Just An Ordinary Day

The weather is wonderful here, these days... so we're spending lots of time outside. Our dog Tom's pretty excited about all the extra company. David doesn't seem to mind hanging out with Tom, either.

Timothy has the greatest giggle.  I wish you could hear it from a picture.  I think you almost can...  He was getting a kick out of peeking in the office windows with Karen.  Someone on the inside saw him looking, so they pressed their face up against the window when he peeked in.  That set him off in a fit of laughter.  Which of course is more contagious than the common cold. 

Jayce and Josiah are hanging out upstairs on a blanket, soaking in some sun.  They're a couple of adorable little guys... and now we have even more babies around here!  It's so much fun to watch them change before our eyes.

Annabelle is one of our newest arrivals.  She's almost 2 years old, and when she arrived, she was completely non-verbal.  But that was last week.  Now she's saying "momma" and "eat."  Joshua, her roommate, is trying to get her to call him "big brother."  So far she hasn't done it.  He's pretty disappointed.  We trust he'll have her chatting up a storm in no time.  Or, on second thought, she'll just get an earful from him.

Funny side story about Joshua... he's taken to addressing groups of his peers as "Children!" (hai ze men).  It's really a Chinese word that grown-ups use when addressing a large group of children.  Joshua doesn't think it applies to him.

But, we're not convinced that Joshua doesn't belong in the group of "hai ze men."  After all, look at his reaction to a praying mantis that someone put on his scooter.  For the sake of the praying mantis' livelihood, we moved him before Joshua could get violent with his fear.  But not before we snapped this picture.  Evidently he still has some "child" left in him after all.  :)

The other boys weren't so bothered by the praying mantis.  Donovan, Ethan, and Vincent just liked watching him.  We distracted them before they got bored enough to see what would happen if they tried to "pet" him or "play" with him too hard.  So no worries, no praying mantis' were harmed in the making of these pictures.

But maybe Joshua's "I'm a big boy" self confidence was... just a little.  :)