A month of Celebrations!

For us, we have a lot to celebrate from mid-May to mid-June!

On May 15th, we celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary! On the 15th, I made a delicious (if I may say so) meal of Chicken Crepes. It was hard at first finding a few of the ingredients, but we did it. We are still learning where the best place to buy certain things are. I will write more about our food differences on the Moscow Missions blog. Then, the next day, Mila, from church, babysat Canaan so that Dougle and I could go out for a special meal. This was the first time we left Canaan with someone here and he did great! Dougle and I went out to a place called Starlight Diner. It is like a 60's Diner, with delicious hamburgers. If you want to splurge, you can get a tasty milkshake...for about $10-$15. We skipped the milkshakes! But we had a good time being together, just the two of us. At this diner, the waitresses speak English and they have English menus. So that is fun too. After lunch, we checked out a nearby bookstore and just enjoyed being out together!

On May 27th, we celebrated Dougle's 30th Birthday!! My husband is getting sooo old! Ha. It didn't bother him in the least to hit the 30 mark. He just gets cuter and smarter everyday! Unfortunately, he had to spend most of the day at the airport (you can read about this on the other blog too). The next day, he spent all day at a hotel helping with LST registration. The next two days, he has spent sick with a sore throat and head cold. So, we hope to celebrate more properly next week. We are thinking about seeing if Mila will babysit again so we can go see Indiana Jones, in English!

My birthday is coming up on June 9th. I will be the very young and stylish age of....27. I keep thinking I am 23; Dougle keeps having to remind me that I am not a teenager anymore!

In addition, Father's Day and Mother's Day fall in this month time period. Of course, they don't really have these days in Russia, so it is easy to forget about them.

We've had lots to celebrate and be thankful for in this past month! We look forward to another year together, another year of life, and more time to serve and praise our Lord, if he wills. God has been so good to us over the past year. We give him thanks!

Happy Birthday, Canaan Kirt!

Canaan is ONE YEAR OLD! We celebrated his birthday Monday night with family and friends. Canaan was wonderful. When kids are one, it is so hard to predict how they will act at any time, let alone on that 'big day'. Right before his party started, Canaan started rubbing his eyes and acting grumpy. But, no worries, he was great! Canaan was a little clingy during parts of his party; I think all the people and excitement just got to him a bit. Overall, though, he was a great partier! He even did spectacular opening his presents. He helped peel the paper off the gifts, played with all the toys (didn't look twice at the clothes), and only cried when we took away one gift to open the next. So, we learned to do quick transitions between presents.
As for eating the birthday cupcake- he wasn't so impressed. He took a few bites of it; either he didn't like it (it was chocolate- could he be related to me and not like chocolate???), or he was too tired from all the other activities to properly enjoy it. Who knows. We got a few pictures of him eating it, but when we went to take a family picture, he started crying. Mommy and Daddy were smiling, but not our sweet boy-he was in a full cry. Poor thing.
All the other kids did excellent too. Malachi (Rob and Denyce's boy), Noelle (Matt and Vanessa's girl), and Grant (Russel and Alison's little boy who was born on the same day as Canaan) were all great sports throughout the festivities. It was such a wonderful night; we all had a blast!
Our theme was TONKA Trucks. Canaan is stuck on trucks. He LOVES them. So, I was giddy excited to find Tonka truck plates and decor at Party City. I called Dougle (who was in Dallas for support stuff) and told him excitedly about my find. What a silly MOM I am!
It was just perfect!
At his party,Canaan came away with blocks, trucks, trains, clothes and more! What a blessed little boy he is!

We thank God an awesome first year with Canaan Kirt. We also look forward to an amazing new year with Canaan Kirt!