What a wonderful year 2007 has been! We have been busy taking trips, getting our bathroom beautifully remodeled and doing lots of fun activities. Liam, Sahali and Kiara (in that order) learned to ride bikes this spring and love going on bike rides on the river path to the park and mall. This summer we spent almost every weekend away, camping, going to the coast, Portland, Seattle and spending a very special week traveling with our extended family in Sunriver, Grandma Eshkie, Grandpa Jerry, Aunt Charlotte, Uncle Jerry and the Cousins, Michael, Jill, Emily and Mia. My girls loved meeting their cousins, Emily and Mia and can’t wait to spend more time with them.
Sahali, 8, loves third grade and her new teacher. She is excelling in her reading, and enjoying learning about pioneers and the human skeleton. She will also be in a play at the Hult Center this year. She has played softball, soccer, and now basketball. She loves spending time with friends, reading, riding her bike and playing and collecting webkinz. Her favorites of 2007:
Dinner: Burritos
Dessert: Chocolate Oreo ice cream
Animal: Horse
Trip: Going to Sunriver with the cousins
Color: Blue and Green
Sport: Basketball and Baseball
Song: Hannah Montana Nobodies perfect
Movie: High School Musical 2
Thing to do: Spending time with my family
Wants to do in 2008: Go horseback riding!
Kiara, 7, is enjoying second grade and has made many wonderful friends. She is a very good student and is doing great in all her subjects. She loves to sing and dance. She was in the Winter Choir and took a flamenco dance class in the fall. I am trying to encourage her to take a hip-hop class and pursue her other interests. She loves playing with friends, riding her bike, playing webkinz and singing and dancing to High School Musical. Her favorites of 2007:
Dinner: Spaghetti
Dessert: Chocolate ice cream
Animal: All of them
Trip: Portland to visit the zoo and friends
Color: Blue
Sport: Dancing
Song: You are the Music in Me
Movie: High School Musical 2
Thing to do: Play with friends at school
Wants to do in 2008: Go to Disney World
Liam, 5, started kindergarten and loves learning to read and write as well as play on the playground. He is excellent in math and enjoys writing numbers and doing math problems. He has many friends in his class and has had numerous play dates. He started playing soccer in the fall and is an amazing athlete, scoring loads of goals. It is so much fun to watch him play! He loves to wrestle with friends, play the pillow dodge game with dad, ride bikes and play computer games. His favorites of 2007:
Dinner: Stroganoff
Dessert: Mint chip ice cream
Animal: Frog
Trip: Camping with friends
Color: Green and yellow
Sport: soccer and football
Song: Hot cross buns
Movie: Shrek the third
Thing to do: Play with friends
Wants to do in 2008: He would like to get his World of Warcraft paladin to level 70.
My sweet and feisty Ella, 13 months, has been such a joy. I love spending special time with her when the older kids are at school. We often go to the library for story time, run errands, and I spend a lot of time chasing after her cleaning up all the messes she makes. She is such a wonderful little girl and I can’t believe how quickly she is growing. We all love her so much and are blessed to see her beautiful smiles and feel her wonderful hugs and kisses. She is constantly making us laugh and loves dancing, I have never seen a 1 year old dance the way she does, it is amazing. She loves listening to music and can’t help but move her body, she also likes playing our electronic keyboard with her butt!
Our Ella favorites of 2007:
Sahali: She is so cute!
Kiara: Her cheesy face!
Liam: Her cheese face!
Gary: Every day I come home from work she runs to me smiling. All the days stress melts away, priceless.
Katya: I love her cheesy face, eyelash kisses and her wonderful cuddly hugs and waking up to her beautiful, smiling face every morning.
Gary continues to love his work at Real Pro Systems. They moved their office to the top floor of the black buildings near Valley River Center. He has a great view and loves looking out and seeing all the wildlife near the river. He has been riding his bike to work everyday, rain or shine. He continues to design at work but spends most of his time collecting foam objects to throw at his buddies at work. He breaks up the day by going to the movies for lunch as often as he can. He is wonderful with all the kids and enjoys doing all the activities. I love that he is so supportive of me and is always encouraging me to have free time in the evening and on the weekends.
I had such a wonderful year, spending time with my family and friends. I feel so lucky to be able to be such a big part of my children’s lives as well as pursue my own personal goals. I volunteer at school twice a month and go on all the field trips the kids take. I am very busy shuttling them to all their practices and play dates as well as relying on my wonderful friends for carpooling. I love my dear friends and have enjoyed many fun weekends away this year to the coast, Portland and Sunriver! I love going out to dinner, coffee every Wednesday morning, shopping, movies, scrapbooking and to the bookstore. I have also finished my 150 hours of real estate coursework and look forward to taking the licensing exam and pursuing my dream to become a real estate agent. I am very excited and look forward to seeing where this will take me!