"Mom My Ride" Video

I saw this one on another blog from my Jan 2007 DTC group. It is really funny!

Why I need to learn Chinese :)

I saw this video clip on youtube and very quickly decided I needed to visit the Rosetta Stone (company that teaches various languages online and with CD-ROMs) kiosk at our local mall! The guy there was very nice and asked if I would like a demonstration of the program. I asked if I could see the Chinese one. Two minutes into it I felt completely panicked! I had absolutely no idea what was going on...I just wasn't getting it & I kept thinking of this youtube video! So he offered to show the program to me in English (for people learning to speak English) so I could see how the program works. Instead I asked him to show me in Italian. I don't speak any Italian but immediately I could understand how the program was supposed to work and I was picking up a little Italian. Then I asked for German because I grew up in a German speaking household. Yes, this Rosetta Stone program was great, I was sure of it! I get it! Then I asked him to show me Chinese again. Again, I just couldn't get it. Here is what was making it so difficult for me. Let's say I wanted to say "The dog is under the table" in Italian. In English it takes 6 words to complete that sentence. In Italian it's around the same I guess (I'll tell you for sure when I get to that lesson! Ha!) but in Chinese it looked like a 25 word sentence. I had no idea of the breakdown of the individual words or articles. Where Italian seemed intuitive, Chinese seemed "foreign". Oh well, in the meantime, the boys and I are having fun learning Italian now but soon enough I will make the big leap to Chinese so I don't end up like the poor Dad in this video ;)

Mardi Gras Carnival

They had a carnival at the elementary school school Evan will be going to next year. It was very crowded and noisy but we had lots of fun. Did you ever see one of those boths that you go into and it blows around money everywhere and you have to catch as much as you can? I think I have seen them on TV on a game show or something. Well they had something like that at the carnival only you had to catch pieces of paper and the paper said how many "dollars" (fake school dollars) you have won. It was very popular and we waited in a long line to try. But it was worth it...Evan loved it! He was grinning from ear to ear the whole time he was in the booth!The second photo is one of Evan, his friend Patty and Ryan. They had a great time!

Wild West Day!

They had Wild West Day at Evan's school last week. I found some cowboy hats and bandanas leftover from a birthday party and stuck his vest on him. Presto...instant cowboy! Of course, his brothers "needed" stuff too so back I went to the basement for more cowboy stuff. I thought, its only a little extra effort on my part and everyone will be happy plus it will make for a good photo. Of course, I wasn't able to get all three in the photo at once with the assorted cowboy gear in the few minutes I had before I had to drive Evan to school. This photo was a close as it came.

Dave's Celebrity Look-a-like

OK, the first celebrity that they matched Dave with was Rodger Daultry! But it was absolutely ridiculous! They also match you with a few other celebrities and David Schwimmer was one of the other celebrities listed. So I posted his photo. "David Schwimmer" is actually the reason we met. It was 1996 at the Beaux Arts Ball held that year at the Philadelphia Naval Station and Dave (my Dave) walked by and I grabbed his arm and said "David. You look like David Schwimmer". He wasn't thrilled about the comparison but it started our first conversation. And that my friends, is the very simple story of how we met.

My celebrity look-a-like!

Someone from my Yahoo DTC group told us about this face recognition site. I tried it out and here are the results. I didn't know this girl but she is apparently from the TV show "Lizzy Maguire". Aside from similar facial patterns we also are both of filipino heritage. Maybe we do look a little alike? :) Check and see who you look like
www.myheritage.com

Barrier Adoption Video Journal (part 2)

I had this video on our blog before but I was having some technical difficulties and had to delete it. Here it is again. I think I got it right this time. This family did a great job putting together this video of their trip to China to adopt their daughter. Recently I received an email from a woman that saw this video on our blog only to realize that the orphanage they were showing was the same orphanage where her twin daughters had lived. It meant a lot for her to see the orphanage. I think she had some photos but not as many as these people were able to get. I can't imagine going through this adoption process without the internet. It has been a lifeline for us in providing us with important information and connecting us to so many others that have adopted or are in the process of adopting. Plus when it all seems so far away I can go to youtube and see all these amazing videos. It has been wonderful!