June / July Update

I'm pleased to announce that Liam Foster Crowley graduated from preschool on Friday, June 13th, complete with the Pledge of Allegiance and the "Make New Friends" song. All the kids wore white t-shirts that had their classmates handprints on them, so it looked really cool and it's a great keepsake! BTW, the reason I wrote Liam's full name is because that is how he wanted his namecard for his chair to read. Mind you, no other children had all three names on their name cards. I guess that's what he tells everyone his name is at school. :-)

Drew has been engaged in combat in his new 2-year old classroom. The biting started shortly after he switched rooms to be with the older kids. I'm sure it will all work out as we're working with the teachers and director of the center. Drew has had some pretty bad bite marks, too, so I guess it's true what "they" say, "what goes around, comes around". On a positive note, 13 months after being home, he's starting to snuggle and/or let us hold him before bed. Normally, he would just reach for bed without any snuggle time. It's really interesting to realize that after all this time, he is still developing as it relates to showing affection. We're psyched!

We've had a lot of other events take place during June and July. One of the more exciting days was June 21st as this was Drew's "Gotcha" Day, meaning this was the anniversary of the date that Michael and I took legal custody of Drew. We are both astonished that a full year has past since Drew joined the Crowley family; and SO happy we're not going to Russia again! We spent some time with Drew going through all the pictures we have in our albums that were taken when we were in Russia on both trips. He got a kick out of seeing them; he was very interested in viewing each of them although he has no idea what they are!

Liam has been doing really well in swim classes. Man, does it keep us busy with class on M, W, F at 6:45pm, but it's so worth it to have him feel more confident in the pool. He loves to practice swimming, so he can tell his teacher that he practiced (he has a crush on her) and he loves to dive for toys. Drew has also become quite fond of the pool and doesn't seem to have any fear about it; this is problematic.

We've had a few visits to Grandma Kia's house, one of them was to visit with her sister, Aunt GeeGee and Uncle Robert. We had a great time and the kids played in the slip 'n slide and small pool. Both Gee and Robert look great and it was fun to see them given it's been a long while. We were also lucky to have a visit by Liz's cousins, Peter and Sara and their kids. We all had a great time and enjoyed the beautiful day.

Over the 4th of July, we continued our busy streak. We celebrated the 4th by going to our hometown parade. This was the first time Drew went as last year Michael took him to meet Grandpa Pops and Grandma Patty. We were so lucky to get an amazing parking spot and sat our chairs down right by some friends who had saved some spots the night before. Drew LOVED the parade; if Daddy wasn't holding him, he was sitting intently in his little chair. We all really enjoyed the parade (although very loooooong) and will definitely go back to the same spot next year. On the 5th, we were invited to go to a 4th celebration at a local country club with one of Liam's schoolmates. What a great time! They had all the BBQ food you could think of, but more importantly, they had a bounce house, huge slide and tons of fun, carnival like games for the kids. It was really fun! We had dinner, played in the play area and then set out our blankets on the golf course and had our own private fireworks show. This was the first time both Liam and Drew have ever seen fireworks. They both wanted to sit in our laps, but I really think Drew enjoyed the show. Liam on the other hand was quite clear that he did not like them at all. :-( Poor guy was scared, but sat squarely in Dad's lap for safety. :-)

On a sad note, Michael's Grandma Buelah passed away earlier this week. He was down in Santa Monica yesterday for the burial and today the family drove to the area that Buelah lived for a service. We are looking forward to Michael coming home so we can all give him a BIG hug.

And tonight, Liam, Drew and I are heading to the Oakland A's baseball game. Unfortunately, Michael can't come, but we're going to go anyway as we were given tickets. Another Liam-schoolmate-event, so it will be fun...we'll just have to see how little Drew does. :-0

All for now, I hope everyone is well.

Take care!

P.S. I hope to post some pics of graduation soon...and maybe even pics from last August. Who knows!