A Birthday Party

Hi,

This is Matt. It's my birthday today - or at least that's what everyone keeps saying. Since I'm only 1 I'm not really too sure what they're talking about, but everyone sure seems happy about this birthday thing. Tim was jumping around my crib and singing some song to me this morning and telling me how proud he is that I'm 1 now. I guess that's a good thing, but I'm not really sure what I did to make him proud. I got some cool new stuff today, too - must be part of the birthday everyone keeps talking about. I got a really soft little teddy bear from Irina and very cool denim jacket from Zhanara. Too bad it's too cold her to wear it. Mommy, Daddy and Tim gave me this really fun clown that wobbles around if I hit it and has a bell in it, but it broke the first time I dropped it. Daddy looked kinda unhappy about that and Mommy said something about she shoulda bought the more expensive Russian toy instead of the cheap toy from China. It's OK with me though 'cause it still makes a rattling noise now when I shake it. We also had cake. It was OK, but I really didn't feel like feeding myself since I didn't take much of a nap today. And then . . . oh, Mommy said I have to quit hogging my sister's blog since I have my own. If you want to see some pictures from the birthday party thing you can see them here.
http://www.mcgillsinkaz.blogspot.com/

Matt
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Tim and I left at 9:30 to go pick up Hope from the baby house and to pick up Matt's birthday cake. Mike must have been wondering what happened to us because we didn't return until after 11:30 because when we got to the baby house the kids were all in brand new clothes for a "concert". OK - so we'll go to the music room and watch the concert - shouldn't take long. Well, the concert turned out to be a seminar for the baby house staff to show what the caretakers are teaching the kids in the different age groups. Of course, Hope is in the oldest group, so they were last to go and we had to wait. Since Tim currently thinks he shouldn't have to do anything that doesn't suit him, this got his day off to a bad start and it only declined from there. Hope, however, is a joy. She recited a poem and performed a dance and a couple of songs with some friends. She's a real ham.

It's amazing how quickly she's adjusting to being with us. She came in, found her toys and started to play while I cooked lunch. Since I was chastised by 3 different people at the baby house for not feeding her enough yesterday (never mind that she didn't finish any part of her meal even though there was plenty of food) I proceeded to cook what almost amounted to a holiday meal. So, until the time that she's with us permanently, looks like we'll be having a soup course and then a meat and something else course for lunch and I will make her eat her food. Today she stayed until after 5 PM and only asked once to go back to her group and that was when I tried to get her to nap. Other than that, she was happy as a clam and made herself at home. Since no one really napped today because Hope was crying so much about napping we all got up and had Matt's birthday party, such as it was. The cake was better than most we've had here - still a little dry, but the cherry filling helped. After that, Hope and I gave Matt a bath because he had cake and cherries smeared all over his arms and legs. I finally called Zhanara to bring us back because I didn't want her to miss dinner at the baby house and I thought they might be wondering where we were.