Happy Sweet 16th Kayleigh!

Today is Kayleigh's sweet 16th birthday!  Not only is this a landmark age to hit, but it is her first birthday since coming home.  We love this girl and are so happy and blessed to have her as part of our Fab 5 and family :)

Someone Is Growing Up!

I haven't blogged in awhile but it's pretty much been the normal stuff.  Kids, house, dance, karate, running, driving, etc!  This week will be cool as Kayleigh's sweet 16th birthday is fast approaching (she will turn 16 this coming Saturday the 29th....).  Last year she was with us until the beginning of August before returning to Ukraine from the hosting trip, so we missed her birthday last year, but were obviously bound and determined not to miss this one! 

In our household, even before we had 5 teenagers, calendar days for events sometimes turn into guidelines rather than set in stone as often there is just too much going on to do it right, or the calendar is packed, it's a weekday, etc.  We started off "birthday week" yesterday with a day out at Canyon Lake with our aunt and uncle, and one of our cousins and her family.  It was a beautiful sunny day, perfect for swimming and grilling.  Our aunt also picked up a birthday cake since their up from Corpus so after dinner we did a birthday cake complete with singing :)

Kayleigh is funny as she really loves the attention she gets here, but also gets embarrassed by it (but still likes it....).  I've been able to watch her at dance class and every time she catches me watching her from the lobby, she'll spring up a huge smile and stick her tongue out at me or something.  However, I can also tell she is loving being important and getting attention, even though often she will play it off.  Sometimes I'll be chasing and roughhousing with Michael, and she'll do something to try and get chased as well.  I am happy to oblige :)

I have no idea what the plan for the birthday party will be, but with Kayleigh having two loving sisters, I'm sure I won't have to worry about anything other than finding something for us boys to do to avoid the hysteria that comes with a bunch of teenage girls being in the same place at the same time!

Just A Fun Week

This week has just been one of those fun weeks where I really have just relished the joys and blessings of getting to be the dad of the Fab 5.  I still have to marvel at how well Kayleigh and Michael have blended into our family.  It's only been four months since they arrived in Texas and yet their being here seems so normal and doesn't feel at all like a new thing.  It's been a busy week just being us!

Going oldest to youngest ......

Bekah ~ Got to hang out with her a couple times this week which was nice.  Now that she's 18 and working and playing volleyball and plowing through senior year in high school work towards graduation, we don't always get to see her as much.  She and I drove down to her volleyball match in San Antonio so we had our alone time in the car to get to chat and kid around.  She is a very special young lady!  She had fun playing volleyball, at one point serving like 13 points in a row (she has this wicked underhand serve that barely clears the net and knuckleballs down....).  Afterwards she and I got a bite to eat at McDonalds (yes we still think the Ukranian Mickey D's was better....) and time in the car going home.  We also went to a movie together (Expendables 2....) to get a couple hours of gratuitous explosions out of our system!  Today she is off at a volleyball tournament, sounds like her team is doing very well!

Alyssa ~ She has been helping us drive the fall schedule as we have the chore cards all set up for the kids, including K & M.  She has been such an amazing big sister helping Kayleigh acclimate to our family.  It transcends normal communication between those two, they could pretty much communicate with each other before either knew the others language!  She continues to excel in dance class with an amazing combination of precision and gracefulness!  I took her out driving for the first time as she now has her learners permit, she did well for a first time (ala no crashes....).  Got to just hang out and snuggle with her last night, she is the perfect size where her head fits right under my chin :)  She is at dance class today, she has done so well with it and loves it and her instructor and school.

Kayleigh ~ I got to take her to dance class and watch her for the first time which was a lot of fun.  She is learning very fast and is so strong.  She will play off that she doesn't want you to watch her too much doing it, but every time she saw me looking, she would get that huge smile on her face, or we would make faces at each other.  I had a Snickers bar for a snack after dance, so when she looked I would dangle it or smell it and smile to tease her.  After dance we drove to McDonalds for ice cream and then back to the house.  She and I have a blast spending time together as she definitely has the Tansey family sense of humor, so we are making funnies pretty much nonstop!  Eating ice cream in the car, making jokes and she picks the mexican music station which we crank up as it's got some high speed accordian rock polka song playing (I start yelling yee ha at the top of my lungs when she puts the country station on and calling her Kayleigh Cowgirl....).  We really enjoy hanging out together, she plays it cool sometimes but loves to be pursued and given attention and smiles easily and often.  She is out with the girls today hanging out :)

Dylan ~ I love spending time talking with Dylan.  He has often been described as an "old soul", meaning that his maturity and insight are well beyond his chronological age.  We had the best time talking and joking around.  We both share the same "gifted" sense of humor so will undoubtedly find something funny that no one else seems to share our humor in!  We get to spend a lot of time with each other as we are in martial arts together (along with Michael....) and our journey through the colored belts, black belt candidicy, and now as fellow black belts has only brought us closer to each other.  We sparred together the other night and he has grown so much in skill and confidence, it is really amazing to see what an incredible man he is becoming!  I am so incredibly proud of the brother he has become to Michael, there is none better than he!  Today he ran in a 3 mile cross country race and finished in the 22 minutes area, about 2 minutes faster than his previous best! 

Michael ~ This kid is a blast.  He is warm and funny and easy to love, and at times really stubborn!  Jodi was on him for something this week and she was correcting him and it took some talking to get him to budge.  Such a guy!  He has taken up martial arts with Dylan and I and so far has excelled in the sport.  He is athletic and quick.  We did a mock tournament this week and he and his BFF Gabe were a team, and they rolled to 1st place!  It was so great to see him sparring and having a blast, with a bunch of kids cheering his name as he fought.  In Ukraine at the orphanage he really didnt have friends, no confidence as he spent his days staying out of the way of the older kids, no brother to love him and do all the cool things you do with a brother (they have two older biological brothers back in Ukraine, but they were not in the orphanage system and not much involved if any in their life).   It was one of those moments when you stop to appreciate he has a whole new life now :)

That's all for now :)

Four Months!

Today is the four month anniversary of Kayleigh and Michael's arrival in Texas.  It has been great!  We are truly enjoying our Fab 5 :)  God is great, we have been so blessed to have them as our family now :)

Not really anything else to say today, that pretty much covers it :)

Who You Gonna Call?

Kayleigh and Michael had trips to the dentist to get their teeth cleaned.  It had been awhile, if ever since it had been done.  We are blessed to have a lot of dental talent in our circles, in this case my sister Lisa is a dental hygenist and very awesome at what she does!  So the kids made a visit to Auntie Lisa.  Kayleigh's wasn't too bad, Michael's brushing habits, well let's say, leave much to be desired so his cleaning was more involved.  So the worst of their initial dentals needs have been taken care of :)

Afterwards they went with Jodi to Costco to pick up some groceries.  Five teenagers can blow through stuff pretty quick, so we're finally at the point in life where buying bulk at Costco or Sams Club works out pretty well.  Typically we've split things with people since we just don't need as much, but that problem seems to have worked itself out.  Costco has a large electronics section and Michael seems very interested in the cell phones.  Not because he has anyone to call, he just likes them for the games. 

Being a young teenage boy, the video game stuff is of great interest to him.  He's adopted into a family that has XBox, XBox 360, Wii, GameCube, Nintento DS (I think that's all of them...) in addition to cell phones.  We are careful to monitor content and duration, but he's teenage boy through and through in interest.  He also has no idea of the cost, and couldn't believe that the phone cost a lot to buy in the first place, and that you had to pay monthly for two years as well!  We saw a lot of cell phones at the orphanage, but they were usually provided by family members, shared by fellow orphans, or stolen phones used until they stopped working.

Kayleigh seems to have a much better grasp of cost and all, and usually will even offer to pay for part of the cost for an item of clothing or shoes.  Naturally we'll pay as needed but it's nice to see her demonstrate the grasp of responsibility.  All of our bio kids are this way so it's great to see her pick up on that and run with it.  That has been the trend in general as Bekah, Alyssa and Dylan are the three best kids on the planet, and have been amazing role models for Kayleigh and Michael. 

It has made our road so very much smoother as K & M have transitioned into our family with amazing ease.  To say now that we have the five best kids on the planet is an easy statement to make because K & M have learned from the best and really chosen to be a part of our family.  We continue to hear remarks from people who have spent time with them about how happy they seem, and what great kids they are!

Tomorrow will be the four month anniversary of their arrival in Texas.  We are blessed that they are here :)

Uneventful Events

The past week was really just a week.  I know this must sound boring in the bigger scope of life, but for our family just having a regular week with Kayleigh and Michael is such a good thing.  It was just a normal week of life for our Fab 5.  Bekah has been working and her final season of volleyball has begun.  Alyssa and Kayleigh were in Houston providing childcare for my cousins son.  Dylan ran in his first cross country meet and he and I had our karate class per usual.  Michael had karate as well and spent time with one of his new friends, Gabe (they get along super well :). 

Before we completed our adoption we heard so many stories and were warned so many times of all the potential pitfalls that come with adopting older children which is totally understandable.  Probably too many people underestimate what will be involved in taking on a child who has been through who knows what, but considering where they are in life it couldn't have been good.  We don't know why really, outside of guessing, but it seems like K & M were spared some of the horrors that come with ending up an orphan.  They both are really sweet kids, they're well behaved, share rather than be selfish.  They have both warmed up to our family rather easily.  So, when we say it's been an uneventful week, it's because they've been so good at being part of our family, rather than no activities :) 

We know we've been incredibly blessed to receive these two orphans and make them our own.  The four month anniversary of their arrival in Texas is six days away, which is not a long time to be here.  However, it just seems like they've always been ours.  Without the diaper phase of course!  I'm really, really digging being the dad of 5 kids now :)