Happy Birthday Daddy :)

DADDY

AND

Presents Galore

Maddy put himself to bed early last night (8pm) so that he could wake up early to open his Christmas presents. Before he went to bed, he put out a plate of chocolate chip cookies and a glass of milk for Santa. Daddy had to do a midnight run to CVS to buy a few more gifts that were wrapped differently to the ones we already had under the tree, as Maddy was expecting gifts from Santa. He had written a letter to Santa asking for a scooter, dinosaur toys and a spongebob squarepants atlantis playstation game . We had already bought them and realised that we should of wrapped them differently to his other presents, hidden them and then placed them underneath the tree after he had gone to bed.

As soon as Maddy got up, he waited until Mummy and Daddy were awake before he started opening his presents and Christmas stocking. He wanted to open them "as a family" he said. Isn't that cute?

Maddy made this snow flake and the pumpkin ceramic pot at school -

A present for Mummy and Daddy

A big Thank You to all our family and friends that sent us presents.

Enjoy your Christmas holidays and keep safe.

Happy Holidays

Here's wishing Everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

Love Matthew, Rachel and Madison xxox

Pressies Have Arrived

Thanks Nana, Papa, Aunty Ling and Uncle Tolly for our Christmas pressies. The box arrived safely. To my surprise I told Madison that he can't open them up until Christmas day, so guess what he did with them? he put them under our Christmas tree. Excuse the fuzzy picture as I had to use my cell phone to take this one - Daddy has our digital camera in Thailand. We still have a little bit more Christmas shopping to do when Daddy gets back so I'm sure the space underneath the tree will be full.

Today Arjit, Maddys friend and neighbor is coming to spend the afternoon with us - he can't wait to have some fun with his friend. Yesteryday we had a visit from Dr. Fati, Vai and her two girls Myra (6 yrs) and Melody (8 yrs) and boy did they have fun playing games in Maddy's room. As soon as they arrived, they stayed there until it was time to go. It was a lovely visit and Maddy will be spending this coming weekend with them attending a Christmas festival and then bowling Sunday afternoon while Mommy has to work.

Happy Holidays everyone :)

It's Snowing

Maddy having fun in the snow. As soon as he stepped off the bus yesterday afternoon he had a snowball fight with Taehoon and Arjit and then wanted to do a snow angel in the snow. All I wanted to do was get inside because I was freezing my butt off LOL.

Daddy is currently in Thailand for two weeks and I have a part time job for the holidays at Macy's, a large department store. I am one of many Customer Service Managers who are assigned an area to assist Sales Associates and customer queries and complaints. It's only for 4 hours a day while Maddy is in school and during the weekends, depending on how often they need me. It's very hard on my feet as I am not use to standing all day long. I have this weekend off because Matt is away so that is a relief.

I have finally received the calendars and will send them off as soon as I can. I hope you all got Maddy's school photo :) Not to worry Sachi and Mark, yours is with the calendar and will be sent soon. Until next time, take care!

Playdates

Maddy had his first playdate yesterday with one of his friends named Arjit. Arjit and his family live in the same building block as us and we invited him to come and play with Maddy yesterday afternoon. They had so much fun playing toy fighting games, running around the apartment (yes I let them do whatever they wanted LOL), playstation games while snacking on biscuits and drink. He stayed for 4 1/2 hours and still didn't want to go home when his mom and younger brother came to get him.

This Thursday he is scheduled to go to Annie's house for a playdate. His mom just called me about an hour ago asking if it was ok for Madison to play at their house this Thursday. She said Annie has been bugging her to call me to make a playdate arrangement. When I got off the phone and told Maddy he jumped for joy and screamed (haha).

Kahlil's First Birthday

We were invited to Matt's friends son's first birthday over the weekend and Maddy made a few new friends. Even though they all were younger than him he had fun playing games with Michaelano and Marrick. We had loads of yummy, some spicy hot foods and yummy sponge birthday cake to eat and were so full and tired, we didn't have time to stop by and visit Fati to congratulate him for getting his PHD. Way to go Dr. Fati. :)

Sakib's parents, Lauren, Kelly, Kahlil, Sakib and Kelly's parents

The birthday boy, Kahlil Khan

Taking a well deserved rest after so much eating

Go Stenwood Stingers - On our way home

Fundraiser at Silver Diner

Avery, Annie and Maddy

We went to dinner at Silver Diner Thursday night as part of Madison's school fundraising event and it was a lot of fun. The teachers greeted us at the door, they waited on us and spent their time serving and clearing our dishes. The kids were loving it and I must say they did a great job.

The PTA gets a percentage of each bill which is a great idea for fundraising. Lots of families joined in the fun and ate lots of goodies too. As soon as Madison saw his fly girls Annie and Avery (haha) he was off. He only stopped by our table to take a nibble and sip on his drink and then he was gone.

Singing "America The Beautiful"

I tried to upload the video we took of Maddy and the kindergartners singing their song, but because it's so long, it won't upload. I did take a few pictures but they were not as clear because we were sitting far away from the stage. Even though we arrived 20 minutes early, most of the seats were already taken.

Maddy ended up not wearing his Samoan outfit. We received a notice in his folder today saying that those without costumes are to wear anything red/white and blue. Because Maddy's friends Michael and Matthew were going to wear these colors, he wanted to wear them too, so out went the Samoan outfit and on went a red skivvy, blue jeans and white sneakers. He did look cool though!!

The performance was wonderful and all the kids dressed up in their costumes looked beautiful! So many different nationalities were represented from India, Africa, Vietnam, China, Japan, Estonia, Iran, Palestine and so on. There was even going to be a Maori Stick Dance performed by the 5th graders, but we did not stay to watch it.

All in all it was a wonderful show and look forward to the next one in 2008. Hopefully by then Maddy will want to wear an outfit either from Samoa, Rarotonga or Japan :)

Vietnamese Students

Parent-Teacher Conference

Monday was Madison's parent teacher conference. We spent 20 minutes talking with Miss Weatherholtz about Madison's progress in school so far. According to her he is above average and is doing quite well. There are a couple of things he needs to work on but otherwise he is very well behaved, listens and follows instructions very well. He is also kind, considerate and has made a few special friends. We were both happy with his progress thus far.

Japanese Hibachi Cooking

We went to have lunch at a Japanese Restaurant called Sakura to celebrate Daddy's promotion he got last week. It was the first time Maddy and I had experienced Hibachi cooking, where a Japanese chef cooks your food right in front of you (on a grill that is) and boy was it exciting and absolutely yummy!! Here are a few pictures we took of our chef and us :)

Trick Or Treat

Maddy and Ashley ready to Trick or Treat

They both managed to fill their entire pumpkin buckets

Whacky Halloween March

Spiderman Mano'o

Maddy's Best Friend Annie who is dressed up as a Pirate :)

Getting ready to go on their march around the school

Azfar, Whitney, Tiffany, Alex P, Anisa, Maya, Maddy, Nathan, Nayeila and Claire

Marching around the playground

Miss Weatherholtz Class - Room 18

Pumpkin Day At School

Pumpkin Day at Maddy's school was a lot of fun. They had different activities with lots of parent volunteers helping out. I was in the library reading books to a few of the kids on halloween and pumpkins. I was even asked to read to the whole class while the parents tidied up after snack time.

In this picture Maddy is scooping out pumpkin seeds and then has to count them and mark them on a sheet. The reason why he is not smiling is because the girl next to him, Nayeila, took some of his seeds.

Playing Bingo

Snack Time

Maddy again was annoyed at Nayeila who seems to be having behaviourial problems according to the Instructional Teacher I spoke with that day. He didn't want me taking a picture with her in it LOL

Painting Pumpkins

At IHOP for a quick celebration dinner

Daddy got a promotion yesterday - Praise the Lord! :):)

Merrifield Fall Festival

Finally, a picture of the All Blacks Flag
Breakfast At IHOP

Building a football jacket holder

Daddy waiting patiently with Baby Octopus

Spiderman Mano'o

Inside the Inflatable Moon Bounce

Climbing the stairs to the inflatable slide

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee