores were supposed to be giving away candy the weather was kind of iffy that night with lots of rain so i thought we better preload the buckets in case we got rained out unfortunately we got there right at 6 and the trick or treat hours were from 4 to 6 there were still a few places giving away candy though so it was not a total bust and godiva chocolates was even giving candy to moms so i was glad we went i was also impressed with the boys ability to tell fancy candy from regular candy and go right for the good stuff then we arrived home and i handed the boys off to dad for trick or treating around our neighborhood just as the boys were getting ready to go their friends from down the street came by so they all went together apparently one of the houses in our neighborhood actually had a dj and a dance floor set up in their garage and the boys were going to town dancing to the music when they got to their friends house max reached his hand into the candy bowl and got a scary surprise when it had one of those monster hands that comes out and grabs your hand he shouted at it and called it a stupidhead then it was time to come home and have a late dinner with more kids still coming to the door with all the distractions and candy in a bucket it was not easy to get anyone to focus on dinner so finally we just gave up and sent the kids to bed now we are doling out candy at a rate of 2 pieces a day and judging by what s in the bucket they ve each got enough to last until the end of november on friday we went down to the point defiance zoo in tacoma because the boys hadn t been there before and also because my aunt betsy was in town and we thought she d enjoy a visit highlights of the trip included a territorial display by the resident sumatran tiger complete with peeing on the window and the kids playground the boys can t resist any opportunity to run swing and slide now we are ankle deep in preparations for oleg s birthday which is on monday tomorrow i am trying not to get too crazy but i think that as with max s birthday in march i may have gone a little overboard we re hoping he likes all his presents we got him a scooter of his own but because he s not quite as coordinated as max we got him a three wheel scooter instead of a razor like max has i think he will have more fun with it than if we got him something that would be too hard to ride we also got him some new clothes and pajamas and a wall mount hot wheels track he s got some books coming plus some hot wheels cars i bought candyland and chutes and ladders so we can work on taking turns and following rules social skills that oleg in particular needs to improve and i got him a stuffed rabbit for my baby bunny because whenever he s in trouble he reminds me that he is the baby bunny from the book about the runaway bunny it s too cute oleg s birthday party is going to be on saturday the 10th it s a spider man theme so i got a spider man pinata tablecloth balloons games etc i also ordered a spider man cake from a friend of mine who is starting a cake business she sent me her drawing this morning we will put an action figure on top so i think he will love it i am really excited to be able to support my friend s business because she has been making some really amazing cakes leave a comment posted in uncategorized happy halloween posted on october 31 2012 leave a comment quick post to follow up about maxs parent teacher conference on monday and to post a sneak preview of max s costume while the boys nap it is still early here i had pt conference with max s teacher first thing on monday morning and basically she said that while max is still a little behind grade level he is doing great socially and soaking everything up like a sponge he has been identified as an english language learner but in kindergarten they keep the kids mainstreamed in the regular classrooms she feels he is really picking things up quickly so she has no concerns about him either academically or socially we are really grateful to have such a great kindergarten teacher this year literally if we could have picked the perfect place to have max start school it would have to be this particular school where the principal is an adoptive mom herself via guatemala and where his kindergarten teacher is a former foster mom with a good understanding of attachment and adoption issues not that there have been any real issues with him at school because he tries so hard to learn the rules and abide by them she understands where that trait comes from and agrees with me that it will be nice someday to see him relax in the school setting and show confidence in his ability to do right rather than fear of doing wrong but for now she agrees he is doing great and she has no concerns about his progress we did discuss some difficulties we have had at home around homework and tantrums related to that she said that it is common with most kids this age and given his background not surprising that he is saving all the good stuff for me we just need to make the message that we still have to do things even if they are hard and keep working on ways to help him work through his anxiety frustration about homework so that he can complete the work and learn from it and now here is your obligatory halloween costume pic of max at his kindergarten pumpkin party this morning as you can see he s very pleased with his ability to pin the nose on the witch and here are both boys dressed up and ready to go watch out bad guys leave a comment posted in uncategorized fall fun posted on october 27 2012 leave a comment the last couple of weeks have been kind of crazy lots going on let s start with my husband traveling to germany for a work thing his parents coming to visit pumpkin farm visits and carving of pumpkins fall hikes and more safe to say it has been a busy couple of weeks once upon a time my husband eric traveled for work all the time and in those footloose and fancy free days before kids i often would travel with him to some of the more interesting locales using frequent flyer miles that was how i got to visit frankfurt paris prague bangkok and taipei all in the space of a couple of years then we started getting serious about the adoption and had to save those miles plus eric switched jobs and didn t travel so much so in the last few years since about 2009 trips to russia were kind of the only travel we did and for the first few months we were home eric still wasn t traveling much but now in the last couple of months eric has started to travel a little more we re trying to make it easy on the boys so that they will feel comfortable that if eric leaves they can be sure he will come back this most recent trip to germany for 5 days was the longest he s taken since we ve been home so it was a good chance to see how it affected the boys they handled it pretty well you can tell they are not thrilled but they are not freaking out about it either we tried to liven things up for them by having the grandparents come out in the middle so i think that made things easier although the boys really seem to roll with things pretty well these days so mostly it was a nice for me to know that i could take a break if i needed to and the boys would be in good hands while the grandp...