The Hartland

Another few weeks have flown by. I can hardly keep up with all that has been happening around here but in the interest of posterity, I’m going to maintain my updates. Without further ado, here is what our past few weeks have held……..

Back to school time! Here are some pictures from the kid’s first day back to their respective schools. Neither Jason nor I was able to be present to get them off to school so these photos are courtesy of my father.

Emily started 10th grade, a sophomore (ugh, where does the time go?)

Ella started at the intermediate school in 4th grade

David started at the elementary school in 1st grade

We are not sending Masamo to any type of preschool yet, unless you count the “school of mom”. We were not quite sure he was ready for that type of environment yet, and as he is to turn four in mid-October, we believe the delay will only help him.

We decided to celebrate the event of back to school with a trip to a special ice cream shop nearby called Aglamesis Brothers. I have very fond memories of going to Aglamesis with my family to celebrate special events and it is almost like taking a step back in time. They make their own candy and ice cream, if you take a look at their photos, the ice cream parlor hasn’t changed much since they opened for business in 1908!

Masamo "enjoying" banana chip, he's still slow to eat ice cream, it's COLD!

Jason has had an exciting event happen at his company, American Air Balance, it got it's own office! Jason’s business is an off shoot (in a way) of National Heating and Air and for the past two and a half years he has had his office down in the West End of downtown Cincinnati (a 30-45 minute commute depending on traffic). However, now his office is only 15 minutes away! We went by one weekend to check it out. It’s bare but its AAB’s “home”!

The kids playing in the new office

It was a month overdue but Ella finally had her birthday sleepover with four of her friends from school. We had the girls over the first Friday after school started and got the party started with tye-dying some t-shirts. The girls then played for awhile with our guinea pigs and in Ella’s room. Once it got dark and they had their pj’s on, Jason and I had them go outside for a “glow in the dark” hunt. We had put a number of glow in the dark bracelets, etc outside and the girls had to hunt for them. They had a great time doing this and l think it helped burn off some energy. Once back inside they settled down to watch a movie and eat some popcorn and brownies (YUM)! When the movie was over it was lights out and it took until midnight to get the girls to stop talking and giggling. Actually I was surprised that they quieted down so quickly! Unfortunately they were up again at 7am (YAWN). Ella seemed to have a great time and the girls were so well behaved that I would not hesitate to have any of them over again.

David started his soccer games the weekend before Labor Day. His team won both their Saturday and Sunday games. This really helped bolster the boy’s confidence. David is a better player this year but needs to keep his head in the game, he’s very easily distracted. I can’t say that a lot of the other boys weren't the same way. He played fullback, midfield and forward. They’re probably just trying to find his fit. He does have a lot of endurance so maybe midfield would work. I look forward to seeing how he develops as a player this year.

We had one last hurrah at my parent’s pool the weekend after school started. Seeing how the temperatures were in 90’s, it was a welcome relief! I will try and include some video later, when the blog website isn't acting up!

This past weekend we spent the long weekend at our property in Kentucky, The Land. We didn’t do much of anything except to relax and enjoy the mild afternoons and cool, clear evenings. It was absolutely PERFECT weather for camping!

Emily did not join us, she decided to spend the weekend with a friend and although we missed her, Ella took the opportunity to learn how to drive her larger quad, “Abe”. Ella has been on one of the two smaller quads we have but since Masamo is so excited about riding we’re moving Ella up and onto the larger size quad. We weren’t sure how she’d do having to learn to shift with her left foot and push the gas with her right thumb but in a matter of 10-15 minutes she was zooming around! Jason also took this opportunity to do some more teaching with Masamo on the little quad. We are able to use a sturdy dog leash hooked onto the back of the quad to keep him from any danger. He pushes the gas with his right thumb and lets go to slow down. He’s doing very well and you can tell how much he is concentrating when he is driving his quad. Even when the quad is off and parked Masamo climbs aboard and pretends he’s driving (this is nothing new, he’s been doing it from the start).

I did notice a lot of butterflies this past weekend. I found that they are called “Red Spotted Purple” butterflies. They did not bother us but were easily caught and we had one sipping from a beer can at one point (my camera was too far away to get the picture in time). Next we had one sipping from a popsicle! David even took one for a ride on his quad when it landed there!

Holding my little girl as she fell asleep by the campfire

Masamo relaxing in the hammock with Papaw

Ella spent a large part of the weekend constructing this "nest"

Ella reading a book to her siblings and cousin

Masamo and Mamaw singing "Twinkle, Twinkle" to all the stars above

Masamo

We had our official 6 month visit with the International Adoption Clinic last week and I was excited to hear how far Masamo has come in the past six months. Here is the breakdown…..

He’s grown 2 shoe sizes, 9 pounds in weight but only ½ inch in height. They say he has a “short stature”. He’s at 90th percentile for weight and less than 5th percentile for height. This doesn’t bother us though, he’s as happy as can be!

He is right on target with his language development (in other words he speaks just like a child who is the same age and was born to English speaking parents). They were absolutely amazed at how far he has come in this area. He was scoring anywhere from 33-46 months on all his development assessments. The doctor said either they didn’t do a good evaluation the first time or his progress has just been amazing! I do believe that their first assessment was an accurate picture of Masamo at the time. Currently, he a very bright and happy child. God has blessed us in so many ways through this little guy, it’s just amazing to watch His hand at work.

One recent story I have to share is when he sat down to eat lunch and Emily was sitting down at the same time. Emily bent her head and prayed silently. Masamo, being the helper that he is, decided to tell Emily what she should say in her prayer and started to prompt her with “Thank you for this day….” When Emily finished she let Masamo know that she had been praying “in her head”. Masamo thought about this for a moment and said to Emily, “You pray in your head?” Emily replied “Yes”. “Oh”, said Masamo, “I pray with my face.” Emily and I started to laugh and that got a smile out of him. He loves to make people laugh, his sense of humor is really starting to bloom.

I also took the dive and cut Masamo’s hair this past weekend. I had been reluctant to do so because of the hysterical reaction we had to getting his haircut the last time (his first time with us). But as Jason put it, his hair was looking “fluff-a –licious”. Although I love his curls, the fro was getting a little out of hand. So, despite the fact that these look like mug shots (something I didn't realize until putting together this post), here are Masamo’s before and after photos.