Christmas eve and day

We spent Christmas Eve with my family. I really loved the energy and excitement we had there and of course the food. It was a very relaxed and special evening. We were tracking Santa the whole evening on the internet and close to 9pm we left so Santa could make an appearance at our house. My parents spoiled us as usual and we thank them dearly for the presents and all they do for us continually. Love them to pieces. 

I love that we captured Dacian's sweet smiles and pure joy. My dad played Santa (just look at the presents he's holding) I also really love the vest my mom knitted for Dacian. He was delighted to wear it and I was so excited that my son has such a cute thing to wear. My mom put a lot of time into making that. Thanks mommy.

Miss Lavi got the cutest dress in the universe and also a Madeline doll. What a fun evening. I am so glad we opened my parents' presents to us that night and that way the kids paid full attention to those presents and didn't get drowned in too much stuff all at once. 

We hurried home after we ate and opened presents at my mom and dad's house and put the kids to bed. We had a hard time putting Dacian to bed who of course was too excited to sleep. Finally since Santa can only come while kids are sleeping he decided it was time to go to bed. Phew! 

Then the wrapping and the putting together of the bike and the mini kitchen began. I was so tired and still had so much to do. Plus the next morning we invited a family for lunch at 1pm. The little kitchen was a pain to put together if you can believe that and that was a present from my parents but we hid the box at our house. I love how little it is and how I can put it next to my kitchen and the kids can play while I cook. I think it will be used a lot and even though small it will serve its purpose well. :) 

Picture below is taken right after Santa came. It was a fun night wrapping and putting stuff together with Shane, listening to Christmas music, talking and just having fun just the two of us. I love having Christmas at my house, and I love just us in the morning. I am fine with guests later on but there is nothing like waking up in your own home and spending the special moments of Christmas morning all to ourselves. I had the best of both worlds this Christmas. Thankfully I have a job that allows me time off during the Holidays otherwise I don't know how I would manage everything. 

Well this post is getting too long and it's a little late but I will be back with more pictures and more ramblings soon. I feel blessed and I have peace in my heart and I wish you all the best in the new year to come. May all your wishes come true. 

Love, Maddy

Merry Christmas! 2010

Well, of course another month flew by.
I am not very happy that I can't convince my husband to get a haircut so thus far no family picture. I am going to take one of the kids but that's a challenge since Lavinia objects to anything that has to do with pictures. If I remember right Dacian did this too when he was TWO.
Anyway, here's a few photos I took recently.
Love my house at Christmas especially since we finally bought our tree.
Anyway, we wish you all a Merry Christmas, may Santa bring you lots of goodies and may you remember the special reason for the Holiday.
Love you all.

I have been having a little fun with my camera yesterday and here are some I like. I love how different things look with all the options a DSLR has.  If only I can really learn to master it now. Long way to go but it's a fun hobby to have and learn more about. No edits, that would probably help my pics some but I am too lazy right now. :)

I finally realized how to have all those pretty out of focus lights.

I wanted to show you all my sweet nativity. My sweet friend Holly gifted this to me a few years back and I just love it. She made the baby Jesus wrapped in swaddles in a crib with hay and Mary and Joseph. I have the other figures from a different small nativity. No big one to show you but this totally does it for me. Thank you again Holly. I think they are adorable. 

And here's my little model who was sweet enough to let me take lots of photos of him and I still haven't gotten a decent one. It's kind of blurry but I liked his sweet face in this one the best. 

I love Santa! ... and some thoughts

I have heard from many friends that they are so against Santa because they say he takes away from having a Christlike Christmas. I never felt that was the case and just thinking about banishing Santa so my kids can only think of Christ made me sad. Why not have both? Sure, everything is so commercial now but I think the fun of it comes from trying to make the holiday special and non commercial; thinking up ways to avoid falling in the I WANT this and that and instead of thinking of the importance of what this holiday actually celebrates. I most definitely don't want to spoil my kids rotten and will do all in my power to live and have a Christmas with meaning.  I hope to teach them about being giving and sweet and most importantly celebrating Jesus's birth, the most important gift God gave us all.
Santa is a not a bad thing. Maybe there are people that don't believe in anything and just do Santa because that's better than doing nothing but having both didn't ever hurt anyone. (in my humble opinion of course)
Recently as I was thinking about this a friend wrote this post.
I think it's worth a read and she beautifully wrote what I too think. I am going to use her letter when it's time later on for my own kids.
I want to hear my kids' thoughts on this magical person, I want to see their excitement, I want them to live the magic. I know that in a year or two my kids will talk about staying up to catch Santa and I can't wait to hear their conversations on the subject.  If you think about it kids don't believe in Santa that long anyway so why take it away from them?  I think they will learn and understand more about Jesus when they are older.

Isn't this Santa so cute? He grows out his beard and plays Santa beautifully. He comes to our church for all the kids to see him and have their picture taken with him. I just love how Dacian was so serious about showing Santa what he wanted. I love that I captured both of them looking at the magazine. Cute!

And now shifting gears a little; a few thoughts on this special season. I am starting to stop stressing over the holidays. I always stress this time of year and I have in years past dreaded Christmas. Why? Because it became a chore, expensive, too rushed of a holiday. But as I pause to think about what we are celebrating little by little the stress dissipates and the joy comes back.
I wish we all take time to slow down and think about Christ, think about how he is the perfect example of a humble and loving person and how as son of God he was born in the most uncomfortable of places.
This season my heart turns to my best friend who lost her mom and aunt within a month of each other, who is going through a rough time and I hope that because of her belief in God she will feel comforted and most importantly feel loved. I sure do love her dearly.
Last Christmas we were not doing very well financially that I was wondering if I could afford even a nice meal for our family. Of course I didn't tell anyone about this and we did manage to have a nice, quiet evening with some good (bought well in advance thank Goodness) turkey and potatoes and more. I wasn't very happy I have to admit, mostly because I had lost perspective of what was important here; I was being jealous of what others might have had, or what great food they must've had etc. (food is one thing that makes me happy in life and I don't know how to change that since I seriously need to lose weight) Silly but that's how I felt and now I feel bad that I wasn't happier because truly life wasn't that bad. I was ungrateful but hopefully that was a lesson learned. Surely other people with less knew how to be happier, they had a much better perspective than mine was.
But seriously what I went through is nothing in comparison to what others go through. I have so much more than I truly need. This year we are doing better financially and I hope I can make someone else happier a little. Thinking more about Christ I feel so much less concerned about me and more about others.
 I read in a book recently how one family "adopted" another less fortunate one and involved their own  kids in the shopping of presents. This helped the family focus on someone else, brought them joy to think of this family they were buying for. The kids in the family also learned a lot from this experience and the focus moved to this poor family, to loving them and thinking of others more than about their own wishes.  This more unfortunate family truly was happy to receive ANYTHING. They were so grateful. The little girl in the family brought the man who gave her the fun gifts to her room to show him the tree she had in her room. She told him with delight in her voice to come look at her beautiful tree. Guess what it was? It was a string of green lights taped to the wall in the form of a tree. She was so happy and to her that was more than enough. So I sat there reading that and the waterworks came.
I want to raise kids who are grateful (a little hard to do it; seems the world revolves around them-pretty typical for their ages but I hope they don't remain like that), kind, giving, and loving. I cannot wait until they grow a little older so I can take them out shopping for others too.

(the "Santa" had a fun gathering at his house the day he lit up all the lights. It was so fun to go there and kind of have him all to ourselves since we arrived later after most people had left. This family is just so fun and amazing. We used to be in the same ward a few years back. Everything was decorated with pretty lights and he had cookies and hot drinks for everyone, they sang and the gave out some Christmas movies and had the missionaries there. Fun event for the neighbors too. I guess they do this every year. What a fun tradition!)

Well, it's pretty late so enough of my thoughts for now.
Much love,
Maddy

A post long overdue

This year's celebrations for my birthday and Lavinia's birthday were quite big. Mostly because I decided it's time for a party at our house. This year I got the flu right on my b-day and I was super sick and miserable. Two days later on Lavi's birthday she had a fever as well. So I had a birthday celebration on Sunday and we did get better by then. 

On the day of Lavi's birthday my parents came over to give her a present and also they brought the most delicious dish ever. See the picture that has a two on it? Guess what? It's Brussels sprout with chicken dish and the 2 is made out of sour cream. I was too sick to cook and I am glad they brought this over because it was heavenly. My mom got inspired from some other dish and made this kind of her own. I definitely will try to make this. Shane almost wanted to eat the whole thing himself. Anyway, kind of funny to stick a candle in a not so sweet desert like dish. 

Also here I am taking all these pictures when I realize I only have one candle in instead of two. Silly mommy. Oh well...

After food came the presents. Miss Lav was so excited to open her presents. She got this pretty dress from my parents and was super happy to exchange her totally mismatched pajamas for this princess dress. It was hard to take it off to say the least when it was time for bed. We got her a baby doll and she has been pretty attached to this baby. She has a binkie that attaches to the baby's mouth with magnets. I also love that pretty much first thing she did with that doll was to put her on the potty. Why oh why can't she do the same? Summer come fast please, I cannot wait to get rid of diapers. 

I guess this is the post of collages. I have too many I like or want to post so this is the easier way to go. We had a lovely party and was glad to have Scott, Candice and their family over and also Kim and her family. It was so much fun. We ate good food of course, mom made the butterfly cake which also was delicious and at the end we played some Minute to Win it games. I needed that. Last year being Lavinia's 1st birthday I mostly did something for her but this year I said I wanted to party and not really do a party with kids. I mean who needs a bunch of 2 year olds running around throwing tantrums every other minute? I mean my very own had a couple to embarrass me well. She was a little shocked I think at the number of people at our house.  

So what other way to celebrate that with a family and friends? Thank you all for coming and for the lovely presents. 

Here's another close up of the cake. 

And here's the TWO year old. Enough said! 

My good friend Cristina sent her this cute dress. Look at that delighted face! Thank you so much Cris. She's a much fashionable little girl. 

 And here we are playing our games. I can't wait to do more fun games like these. I liked it that even the kids got to play and had fun. 

Phew! I was dreading posting this because I had so much to say, lots of pics, editing, etc.
Now I have just a few more from Thanksgiving and our recent snow and I am all caught up.

Lavi, our princess

Ha! Lavinia is so funny. She now wants to wear a million outfits a day. She calls herself princess or ballerina and prefers pink. What happened to my girl who liked cars and trucks only and no dolls. Hmmm, apparently a girl will mostly be a girl no matter if she has a brother for a sibling or not. It's cute how serious she is about things and how much she is a typical 2 year old. She just wants the world to work for her. Right now I left her crying in her room after not giving in to changing her yet again. She has since stopped crying but keeps coming out saying: Bad baby, bad baby, and you guessed right, that baby is her mom in her opinion.
I had no idea clothes are that important this early on since with my son that was NEVER a problem. He never even cared what he wore, I didn't have to make him choose from two outfits let's say. Super easy going in that respect. I think I am in for trouble.
Otherwise what else is new? Hmmm, I am still sick. I got sick on my birthday (the yucky, most miserable flu that kept me in bed all day for two days) and now I just got back from the doctors and found out that I have bronchitis and was put on antibiotics. I can't wait until they kick in because I am in pain from all this coughing. I feel terrible having to come to work to infect everyone but there were no subs available today. Plus it snowed and it's always a big deal in Seattle when that happens, schools may be late or closed all together and our fear was they might close the school day at noon or later and I wouldn't be there to help my co worker through it all. Now we are all thinking they might have to close the schools tomorrow since it's really quite dumping out and it's sticking and it's supposed to snow all night long. The problem in Seattle is that we are not super equipped for bad weather (since it's a once a year event most years) and the city is so super hilly and then you have these icy roads with drivers sliding all over the place. Anyway, I love the snow as long as I am home to play in it (or skiing in the mountains) and not have to drive and worry if I might get hit any second by another driver.
So here's to hoping I stay home tomorrow and mostly, mostly just to start getting better. These kids are super wearing me out and they have all this energy that of course only drains mine and I don't have much left in me.
Also with it being cold they are not so excited to go out for a long time and instead have cabin fever. Feel free to give me some ideas on fun things to do that are free. We have played all the games that we have or so I think. Sorry, this is the sick person in me who almost just wants her kids to disappear for a few days so I can get better. I only have so much patience you know. Hats down to all stay at home moms who have to fill out the days with their little kids ALL THE TIME! Not that I don't wish I could be in the same boat most times. :)
Well, that's it for now. More later. I am too lazy and sick to post pictures so I have to postpone for another time.

Geekiness

I love sci fi shows. Recently Shane and I finished the Battlestar galactica series and I loved it. It was addicting, I couldn't wait to watch all the seasons and since we have Netflix we had them all pretty fast. Well, for my birthday, actually the weekend before my birthday Shane took me and the kids to this new exhibit they had at the EMP (Experience Music Project right next to the Space Needle) They had all these life size models, Charlton Heston, Planet of the Apes stuff, ET, Star Wars, Star Trek, Terminator, Dune, and other stuff. All pretty awesome. I know it's geeky but I love it nonetheless. 

More posts to come with pictures of our other celebrations for mommy and daughter's birthdays. 

Halloween 2010

This Halloween started out in the office. We like to dress up at work and this year we were Mr. Anderson's angels. Mr. Anderson (our principal)was Charlie and blurted things out from his office. I will post pictures as soon as I get it off the card from work.
Saturday night it was our church's Trunk or Treat. There were so many children there, it was super crazy but fun as well. I am so excited the kids' costumes turned out super cute and that we had enough time to actually finish sewing them. Thank you to my great mom who is a great seamstress who just made out the paterns and taught me how to sew better. We made the cape, apron, skirt, vest and Lavinia's hair and then Dacian's whole wolf suit. We ran out of time for my bonnet so we ended up putting a pillow case on my head. I look nothing like an old lady but you get the gist. Shane is missing an ax but otherwise I think he looked the part pretty well.

And here are my parents. Dad sewed his costume last year. I love it!

As soon as I put make up on his he said his nose was super itchy and so we have a nice smeared make up now. Oh well, he still looked pretty cute. 

Lavinia. Sweet. Super. Red. Riding. Hood.

Just a funny wolf really excited to catch and eat Little Red. 

How sweet is this wolf? He was playing the part so well into deceiving Little Red. 

And a silly wolf picture. He was super silly that day and I have lots of pictures with his funny faces but I will stick to this one. 

Here are our pumpkins at night. 

Later in the evening we went out to trick or treat of our neighbors. 

Aren't they so adorable? 

Fall and the latest

Mostly because I am tired  of looking at the last post I decided it's time for a new post and some pictures. I took Dacian out for a fall photo session while Lavinia was napping. It was so gorgeous out, warm and the light was beautiful. I so wish I had friends to visit me so I could show you the beauty of this state. I sometimes feel so friendless. Actually I am pretty friendless. Why is it so hard to make friends? I tend to think it's because we've made life so busy for ourselves there's no time for just hanging out, there's always so much on our to do list. And friendships fall lower on the list. Then I think maybe there's something wrong with me, that I'm just too boring so maybe that's it. I guess I like not to think about that too much. I tend to get depressed quite easily. I have had great days lately however so I  have been quite positive. 

I finished my parenting classes (yay! Loved them but being gone all day until 9pm was a lot harder than I had thought).  We have gone to the fair, gone to the pumkin patch and are almost done sewing the Halloween costumes for the kids. Can't wait to show you the costumes when they are done. If only my kids will pose pretty for me. Lately I've had a heck of a time with one little girl who could care less about mommy trying to capture her cuteness on camera. 

Today it was Shane's birthday and even though he got a very nice (pricey gift) and thought about just keeping it in the family I decided that 35 is a pretty special birthday and he deserved to be with family and friends. So totally last minute I invited fiends and family to Red robin. I love that place. I also got his a cake at Hoffman's (remember the cake he got me last year? Same place) that was so delicious and brought it with us to Red Robin. They brought it out for us and sang and embarrassed Shane a little. It was a fun night. 

The kids were super hyper and that was before desert. I am sure glad they are a kid friendly place. My son has the energy of a whole crowd. It must be that he's a boy. 

Anyway, we love you daddy, hope it was a great day. (Sadly I had no memory cards in the camera. I do have to say I have a hard time taking good pictures inside without a good flash or a tripod so I probably would've ended up with a bunch of blurry pictures anyway. 

This is the view I get in the morning when I leave our neighborhood to go to work. I can't get enough of it. I am sure glad I went to take the photo because just today I saw so many of the leaves fallen out already. Fall comes very quickly around these parts but I can't complain, we've had a beautiful one. I really don't want it to end. 

 Totally SOOC. Love the colors.

 I like this one of my son. Finally I like that he's ditching his cheesy smile. He's so cute, isn't he?

 Just around the corner from us. I loved how that light was just perfect falling on those trees giving them that  wonderful golden light.

Anyone else love fall as much as I do?I know at least one person who is 100% agreeing with me right now. :)

Love and Logic

I got back from my third parenting class. I am fascinated by the new techniques I have learned. They make so much sense yet boy it's not so easy to dive in and actually do it.  Maybe it's because I've been doing my own, kind of taking it by the day parenting for too long. I get mad too easily and I realized how little patience I have and how much more I have to learn to calm down so that I am good parent. We were told to take it easy with implementing what we learn and not to do it all at once. I realized that I have to have a plan of attack and rehearse what I would be saying should he/she misbehave. It helps getting a few answers ready. It helps to think about different situations that happen often and have an answer ready. It also keeps you cool and collected, enough to be in charge and not be drunk on emotion.
The other day Dacian hit my back more as a joke but it hurt. And we don't tolerate hitting so this is how it went:
"That's so sad Dacian, you hurt mommy. I was going to take you to Safeway to get a little toy with your quarter but now we don't get to do that. That's just so sad!"
First empathy, then consequence is what they teach in the first lesson. No matter how long he cried I just kept repeading. How sad... that's just so sad...
Well, I kind of took my time on this one and just implemented. It was a success. A success for me for being able to stick to my guns and for being on the ball, a success because Dacian (hopefully) learned not to do that again even as a joke. I told him that we can go to Safeway the next day but that I would ask grandma about his behavior. Apparently he was a little angel the next day and remembered to tell me he was a good boy so he could get his prize.
Was that easy? Yes and no. Yes because that was so simple; no because when we are mad or annoyed empathy doesn't come naturally. So if I rehearse and do this over and over, the "that's so sad" expression will take on a new meaning.
But the more I listen to the instructor and read the materials provided I realize how much I need to change about the way I parent. I get a little overwhelmed but I am excited to have new tools on how do it better.
I will come back to this subject with more examples as I start having more success. Maybe parenting comes easy for most people, maybe everyone's children are little angels, all I know is I have work ahead of me.
But I wouldn't change it for the world. I love my kids and I am so happy I get to be their mommy. I get to love them, play with them, and create memories as a family.
OK, now I really need to go to bed. Night, night.

So excited

Tonight I went to my first parenting class ever. A very smart and wonderful lady is offering this class for cheap for parents and staff and I think others who may be interested at my school for 5 weeks in the evening. She is teaching from the Love and Logic curriculum.
I am so exited to be able to learn techniques on how to be a better parent and guess what the first lesson was? How to stop the whining and arguing. Aren't I lucky for that to be my first lesson. I have been wanting help on this for waaaaaaay too long.
 I am so exited to give this a try. Tonight was a great night with Dacian though so I have nothing to report. I really thought I could practice right away though. :) I am sure I will tomorrow.  I wish Shane and my parents could also attend just so we can all be on the same page. Wouldn't that be wonderful. I don't think I am going to get my wish though. :(
I will report back with results, good ones I hope.
Ta ta!

Too Tired

It seems like every time school starts back up (meaning I go back to work) I am too tired to blog. I have so much to catch up on but I just don't feel like putting in the time to add photos and write up stories. I may do a whole post later on this topic, blogs and what not. To be honest when I get in  blogging funk I contemplate just not blogging anymore. I guess that is why I should just write even a little bit or else it's too hard to start back up.

Dacian started his new preschool which he loves. His bus comes way early so he's been rather grumpy lately adjusting to his new schedule. He can finally go to bed earlier. Summer throws our schedule off with the longer days of which we take full advantage by going to the park, swimming late, etc. I think soon he should get used to this schedule. I think I need to start up the bed routine even earlier as before preschool he loved reading books with me and saying his prayer and now he just says he is sooooo tired and just wants to sleep.

Lavinia gets cuter everyday. She is able to say lots and lots of words and little sentences now but does not speak Romanian as much as Dacian did at that age. She now hears Dacian speak English all day long and imitates what he says. I noticed how Dacian is more and more comfortable with English and I have to make him speak Romanian. I  tell him if he wants to go to Romania with me he has to speak it or else no one there will be able to talk to him.   It seems to do the trick for now. I completely understand though why it's hard. I will stick to my guns though. I can't imagine throwing away a good thing like that. :)
 It's always been so important for me that he can speak my language. Sure, it helped having my parents take care of him day in and day out since that's all they spoke with him. But since preschool and tv time and computer time and church and all his friends who speak English it's a little hard to make it appealing to continue to speak another language.

But away from my tangent and back to Lavinia. She's so fun and so cuddly. She just allows me to love her and she's so sweet giving us kisses and hugs. She's a naughty girl too at times. She loves to play with cars and trains but also loves to look pretty and always twirls and twirls as we put on her Sunday dress and shows off any hair pretties or jewelry she's got. So I guess she is girly but also a little bit of a tom boy. She's a climber and super fast. She likes to go outside with us and go pick blackberries and hold Tommy's leash. She is also an awesome whiner but I think most of it comes from wanting to express herself and not really being able to. I am so much more calm with her and I know what stages she's at and that they will all pass too. Oh, almost forgot, she's super afraid of bugs (not sure why, maybe she got stung once since she calls all bugs bees and when she sees one she screams and comes to cling to my legs.
She does NOT like nursery. She could care less if we walked the halls or go to RS at church. Again, don't know why she hates it so much there. I tend to think the older kids pushed her or something since most kids there are 3 and older. She is one of the two little ones in there.
Anyway, I hope this stage too shall pass and I will again be able to go our meetings without her.
All in all having kids is the best thing ever. I have been enjoying them, really treasuring their littleness, enjoying the funny things Dacian says, his sweet love for us and also my little Lavi who adores her brother.
I could go on and on about my kids and all the fun things we've been doing but I have to go put Dacian to bed and this post is getting lengthy. How did this happen? I thought I couldn't come up with anything.
Also I might just fall asleep putting Dacian to bed. I am that TIRED.

Egg plant spread (Salata de Vinete)

I had a craving for this eggplant salad spread for a while now so with four little eggplants I bought at Costco it was time to get to work. I roast the eggplant right on top of the fire but you can broil them on a cookie sheet as well. ( keep turning every 5 minutes or so until it's all charred)

I turn it until it all looks like this: 

It's very easy to peel the burned up stuff. Keep all the yellow goodness with seeds and all and lay it on a cutting board to drain of the juices a little. 

After it's drained chop it all  and put in the prettiest melamine bowl that your husband may have given you for Mother's day :) OK, totally optional but I had to show you all how pretty my bowls are and to praise them and tell you how much I like them. I can even use them as a double boiler (putting the bowl on top of a pan with water in it) 

Now pour about a cup and 1/4 of vegetable oil in there and a half of white onion chopped finely plus salt to taste. At the end add a little mayo as that will lighten up the color a bit but you can leave that out and it will still be good. 

Voila! The end result is so good. You can eat it with tomatoes on a slice of French bread. I even add feta on top. Very Mediterranean dish and VERY good. I loved the smell of my house while they were roasting however Shane will disagree wholeheartedly. Anyway, we all know how smells bring us back to a certain place sometimes and that was Romania for me. I miss it a lot and since I haven't been there for 6 years and since my parents just went there this summer I was a little homesick.

 Enjoy!

P.S Hubby almost ate the whole thing at once. I will have to buy more eggplants for next time. It's a yummy appetizer.

Blue Angels

Last weekend we saw angels. The rain stopped just in time for the show and started back as soon as the show was over. As a tradition Seafair weekend we go to see the Blue Angles. We hear their loud engines starting with Thursday, their practice day and then Dacian can't stop talking about them and about when the day comes to go see them. This Saturday we went earlier than usual to hopefully get a good spot on the bridge (I-90 that goes right over Lake Washington connecting Seattle to the East Side.)  We totally came unprepared, no umbrellas, no rain coat, just sweaters since it was chillier and overcast when we left home. Well as soon as we got to the bridge it starting pouring. At this point I am thinking well are they even going to fly? What a waist of time I'm thinking and found myself grumbling and cursing this area of the world for all its d*** rain. Seriously I will never get used to it. Even summers are not that hot and you still get plenty of rainy weekends. But better get back to my story before I plop a few more curse words on my blog. Ha!

Fortunately the rain gods listened to our prayers and stopped the rain for the show only. Fine by me. I guess the Angels flew lower that day since it was so overcast. It was super awesome of course. I wish it lasted longer. I really, really wished to be in their cabins along with the pilots. The adrenalin, the feelings you must get when flying those things, probably nothing else like it.

 We had a very pleased 4 year old that day and to be honest so were we.