6 months later...

OK, so I'm not so reliable in the blogging world. I can't believe it's been 6 months since I last updated, but many of you have started your own blogs, which has inspired me to get started again.

Let's play catch up. Ethan is 3 years old now. He's 41 1/2 inches tall and 41 lbs. I can't believe how big he is. He just keeps growing and growing. He's learning so much so fast and I think he will really love preschool once he starts in September. He will be attending school 3 days a week from 9am to 1pm. I'm not sure what Salla and I will do without him, but I'm super excited for him.

Salla is now 14 1/2 months. She is 26lbs and growing just as fast as Ethan did. She's walking (Yay!), practically running to keep up with her brother. She's not sleeping through the night yet (boo!), and still takes 2 (short) naps a day (who needs sleep anyway?) but in general her disposition has calmed down a bit since infancy. Don't get me wrong, she's fiesty, stubborn. and has quite the set of lungs when she's mad, but she seems to be enjoying life more these days.

This summer has been busy for us. Of course, we try to make it to the beach as much as we can. Ethan loves the water, Salla loves to get sandy. We celebrated Salla's first bithday and Ethan's 3rd birthday. Somehow I pulled off 2 great parties with tons of kids. Ethan took swim lessons and did fantastic for his first class experience. It was fun to sit on the side and watch him with the teachers and the other kids. He did great and passed "Level 1". Next we spent 2 weeks in MD/PA/VA in July. It was a looooooong drive up and back(18 hrs and an overnight hotel stay somewhere in the Carolinas), but better than dealing with flying (remind me to post about our trip in May when we managed to miss a flight out of Atlanta while we were waiting in the airport). We got to see lots of loved ones and friends we haven't seen in ages. Overall, the kids did great and everything went off with out a hitch. Since we've been back, I've been trying to keep us low key and back in routine. Ethan and Salla are playing a lot together, though I feel like a referee most of the time, but it's exciting to see them interacting so much more. He does get physical with her a lot, but most of the time she just laughs. I find myself saying this over and over, "If she's crying Ethan, it means she doesn't like it!". Now I just can't wait for the weather to cool off a bit so we can spend more time outside (it's Africa hot here)...

So that's where we are now. Thanks to everyone who's been keeping in touch and sending me their blogs! It feels good to be back:)