Adalin is 4!

Or she was on February 9th... I am still behind on the blogging a little! We were in GA for Adalin's birthday, running from the freezing cold winter in MI. We had a little party with my mom's side of the family that lives down there. Adalin is pictured below with my mom's dad, "Grandpa Haack" who she really bonded with during our visit. My aunt Tammy and uncle Eric and my cousins Rosie and Levi were there for the event as well! Good times!

I can't believe how grown up Adalin is. Her personality is very sweet. She can be demanding and sometimes even bossy. She thinks she is 17 by the way she acts sometimes. Her best friend is her sister, Kira. She loves her baby dolls still and loves to learn about new things. She doesn't take naps anymore! She can write her name and do simple addition and subtraction problems. She has a photographic memory like no body's business and is as cute as can be. Her hair is still blond, though darker than I thought our kids' hair was going to be. She weighs 39 lbs and is 39 inches tall! She shot up to 70th percentile for her height too! (Adam was happy about that.) She is very sweet and compassionate and is always willing to help if someone needs her (as long as she isn't too tired.) :) Happy birthday Buzz!

When we got home from Ga, we had a little princess/Valentines party for her and her friends! I didn't take too many good pics b/c I was running around like a crazy lady, but here are a couple. The party was great. We decorated felt crowns that I sewed (the night before), frosted cupcakes, played duck-duck-goose, ate pizza and cake and ice cream and opened presents!

Church Ball at its Finest

Adam got an elbow to the face playing church ball a few Wednesday nights ago. He came home and said, "I need your help" after only being gone 45 minutes (which is unusual). I looked at his eyelid, split open and bleeding and said, "uh, ok..." He hands me some dermabond (skin superglue) and gives me instructions.

OK, blood and cuts I am OK with. But I was nervous and shaking for some reason. I think it was mostly because I felt bad for Adam. It looked painful. I was about to open the glue when I said, "lets just call someone to help out a little." He didn't object, so I called a neighbor that lives 3 houses down who is an intern at the hospital and in our ward, but they didn't answer. So I called another neighbor, who is also in our ward and almost done with his ER residency. I felt bad calling him. He and his wife have very busy callings in our church and they have 5 boys... they are busy. And it was 10 pm. He came down to our house and said it needed to be stitched up instead of glued b/c it was only a few millimeters above his eyelashes. He personally took Adam into the ER and gave him some stitches! It was one of the nicest things somebody has ever done for us. When I called for some assistance dermabonding, I really didn't expect such a huge favor. It was a blessing.

Here is our friend Brian taking the stitches out. Adam is all healed up now!

Hockeytown Cafe

Elina is a huge hockey fan. She plays hockey too! Seriously! After the Detroit Science Center we headed down to Hockeytown Cafe for dinner. Appropriate.

Adalin in front of the Detroit Tiger.

The year I graduated from HS. I remember watching the final game the night of our senior party on a big screen TV in the hallway of our high school.

The year Adalin was born.

The year I was born.

You know how much $ this jersey is probably worth?

Isn't this picture hilarious?

The Detroit Science Center

When Elina visited, we headed to D-town to the Detroit Science Center. It is always fun to go downtown when company is in town. There were tons of cool things to do there for the kids and some cool things for adults to do too. We saw an underwater adventures IMAX movie as well! Adalin loved the movie, Kira was hungry and tired... given the circumstances, she did really well during the movie too.

Elina!

We have met a lot of wonderful and amazing people so far in this journey called medical school. Elina is one of them. She goes to school with Adam (is in his class) and is doing her rotations in York, PA right now, just as Adam is doing his here in Grand Blanc, MI. When we lived in Kirksville, we hung out with Elina a lot. It all began b/c she is a dog-lover. She asked Adam if she could walk our dogs for us sometime. We said, "Yes, please do!" Then she insisted on babysitting for us, free of charge, so we could have some one on one time every once and a while. She soon became my smoothie-making and baking buddy, my running buddy (on occasion), and a frequent guest in our home for dinner or just to hang out. The Lemon Butter Pound Cake that I make a lot (my MIL's recipe) soon became Elina's favorite cake ever, which I made for her on her birthday. Our entire family loves Elina. We will all be friends forever!

Anyway, Elina missed her "Mormon friends" and came to see us a few weeks ago. (I am really behind on my blogging...) We loved her visit and hope that there are many more to come!

The Post Office

For our little home-preschool group, we took a field trip to the Post Office. We got to go behind the scenes and see everything from the humongous scale that could weigh a small vehicle to how they put mail into the PO boxes. It was so fun!

This is a picture some of the kids with our postmaster.

Adalin (with a silly look on her face) behind all the PO box cubbies.

Adalin and Kayti.
(OK, I LOVE KIRA IN THIS PICTURE. This is so her. Sometimes she makes this squinty face, turns her head to the side and down when she poses for pictures. She is the funniest little girl!)

The Little Ham

Her name is Kira. I am taking a picture of sickly Adalin, passed out in the living room and Kira says, "Take a picture of me too!"

Poor girl

Adalin was just randomly sick a few weeks ago. It only lasted a day or so. I felt bad for her! I was making dinner, Adam was on his way home from "work" and I look over in the living room and Adalin fell asleep on top of our chair cushion. She NEVER just falls asleep, unless she is sick. I had to snap a pic.

Flower Girls

I LOVE matching Adalin and Kira's outfits. They don't match everyday, but when they happen to both have the same outfit clean, I jump on the opportunity. This is before the little hair-cutting episode... I miss Adalin's longer hair. :(

Curiosity killed the mommy

OK, I don't know what my kids deal was today but they drove me crazy with their curious workmanship on each other. First it was ink pens. I hop in the shower and exit 10 minutes later to find 2 girls with ink drawn all over their faces, arms and necks. Then a few hours later I am folding laundry, loving how the girls are playing so nicely with each other in the next room. I go into the hallway and see a big chunk of hair. Adalin's hair. Yep. She cut it, ear length on both sides in the front. Her hair was so cute too. She also took the liberty of cutting Kira's well fought-for hair to the scalp in 3 places. Thanks a lot. We made a trip to the hair salon right after and they tried to do the best they could with Adalin's chop-job. I will post a pic or two of her new dew when I am not so mad about it. :)