Two months with us and lots of summer fun!

Time has really gotten away from me! I can't believe I haven't posted before now. Kristen has been home with us for two months now and we just continue to be amazed at her progress and the way she is settling into our family.

Summer is one of my favorite times of year because we do lots of special things and Forrest and Katie are home from school. I was in agony waiting as long as we did for Kristen's travel call, but it really was wonderful timing. It has been great for our family to all be home together for the past two months. We have been able to introduce Kristen to some of our favorite summer things and she enjoys them, too. I think her favorite food is "ic-ee cream!" I just love to hear her ask for it! And she knows exactly what it is, too! She can unfailingly identify it in books or pictures!

I think the question I get asked most often about Kristen is how she is doing with English. First of all I have to say that I think she is doing amazingly well! She calls each of our family members - including the cats ;) - by name. She can almost count to ten (a HUGE accomplishment for her) and her other vocabulary is growing every day. She understands much more of what we say to her than she can say to us at this point. But her Korean speech was very limited, so we are even more happy with her progress.

Now, my little aside about the language! If you have never traveled to an Asian country, or been immersed in the language, I don't think you can understand the difference in the languages. I LOVE languages and am pretty good at figuring out at the least some words, hearing similar root words from English and hearing sentence patterns. But the Korean language truly sounded like a puzzle to me. It was so odd to not be able to make out anything - including where sentences started and stopped. Even learning Kristen's Korean name was hard! I have a great framework to try to fit language into and it was hard for me. Now imagine being 6 years old and thrown into not only a new language but a new world, in almost every way. Considering all this, I am even more amazed at the progress Kristen has made in such a short time.

Here are some picture highlights of our summer so far!

Kristen's first trip to a pool and hotel with us - we had a GREAT time! I love this first picture - she was kicking and splashing and just had a look of joy on her face!


Daddy with Kristen and Daniel - a great water taxi!


Kristen sat in this chair and wanted Daniel to sit with her for a picture - so sweet.


Kristen and Mommy work together to score some SkeeBall points...notice that said SkeeBall is in fact BEHIND us...oops!


This one isn't the best picture of Kristen's face - but again, her smile just melts my heart. She looked for Daddy and Mommy every time that plane came around!


Mommy with her three kids. Wow, everyone is looking at the camera!

Kristen has the sunniest disposition. She fits in with the other kids so well. She really looks up to her big sister - who has already taught her lots of mischief. Katie actually does a great job of teaching Kristen - our last trip to the grocery store, Katie was naming everything and Kristen was repeating after her. Kristen is also more of a "little mommy" to Daniel than Katie is. It is funny to hear her stern little voice telling him no.

We are so glad Kristen is home with us! We have one more month all together and then September and school are coming too soon!