Braska Bear

In honor of my beautiful angel friend Jalayne , who would be celebrating her 3rd birthday today with a shiny tiara with big pink jewels, some of my friends were happy to share some tiara pictures as little princesses, so we can have a kind of “virtual princess party” for our friend.  Princess ME! Princess KiKi Princess Sophia Princess Kayla   Princess Violette Princess Kellsey and Princess Kennedy Princess Adrian Princess Rylie Princess Cesalie   Princess Piper   Princess Kinsley Princess Kallie and Princess Brittany Princess Erin Princess MaryEllen   Princess Aleena   And because Daddy wanted to be part of Laynee’s party……. Princess Daddy Thank you so much to everyone who sent us pictures!!!!  We miss you, Laynee!  But thank you for letting us love on your family a little while they are missing you, too....

A few weeks ago, we went to see my friends Connor and Lucas.  They used to live in the town where I lived when I was a tiny baby.  Now they live in a different place, just like us.  But a different different place. So we went to see them and play for a couple days.  They have the BEST playroom and SO many toys!  And they also have the best mommy and daddy for reading books!  Mr. Matt and Miss Nico read lots of books to me and KiKi, and I love books, so that was my favorite part. They also have a chair I call the thinking chair.  Like Steve has on Blues Clues, you know.  This is me showing Mommy how I smile.  She says I need to practice a little. Here’s KiKi playing in the playroom.  She had a lot of fun in there. And before we left, all us kids got on the couch for a picture.  Mommy and Miss Nico took a bunch because we were being a little silly and not listening all the time. Then Connor took ...

I don’t post all of these, though I sometimes feel I should, because it is overwhelming how many children need to be adopted and saved. But Mindy will be transferred on Saturday to an institution where she can no longer be adopted, where most children like her do not survive over a year. She is a HEALTHY little girl in Russia, turning 4, with Down syndrome. She will be sent to a mental institution with very little care or interaction, if any at all. It seems like it’s too late. Today is Thursday.  She has two days left. Please Grab This Button! It seems like I have to give up, yet my God is big enough to do anything.  Maybe He will protect her while she is at the institution. Maybe He will take her home to Heaven where she will be able to enjoy perfect love and no fear.  But MAYBE, just maybe, YOU are meant for her.  Maybe SHE is meant for YOU. Maybe YOU are meant to bring her home and love her like crazy.  Maybe it’s YOU that she’s been waiting for. She...

One of the my sister Rachel’s most well-known fashion traits among friends and family is that when she is not wearing her suits and slick professional attire, she is likely to be seen in comfy velour Polo casuals. It’s kind of funny how many she has. So whenever the girls wear little track suits like this, we always say they’re trying to be like Auntie Rachel. (And I have to say, these pics are from last Saturday, 1/16, when we were getting ready to go to our friends’ house. Jason and Sarah keep such a clean house, even with 2 preschoolers, that I knew it was probably the only place I’d let Braska wear this cute white outfit.)

Last week we went to see our friends Amber and Katelyn.  They have the BEST playroom with lots and lots of toys.  The biggest one is this big bouncy house.  I just call it “Jum-ping!!” Amber and Katelyn can jump really big and bounce all around, but since I can’t stand up by myself very good, I just bounce and roll around.  And I look cute, of course! And sometimes I slide too.  Because that’s what you do with a slide. If you want to see more pictures from our playing, KiKi put some on her blog , too.

A couple weeks ago, my friend LC’s new little brother, Jace, came to my house.  He is SOO CUUUUUTE!  I love things that are cuuute.  That’s how I say it, too. Cuuuuute! Jace was coming to see my heart doctor that I’m sharing with him and LC, Dr J.  He’s really good, and Jace needs a good guy, so I thought he would like Dr. J alot.  Dr. J is going to have Dr. H help Jace too, and then he’s gonna be all fixed up! After Jace had his appointment, he and his mommy Miss Courtney stopped by my house to say hi.  We told Miss Julie and Jack that they were there, so they came by to see them, too! Jace was kind of hungry, so Miss Julie gave him some milk.  He doesn’t drink much because he gets tired when he drinks.  I used to do that, too, before my heart got all fixed. Jack checked out Miss Courtney.  She’s really super cool, and she always plays with us when she visits.  I hope I get to go to her house someday, because I bet it...

This week I’m sick, so I can’t play with my friends.  But I found some pictures that I forgot to show you of some fun times we had lately. Here’s me and Jack watching Veggie Tales on Mommy’s computer.  Kinlee was climbing up on us but she fell down right before Mommy took the picture. Then another day I was showing Jack my favorite present from Grandma C that I got for Christmas.  You put the letters in the little sun and push and it sings a little song about the letter.  Like this… R says rrrrrr. R says rrrrr. Every letter makes a sound, R says rrrrr.  I know the whole song, but I like to push them alot of times before the song is over.  Mommy makes me go to a different toy when I do that, though. Then on a different day, we left school early to go see Sophie and her family at the place where we see my doctors.  It’s called Children’s.  They are the best, I think.  Sophie has some of the same doctors I do, so she was seeing ...

I’ve been feeling not very good the last few days.  KiKi and Mommy are sick, too.   Mommy says we’re tired, also.  She keeps saying she’s “sick and tired” of this junk. So this week I get to stay home from school, and we’re just going to try to get better.  When I was a baby I didn’t get sick like this, and I don’t really like this part of being a big girl.  Mommy says none of us used to be sick til I started bringing bad germs home from school.  And I like to share, so I give them to everybody. It’s not going to be much fun to have nobody to play with and no playtime with my friends, but I think I want to get better, so I’ll try to have fun with KiKi for a while. Me and Mommy are working on lots of new stories and pictures for you to see, some on all of our blogs.  You know, since we’ll have some extra time at home this week.  So don’t miss ‘em!

Braska walked 5 steps, from the TV cabinet to the couch!!!  Without us telling her to!! While I was typing the post on my blog , Miss Thang decided to treat me to a smile.  She was watching Sesame Street, and she had sneaked into her favorite position of standing against the TV cabinet, about 9 inches below the screen.  I noticed and paused her show, and I told her to get on the couch.  Typically, she would turn around, drop to her knees, and crawl quickly to the couch and climb up to her “spot.” But she—without a pause—turned and walked the 5 steps to the end of the couch and climbed up!  I just stared.  I tried to cheer for her, but I have no voice at all, so it was a pathetic, whispery cheer with clapping.  It’s a small thing, but it’s the 1st time that she’s done more than 2 steps of her own initiative.  That’s cool! Oh, and while I’m typing this post, she just went from couch to couch, about 3 steps, on her own too.  She must be ...

Virus.  Sometimes I hate that word.  But so far her ears are clear. (As much as she can see…it’s always debatable with little missy’s tiny canals. THOUGH, we’ve had a couple docs tell us recently that hers aren’t as small as many, so that’s good.  But I’m off topic….) For now she stays home from school, and we wait it out.  KiKi will be next, no doubt. I never realized how awesome those first three years of no colds, coughs, and viruses were.  I miss those days! She was asleep before we got home—it is a long 1 mile trip from the dr office, you know.  So she’s in bed now, hasn’t moved since I put her there 30 minutes ago.  Hopefully she can sleep it away.  Even with her other sickness recently, she never slept in the morning.  Hmmmm. She had an appointment for her ENT for this coming Monday but I had to move it last week due to a conflict with another doc appointment.  Now I wish I hadn’t.  The reschedule isn’t til 2/22.  ...

Last night Braska started acting a little more mellow than usual—and she is pretty mellow. She had just the slightest fever, and she fell asleep on the floor before we could even get her to the bed. Her buddy Jack has been sick, and I was hoping she didn’t catch what he had from the same source that gave it to him. But I think we did… This morning she was very warm when she got up, and she’s been very limp and fussy. Here’s how she is watching Sesame Street this morning. If you’ve ever seen her watch Elmo and company, you’d know how big a sign this is. So we’re headed to the doctor again this morning. She says “ears hurt” and I’m going to believe her and have them checked. She’s also got a pretty deep cough. I don’t want to just wait and have it get badly infected again like last time. The good news is that Kinlee is well for now… praying that continues. Question for you pros: We’ve debated some issue with our carpet (it’s old and the previous owners had animals and weren’t a...

Sometimes Daddy’s funny because he lets us sit on him when we watch football, and he laughs when we bounce on his belly. Sometimes he’s funny because he dances all silly and makes us laugh alot. But today he’s funny because he put a REEEEALLLLLYYY funny story on his blog and it made Mommy laugh and laugh.  And that makes me and KiKi laugh too.  And everything is more fun when you’re laughing, I say!  Go read Daddy’s story here .

Mommy and Daddy moved everything around in the living room after we took the Christmas stuff down last week.  It looks like they made the room bigger and we have more room to play!  And I found a new place to see the TV good.  It’s not too far from the TV, and I can get real comfy. Mommy says if she did this it wouldn’t be comfy…