Our wonderful, sweet baby boy #3 is here! Carson Malosi Tapusoa was born on January 6, 2010 at 12:29 PM. He weighed 7 lbs 3 ozs and was 20 1/2 inches long. After a somewhat scary turn at the end of a pretty normal pregnancy I was induced 2 weeks early due to suddenly becoming pre-eclampsic. Enjoy some of our pictures from this exciting birth, hospital stay and bringing him home!
We had a Very Merry Christmas indeed!!
We love opening stockings, even Tama got lots of treats and toys in his stocking!! We found this hilarious dog stocking that sings and barks Christmas songs while it flaps its ears that have bells on them. . .soooo funny!
But the gift of the year had to be for Aidan. . .BB Gun - a 9 y/o boys dream. . .he didn't even ask for it (I think he would've never believed he would get it, so he didn't dare ask). Wow was he excited - I'm not sure I've ever seen him so excited about a present before!!! Once he got a small piece opened and saw the box he started tearing the rest of the paper off at Mach 4!!
Despite Mason having pnemonia and Julie having a sinus infection, it was a great Christmas - we had friends over for dinner and Julie's mom was with us - always good to have Grandma here!!
Hi Everyone - Aidan's science project is titled "which ingredients are the most important when making Chocolate Chip Cookies? We will be making lots of cookies this month!!! Please help him by taking his survey - Thanks!
Survey now closed - thanks to all those who did - we got 40 complete which is way above what we we hoping for - thanks everyone!!!
We'll post pics and results end of Dec or Jan!!!
We can't believe it's been two years since this little blessing joined our family!!! He had a fun birthday on Monday - he was a bit perplexed with the candles - he insisted on having all these different ones on there, but he only had to blow out 2 and was confused at first, but then he got it! Unfortunately I had been sick all week and didn't have the energy to make a really fun cake, but he was very happy with chocolate!!! He got balloons early in the day and had a total blast with them all day and kept coming up to me and saying "Thank you baoons, mommy" - oh melt my heart!!
So, this is a few of the happenings of the week in reverse order. . .
Yesterday Mason (Mr. Busybody) was standing up on the bench at church to see the kids (during the annual Childrens Program), lost his balance and fell. He was right in between Delvin and I and we were just not fast enough for this kid!! Anyway - he hit his ear right on the corner of the wooden pocket that holds the hymn books! He hit it perfectly and had a nice laceration all around that little piece of the ear. We attempted the Walk-in clinc hoping not to have to deal with the ER, but they said it was too complex for them and sent us to the ER. We actually were in and out of the ER faster than the walk-in clinic!!! It was quite the ordeal with Delvin and two nurses holding him down while the Dr sutured it up. He ended up with 5 stitches. He screamed like mad and would occasionally take a break from the screaming and one of the nurses said "Mason, you're a tough little cookie!" Mason immediately starts yelling "cookie, cookie, momma". We were laughing so hard! It was so funny. Afterward they gave him a popscicle and a teddy bear. I put a bandaid on the teddy bears ear just like his and he thought that was cool, wouldn't let go of the bear after that! Anyway - trauma #1 with Mason - check! I'm sure with this kids there will be plenty more to come!! Grrr - he is scheduled to get his two year old pics taken on Thursday. . .guess I'll have to wait another week until after those stitches come out!
As I mentioned above it was the annual Children's Program at church. . .Aidan did a great job this year - we were very proud! Every child (ages 3-11) has a part they say and a few of them are chosen to write and give a 1 minute talk. This was Aidans first year to give a talk. He did an awesome job! He talked about Service. He used the example of how people helped us with our garden and how we were able to serve others by sharing our vegetables. Luckily we were able to settle Mason down and get the bleeding under control just in time to stand in the back and listen to Aidan give the talk, then we left for the ear repair journey!
I haven't posted yet about flag football, mostly because I haven't gotten good pics, but oh well, here are some anyway. Delvin has been coaching Aidan's team through the Boys and Girls Club. They are both loving it!! Here's Delvin in action during a Huddle!!
This is Aidan's first year playing and we are shocked at how good he is!!! He often plays quarterback, but he really loves playing defense. . .he is excellent at both!! It is fun to watch him - he has turned into quite the football junkie over the last few months - he wants to watch football on tv and has to go out in the back yard and practice the moment he gets home from school. He's so motivated to learn and is far more "into it" than I dreamed he would be. . .watch out!
No the baby didn't arrive early, but we had a surprise addition to our home!! Tama is a puppy we found two weeks ago wandering around all day and could not leave him in the cold over night so we brought him in. We looked for his owner via craigslist, vet scan for a ID chip, newpaper lost and found and fliers and never found his owner. However, we did find 3 siblings that others in our area had also found and none of them had any success in finding the owner either. . .looks like the litter was dumped :(
Anyway - after 2 weeks we've decided he's ours to keep and have named him "Tama" which means "boy" in Samoan. He is a sweetheart - quiet, cuddly and very loving. The vet says he's 3 months old or less. The boys are in love with him as are Delvin and yes, me - I actually am good and attached to this animal, ME! I never thought I would care so much about a dog, but alas!!!
Mason is pretty rough with Tama usually, but on this occasion he felt he needed to teach Tama about being a dog, so he read him a book - Clifford the Big Red Dog - of course!!! (I love the pointing fingers like he's trying to teach Tama he's a dog like Clifford - so funny!)
Aidan is awesome with Tama - he takes him in the back yard to play every day after school and does not even care when he has to pick up the "unpleasantries" Tama leaves around the house sometimes!!! 
Mason was so cute - he insisted that I take what he wanted to share with me. . .funny kid!!
Under his Monkey costume he wore his "Skeleton" that a friend from work gave me. . .he is in love with his "kelton jammies" They glow in the dark and he thinks that is the greatest!!!
Mason is in the "I do it" stage! While it is so cute that he wants to be so independent, it is soooooooo frustrating that we can't seem to get anything done in a timely manner. Lots of extra time has to be given to either fight with him or to just let him attempt to do it himself. I'm having one of those moments right now!!! I really need to get to the store and he has to put on his overalls himself. Instead of fighting I've decided to give him the time to "I do it" as I do some deep breathing to prevent me from getting too frustrated. I've decided to sit here a blog about it instead!!
Look, I just got some cute pics of him after he finally got the overalls on backward and is trying to do the straps. He quickly noticed I had the camera and then a new "I do it" began - he loves taking pictures. Ok, I think the mommy "blogging time out" worked and I'm going to attempt to get the overalls on the right way and head out. I'm already anticipating the next "I do it" in the car, trying to get his carseat buckles on. Oh the joys of motherhood!
Thanks so much!!!!
We have heard via email from one of Delvin's sisters in Western Samoa. All of the Biological family in both Western and American Samoa are safe and ok, with the exception of the Uncle. We hope that we will hear good news about him as well!!! We haven't heard news of the 3 missing on his adopted side. Still collecting clothes and shoes to send - thanks for your help!
Today has been very difficult - we can't even imagine how all these people enduring the harsh conditions of these natural disasters are managing. Delvin has been on the phone the majority of the day trying to learn all he can about his families. Delvin has two families. Both his biological and adopted families have members on both islands. The village near where Delvin adopted father is from is completely destroyed. Several of his family members are still unaccounted for.
American Samoa:
Birth family - 1 sister unaccounted for
Adopted family - a cousin has been in touch with family in America via a satellite phone and reports that two cousins and an Aunt are reported missing
Samoa (Western) Where Delvin was born and lived until he was brought to the US:
Biological family - The only communication from this island we know of at this time is from the government. One of Delvin's cousins works for the government and called his sister who lives in Puyallup, Washington. He reported that his father (Delvin's Uncle) is missing and his house is destroyed. This Uncle was a 2nd father to Delvin, he spent a lot of time in his home and is very worried about his safety! We don't know anything about the rest of his family. Delvin has 2 sisters and a brother that live there with their families. The brother and one of the sisters live on the original family property which is on higher ground, so we want to assume they are alright. His other sister, however, we have no idea about her conditions.
Adopted family - Delvin's father is the High Chief of his village, which was completely destroyed - no immediate family members live there, however there are many cousins, aunts and uncles. Delvin's father will travel there as soon as allowed to help with the organization of clean up and rebuilding. As the High Chief it is an expectation that he comes to help. We anticipate he will be there for a long time and are already praying that he will be able to endure the conditions and return to us safely!
We are collecting clothing and shoes to send to Samoa. If you can help us out with this cause it would be much appreciated!! We will be sending the donations to the Samoan Federation of America, who has containers they will be sending to Samoa. Please help us out with all sizes, male and female, new or used clothing and shoes. Bring them to our home or contact us and we will come pick them up! Thank you in advance for your help!!!
While I was cooking dinner today I hear this clomping coming toward me. I turn around and there is Mason wearing Aidan's shoes, backpack and carrying his lunchbox. He was all ready to go to school!!! This kids cracks me up all day long!!!!!
Aren't these hilarious? We just had to laugh!! We'll call them Aidan Carrot, Mason Carrot and baby carrot (anyone have name suggestions for the 3rd?)
Can't believe he's in third grade!!! And yes the camera battteries died again and I couldn't get another pic, so his eyes are closed, but at least he's smiling!! We took him to school and got to go in the classroom for a few minutes, but we had to leave early because Mason was having a fit. . .he did not want to leave his brother there, no no, he wanted his brother to come home with us!! Mason threw a fit all the way until we were driving away and I was able to finally occupy him with something else.
It should be an interesting year! His teacher is EXTREMELY organized and I've never seen such a specific list of school supplies or such explicit directions of exactly what to do with the supplies! We took the supplies in last week at back to school night and got everything organized that night, she wanted everything to be ready to go when they walked in today. Each student has a very large, detailed planner. This will probably be really good for Aidan to learn since we are so laid back and not a very planned family. I've already gotten more emails from this teacher than from the last three years of teachers combined!!!! In many ways I really appreciate the communication, in some ways it's a bit over the top -but I think it will be really good overall!! Like I said, it should be an interesting year!!!!
Thursday we made our Annual trip to the Evergreen State Fair in Monroe. We ventured into a few new events and happenings this year but still made sure to do all our favorites!!! I was bummed to not be able to go on any rides, but Aidan and Delvin had a lot of fun and Mason loved the Kiddie/family rides, but of course the camera batteries died before I could get a picture of him on a ride!
This turtle was roaming around while we were waiting for the Pie Eating contest - the boys loved following it around!
