December Break in Egypt

Our destination for our December break this year was Egypt, and it was definitely a vacation to remember.  We had been advised by several people to take the guided approach to this trip because it can be very frustrating and difficult to get around without.  So this is exactly what we did, and that included 5 star accommodations and elaborate meals - not a bad way to spend Christmas,

Our trip started in Cairo where we visited the pyramids of Giza and the Museum of Antiquities.  It was absolutely fascinating to see how massive the pyramids are - all for just two small rooms inside, one of which is the tomb that the pyramid was created for.  To first view the pyramids, we took a camel ride through the desert.  The girls loved this part.  Taelyn kept talking about how bumpy her camel was, and she would often encourage it to keep moving by yelling "Go, Mickey Mouse, go!"  (Her camel's name was Mickey Mouse.)  Kaelia was very calm on her camel and liked to pet it while saying, "Good boy, camel."

After learning a bit about the history of the pyramids, our guide brought us to a pyramid that we could go inside.  We had to hike up half the pyramid to get to the entrance, and then we had to hunch over and make our way down a long tunnel with a ramp leading to the bottom.  Taelyn walked the entire tunnel by herself, up and down, and Kaelia made it most of the way on her own. By the end, we were sweating and tired, but it was worth it.  Inside the pyramid was two rooms: the first was for deterring tomb robbers by making them think this room was the tomb, and the second room was the tomb where a king was buried.

The museum was fascinating as well.  We got to see many of the items that were included in the tombs with the kings.  Some kings had their grand beds with them as well as jewellery and carriages - all meant for the kings to use in the afterlife according to their beliefs.  The most intriguing part, though, was the mummies.  We got to see several of the mummies of past Pharaohs, including King Ramsies II from the story of Moses in the Bible.  His mummy still had his teeth and hair!

Next on our trip, we took an overnight train to Aswan.  The train was rickety and difficult to sleep on, but it was definitely an adventure, and the girls loved sleeping on it.  Once we arrived in Aswan, we headed over to a gorgeous Movenpick hotel on an island.  Just hours later, our guide met us at the island in a small boat and took us on a boat tour over to a Nubian village.  Here we got off and visited a local Nubian.  Many of the Nubians have pet crocodiles, and this house was no different.  We even got to sit with one of the crocodiles on our laps!  I was terrified, Kaelia wouldn't even go near it, and Justin and Taelyn found the experience exciting.  Taelyn is still talking about how squishy the crocodile was, and Kaelia stills talks about how she was too scared.  After holding the crocodile, we went to a local school in the Nubian village where a teacher took us to a classroom and attempted to teach us parts of the Nubian and Arabic language.  We recited back the alphabet, numbers, and a few phrases, although we didn't really remember any of it later on.  We even got to write our names in Arabic.

The next day, our guide drove us to the High Dam where the Nile River is controlled to prevent flooding and to produce hydroelectric energy.  After that, we boarded the Amarco II where we began our cruise up the Nile River.   The cruise boat was incredible and another excited adventure for the girls.  It was a three night cruise to Luxor with several steps along the way for some excursions of ancient temples.  The temples were unreal.  We thought we would see some hieroglyphic writing, but that is a complete understatement.  Each temple was covered in hieroglyphic pictures from top to bottom on every inch of stone.  Some of the pictures even still have their original color that ancient Egyptians made with natural sources such as indigo.

Our favorite temples of the entire trip were Kom Ombo and Karnak.  The construction of Kom Ombo was such that the length of the temple was built like a megaphone so that when the people were outside and the high priest was inside, his voice was amplified out.  Since they could not see him and could only see the statue of the god, they thought it was the god speaking.  Karnak was a very large temple, with different sections devoted to different ancient kings.  They were all incredibly impressive.

The cruise ended in Luxor.  Aside from the temples, we went to the Valley of the Kings - tombs that were found in the moutainside to detract tomb robbers after many of the puramids had been robbed over the years.  This is actually where King Tut was found, and we had seen all of belongings in the Museum of Antiquities in Cairo.

After one night in a hotel, a driver took us across the desert to Hurghada Beach, on the Red Sea.  We stayed in the Movenpick Hurghada Resort, a spectacular resort on the beach.  This is where we spent Christmas day.  The hotel even had a kids' Christmas party that night where the girls did some dancing, baking, and eating.  The girls really liked Hurghada and the beach, playground, and pool.

We ended our trip back in Cairo for a day where our guide took us to some more modern buildings (modern meaning AD and not BC).  First, we visited the Citadel of Saladin and the Alabaster mosque, the former from medieval times adn the latter from the 1800s.  Then we went to Coptic Cairo and visited the Church of Abu Serga where Mary, Joseph, and Jesus are believed to have rested during their travels in Egypt.  Nothing but a single pillar remains from the original church, but we did glimpse the resurrected crypt below the church where the family rested.

Egypt was a unique trip that we will never forget.  For more detailed information, please see Justin's write-up on our travel blog.

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Happy Holidays!

We made two Christmas cards this year for the holidays.  The first one is printable, and the second one is animated at the link at the bottom of this post.  Enjoy!

CLICK BELOW TO VIEW THE ANIMATED CARD:
http://www.jibjab.com/view/94WR1JGo3zACIVVE1UZ0

Kaelia - 21/2 Years Old

Kaelia turned 2 1/2 on 12/12/12 this year - the last date duplicate for the next 88 years.  And Kaelia has the potential to be alive for that next occurrence on 01/01/2101.  For the time being, however, the last six months of Kaelia's life have been really fun.  She is now bursting with individuality and personality.

One activity that Kaelia has started doing is role-playing where she acts out a scenario that she has seen in life or in movies.  She learned how to put on her own athletic shoes and immediately wanted to wear one of our running watches so she could go for a run.  She will wear the shoes and watch as she runs all throughout the house, taking the occasional break to wipe away some swear and then continue on.  This usually happens for about -10 minutes.

Kaelia also LOVES the Disney movie, Tangled, and re-enacts a scene where the mother is brushing Rapunzel's hair.  After her bathtime just before bed, Kaelia sings the song from the movie as she gets her hair brushed and asks if she can go outside.  Then it is our turn to say that outside is a very dangerous place and that she must never leave the tower.  Kaelia also loves to switch roles and say the reverse lines as she brushes our hair.

Kaelia's most recent activity just started a few days ago when she learned how to cross her eyes (she learned this completely on her own and ran over to show us).  She will look at us very seriously and then roll only one of her eyes inward.  This often happens when we are trying to get her to do something serious like go to bed at night.  But when we try to enforce bedtime, we all end up in hysterics as Kaelia rolls her eye.

Cognitively, Kaelia has been working on her numbers, shapes, colors, and letters.  She can count up to 15, knows all of the basic colors and shapes, and can identify many letters - especially the ones that begin family and friends' names.  Whenever she sees a T, she yells out "T for Taelyn," and the same things happens for S (Sarah), J (Justin), M (Maria - our nanny), and A (Arianna - her closest friend).

Physically, Kaelia is now 22 lbs. and 34.5 inches tall.  She is pretty small for her age, so we like to call her our skinny Minnie.

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'Tis the Season

Over the last few weeks, we have been getting in to the Christmas spirit and gearing up for the big day when Santa comes to town.  The preparation started by putting up the tree just after Thanksgiving.  The girls were eager to help and did a great job with it.  This is the first year that they both were able to decorate the tree without any help.  I, of course decorated with them, but they independently put their own ornaments up.  Taelyn stuck to the left side of the tree while Kaelia was on the right, so it is pretty cute to see how there are two big clumps of ornaments all together on both the right and left sides.

The girls and I also joined our good friends for some Christmas cooking decorating.  We went over to Arianna's house (she is the girls' best friend) where the girls rolled out their own cookie dough, used the cookie cutters, and then decorated the sugar cookies when they were ready.  The funniest part of the day was that they girls took breaks in between cooking-making to go swim in the pool.  It's really weird to be swimming during the Christmas season, but it definitely was fun!

This past week, the girls also had a chance to visit Santa Claus at the mall.  They were both so excited but also quite shy.  This was the first year that Taelyn finally got the nerve to sit on Santa's lap.  She had a huge smile on her face the entire time.  And even though she has been talking non-stop about how she wants a dollhouse from Santa for Christmas, when he asked her the big question, she froze and said she wanted a pink teddy bear.  We have no idea where this new gift came from because she has never talked about a pink teddy bear, nor does she want one.  Kaelia, on the other hand, was not quite ready for the trip up to Santa's lap.  While Taelyn was sitting with Santa, Kaelia was hiding behind our shopping cart.  Eventually, Taelyn tried to convince her to see Santa, but Kaelia was definitely not ready and got pretty mad at Taelyn's attempt.  I finally put the girls in the cart to leave, and Kaelia immediately ducked down inside the cart to hide from Santa, but then made little peeks here and there to see him.  The only picture I was able to capture with her and Santa was of her in the cart and Santa in the background.  The whole experience was exciting for her nontheless, and both girls could not stop talking about how they saw Santa Claus.

To add to the excitement, the girls just received email video messages from Santa this week.  You can view them at the links below.

Click here for Kaelia's video

Kaelia's Reaction

Click here for Taelyn's video 

Taelyn's Reaction

"I can swim!"

After over a year of trying to get Taelyn to swim with arm floaties, she finally tried them out and learned what all the fuss is about.  Taelyn has recently been attempting to use her floaties in the pool over the past few weeks, but has been scared to go in to the deep end.  But with a little assistance from her daddy, she just discovered that she will not, in fact, sink with floaties on and absolutely loves to swim in the deep end now.  This video is of the first time that she went in the deep end and realized that she will not sink.

WADDLE!

One of the girls' all-time favorite books to read before bed is WADDLE! that they got from their Aunt Katie and Uncle Brad.  The girls act out each page and then run away when we get to the last page because the alligator is going to get them.  They also like to "read" the letters in "WADDLE!" before starting the book.  Here is an example of what they do every time they read the book.

Little Ballerina

Taelyn had her first dance recital a couple of weeks ago, and she was so excited for it!  Justin and I took the morning off of work to go and watch, along with Kaelia and our nanny, Maria.  When arrived, all of the dancers were sitting together in the staging area, but I couldn't find Taelyn any where.  I just figured the dancers were a different class of dancers.  Then a little girl ran over towards me, and there was my Taelyn all grown up with make-up patterns around her eyes and jewels.  She was one of the dancers that we saw, but I completely did not recognize her at first.

The actual recital was absolutely adorable.  Taelyn was very focused to make sure she was doing the dances correctly and then started to really open up when the dances entitled imaginative play.  One dance involved ribbons while another included a baby doll.

Taelyn was also happy to have her sister at the recital.  At one point, Kaelia was sitting in the back of the audience's section.  Taelyn looked over at me and mouthed the words, "Where's Kaelia?"  She was relieved to see her back up front with me a little later.  And at the end of the show, Kaelia gave her sister a big hug and told her "Good job."

We are so proud of our big girl, and Taelyn can't wait until dance class starts up again in January.

Funny Things Kids Say

Here are the Top 5 funniest things that the girls have said over that past few weeks.

5. (We call this one the Disney princess medley)
Taelyn: Come on, let's dance at the ball!  (Taelyn and Kaelia dance together at the ball from Cinderella) Oh, I have to go!
Kaelia: When I see you again?
Taelyn: Oh, never, never! (our favorite line from Sleeping Beauty when Aurora first runs away from the prince)
Taelyn: Oh no! (falls down and goes to sleep from Snow White as Kaelia runs to her side)  Kiss me awake.
Kaelia: I really like to help you, but I don't kiss frogs! (with her arms folded and an angry look on her face just like in the Princess and the Frog)

4. (Overheard from the shower as the girls were sitting on our bed in the morning)
Taelyn: Kaelia, did you sleep well last night?

Kaelia: Yes, Taenyn.

Taelyn: Ohhhh, I didn’t.  I woke up and saw a BIG spider!

Kaelia: Ohhhh, I woke up and saw a dinosaur!

3. (At the dinner table when Kaelia had not been wearing pants for several hours already)

Sarah - Kaelia, I love your little undies.

Kaelia - (looks down) Huh (huge gasp). Where my pants?!

2. (The girls were fighting over who got to hug mommy first)

Taelyn: Mom, I just want to rip your head right off and hold it all day!

1. (So funny, we had to show a video of it!)

Kaelia's First Haircut

Kaelia got her first hair cut this weekend, and she survived it like a champ.  She was really excited for the endeavor because every time her sister gets her hair cut, she comes home with a sucker and a balloon.  Kaelia soon realized, however, that there is much more to getting a hair cut than goodies.

I took Kaelia to our favorite kids place called Kiddo Kuts where there are TV's at every cutting station, a large TV in the ceiling above the hair washing bins, coloring books and crayons at the waiting table, and a mural of cartoon animals during winter all over the walls.  Kaelia had to first lay back in the washing station to get her hair washed; this was the toughest part of the day because she didn't want to  do it.  So Taelyn came over to show her how, and with tight-clenched fists around my shoulders, she finally laid back and watched The Lorax on the TV above.

After washing, Kaelia sat perfectly still in the hair cutting chair while she continued to watch her movie.  She made the occassional face when she was being prodded and pulled in different directions, but as a whole, she did fantastic.  When the cut was done, Kaelia leaped down from her chair with some cute curls and butterfly clips in her hair.

To top off the experience, Kaelia did get her sucker and balloon as well as a 1st Haircut certificate with clips of her hair attached.

Trick or Treat!

Last night was the official night for trick or treating in a well-known community of our town.  The girls had been waiting for this night for quite some time and were so excited to get their costumes out and wear them.  We purposely did not let them see the costumes until yesterday so that the excitement could climax on our Halloween night.

We started our Halloween preparations at our good friends' house where we had dinner and the girls played with their best friend, Arianna.  The plan was to get into our costumes there and then head over to trick or treating at 5:30pm.  Unfortunately, as the time got nearer, the weather grew dreadful.  By 5:15, it was pouring down with rain with crazy thunder, lighting, and hail.  There was no way we go trick or treating out in that!

So we improvised.  Justin ran out to the store to pick up some candy while I got the girls dressed up.  Taelyn was a bumble bee and bounced around all evening, stinging people with her stinger.  Kaelia was Cinderella and could not get over how beautiful her dress was.  She kept lifting up the sides of her dress, saying "look at my dress!"  She was gorgeous, and Taelyn was hysterical.

When Justin got back from the store, he and our friend, Kris, stood behind various bedroom doors while I took the girls trick or treating from door to door.  All three of them did an excellent job saying "trick or treat" and "thank you" afterward.  They had a wonderful time and were perfectly content with their trick or treating experience indoors.

Taelyn introduces herself to all of the new characters in the room.

Victoria Falls

For our October holiday this year,we traveled up to Victoria Falls, one of the largest waterfalls in the world.  The vacation was filled with good family outings combined with some extreme adventure.  We started the trip with a flight to Zambia and a short drive up to the border of Zimbabwe where we spent most of our time.  After purchasing visas, we made our way to the Victoria Falls Restcamp and began to book all of our excursions.

The first full day was spent on a safari in Botswana at the Chobe National Park.  We started in a boat on the Chobe River - an experience that we have never had during a safari yet.  It was amazing to see the animals from this perspective.  We saw lots of hippos (in and out of the water) and crocodiles.  The girls especially liked the crocodiles.  We also saw many water buffaloes and more elephants in one place that we have ever witnessed  before.  Hundreds and hundreds of elephants were packed together at the river.  We even saw a large group of them cross the river to the other side.  As they stepped in to the river, the elephants held on to one another, trunk to tail.  When the baby elephants did this, they completely emerged under water and could not be seen again until they made it to the other side.  After about three hours on the river, we went back to land for lunch followed by a game drive alongside the river.  Here we saw many of the same animals but from the land perspective.

During the next day, the girls stayed back with a baby-sitter at the Restcamp while Justin and I went white water rafting.  This was an experience that we will never forget.  We first had to hike down a very rocky path to the bottom of the falls where we awaited our fate on the Zambezi River.  There were a total of 19 rapids to overcome, and as long as our boat worked together as a team to paddle and listen to the guide, all 19 should go smoothly.  Unfortunately, we ended up in boat with no one else that had rafted before.  We're not even sure they knew what they were signing up for because very few people in our boat even wanted to paddle at all.  This was bad news for any of us that planned on working hard to stay in the boat.  Needless to say, when we entered our first class 5 rapid, there was no hope at all.  We immediately were tossed out of the boat, and this was the scariest experience I have ever had.  I was pushed under rapid after rapid without a chance to come up for air.  Any time I reached the surface, I was pushed straight back down without the chance to take a deep breath.  I thought for sure I was going to drown, when I finally reached the surface and stayed there.  A kayaker picked me up and brought me back to another boat while we all waited for someone to fetch our capsized boat and bring it back to us.  Justin was picked up by another boat during this time and came out without any physical or emotional damages.  When everyone from our boat finally sat back in to our original boat, someone mentioned how she saw a crocodile in the river during our fall!

The next class 5 rapid did not get much better.  One of the leaders in the boat actually started paddling backwards going in to the rapid when the guide was screaming "hard forward!"  Once again, we were hopeless as a boat and ended up in the water again.  The fall was not nearly as bad this time, but morale was very low in our boat.  We needed to survive a rapid, so Justin took the lead along with another guy that was not a huge athlete nor had any rafting experience, but he was willing to work hard and lead.  This defintely improved our rafting abilities, and we did make it through most of the rapids that were left, but there was nothing we could do about the people that did not want to paddle.  There were times where Justin, I, and this other guy were the only three of the eight people in the boat that were paddling at all.  It was so frustrating. 

Just when we thought we were going to reach the end, rapid #18 was another class 5.  We went in to the rapid determined not to fall, but again, it was not our fate.  Our boat practically bent in half and the top side flipped backwards.  This was Justin's worse fall.  As one of the leaders, he fell backward and over everyone else in the boat.  His knee ended up hitting something hard (perhaps another person's tooth), and his is still concerned that it might be injured.  It also did not help that once we finished the rafting, we had to hike up to the top of the ravine, but we both made it and survived the 19 rapids and 4 capsizes.

The next day of our trip was a lot more low-key as our family took a little hike and visited the waterfalls.  They were enormous and beautiful, and the girls were really excited to finally see the Vic Falls that we have been talking about for a while now.  Taelyn learned all about how some things are for kids and some things are not as she realized that she can't get too close to the edge or raft the river at the bottom.  Kaelia discovered that she loves some waterfalls but not the ones that get her wet.  She did not like getting in close to the parts that were spraying water every where and would not stop talking about it.  Even when we reached the end where everything was dry, she pointed over to the rainy area and said "other waterfalls get me wet!"  The hike was also a good experience for the girls.  Taelyn held the guides hand through some of the paths until she had to make a stop to swing on the "Tarzan" vines.

We had a pretty down day next in our trip while we walked around town and spent a while at the pool.  But we ended the day with a train ride to a bridge that connects Zimbabwe to Zambia, going across the Zambezi River.  The girls had been talking about the train all week and could not wait to ride it.  They were also equally as excited to get to the bridge because we called it the Tangled bridge from the Disney movie, and Tangled is Kaelia's absolute favorite Disney movie.  (She did understand this time, though, that Maximus the horse would not be on the bridge!)  The train ride was fantastic and came with happy hour drinks and snacks on the train and champagne once we reached the bridge.  During the ride we saw some impala and warthogs as well.

For our final day, we headed back to Zambia to catch a plane back to South Africa.  But before we went to the airport, we made one last stop to Devil's Pool.  Justin and I took turns while one of us stayed back with the kids and the other zoomed off in a small boat to the top of the waterfalls.  Here lies a small pool with a rock wall directly at the edge of the waterfall.  So we jumped on in to the pool and climbed over to the rock wall.  The guide even held our feet while we lay down as if diving in to the falls.  Our photos from the experience look like we Photoshopped ourselves in to a picture of the waterfalls, but it was actually us there!  To end the experience, breakfast was waiting for us behind the pool.

Our trip to Victoria Falls was absolutely amazing!  Check out our photos below.  For the rafting video, I am in the yellow helmet, and Justin is in the front (most of the time to the right except for the second crash).

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Weekend in Drakensburg

We recently had a long weekend off of school, so we decided to head out to the Drakensburg mountains with a new family from the school.  We stayed in a little 4-bedroom cottage up against the mountains that was perfect for our family.  It had a small lake for boating and canoeing, a playground, trails for hiking, a rock pool, and even three donkeys that lived on the resort as the owner's pets.

During our first full day in Drakensburg, we left the resort and took the kids pony-back riding.  The girls absolutely love horses (especially Kaelia) and were pretty excited for this.  The both a had a good time, except that when Taelyn was riding, Kaelia and I looked at all of the other horses in the stable, and she decided that she liked the white horse the best because she thought he has Maximus from the movie Tangled.  So when it was her turn to ride the pony after Taelyn, she got upset that he was not Maximus because he was brown.  Once she got over that, though, she was happy to ride.

The next day, the four of us headed down to the lake to try out the canoes.  After about five seconds of sitting in a canoe altogether, it was obvious that a canoe is just a little to wobbly for four people and two of them little kids.  So we decided to take a row boat out instead, which was still a little wobbly and the girls had to get used to it.  In the beginning, they both held on to the sides like their lived depended on it, but then they relaxed and had a nice time as the ride went on.

Once we finished boating, we tried out the rock pool.  It was a beautiful set of little pools made out of rocks, that trickled down to one another, similar to the small pools that waterfalls make.  Although man-made, it was really neat and the perfect size for the girls.  We thought it was a little chilly to swim, so we didn't come with bathing suits, but the girls didn't care about any of that.  They undressed little by little and were eventually in their diaper and underwear, splashing around.  Taelyn loved to climb that various rocks while Kaelia spent some time "paddling" to Michigan with some leaves to mimic the rowing that she just learned about in the row boats.

Justin and I also had the opportunity to explore the amazing views from the hiking trails.  We ran on various trails each day - one of which ended at a small waterfall.  The rest of the weekend was spent hanging out with our friends and their two children, relaxing, and feeding the donkeys.  The girls really enjoyed this part.  They would grab grass from the ground or carrots from our fridge and take them out to the donkeys several times a day.  One time Taelyn curled her fingers in a little too much instead of laying them flat, and a donkey that was blind accidentally took her finger in with his food.  I had to grab her finger out of his mouth and calm her down.  But afterward, she just laughed the whole thing off and said that she was really silly for sticking her fingers up.  Kaelia also loved the donkeys and visited them quite a bit.  When I was helping Taelyn get ready for  nap time, I turned around and couldn't find Kaelia.  I looked outside and saw her with the donkeys, petting them and saying "good night" and "I love you!"  It was very sweet.

Check out the slideshow below to see some footage of our trip!

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Latest Trends

The girls have really gotten in to some specific trends lately.  The first one is the "Call Me Maybe" song by Carly Rae Jepsen which we heard several times a day on the radio this summer.  At first, I thought the line at the end of the chorus was "So call me baby" (it is actually "call me maybe"), so I started singing the song.  Kaelia stopped me and said, "No, don't call me baby.  Call me Kae-ya!"  From there both girls told me not to call them "baby" and they now love to sing that song.  Here is some footage of the song during bath time.

And here is a classic dance moment that Kaelia has been showing off lately.  We like to call it her Happy Gilmore stride because she prances like this down the hall sometimes.

Taelyn has also discovered how much she loves gymnastics after watching the Olympics.  She likes to pretend that our bed is a balance beam.  Here is her attempt at it.

Fun Friday

Today at school, we celebrated International Day where we were able to bring girls in with us to enjoy the festivities.  We first marched in the Parade of Nations.  Each country that is represented at the school was announced, and while the national anthem was playing, the students and community members that are affiliated with that country marched around the field.  We, of course, stood up when they announced the US and wore our red, white, and blue with pride.  The girls especially liked wavy their USA flags, and Taelyn even commented on how they were just like the flags at Grandma Pepera's house.

After the parade, the girls came up to my classroom where the 8th grade students divided up into different classrooms to enjoy various cultural activities.  In my room, I hosted a proper English tea party, and the girls helped me out with it.  Everyone got dressed up in their proper fancy apparel, made English Breakfast tea and cucumber sandwiches, and then attended the tea party.  It was actually time for the girls to go back home for their naps while the tea party was happening, and Taelyn was devastated that she couldn't finish the party.  They both LOVE having tea parties at home with their tea sets and are experts at how it is done!

To top the day off, we went to Taelyn's school in the evening for her first concert.  Kaelia, Justin, and I sat in the crowd with several of our friends to watch all of the preschool classes come up and sing songs related to an under the sea theme.  When it was time for Taelyn's class, Kaelia saw her sister up on stage and immediately ran up to join her.  This actually happened a couple of times that night, and we had to keep a close watch on her while also trying to video tape.

Taelyn's class sang three songs.  The most memorable was the first one about three blind jellyfish.  They had body movements to go along with the song, and it was very cute.  Taelyn did a great job singing and attempting to keep up with the motions.  At the end of the performance, she was the first one to take a bow before leaving the stage.  She loves to bow, and she practices this quite often at home when she is dressed up as a princess.  She will bow to us and say, "Your Majesty."

We had such a wonderful Friday with our family, and we are so happy that we could take the kids to work with us today and enjoy some memorable moments all day long!

Taelyn's 1st Day of School

Today was the big day... Taelyn had her very first day of school!  She has been waiting for this day for quite some time now, and it definitely lived up to all the excitement.  First, we had to pack her a little snack in her lunch box and get her backpack ready.  Taelyn was eager to get some "school" books from her room to put in to her backpack, but we decided to keep those as home so she could read the books that the school has.

Justin and I took some time off of work to take Taelyn in to school today, and we started with the walk to school at 7:30 this morning.  Taelyn held our hands and talked and talked the entire way.  She kept saying "Maybe we should take the bus.  School is too far away!"  But we made the 600 meter walk without any problems.

Once we got in to the school, Taelyn immediately checked out all of the toys and particularly liked the dress-up clothes and the play kitchen.  When it was time to gather with the other boys and girls, two little girls came up to Taelyn and started holding her hands.  It was precious!  The three T's (Taelyn, Tia, and Tyler) stayed that way for a little while, gave each other little hugs, and then got in line together to enter their class.  They were instant friends!

When it was time to pick Taelyn up from school later on, she told me that she couldn't go yet because she didn't have dance class.  I then explained that dance class is only one day a week (on Wednesdays) and that she will go tomorrow, so there is another first that she is looking forward to.

Once we got back home, I asked her all about her first day of school.  Immediately she told me that kids say naughty things.  Apparently she was crawling out of the sand box during recess and some kids started laughing, saying her bottom was sticking out.  Taelyn thought this was hilarious because she loves to talk about how her "butt is sticking out" all the time when her pants fall down a bit.  And we prepped her ahead of time by telling her that she couldn't talk about her butt at school, but to her surprise, she could and did talk about it!  Taelyn also told me that she was making a funny face and a kid said that was ugly.  We learned today that ugly in South Africa actually means naughty, so I guess the comment wasn't that bad although Taelyn is right: kids do say naughty things!  The final comment that Taelyn mentioned about her first day of school was that she got lady bugs stamped on to her hands because she sang "very well and nicely."  She couldn't remember what songs she sang, but she was very excited about the stamps.

Overall, it was a fantastic first day, and Taelyn got to celebrate with a treat that she made at school: a car made out of candy!  Needless to say, she is eager to go back tomorrow and to try out dance class.

Taelyn's Self-Portrait

This is Taelyn's 1st self-portrait that she drew.  She was actually coloring by herself while we were in Colorado this summer and ran over to us to show us.  She said, "Mom, Dad, look!  I draw Taelyn.  It's me!"  She did a great job adding legs at the bottom and lots of crazy hair on her head.  Then she included eyes, a nose, a mouth, and two arms.  Afterward, she wrote a "T" at the top to show that the picture is herself.

During the same week, Taelyn also wrote her first word.  She was drawing on the sidewalk with chalk, and we asked her to write H and I to spell "Hi."

Our Summer States Side

We had another eventful yet fantastic summer this year in the States.  The trip started in Michigan where we spent some time with our families, and the girls had lots of time to hang out with their grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.  Taelyn did her best to understand who everyone was and where they live, but both girls got names and places mixed up from time to time.  They first saw Aunt Katie and Uncle Joel quite a bit, so for a while, every new female was Aunt Katie, and every new male was Uncle Joel.  Then as the summer progressed and they saw more people, all females became Aunt Brandy or Leah, and all males were Uncle Matty.  By the end of the summer, I think Taelyn at least had it all straight and could probably tell you where each person lives (state and country).

Shortly after returning to the States, Justin and I flew out to California where he competed in the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run.  The race was not without its challenges with 6 hours of rain to start, but Justin ran the absolute perfect race and finished in 23 hours, 13 minutes - well under the 24 hour mark for a belt buckle.  It was an amazing weekend to be a part of.

In the beginning of July, we then flew as an entire family to Colorado to visit some old friends and stay in our hold town, Colorado Springs.  We missed the town instantly and made sure that we saw all of our old favorites: Toddler Time at the library, numerous running trails, Jack Quinn's Pub run, and the award-winning beer guy.  We stayed with our good friends, Leah and Steve, while the girls also got to reconnect with Taelyn's very first friend, Kelsey.  At the end of our stay, we also attended two different weddings - one of which I was the singer during the ceremony.  It was great to see our friends again and to spend some time in our favorite state in the US.

Other highlights of the summer include day trips to various kid-friendly places.  The girls had a blast at Jeeper's, an amusement park for young children inside the mall, and at the wave pool with their Uncle Joel and Grandma and Grandpa Pepera.  They also got to go to Canada to the cottage where they spent most of their time on the beach with Aunt Katie, Aunt Andy, and Grandma Walker.  Taelyn even fell asleep on the beach and took her nap there!  Another highlight was a little fishing trip that the girls had with Grandma and Grandpa Walker where they had their first boating experience.

Although our summers are always hectic and crazy, we had a lovely time and are thankful to see our family and friends again.

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Kaelia - 2 Years

It's hard to believe that two years have gone by already and that Kaelia is such a big girl now.  At two years old, she is 25 lbs. and 33.5 inches tall.  She is an excellent climber, jumper, and runner (although she is not even walking at the moment due to her injury in Germany.  Kaelia loves going to playgrounds where she can practice her motor skills while the swings are her absolute favorite part.  She could swing all day if she had someone willing to push her that long.

One of Kaelia's other favorite activities is to color.  She will sit in front of a coloring book for a good 15-30 minutes coloring independently or with others, and she is actually pretty good at staying inside the lines.  She knows all of the basic colors as well as shapes, and she can count from 1 to 10 on her own.

Kaelia's verbal ability is thriving as always.  She is speaking sentences up to 5 words.  Just the other day Justin put her on his shoulders, and she said, "Look a me, mom, I on top-a Daddy!"  Kaelia can also show a bit of a sense of humor with her words.  She often plays the role of "Angry Cat," a character that she made up to be silly.  She will look at us with the most angry face we have ever seen and start viciously yelling "meow."  Then when she is done, she shows us the happiest smile.  It is definitely entertaining to see her go from happy to sad and vice-verse like the flip of a switch.  The two-year-old phase has brought on some tantrums here and there while her personality is bursting through the seams with happiness, activeness, and joy.

Here are some highlights of the last year.

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Kaelia's 2nd Birthday

Kaelia had a wonderful birthday party today.  It was low-key, held at a small park and playground in Ortonville where Kaelia celebrated the day with her grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.  She was so excited this morning to have her party.  She woke up, clapped her hands, and said "it's my birthday!"

At the party, Kaelia spent quite a bit of time on the swings - her favorite part of playgrounds.  She swung with her cousin, Jacob, with mommy, Aunt Katie, Uncle Joel, Grandpa Walker, and Grandma Pepera (just to name a few).  Another big moment for her is that she started walking again!  Kaelia walked to different play structure and to the various picnic tables for lunch, presents, and cake.  She was incredibly cautious and wobbly, but she is at least getting there.  We are so happy for her.

After some time on the playground, we had lunch and then moved on to opening presents.  This part of the day was exciting for Kaelia but also a bit overwhelming.  She wanted to spend time with each present once she opened it and got upset when it was time to move on to the next present.  Eventually, Taelyn stepped in and "helped" Kaelia open her presents so that Kaelia could keep playing with the last one while the next was was opened.  Some of her gifts were some coloring and sticker books, a purse, Minnie Mouse items, and a piano.

Next came the birthday cake.  Kaelia was very eager for this part of the party.  She picked out a Disney Cars cake in the store a couple of days ago and couldn't wait to eat it.  Everyone sang Happy Birthday, and Kaelia attempted to blow out the candle (and was successful with the help of the wind).  Then Kaelia cut her own piece of birthday cake and finally got to eat her Lightning McQueen!

Kaelia had a lovely time at her party.  After the party was over, Kaelia said "Where'd my birthday party go?  I want my birthday party!"  Thank you to everyone for the thoughts and gifts on her special day.

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Bavarian Germany

On our way back to the US for the summer, we decided to stop over in Germany for a week.  Not only did this split up our awfully long flight, but we got a fantastic vacation out of it.  It was actually one of the best vacations we have ever had.  Germany was incredibly clean, beautiful, and efficient.

To start the trip, we went to Munich for a couple of days where we visited the Dachau concentration camp - the first concentration camp in Germany during the Holocaust.  It is preserved as a memorial and museum and was very sad to see.  Prisoners were once kept in the sleeping chambers with three people to a bunk slot, and they were at times fed only potato skins to eat.  Many prisoners died of starvation.  Now the camp shows room after room of black and white pictures that depict the evils of man in its darkest hours.  A large sign reads in multiple languages, "Never Again," a hope we all share.

While in Munich, we also went to the 1972 Olympic Stadium.  Being huge fans of Steve Prefontaine, it was significantly important for us to see where he ran as well as the site of the horrific terrorists attacks of Black September.  The track was being redone, so we were unable to walk on the track, but we sat in the stands while the kids ran around.  Also on the tour was the pool where Mark Spitz set his records.  Unfortunately, there was very little on the information side.  We left disappointed not seeing more historical items.

With the big cultural sites out of the way, we hit the largest beer hall in Munich, Hofbrauhaus.  With four levels, this beer hall rocks any night of the week.  We feasted on sausages and dark beer while a band played traditional music.  The girls danced in the aisles.  Later that evening, Kaelia was riled up from lack of sleep, climbed half way up a bunk bed ladder, and launched herself off.  We spent the night in the emergency room and returned again the next day because Kaelia refused to walk and screamed bloody murder at being set down.  We carried her for the rest of the trip.

On the way out of town, we rolled the the Theresienwiese, site of Oktoberfest.  While nothing was going on, we vowed to return some day when there is.  It was a few hour drive down to our next stop: Garmisch, in the mountains on the boarder of Austria.  It was our first experience on the autobahn, and we fared well.  The road had high speed limits, but it never felt too fast and we were impressed by the order on the road.  When we arrived, we rolled up the hill to the base of the Zupsptize, the highest peak in Germany.  We went up the cable car at the extravagant price of 50 Euros a person to the top.  From the 3000m summit, we could see into four different countries.  The girls loved playing in the snow at the top because it was the first snow Kaelia has ever seen and Taelyn wasn't old enough to remember her snow encounters.  Taelyn actually took a big chunk of snow back down the mountain and held on to it in a ziplock bag that she slept with during her nap that day.  After the Zugspitze, we ended up in a beer house where everyone of the patrons was dressed in traditional Bavarian garb.

For the next few nights, we crashed in Fussen, also in the southern part of the country.  In an effort to realize a romantic dream, we stayed in the most castle-looking place we could, Hotel Fantasia.  The rooms were very nice, in the center of town, and looked up to an actual castle.  The girls loved the trampoline, Sarah the towers and archways, and Just the large breakfasts.  From here we enjoyed several great runs along parks and rivers and into mountain lakes.  But the main purpose of visiting was to see the famous castles of Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau.  The Neuschwanstein castle is what Disney's Cinderella's castle was modeled off of, so we told the girls that we were going to see Cinderella's castle.  They ran up and down the stairs at this castle, pretending they lost their glass slippers like Cinderella, and Justin and Taelyn danced at the "ball" when we entered the entertainment hall.  Then we took a horse-drawn carriage from the castle back to the parking lot.

Our next stop was Rothenburg ob der Tauber.  This medieval city has been around since before 1000 and some of it has original structures.  We visited the Medieval Crime and Torture Museum and saw many artifacts.  Our favorite was the barrel the drunks had ot wear and the masks for women that were gossips.  There were executioner swords, axes, thumb screws, and iron maiden, and much more.  We went for runs around the walled city, and it felt as if we were in the 1500's.  We ate Scneeballe (snowballs) of dough - sugar and chocolate, famous for the area.  We also visited the Christmas factory which had four levels of crazy holiday cheer.

Our last stop was the small town of Hirschau where we visited a former UNC athlete.  She hosted us in her house and we sampled small-town Germany life, including a few games of shuffleboard.  Our friends from South Africa told the girls before we left for Germany that shuffleboard was called "shuflebrau" (apparently that is not the correct word for shuffleboard, though), so the girls had a great time learning what shuflebrau was.  It was the perfect ending to an amazing trip.

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Running Début

Pre-race game faces as the girls toe the line.

We spent the morning of our Mother's Day at the Jacaranda City Kwaii Challenge where our entire family ran our own races.  Today was actually Kaelia's running début as she ran her first race ever!  She was entered in the 50m Nappy Dash in the under 2 age division while Taelyn ran in the same event but for the 3-4 age division.  Both girls did such a great job and had a fun time.

When the announcer yelled go for Kaelia's race, I grabbed her hand, and we immediately shot up to the front of the pack.  Then Kaelia yanked my hand away and headed straight for the finish line on her own.  Once she saw Justin there, she started walking, but then finished strong after realizing the race was not yet over.  For Taelyn's race, I did not need to hold her hand because she is a pro after having done this last year and only wanted me there for moral support.  Unlike Kaelia's race, Taelyn immediately placed herself in the back of the pack so she could look around and take in the entire experience.  She certainly crossed the finish line with a smile on her face!  The girls left the race completely tired out and with a medal around their necks.

 

Post-Race Celebration!

Prior to the exciting Nappy Dash, Justin and I showed up to run a half-marathon together.  I was originally planning on running the 5K but decided to jump right in to a longer event as a starting point for the next school year when I want to race half-marathons and see what kind of time I can do.  Today was actually my first half-marathon after having my two girls, and I am certainly rusty.  My goal was to run 8:00 pace per mile, and Justin decided to run with me to try to pace me.  Once we started  the race, though, it was quite clear that Justin had a different goal set for me, so the pace was faster from the beginning.  The course was also pretty difficult; at times I felt like I was crawling up the hills.  In the end, I am very glad he was there to push me because I ended up running 7:30 pace (1:38:30) which was my goal for racing next year!  So I guess I'll have to make a new goal now and continue to work my pace down closer to my pre-childbearing days.