Saturday, February 16, 2013

Where has the time gone?


So, can you guess what we were doing five years ago today???  That's right.  FIVE years ago we arrived home from Ukraine!  Now, it is said that time flies when you're having fun.  I won't say that the time has flown by.  More like it has seemed to stand still during much of the last five years, when we just pray to get through another day.  Yet, looking back, five years IS a long time.  And so much has happened.  When I go back and read the posts and comments from those early days, there are so many funny stories.  And, at the time, just about every one seemed to be a major crisis!  I guess things really don't change that much.  Take today, for instance.  It would have been nice to have some real quality family-time to commemorate this milestone day together.  This is how the day actually went...

Chris:  "I still have this really bad sore throat I've had all week."
Ellen:  "Suck it up."
Matthew:  "I don't feel good.  My stomach hurts and I have a headache."
Ellen:  "You're just trying to get out of going to karate class."
5 hours later at the walk-in clinic:  Chris and Matthew are both diagnosed with strep throat.

While father and son were off seeking medical attention, I pulled out my trusty Ukrainian-American cookbook to make a special meal for the big day.  The stuffed cabbage was super labor-intensive, but much tastier than I was expecting.  Too bad I ended up eating alone, while the others were at the 24-hour CVS getting antibiotics and marked-down Valentine's candy.

That's right.  We had a candy caper at our house that needed to be brought to justice.  For Valentine's Day, Chris and I each bought the other a large heart-shaped box of Russell Stover chocolates.  To my dismay, on Friday morning, two of the highly-desirable caramels were gone from my box!!  Not wanting to take any more chances, I moved my candy to a secured location.  Chris, on the other hand, foolishly left his box on the kitchen table Friday night.  Imagine his outrage this morning when he realized that Thomas had taken SEVEN chocolates!!!  I'm not sure which is more shocking, Thomas stealing all that candy, or Chris making Thomas buy him a new box.  (Even if it was on clearance, it has lace and a rose on the heart-shaped box!!)

So, happy anniversary to us, and thank you to those who still check in at Kelly World once in a while.  The boys are still very much a handful at 8 and 10 years old.  The picture above was taken last summer, the day they received their yellow belts in karate.  We've aged a lot in five years, but we are richly blessed.  As these years tick by, I hope that we will always be able to look back on them and laugh.


Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Second grade strings concert

Tommy performed The Monkey Song and jammed to a few other numbers tonight.  He and Miriam sounded great on violin and looked fabulous!