Starting slow...

So, Mike had told me he wanted to be the one to post updates on our site more, but he's not keeping up with his end of the bargain!  

I can't believe October is here already.   We celebrated our 12 year anniversary a couple days ago!  I can't believe it has been that long.  Mike and I are planning a trip to Orlando (just the 2 of us) the first week of November while Nana and Grandpa M. visits with the kids.  I'm so excited!  We are planning to do the Epcot Food and Wine festival and go to Harry Potter world (I hope)!

Shane's 5th birthday is coming up in a couple days!  He is doing SOOO well, I am so proud of him!  He is learning things so fast.  We are planning on just having a small get together at the park with just a couple friends. 

Makenna and Shane are going to be Ninja's this year for Halloween!  I am actually really surprised that is still what Makenna wants to be.  Originally she wanted to be Cinderella again (she was last year)  but I told her what Shane was going to be and she wanted to be the same.  I can't wait to take pictures. 

Makenna rides her bike!

Like I mentioned in an earlier blog submission, we taught Makenna to ride her bike without training wheels and she's doing great now. Too bad it's too hot to be outside half the time in Georgia!

Shane's been doing great with potty training and it looks like it's finally sinking in. Jennah has been an all-star for bringing him to the bathroom 15 times a day!

First week of school

The first week of school came and went, and it went great! I just had to post this end of week progress report of Shane's, because I'm so proud that he recieved an "outstanding" for treating others with respect! It's extremely important to me to treat others with respect! I'm so proud of Shane! Makenna did great too- she was on green (good) everyday this week!

1st Day of the 1st Grade! and... Preschool

Today was the first day of school... for both Makenna AND Shane! There was a lot of confusion about Shane's first day- I thought he started in September, but I guess it was just the regular preschool class that was starting later- luckily, I wasn't the only confused parent!

Makenna had a GREAT first day! Her teacher seems really nice, and she had a green circle today! Shane also had a great first day! I was really worried he'd cry from separation anxiety like he did last year, but he seemed really happy to be back!

These pictures don't really show it, but they really WERE happy today!

Sunset Beach

Jennah's Post

It has been such a crazy summer, I haven't been able to post as much as I'd like. Thankfully Mike has been able to post some updates too. Here we are at Sunset Beach, Oahu, on the 3rd of July. My high school friend and classmate Pinky took these family photos of us!

Look Ma, no training wheels! Makenna learns to ride a bike...

Yesterday, Makenna learned to ride her bike without training wheels, after three short days of trying about 45 min per day. She was nowhere close before that. I went and bought her a 16inch bike, assembled it minus the petals for the first two days.

I read about a method the New York City Bike Club used: I watched a video on Youtube where the instructors removed the bike petals at first and lowered the bike seats, then had the kids walk the bike along and coast by lifting their legs. Quickly, the coasting time would get more and more as each kid found his or her balance.

So I tried this with Makenna and once she could coast for about 12 seconds, I had her try her bike with pedals, and she was up and pedaling like a natural in about 60 seconds! The method basically teaches the kids balance, which is the most important aspect of learning to ride a bike. Makenna learned without falling one single time!

Well, here's that video for those interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO7HsWf8cbI

Shane Operation: No complications

Shane had his operation yesterday at Shands Medical Center in Gainesville to remove the suspicious area on the right rear area of his brain. The biopsy turned into an operation: the surgeon noticed the abnormal area could be removed so he took it all out. Apparently it looked abnormal, but not "bad", as in cancer bad, so that's good.
Friday we will get results of the biopsy and then there is one more follow on appointment at Shands. Shane was left with a 3.25 inch scar on his head as you can see in the photo. He stayed overnight and was only a little fussy, but the next day he was laughing, very energetic and his old self.

The hospital is amazing and I'm glad he went there as opposed to any other one. We've had very good experiences there overall, so bravo Shands and bravo Shane!

May 27th...

Friday May 27th was such an exciting day for me! My friend Ashley went into labor, 2 weeks before her due date. Unfortunately her hubby was deployed, and had to miss the birth by 2 weeks! (he is due home in a couple days). I went to the hospital so that she could use my laptop and Skype with her hubby so he could "be there". Well, it happened so fast, and I ended up staying for the birth! It was truly a day I will never forget!

a day of therapeutic horse riding...

Shane has the opportunity to do horse therapy weekly through the airwrrior courage foundation - We are so grateful for the resources he has here!

So on Saturday Mornings, we take him and he gets to ride this little horse, Rusty.

Some of the benefits riding horses include: stretching muscles, increased range of motion, and sensory integration, which is so great for Shane.

But also, while learning to keep his balance on the horse, they play educational games like matching colors, singing the alphabet and stretching to put rings over posts. I love it!
Here is Shane throwing colored bean bags into a bucket.



Here he is stretching his body to place rings over the post



We are so happy that Shane has this type of therapy available to him! Makenna is attending Horse Camp this week so she has the opportunity to ride horses too and not feel left out!
(sorry for the blurry pictures, taken by my camera phone)

Video of the day!

Shane at the beginning stages of reading. It's very hard to hear, but he does sound out the letters.



The countdown to our trip back home to Hawaii has officially begun! I can't believe we will be there in less than 2 weeks now!

Catching up!

Mike wrote the last couple of posts but I am finally back to post one of my own. It has been so long! I feel like I haven't had a chance to catch up with life lately. Ever since Mike's been back I feel like there's been so much things going on!
1. Makenna graduated from Kindergarten! This one really got to me because I still remember very clearly the day Janell and I graduated Kindergarten, and it did not seem THAT long ago!

Proud Parents :)


With her teacher Receiving her diploma

Proud mama

Happy Daddy!

Just a couple days later, Makenna had her ballet/tap recital. I know Mike posted a couple pics and a video so I will just post this one picture of her getting ready:
Hmm.. Not sure if I like seeing my little girl putting makeup on!

Other things going on at the Mullins hale: Shane started regular therapeutic horse riding! Mike goes back to work this week, and as for me, I got to be there while one of my friends gave birth to her baby girl! It was so exciting and unexpected! Her husband is deployed right now so I was going to let her borrow my laptop so he could be there at the birth through skype... as I was getting her set up with skype she was ready to have the baby so I stayed with her! It was truly amazing!
Next up for us is getting ready for our trip back home to Hawaii!!!

Makenna ballet star!

Makenna and her friend Ashley Meggett (Dave is the 71st Rescue Squadron commander and an old friend). They both did great and it was cool to have them in the same dance class!

Waterbug girl

Here's video clip of Makenna swimming at the neighbor's nice pool. I used my HD underwater video camera, which cost about $100 at Amazon.com. Amazing how cheap technology is becoming these days. Too bad Blogger severely degrades the video quality for some reason.

I'm Home!

Here are some pics,--'m elated to be home by the way...

Camel Race (New Compilation)

Here's a better movie of the Camel Races! This one shows much better shots of the entire spectacle.

In My Room

Ok, this is my room in southwest Asia (most of you know exactly where, but I'm practicing good OPSEC). I'm testing out my new, cell-phone sized HD waterproof video camera. Can't wait to use it in the surf!

Maj Saeed's Racing Camels and House

Please read the following post before this one!

This was the small lunch. Dinner was huge!This is a very nice baby racing camel. All of Maj. Saeed's camels were well trained.

This is Saeed's 16 year old son, Mubarak. A really nice, mature kid.

Camel Races with Major Saeed and son

Maj Heath Schneider (HNCC security liaison) and I hung out with Qatari Major Saeed (Qatari security officer on base) and his son Mubarak for eight straight hours. We saw 3 of 12 camel races, went to a market to buy some food (we ate two meals), hung out at Maj Saeed's camel racing house (he owns another), met his camels, and watched the news. THE RACES The camel races are a very big deal to the Qataris. These were on a Saturday, and one of the last race sets of the season. Racing camels from UAE, Oman, Saudi, and Qatar were there. About six camels ran each race, the winner of each taking $30,000, a new SUV and other prizes. Second and thirds place received to car but $15,000 and $10,000. Maj. Saeed owns 15 racing camels, but none raced on this particular day. One of his camels would take third place on the following day though, so good for him. Nobody actually rode on the camels; they used small robot jockeys with remote controlled whips. Unfortunately, I didn't get a good shot of a robot jockey, but they rode on top of the camel's rump. The camels themselves were a breed of Qatari and Sudaniese camels, a hybrid breed that produces the fastest camels. Although their legs looked to be moving in slow motion with their gigantic strides, these guys could peak around 40 mph, and the races that day were five miles. All audience members and owners watched the races while driving their SUVs, and a different race ensued with cars lumbering around haphazardly four to five rows across and jockeying for position. The winning camel has its head rubbed with pure saffron, an extraordinarily expensive herb, and the residue is left to wash off naturally. It is a sign of a winner (and makes the camel smell good too). Here is a video of the first race--you can hear the radio race announcer narrating in arabic:

SW Asia Jazz Jam

I traveled off base the other day with the deputy director of our section and one of our translators, Sam, who has his master's degree in music at the University of Louisville and plays piano, accordion, oud, and some other instruments. Too bad we were drowned out by other music in the store; in the attached video it may be tough to hear the Oud he's playing unless you have good speakers. Regardless, it was fun to actually play with a real person, even though I'm no jazz player on the bass. I came up with a simple jazz turnaround line and Sam went with it. After that we ate at an Iranian restaurant and drank some tea at a Morrocan restaurant. Stay tuned for my blog about the camel races I went to on April 2nd!

toothless!

Makenna lost another tooth! She was so excited! She even woke up at 5am to see what the tooth fairy had brought her! The tooth fairy gave her 3 dollars for her tooth and yesterday we both went shopping and this is what she chose as her prize:

I’m back….

I apologize for the lack of posts this last 2 months!! It’s been really hard to set time aside while Mike’s been gone to post a blog…I’ve been trying to keep busy!

This past weekend, I took the kids to the Azalea festival in town, kids had a blast and Makenna rode a mechanical bull!

Shane going down the slide with Brandy!

Stuck in a bubble

She stayed on for a long time!

Getting ready for face painting!

She chose to be a Mariposa!

Makenna and her friend Ashley

Future Picasso

Pony Ride!

This is from Autism Fun day a couple weeks ago!

Makenna’s finally riding her bike! (She never wanted to before… a little afraid…now the bikes a little too small! LOL)

Will try to keep updated more frequently!