Science experiment!

For fun this summer we are doing science experiments, most especially when one little girl is taking a nap. This one was so easy and fun. Dacian did it over and over again. Try it, I think your kids will love it. 

Oh no!

So here I am making dinner when I look over at Lavinia and what do I see?  A BLACK eye. She had just woken up when I asked Dacian to go get her. " What was I thinking?" is exactly what I was saying in my head. Did he drop her? Why did I let him take her from her bed? He does it all the time, how could this be? It's REALLY black but no screaming.

Then I see my sweet son proceed to give her a silver eye as well. Well, if you haven't guessed it it was my makeup. She was sitting there so silently loving being prettied up by none other than her BROTHER. Whew! Just makeup!

Here's a close-up shot. Pardon the messy face but this is what Lavinia sports most of the day. 

Our summer vacation

Lately I've been slacking off for no good reason really other than I've been enjoying my summer. But I don't want to fall too far behind in my little blog.
We spent 3 days in Walla Walla with Shane's brother and his family and like always we had a blast. They have a little boy Dacian's age so my son was so excited to be there. We went to a water park, played on their slip and slide right in their front yard and went to a show of Footloose where their daughter played in. It was so much fun and I enjoyed being in an outdoor theater on a hot summer evening. Thankfully there were no mosquitoes.

From there we went to McCall, ID where Shane found a really cool, affordable cabin in the mountains of this resort which is I guess out of business now. It was just the right thing for us to do. We only stayed three nights though. We explored the area which is perfect for those who have boats but we had fun of many of their sandy beaches just swimming around. It was a relaxing vacation for once. We decided that with little kids we needed to gear our vacation more for a spot that is family oriented and not go on a big tour like last summer.  Who wouldn't have fun in a pretty place, with lots of little hikes, swimming, great food and my favorite almost, the jacuzzi. I was so excited to go in it really late when the kids were sleeping. There were not many people there and so not too many lights on and that way we were able to see that perfectly painted starry sky. I loved it! We saw lots of shooting stars and the Milky Way.


View of Payette Lake from downtown McCall. 

Dacian and Lavinia on a nearby beach. The water was really warm much to our pleasure. 

We called this car Mater. This place was fantastic and I think next time we come here we want to stay here.

There's a hot spring right there that is remote more or less and they have cabins for cheap that I guess are pretty nice ( no electricity though) and also the whole place is also a ghost town. Pretty amazing. 

There are these really old shacks dating from the 1800s and of course no one still lives in them. There is also another ghost gold mining town nearby that we didn't get to see but next time I am sure we'll head down there as well.

On the way back we stopped in these fields of wheat. Dacian made that pose and I was so confused as to why he was sitting like that: "Mom, I'm a scarecrow, can't you see?" Oh, silly me, but of course.  I immediately got my camera out and took a picture.                  

This was an quite interesting Bed and Breakfast. I saw it out the window when we were driving and just had to stop. You don't see this type of stuff every day. There was another little house/workshop in the vicinity where this old man was carving dogs of all breeds out of wood. They were really cute and the man was so nice and kind. I love it when I meet sweet people who are open and friendly to strangers.

So I guess this more or less sums up our little vacation. We had other fun and will still have fun for the next three weeks of vacations that I have left. Look out for more posts to follow.
I hope you all had a great summer as well.

Another graduate or two or three...

Well, I have a few new graduates in my life. Numero UNO: DAD
My amazing dad went to school for a year to get a certification as an auto mechanic technician since without knowing English really well it would be hard to find a job in his real profession, Engineering. He did amazingly well (even got a scholarship his second term for really good grades) and in the process he learned English better, he pushed himself, was patient and diligently stayed up in the wee hours of the night studying, looking up words in the dictionary all at the ripe age of 62. Simply amazing. I am so, so proud of him. Now we are praying hard that he finds a job where he could put to the test all the new things he learned. He's a super handy guy and very strong and healthy. I love him with all my heart and wish him the best.
Here he is and here is my aunt who was here helping me with the kids while dad went to school. So grateful for her and my family.

Of course we had to celebrate Romanian style. We had a BBQ and end with delicious cakes made by my mom. We celebrated dad's graduation, Doina's birthday and her farewell and father's day. It was such a fun day!

Michael, Shane's step dad was able to join us and a cute couple who are our neighbors and who are expecting their first child.

Our next grad is Scott, my brother in law. We are so proud of him as well. He got his MBA at Western University. I can't believe 2 years flew by. Now he is a proud daddy of two kids. Imagine that, little kids and having to study for two years. Also pretty amazing. To celebrate they had their own BBQ with yummy food and desert at a park (they were so lucky to have a nice, warm day). We love visiting them and the beautiful place that is Bellingham. Later on we went on a nice walk and let the kids play.
Here he is with new baby Zeke.

I was able so snap a few pictures of new cute baby Zeke and Dacian. My son was so in love with him and was curious about him and wanted to hold him a lot and even share with him some lollipop. Of course we made sure he had none. :)

And last but not least my own brother is graduating in a month from BYU with his masters in Spanish and has been accepted to go to University of Kentucky for his PhD. He also had another baby while studying there. Chris, send me some pics so I can add one of you and your cute babies.

I am inspired by all their examples and hard work and hope some day soon  I too can go finish my degree. Love you all.

Preschool Graduation

Mr. Daci, the Little Roo Preschool Graduate. I can't say enough about this great preschool. We all loved his teacher and also all the high school students who helped in there.  It was so fun to participate in their end of the year party and graduation. I even bumped into two girls I used to have in our daycare back when I was a daycare teacher. I couldn't believe it. Just like that these girls were all grown up. Just like that my boy is growing up so fast.

 I was all tough when preschool started and didn't really get that emotional when I dropped him off for the first time but now at the end of this first preschool year I was kind of a mess. I loved seeing my son so happy. I loved seeing these young students caring for my little son. They came to me to compliment me on what a good boy he is and what fun outfits he wears at school. Mind you my parents dress him since they are the ones taking him to school. So the compliments go to my parents too. :)

Dacian changed a lot this year. He now speaks English really well and has the tendency to use mostly English even though he can speak Romanian just fine. He is very interested in learning and I could see how much being at school has helped. He counts things all the time, he can read simple sentences and he likes to spell and sound things out. I can only hope he keeps this up. 

By the way this school when I enrolled him in it we were told is not stressing academics but try to take it easy on the kids and prepare them for Kindergarten, teach them manners, etc. I had heard from our church members great things about it. I am glad we made it in since they have a long waiting list for it. Sadly this next year will be the last ever for this program due to no new funding from state. 

With all this in mind the decision to switch him next year to a different preschool was very hard. Because I work for the district I get to place my son in our preschool if I want for free. Now Little Roos is not expensive at all but when you talk $900 a year I think I prefer free. I know our district has great teachers there too and also a good program. I know that Dacian will adjust just fine. I'm the one who seems to not be ready for change for him. I second guess myself and wonder if by being cheap I am taking him away from his friends and this wonderful teacher. I still have him enrolled in the old place so I guess it's not final. What should I do? 

Decisions, decisions....

Sweet Lavi thought this was all fun too. She danced when they played a slide show and clapped a lot. She also made friends with some students who liked to give her plenty of attention. Who wouldn't? She is so cute and so little.

The good and the bad

On the day we made cookies Dacian was also doing his own cooking. He grabbed a real pan and put it on his little stove. Lavinia is enamored with her brother. Look how cute she is gazing at her brother. Man, I love my kids! 

And since I don't want to forget and this paper will probably get lost at some point I wanted to post what I found on my fridge a while back. I came from work and I found this posted on the fridge. That's what he does with stuff he is proud of. I have to admit I was pretty proud of him too. It seems like something finally clicked and now he can read short words and sound them out and write them. Of course there are still lots of mistakes but it's a start. I didn't tell him to do this though or ever sat down to really spell the words so therefore I'm pretty surprised. 

That was the good. The bad is that my daughter thinks my couches are for writing. That same day this is what I found. I was so mad. Fortunately it came off pretty easily. Except for writing on my walls once Dacian never did stuff like this. Now they have a fun easel I bought at IKEA and I hope they will use this instead of items in my house. 

And to fully entertain my audience here's what I also found on my fridge as well a while back. Boys... It's so funny the Leap Frog thingy spells the word and then says: Congratulations! Good job. It's funny to hear that after the word BUT(T). 

Memorial Day weekend

Memorial Day weekend went by with such success this time. I always kind of dread the trip up there because it's so long (6 hours)  but this time add in that nasty traffic, it added 2 more hours to our trip. 

Saturday we went to Summerland and took the steam train ride. We've never done that before, as a matter of fact I had no idea there was a train going by there. That was the highlight of the trip for us. There was a guy playing the accordion on the train and people were singing along with him. The conductor was pretty cool too. 

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for such a fun trip. Here they are having fun with us. 

Here's my sweet aunt from Romania who spent 6 months here with us helping us out with the kids while my dad went back to school. We love her.

The view of this valley is gorgeous. I love visiting this place and seeing all the vineyards and orchards that are taken care of so well. Also the area has lots of lakes and is a pretty popular touristic area. 

Here we all are with the nicest man who was nice enough to pose with us.

Sunday morning on our way out to the center the kids got to ride horses. I still haven't had my wish come true to ride a horse myself since I've never done that but the horses were a little jumpy so they held them tight and let the kids go around a little bit. Lavinia would have none of it but Dacian had a blast and was quite excited for the rest of the day with just this experience. Thanks Grandma for this fun experience. 

After going horse riding we visiting the In'kmeep Desert Cultural Center. This place is amazing and my own mother in law is the manager of this place. She was involved with this center ever since this new place was rebuilt and is so great at what she does.
Isn't this statue so cool? In the distance you can see the new condos and hotels that were recently built. When my father in law was alive we got to spend a night in them and they are super awesome. Am I making this place enough advertisement? I do wish people could experience this place. It's neat.

Aside from the inside of the cultural center which is so fun (they have a native movie and other fun stuff) the outside tour is my favorite. It's a native village that's pretty big and they have these cool statues depicting life in the olden days. 

Lavinia played with rocks a lot. It was hard to get her to go anywhere because that's all she wanted to do. 

I especially liked seeing the salmon.

And this statue. The wall that you can see a little is made of all sorts of soil types in the area. I have to get a picture my aunt took so I can show it better. Again, pretty cool.

Here's my mother in law giving us a fun tour with the golf cart. I guess it's nice to have relations in high places. :) Usually you just walk which is fun as well.

Here's Dacian inside of a cool log hut.

Lavinia being the cute girl that she is.

View from the village. Awesome! And not long after we took this pictured Shane almost stepped on a rattle snake. That's right, they have those creatures over there. There are signs all over cautioning people to make sure they look around and not step on them. I guess the rattle snakes are a protected species. I was paranoid for the rest of the tour.

On our way back home we stopped at a nearby park and Dacian played in the water. He actually swam around in the cold water. I can't believe I let him but is was so hot outside and this lake's water warms up fast. It's great during the summer.

Water, his best friend.

OK, more fun on the same day. We stopped by Spotted Lake. This lake is amazing. It's got 365 circles each with a different mineral inside. in the summer there is almost no water left just these circles in multiple colors. It's rained a lot this spring so they have a lot of water. There is a plan to build a cool trail down to the lake and make a nice parking lot for people to stop by. We didn't hike down to it for lack of time but it was fun to show my aunt this place as well. I think she had a pretty fun weekend.

And last but not least that day right before we got to grandma and grandpa's house grandma took us to this rock that has these ancient pictographs on it right on the reservation. I loved seeing this.

I also loved spring on the rez and this pretty desert flower.

On the way back home we went the longer route just to avoid the passes which we knew would be terrible and we stopped by Harrison Hot Springs. We didn't have time to stop and actually go swimming but it was a good stopping point. Maybe we'll go there in the fall.