Adventures, Ice Cream, and Pictures

Although I never found my camera, my old back-up digital camera works well enough to get by for now.

Adventures
Several months ago, my mom and I started walking at the mall. It was just too hot to walk outside and our nearby gym had closed down. Around that time, Rai still didn't have enough energy to walk with us, so he chose to ride along in the stroller ... as long as we occasionally stopped for a snack or a train ride. The mall also has a bungee jumping place where you can wear a harness and jump incredibly high using both bungee cables as an air trampoline. My mom thought I was crazy, but when Rai asked if he could do it, I was "sure, why not?" Luckily, you only had to be over 20 pounds, and Rai was certainly over that. Well, it wasn't too traumatic, but Rai wasn't about to do that again. He was okay until they started the machine which raises you higher. At the time, Rai didn't like the noise and immediately wanted out. I did get a few pictures of him somewhat smiling while squeezing my hand, but I wasn't surprised when he didn't ask to do that again.

Until last week. :-)



You could tell he was tempted to try this again several times over the last few months. Each time we would see a child jumping and doing flips, Rai would stop and smile. When I turned to him and asked "Do you want to try it?", he immediately looked startled and shook his head. So imagine my surprise when he said "Let's try it!" and actually giggled the whole time!






But he still wanted to ride the train, too! :-)



We bought a season pass to the zoo this year since we had been going every Friday. As schedules became more hectic and the heat rose, we took a break from the zoo for most of the summer. Last weekend, however, Rai asked to go to the zoo, so we went EARLY hoping the temperatures would stay lower than 100F for at least a few hours. Luckily, they did, so we had some time to see a new section of the zoo called the "Wilds of Africa" and the Bug house.

Yes, I love snakes, but bugs and I don't do well together. Hey, snakes are soft, cool, and calm. Bugs are crunchy, fast, and have little legs that make my skin crawl. I tried not to impose my squeamishness on Rai. He looked around, asked "What's that?" several times, and then was ready to go. WHEW!
















And in preparation for our vacation to San Antonio which starts later today, I told Rai we could get him some new sunglasses. (Rai's sunglasses from his last trip had some pieces missing.)



Rai wanted to pink flamingo sunglasses, so I took advantage of a little work-related joke by getting Rai a matching stuffed animal pink flamingo and calling him ... well I don't want to give the joke away. :-) Here is Rai posing with ...




Ice Cream
Rai LOVES desserts. He doesn't get too have very much of any dessert or have it very often, but he LOVES them. The other day, his preschool teacher said that potty training was going well and to pick up UNDERWEAR for preschool on Monday. I almost cried. Underwear? He's 2! Oh, I'm not ready to see him grow up this quickly, but I have no choice. He's a big boy ... with underwear. I asked him if he was ready for underwear, and he smiled and said "Let's get Kitty-chan or Spiderman!" (Yes, Kitty-chan is Hello Kitty.) No, we didn't get Hello Kitty, but we did get the assorted boy pack with Spiderman, Finding Nemo, Cars, etc. Now, my conversations with him on the phone are "Mommy, I go potty! I wear Spiderman!"

So what does this have to do with ice cream? Well, before we bought the underwear, I had only see Rai actually go potty in the toilet 3 times (once in August of last year, once a few months later, and once a few months ago). So when we went to the mall to do our crazy adventure bungee jumping and train ride I made Rai a deal. "If you go potty in the toilet, we'll get ice cream." Apparently, he was motivated. As soon as he went potty, he said "I get ice cream!"

And he did. :-)





Pictures
Here is a picture of the new wall of pictures. Rai can almost reach several of them, but they are at least easier for him to see.

The pictures on the left and right were given to us by Omma and Appa (Rai's foster parents), so I'm grateful that these images will still be familiar to Rai.


Vacation!
Today, Rai and I leave for a weekend in San Antonio. It's going to be a great weekend with MANY pictures! We're visiting with an old friend, staying with my cousin who I haven't seen in a year, spending a day at the Snake Farm with another adoptive family (we met IN Korea), and going to Sea World! So be on the look out for more pictures soon!