Ezra's 3rd Birthday

Our baby boy is 3 years old! He seems so big now a days.. it's crazy. 

We had such a sweet day celebrating with Ezra. This is the first birthday that he has understood what a birthday is and was excited for all the festivities. 

The day started with birthday pancakes and 3 candles to blow out. 

We had a birthday party for Ezra with all of his friends at school. It was so sweet! 

His classroom door had a "Happy Birthday Ezra" sign on it. 

(and a giant elf next to it..impressive. haha) 

 They had little signs for us to take pictures with, complete with a birthday crown and sash for Ezra. 

When we asked Ezra what he wanted for his birthday, he said "cake". haha 

So I had the local cake shop make an extra special Mickey Mouse cake. 

Ezra loved it! 

Singing "Happy Birthday" to the birthday boy. :) 

After cake and snacks, it was play time! 

Its so sweet to see him making friends. 

When we got home we opened up more presents and packages sent in from grandparents. 

Then after his nap, we took Ezra downstairs to his big surprise.. his first bike! 

Later his friend Tia joined us and they chased each other on their bikes. 

Madelyn and I had fun watching them play. I think I'll be sitting in this chair for many hours to come.. 

We had such a fun day! 

Ezra loved the cake, the friends, the presents and all the attention. 

And we sure do love our Ezra! 

Thanksgiving 2015

We had such a good Thanksgiving this year! 

In true pilgrim style we celebrated it with Indians.. haha. 

Indians that have blessed us tremendously and have allowed us not just to survive but thrive in our new home. 

It was their first time to experience Thanksgiving so we went all out. 

The appetizer/dessert table. I made pumpkin pie and pecan pie.

 After we ate, I also made chai (tea) and we have chai/pie time. 

Everyone loved the pies! 

The table- I was really proud of how cute it looked. :) 

I made shirts for the kids with their names and turkeys on them. 

I just used the printing paper that you can iron on to shirts.

So easy and so so cute!  

Punkaj and Charu

We have spent HOURS learning Hindi with these dear friends and have been so blessed by their family. We've spent many Indian holidays at their house so it was fun to invite them to an American holiday. 

Anu and her daughter Jennifer

When we first arrived in India we needed someone to watch Ezra while we had class and a friend introduced us to Anu. She's been a part of our family ever since. Ezra and Madelyn both love her to pieces and we are very blessed to have someone we can trust to watch the kids when we work or need a date night. 

Ezra being cute and eating chips.  

Group photo

I just can't say enough how much I love the people in this picture. They have truly become our Indian family. 

It was pretty funny to go dish by dish and explain all the different food we made. 

Most of it was new to them but they were troopers and tried it all! 

We also went around the table and talked about what we are most thankful for from the year. 

Anu's daughter doesn't speak English so the whole time we were talking in Hindi. At this point in our learning that is pretty effortless, which is something we are SO thankful for!! 

We had SO much food. But its just not Thanksgiving if there isn't about 10 items on the menu.. right? 

After lunch, chai, pie and more visiting, our guests left, we took naps and then ended the day with Christmas movies and putting up the tree. A tradition I cherish from my childhood and Ezra was a big fan of this year. 

God has blessed us TREMENDOUSLY this year! 

In work, in family, in friendships.. we have seen his hand guiding and providing over and over again and we are very thankful! 

Fall 2015

Fall is upon us! And although it is still 90 degrees outside, I have very excitedly decked our whole house in a ridiculous amount of fall decor. It is so festive and wonderful. :) 

These last months have been a blur of work and play. We're learning a lot, teaching a lot and playing a lot. Its a really good combination! 

Since we are more busy, we try to make our together times more special.. such as making smores on the gas stove. I intended it to be family fun and introduce the awesome treat to Ezra, but the fire really scared him so he ditched us for his toys. Madelyn was already asleep so it became a delightful surprise date night in the kitchen to talk about life and eat way too many smores. 

Madelyn is growing so big and strong. She is now 5 months old and still joyful as always. 

Her and Ezra are starting to play together. He's excited about it now but I think when she starts stealing his toys he won't be so happy unfortunately. The price of siblings.. it'll be worth it in the end. 

My birthday was last month and man was I spoiled! It was a lazy day full of a professional massage, an afternoon nap (coveted by all moms of little ones) and ending with a big dinner with friends. And my mom and Luke's mom sent tons of special treats in the mail! Ezra was just as excited about them and didn't want to wait for Luke to get home to open them.. haha. 

Ezra has been growing up so fast these past months. For his "terrible twos" he is doing pretty good. He's more emotional but he doesn't throw tantrums. He actually says the words, "I cry..." haha. It was cute the first few times. 

He is more adventurous, playful and helpful than ever. He LOVES to help in the kitchen. He comes from a line of professional chefs so maybe we're grooming him to take over the family business. haha. 

He goes to play school now and has been learning so much! 

This is Ezra and his class.. so cute! 

We've also started a Monday night tradition of baking together. We add in a craft if there's time because Ezra is a fan of crafts too. He has a lot of hobbies. This particular Monday we tried out no-bake-cookies and an Ezra sized scarecrow. Ezra loved making both. Madelyn is a really good napper and she likes to sit in her swing and watch us cook so I'm so thankful to still easily have one on one time with Ezra. 

He loves to paint. So we usually print off alphabet or number coloring sheets to review what he's learning in school. He has fun and I feel like I'm doing my part in his education. It's a win-win. 

We are coming up on 2 years in India! It has been such a crazy, wonderful, growing time. Every day there are little surprises that you only get here.. such as cute photogenic cows right outside your door.   

We've made huge strides in Hindi and can really have in-depth conversations with friends and neighbors. There are still mistakes and there's progress to be made but being able to communicate has been such a blessing!   

Recently I've been reading Harry Potter 1 in Hindi. It's been great for learning and interesting to read but I'm so slow.. haha! Right now I'm at a 3rd grade reading level, but I figure at the end of this I should be a great reader. 

I've also been learning to make Indian food. My friend's mom is a really really great cook so my friend is teaching to make food like her mom. And we do it all in Hindi so its double learning. 

Ezra LOVES Indian food so he's very happy. 

And those are the recent happenings around our house. Fall is my favorite time of year because we get to pause to see our many blessings, praise the Lord for them. 

He's certainly blessed us beyond measure! 

Praise the Lord! 

15th August, 2015

15th August is India's Independence Day. It is a day celebrated with family, food, music and lots of kite flying. We joined in with some friends and had such a fun day!! 

I dressed both kids up in orange and green in honor of India. 

It is crazy how many people live in our city and how congested they live. But on events like these, it makes life really fun! 

The view of the street outside their house. It seemed picture worthy. 

Making pakoda and chai with the ladies. 

Ezra loved watching the kites and even got the fly it a little. 

I tried flying it too. The goal is to get your kite super high in the sky and cut any near by kite's string.. making you the highest and longest reigning kite. 

Ezra and I made a paper Indian flag, which he loved and is now proudly displayed on the fridge. 

The beauty of this expat life is being able to celebrate holidays from both countries. Double the holidays, double the fun! 

Thailand 2015

We survived our first international vacation as a family of four and it was actually GREAT! I'm amazed at how precious and easy going Miss Madelyn is. And Ezra is getting more and more fun. 

We recently got the movie Planes from the market and Ezra really likes it. I usually watch it with him on the Hindi setting which is great practice for me and he can't tell the difference. Anyway.. He is very excited about planes and was over the moon about seeing the planes and riding one. I guess he doesn't remember he's been on over a dozen flights already.. haha. 

 Ezra wanted to make sure we didn't forget his Buzz and Woody dolls so he was stuffing them in the luggage. It was cute! 

While in Thailand we had some work meetings and visa applying to do but we also had lots of family fun! 

We went to the aquarium for the first time with kids. Everything is so much sweeter with little ones. Harder of course, but so fun and worth it.

Ezra loved the fish. I did too. I forgot how beautiful and relaxing aquariums are. Luke loves aquariums too so this resparked his desire for one in our home. 

Another day we went to the mall and there was a sports store. Luke and I have always really enjoyed walking around sport stores. We don't have any in Delhi so this was a treat to us and Ezra was estatic in the golf section.. haha. 

We also went bowling which is Ezra's current favorite sport. 

He is very adamant about doing it all by himself and actually does pretty well (with bumpers). Needless to say, he has gotten a lot stronger this summer from chunking 6 lb. balls every week.  

I grew up on a lake and Luke's family vacationed at the ocean often so we love to be near the water. The beach is definitely our favorite vacation spot. Between the sound of the water, the fun of swimming and the beauty of sunsets, its a great place to escape the city and rejuvenate.

We also made it to the golf course.. of course. It was so much fun! Ezra was such a big boy, hitting the ball with Daddy. We played with a sweet older Asian couple and they were very patient with Ezra. They had grandkids so they understood and I think they quite enjoyed our little ones.  

The kids almost made it through the whole course. About hole 16 they both fell asleep. I didn't play any holes but I cheered good shots, kept kids happy and made a great napping pillow apparently. Moms.. its what we do. :) 

We spent most of our time swimming and lounging by the pool. They had a large pool that was Ezra's height so he had a blast playing in the water. During our meetings there were other families with kids that we were able to meet and visit with everyday. It was great! 

We really liked Thailand. It is beautiful and the people are friendly. But after a couple of weeks we were ready to come home. 

So now we're back to the normal schedule of work, school and loving on kiddos. 

This is such a precious season with this precious little gal. I just can't express how much joy she brings my heart. We're definitely BFFs already. 

It's now the start of monsoon season in Delhi so we have been able to break out the rain jackets and umbrella. We love rain so its been nice to hear it splashing outside and we've enjoyed the cooler weather it brings too!

I'll leave you with this picture of Ezra.. eating his chocolate donut. It doesn't have anything to do with our Thailand trip but its still a sweet memory I want to keep. he's getting so big. He's thoughtful, funny, pretty obedient for a toddler and a very good big brother.