Happy Birthday DA!

We have two 11 year old in the house. Back in November, we celebrated DA/Danik's birthday.

Happy Birthday my sweet son! Blessings to you from above, and I just want you to always remember, mommy and daddy loves you, and no matter what , you are always accepted by your family!

DA is very smart, happy and just sweet boy! He is opening up more and more, loves to help, and most of the time we don't' know that he is in the house :) He is gentle, younger siblings loves him, and he loves to play with them too! He is the one who always asking questions about everything, sometimes it's hard to answer his questions. Loves Indians , and if he had opportunity would go and live somewhere in the wild  :)

Happy Birthday Danik, Happy Birthday Danik, Happy Birthday Danik, Happy Birthday to you!

 Ready to pray before breakfast! 

 Waiting for his present

 Cake time

 Silly boy, he was playing and showing off :)

Happy Birthday Danik, we are happy to have your home! Blessed to be your parents!

1st Trimester -done

I am a little late with this post, kids are already back to school, but well I wrote this few weeks ago, and just will post this here now.

We are officially done with 1st school Trimester. Between Thursday and Friday, I had 6 parents conferences, I am so happy it's over :)

Overall boys did great job during 1st Trimester, they worked hard on their school and home work. I am so proud of them. Each child made progress academically, some more than others.


DJ- lets just say that he was much better last year, and he was trying much harder. The main issue, that he is not trying, and really not doing anything. We are working on this. There is huge possibility that he will need to repeat 6th grade again. I just have no idea how to motivate this child?!

DA-Made huge, huge progress. His reading is still behind, but math improved a lot. Last year we all thought that his weak spot would be math, but this year he is one of the strongest student in class, and getting math done quickly. Slow with homework, but getting done most of the things on his own.

EE-made HUGE, HUGE progress academically. I don't' worry much about him being behind in his math or reading  but his behavior  does rise many questions from teachers, and us, and there is just many  many issues we are dealing with. He is learning his multiplications, and doing most classwork. He needs a lot of supervision, but he is getting there, and trying hard.

SN-was trying harder last year, but still in only 1 year being in US, and never been in school before until he came into our home, he is doing awesome. He already cached up with his class level in reading and math. He is super smart! Most of the time he does his homework on his own, but sometimes needs a little help.

DD-is making progress. When he came, he was in 1-2 year old developmentally, and couldn't even hold his pencil. Today he knows most of the letters, number up to 10, and just made a huge progress in everything. He is still very behind, socially very behind, but he is smart boy and trying hard. Before he couldn't even put a dot, or write anything with out me standing over his shoulder, and now he is more sure in himself, and can do a line or two with out me being there! He is my smiley-funny boy! My little monkey :)

Denny-my A's and B's student. I am so proud of him. His teacher thinks that he is the sweetest boy ever :) I think that too :) He gets his homework on Monday for the whole week, and usually he is done with his homework in one day:) He needs a little supervision only with one or two pages, but he does all his homework on his own.

ElliAna-our princess, we do little writing and counting few times a week. She asks to do "homework" when her brothers come home. She is a little smarty pants:) We can easy send her to a 1st grade now :) , but she is only 3 years old.

Popular name "Daniel"or Daniel times three

Long time ago, I promised to share why we have 3 Daniel's in our family, and didn't' change their names during adoption of our new sons.

I know that everyone does have their own opinion, and I am just sharing, because many people are asking questions.

When we just started our 1st adoption journey in 2009 we also decided that we will not change child/ren names. We knew that our child will be older, and they will have life before coming into our home, they had mom, who gave them that name, they had history with out us, and their name was with them from the moment they were born. Child is coming to a new life, with many many changes, and to have their name change it would be way to much.

We were double questioning ourselves during our first adoption when we met our oldest son and found out that his name was Daniel (DJ) because at that time we already had a two year old Daniel (Denny), our bio son at home.  We did try to talk to Daniel J  to have his name change.

We asked Daniel (DJ), and ....
Daniel (DJ)(7 year old at that time) responded, " I know about God, and I know there was man name DANIEL, he listen to God, and was Gods Man. I want to be just like him when I grow up!"   After his response  we never went back to that conversation!

About a year ago we found Daniel J (DJ) grandmother, and she was very thankful, and happy that his name was the same.

In January 2012, we found out about two boys, brothers, Daniel A (DA) and Stanislav (SN). In May we finally went to adopt them, and question about name change were up in the air again. We tried to stick to our philosophy/believe, how hard would be for a child to have everything new, and new name but we asked Daniel A (DA), and he wasn't sure he wanted to change. He loved his name! He did try to pick different name for himself, but would go back to his name, and say that he really like his own. This is how we got our 3rd Daniel. I know that it was God's plan, and we happy to have our 3 Daniels :)


After our adoption was finalized, we had opportunity to  meet boys, DA and SN, grandfather. One of the first questions he asked was: "I know that most parents during adoption change their new children names, What are the new names for boys?" When we told him that their name are the same, he had tears in his eyes. He said: " Thank you, thank you for not changing their names, their birth mom loved them a lot, and she is the one who did named them!"

By not changing boys names, we try to show respect and let them know that we do respect their past, we do appreciate their birth mom for having them, giving  life, and naming them.

I know that all situations are different, and there is different circumstances. Maybe if we would adopt younger child, or our new child would hate their name, and desperately wanted to change, we would change their name.

We are happy that our kids are happy, and they all love their names. At one moment, when we just came home after adopting our Daniel A (DA) and Stanislav (SN), Stanislav (SN) was asking to change his name to Daniel :)

Blessings

Lake Tahoe #2

While I was sleeping Sergey and our Princess went to Safeway, got flowers, coffee and donuts(our birthday tradition). 

 Enjoy hot chocolate with donuts

 Boys helping with dishes

 While mommy and daddy had their coffee, kids did a little school work

 EE maturing and loves to play and be a big brother to our Princess

 After breakfast more playing outside, daddy had a great time with boys

 Smiley boy

 Tickling 

 

 After lunch we went for a walk again

 I just love these two! 

 Exploring

 It's so beautiful! I couldn't get enough of all this beauty around us! Gods work is amazing! I wish we could live somewhere in the country. Maybe someday!

 Denny

 DD

 Were taking pictures of each-other

 Boys through few rocks :)

 Us

 Little ones enjoy watching educational programs

 After lunch, smore's time

Later we drove around, and accidently found this little playground by the lake. It was beautiful, to bad I didnt' have my good camera with me. I took few pictures with my phone. 

We had a great time! Thankful to God for giving us this opportunity, and thankful to family "V" for opening their heart and sharing their home! Blessings