The Oklahoma City Zoo

David had ROTC stuff to do today, so PaPa, Grandma Kathy, Keith, Judy, Jeremiah, and Hannah all got to go to the zoo. Hannah has not been to a real zoo since she was just 10 months old, and of course, far too young to remember anything!

She made plenty of memories today...

A close-up look at a peahen

Watching the seals and sea lions

Giving Jeremiah a ride in the stroller

Hannah and Mommy checking out the albino peacock.

Hannah and the bear

Hannah and Grandma Kathy

Jeremiah and David (LOL)

Move in day...or is it the official move out day?

David and PaPa unpacking

Jeremiah goofing around

David has flown the coop, left the nest, moved up (or at least out) and has moved into the dorm room at OU. He even got to meet his new roommate, Gregory. Life is always changing!

The rollercoaster ride we have been wating for...

David has been planning this picture for weeks...no, make that months! He broke his phone in May and purposefully kept the broken phone just for this picture so he could appear to be talking on the phone when it was taken. You gotta love the ideas that teens have!

Keith, David, and Jeremiah went to Frontier City today to have some "man time" and see Family Force Five in concert. They had a blast!

Sunday...happy Sunday!

Sundays are awesome! Today, we got to go back to Wilwood church to worship, then to our friends' Melanie and Travis's house for lunch. Yummy! Finally, back to Kathy's house with the rest of the family for homemade spaghetti and meatballs! At this rate, we will all weigh 200 pounds before we are done visiting...

Jeremiah with his cousins, Kobe and Joshua

Hanging out with Grandpa Bullet

One of the hard things about living overseas for such a long time is that you miss out on getting to know your family, especially if you are only 3 years old. But really, it is hard for all of us. Even though we have been in the states for a full week already, we have just really not had enough time to really spend with our family.

Today we say goodbye to Grandpa Bullet and go back to Oklahoma City. It's been a visit too short already!


Of course at Grandpa Bullet's you have to have a tractor ride!!


Playing a little hide-and-seek. Of course, if the pole was a little bigger, Hannah might actually be able to hide behind it.


Tractor races with Grandpa....kidding, of course.

Now, we are back to Oklahoma City. Time to get some things taken care of for David's college days!

To the Lake!

What did Jeremiah want for his birthday? Fishing! Well, not only did he get to go fishing, he got to go out on his Grandpa Bullet's boat AND have his friend Chase come for a visit! Yes, this is his friend Chase, from Germany who is in the process of moving to Missouri. How awesome is that??!!


Keith and David soaking up some rays!

Steven already has a tan, unlike those of us pale skinned folks.

Hanging out...

Grandpa Bullet teaching Hannah how to fish.

All tuckered out after a long day.

Happy Birthday, Jeremiah!

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful 14 year-old on the planet!

A Day with PaPa and the Route 66 Museum

I do not know how many times we have been to Clinton since the Route 66 Museum opened (obviously none in the past 4 years), but we had never visited the museum until today. It is rather nice, inexpensive, a little small, but definately worth it. The kids had fun looking at the old soda machines, early gas pumps, diner replicas, phone booths, and vehicles. It was a nice way to spend the afternoon. Not to mention...there was a visit to Sonic afterward. Oh, how I have missed Sonic!

Hannah posing as a "driver". Notice Jeremiah on his hands and knees so Hannah could have a boost!

Jeremiah and Hannah at the diner.

The kids.

Later that day, we were back at PaPa's. He had a surprise for Hannah after nap...fingerpaints!

David "helping" Hannah

Off to PaPa's

Where was my camera today?? Not a single picture to show for our first day at PaPa's house. What was I thinking?

Is God amazing or what??!

What an awesome day! We all got up this morning and went to Wildwood Community Church in Norman. This is where we all attended church when God first called us to adopt Hannah. We still keep in touch with many of our friends from there and were eager to see them again. However, due to our schedule, we had not let many of them know that we were arriving this Sunday.

It was so incredible to see everyone! We saw our old friends, their kids, who have grown 4 years older, and don't look a thing like what they did when we left. At least the adults haven't changed a bit, and the kids look more and more like their parents. What was even more amazing is seeing all the babies that have been adopted and born since we left. Let me just say that Wildwood's people are committed to adoption and having babies! What a blessing! It was Halli's first Sunday at church (She is a 4 month old, beautiful baby adopted by our friends the Lentzes), and we got to see Weston, adopted by the Greene's from the Ukraine just a couple of months ago. Awesome, awesome, awesome. Did I mention how AWESOME this is?? Well it gets better...

After service, we met up with some of our very best friends, the Herberts. Oh how I have missed them over the years, but the busy-ness of life keeps us from keeping in touch as we should. Anyway, we decided to go out for some Mexican food. Tarahumara's was our first choice, but we decided that it was too busy on Sunday to attempt to go there, so we decided on Los Dos Amigos. The kids piled in he cars and off we went. Fortunately, immediate seating was available; we were STARVING! (I think it is still a jet lag thing) We walked into the dining area where they have pulled two tables together and look over and saw our very good friends - the Martins - who have just moved here from GERMANY. Did I say Germany??!! Yes, indeed I did. They had just gotten to the restaurant and hadn't been waited on, so we introduced our old friends to our older friends and pulled up another table.

Now, we knew the Martins were moving to the Tinker area and were looking at Norman as a place to live. We had told them about Wildwood, but in the midst of moving, they had lost the information and had been visiting some churches looking for a church home. But how much more wonderful was this that they could come visit WITH us the next Sunday and we could introduce our friends to our church personally? Not to mention, Jasmine, the Martin's daughter and David are both going off to college in a couple of weeks, and they will have a chance to hang out before Jasmine leaves for Liberty.

Ah, old friends, older friends, and a meeting that could have only been orchestrated by God. I can bask in this all day!

Uncle Lance and Aunt Barbara's

Hannah and Joshua painting together. Water was all over the table, they painted about 10 pictures (all the same green/grey color), they had an awesome time, and it all washed out!

Jeremiah was whipping Uncle Lance on the Wii (or was it the other way around?) Depends on who is telling the story!!

Hanging out with family!

Hannah and Joshua met when Hannah and Judy came to Oklahoma in Sept 2007...but that was a long time ago. Now, it only took a few minutes for them to become as thick as thieves!

While the little ones are occupied Kobe takes a minute to watch TV - alone!

David - posing in front of Circle K...there is some significance to this, but what??!!

We made it! Now, on to the important stuff!

We made it in LATE last night, or was that early this morning? That last 45 minutes or so was nearly TORTURE!! Jet lag coupled with 2 very long days of driving is not a good combination. However, we are so glad we are finally here.

Our first Oklahoma breakfast...Krispy Kreme!


Watching the doughnut making - fascinating!

We do have an interesting story from yesterday afternoon. We were driving through Missouri, when Keith decided that we should call our friends, the Busseys who are moving to Whiteman AFB in Missouri. Now, best we knew they were staying in either Mcalester or Sapulpa in Oklahoma. I had to call a couple of numbers, but finally got in touch with Steven's brother who had them call us. But...they weren't in Oklahoma :( INSTEAD they were just outside of Springfield, Missouri on their way back to Oklahoma. Well, guess where we were??!! Just outside of Springfield, Missouri on our way to Oklahoma! God is so good :) We met at a roadside restaurant and had dinner in Missouri with our "Germany" friends! No coincidences with God.

Making our way across the US

On the road again...but I'm ready to be done! Glad to be in the USA, but ready to be in Oklahoma! Already driving across the US is taking its toll. The kids are "DONE" being in the backseat, Keith is done driving, yet still insists on doing it all :), and the kids have already watched more TV in a day than they usually do in a week.

Keep on trekkin', we still have over 900 miles to go!!

We are off to the states!

We are braving space available travel and are off to the states for a few weeks to get David settled in for school and to go visit family. We are so excited to get to go home for a while. We have a whole list of who we want to see, where we want to go, and what we want to eat! Right now, we are headed to Dover. Looks like we will have to rent a car and drive for a couple of days to get to Oklahoma. Such fun!! At least we are making it out the same day that we first tried for travel!

Waiting for our flight to leave. We are already tired and we haven't even started!

Ride 'Em Cowgirl!

OK, we won't buy Hannah a pony...so she makes "ponies" out of everything. The strap on her purse are "reins" and she loops them around anything to make a pony. She thinks that if she tucks in her shirt and puts on a belt, she looks like a cowgirl. Add the hat and the boots, and "Woah!" the transformation is complete!

So You Wonder What I Do All Day?

This is my normal morning routine...get Hannah breakfast, make coffee, catch up on the "news", take a leisurely shower, get dressed, then start the day. Yeah, right! However, I do occassionally get a moment to hang out on the compute for a few minutes.

Schoolwork

Any of you who know Hannah knows how much she loves, loves, loves her schoolwork. Every day she asks for some kind of work to do. She wants scissor work, color work , letter work, number work or just plain schoolwork. She will color, cut, paste, write up to 15 pages a day. I have to stop her there or she will use up her entire schoolwork workbook in a day! It is amazing. Now she wants to learn how to read. Crazy little lady!!

Chalk

Hannah likes to color with chalk on the back patio. Ms. Beth gave her the sidewalk chalk for her birthday, and it has provided many hours already of outside entertainment. Today, Hannah decided to make a picture of David. He is the circle with legs and other features. Then she added Mommy, Daddy, Jeremiah, Hannah and Chris (David's best friend). As you can see, we are all just floating heads. Guess we just didn't stack up!

Packing up

Hannah was watching over David's packing. I don't remember getting old enough to have a college student for a son. The movers will be here tomorrow to collect his stuff. I guess there is no turning back now.