The Lundy 5

We celebrated 3-out-of-5 of our 5-in-1 holiday a day early today. Tomorrow we'll finish up with Allen's birthday and Halloween. But today we celebrated the adoption anniversaries for Matt and Lizzy (9 years) and Josh (14 years).  We went to a fun restaurant for burgers, fries, and milk shakes. Photobomb by Allen. Then we went to Branson Landing to see the fountains (water, fire, light, and music show by the same producers of the Bellagio fountains - which we saw when we hit Vegas in 2010 ).  The boys hit Bass Pro while Lizzy shopped for as long as I could keep up with her.  A yucky, rainy, but fun day!

The shoes were set by the door with care In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there For our Ukrainian tradition in which Josh can still boast Of course his shoe is the biggest, because he wants the most

It's here again. Halloween, Allen's birthday, and Josh, Lizzy, and Matt's Adoption Days!  Even though it was freezing, Allen requested this awesome ice cream cake . Allen was very happy to find a tree stand he's had his eye on! The goats helped assemble it. You walk the top and bottom parts right up the tree. [Flash forward: In the first week after this, Allen got 2 deer and Josh got 1!] And Lizzy made us spooky cookies while we watched It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Can you believe that was from 1966?!

I received my new necklace today from Sunflower Farms & Shop and I LOVE IT!  It says give them roots & wings and it's a great reminder to me of my awesome and sometimes excruciatingly hard job as a mom.  We work very hard on establishing roots, made a little extra challenging as an adoptive family.  And while you might not associate "roots" with "traveling family", you can't get much closer or develop deeper relationships than a family living in a 400 square foot box together 24/7/365.  Our four years traveling together helped us grow much closer than we ever were living in a house.  But as they're getting older (12-14 right now, how did that happen?!), I need to strengthen their wings too.  While I would prefer they stay little and have no need for wings, they refuse to stop growing.  We joke about the 18/30 rule (once they hit 18, they have 30 days to leave), but honestly I can't imagine them not being here.  Alas, they will leave...

Day 1 - Sunday, Oct 14 We were met at the airport by Gregory who took us to the Stemples' home.  (Friends of the Purperos and wonderful people.)  They showed us around Kiev I read that Kiev is 1500 years old.   They were very generous and great!  (Thanks so much!)  Our only pictures we have of them came from the video camera.     Day 2 - Monday, Oct 15 Hello everyone! We're here (in Ukraine) safe and sound.  The plane ride was very uneventful (a little frisking went on though!) Today, we went to the National Adoption Center and looked through books and books of available children of all ages, so very depressing. First, we had one of our MANY waits outside a building :  Then, we had one of our MANY MORE waits inside (both just as cold) :     We read a lot about bringing gifts with us.  Ukrainians are supposedly known for giving/receiving gifts.   They were recommended for the Adoption Center Di...