The Chris & Kaija Claridge Clan

As I mentioned in my last update, we had the opportunity to go and see Sue and Philip in July, and as hard as it was, we forced ourselves to go to Hawaii in order to visit them. Hawaii is awesome!! Chris and I have both been there, but never together, and after this trip, we decided we are going back next summer without children!! The kids had a lot of fun, but we didn't get to do or see as much as we wanted to because it is too hard with babies. The boys loved the beach, they weren't to sure about the ocean the first time, but once they were in the water they loved it. Sue took us to this beach where every afternoon, turtles come to enjoy the sun, it was really neat. Callie was out swimming, and she starts yelling, "Mom, I think I'm standing on a turtle!" I told her it was probably just a rock, but then she says, "It's moving" Sure enough, I go out and look, and there is a turtle swimming under her feet. The boys had fun playing in the sand, they got it everywhere, and had a blast. Thanks again to Sue, Philip, Jasmine, and Juanito for letting us invade there house for a week. Sue said her house was really quiet after we left-she forgot how noisy two little boys are, and I think her chihuahuas might be scarred for life, but that was the best vacation we've been on in a long time. I was really worried about the six hour flight with Connor and Cooper, but the only part they freaked out about and screamed, was getting through security. Once we were on the airplane they were fine. While we were there, Callie decided she wanted to get her ears pierced. She's never wanted it done before, but I think after spending the day at the flea market with Jasmine and looking at all the earrings, she changed her mind. So, we took her to the mall and had it done, I thought she would get hysterical, but there was a crowd of us watching her and Chris was taking her picture while it was done and that distracted her enough that she did fine. Philip was even nice to me almost the entire trip, it was kind of weird!! Just kidding Philip, you know I love you--especially since you bought me a Slurpee. My sister has a 7-eleven right around the corner, and they had the best Slurpee flavors ever--Coke has always been my favorite-at least since I was pregnant with Cooper, but her 7-eleven had Pepsi and banana flavored ones. I discovered-thanks to Sue-that a banana/coke slurpee is a little sip of Heaven!! Yes, I can be bought for a Slurpee. But anyways, we survived and wished we were back there the minute we stepped off the plane at one o'clock in the morning and it was 112 degrees--welcome to Phoenix!! Next up for us, we are headed to Nashville in October to find a house-we are so excited!! I got my new dental hygiene license number in the mail a couple of weeks ago, so I can now clean teeth in Tennessee!!!(If anyone has teeth there) We are planning on moving the week after Christmas, so if anyone is interested in renting our house, please let us know. My mom just found out this past Monday that she got a job in North Carolina, and she has to be there August 31st--sorry sucker!! She is so excited, and I am so happy and excited for her. She will only be about four to five hours away from Nashville, which is not bad at all. It will be nice to still have them pretty close by. That's about all from our family for now--hope you all had a great summer--as Jani would say, Love ya lots!-Bye

OKAY, OKAY, We all know that I really suck at updating our blog, So here's a really long update about what's been going on in the Claridge house since the holidays. Connor and Cooper have both had birthdays, Connor is now 2, and Coop is now 1--I can't believe how time flies. I never would have thought having two little boys would by so much fun, granted it's a headache at times, but they are pretty hilarious. The biggest and best news is that Connor is now offically a Claridge. His adoption was final the 22nd of January, and on March 21st we had him sealed. That was by far one of the neatest experiences ever. All of my kids were so good! The temple is like magic! Callie was so excited to be able to go in, and I think she is old enough to remember just how neat it was. Cooper was even quiet!! Connor was so cute during the sealing, he just looked back and forth between Chris and I with his big smile, it was amazing-thanks again to all who came and supported us-our families rock! Moving on--literally. The end of March, Dr. Huang (the dentist I have worked for the last 6 years) announced that he had sold his practice, the next month he sold his house and as of next week he will be moving to Provo. The Doctor who bought the practice is nice, but not really someone I want to work with for any length of time. So when my brother-Jared--graduated in May from Dental school and he asked if I would come work for him, we said YES!!! Tennessee is really pretty, and yes I know it is humid in the summer, but we are ready for a change of scenery for a while. The housing market has kind of ruined our chances of selling our house, so we are going to rent it for a year or so and see what the market is doing. So, if anyone knows someone looking to rent a house in Mesa, in a really great ward, send them our way. We would like to be out of our house by the end of the year, if not sooner. I just finished all the paperwork to have my dental hygiene license switched to Tennessee-way too much fun!! The kids are great. Cooper is walking all over the place--or staggering if you want us to be accurate, but it's pretty cute to watch. Connor is getting pretty close to standing all by himself-which is huge for him. Callie is out of school and already bored of summer-if anyone wants to rent a 7 yr old for a couple of weeks, let me know!! Chris is still going to school and absolutely loving it-especially the staying up all night doing homework while all the kids are in bed. We are looking forward to going to see Sue in July on the beautiful island of HAWAII!!!-I'll definitely update after that trip, as we will have some awesome pictures. And that is all the new and exciting news for our family in a nutshell. Hope you all are doing great--as Jani would say, Love ya lots, bye!!

HALLOWEEN Okay, I know I'm a slacker and that Halloween was like three months ago, but what the heck-everyone still needs to see how cute my kids were in there costumes. Connor was the "Hunny Pot" from Winnie the Pooh and Cooper was "Roo" from Winnie the Pooh. They both absolutely hated their costumes and only left them on long enough to get some pictures, but oh well. Callie was a "Funky Witch" and she loved it!!! I swear I think we walked ten miles trick-or-treating, but it was fun. Of course Chris volunteered to stay home and pass out the candy so he would not have to do the walking, but he also had both boys, so it was a trade off. THANKSGIVING Okay, so I have no pictures from Thanksgiving, but it would be wrong to just skip to Christmas. Let me just say that Thanksgiving was the pits this year!! It started out good, but Thanksgiving night I got the flu and started throwing up, and so we got up Friday morning and came straight home, by that afternoon Callie and Cooper were both throwing up, and Chris joined in the fun that night. For some mysterious reason Connor never got it-I don't know how, but I don't care to eat turkey or dressing for a long, long, time!!! CHRISTMAS Since my parents and Tawnie, Paul, and Shelby were in Hawaii for Christmas (Sorry Suckers!) we had Christmas at home for the first time. It was really nice, and Callie was very excited to have santa come to her house for the first time. We did go to Fort Thomas Christmas day, which was also nice. Callie got a bike from santa, which was very unexpected for her, and if anyone has any advice about teaching an extremely stubborn seven year old how to ride without training wheels, we are open to suggestions. Connor got a rocking horse that he absolutely loves and is incredible cute to watch on it, and Cooper got a train that makes a lot of noise!!. It was a great Christmas, and if we missed any of you with our cute Christmas cards we are sorry-send us your address and we will make sure you get one next year!!. We went back to Fort Thomas for New Years and let me just say that I now enjoy the game "Hand and Foot"-even though Grandma Norton gets a little too violent and likes to slap the table and yell "PAY ATTENTION" It was mainly directed at Hannah, so it was pretty entertaining. The boys mainly played the WII's that they had hooked up in two different rooms, but we all had fun. Chris is also making me mention how sad he is that his Eagle Scout project is about to be torn down to make way for the new temple. He had to go and take pictures of it, so if you all could just pause and have a moment of silence for him, that would be great. (In case you are all wondering what his Eagle Scout project was that is depicted in these pictures- it was the cement back stops at the softball fields,they has been in place for nearly fifteen years). Anyways, thats about all for now, hopefully our next blog will be about having Connor sealed, we will definitely keep you all posted. Happy New Year to all! Love-Us

So we did the Down Syndrome Buddy Walk yesterday and let me just say that it was awesome!!! We had so much fun! We want to thank all our friends and family who supported us. We were able to raise a little over $1,400.00 for Connor's Crew. A big thanks to Jed who got his company to double his donations, and a big thanks to Holly for designing our shirts. Also thanks to Jetti and Scott for bringing the Phoenix Sun's Gorilla to our group-the kids loved it. There were about 3000 people who turned out to support Down Syndrome yesterday and it was just a really fun and uplifting experience. The kids had a blast. There was a rock climbing wall, a jumping castle and booth after booth of games and trick-or-treating. There were so many cute kids there and the neatest thing was they were so happy and you would not even know that they had a disability-they don't see themselves as disabled. We met a mom and her little girl who is 11 months old and has Down Syndrome-we took Connor's picture with her-she is so dang cute-her name is Madison and I think her mom used the phrase "arranged marriage"! I also got to meet a mom from California when we were standing in the food line for lunch. Her little boy is 18 months old. He fell asleep on my shoulder while we were talking-he was so cute. Anyways, his mom was telling me that he had heart surgery when he was nine weeks old and he now has a pacemaker, he also is not able to feed himself yet and so he has a feeding tube in his stomache, she is hoping it will be out soon. It made me so thankful that Connor is so healthy. Our pediatrician, Dr. Sudha got an award for Doctor of the year at the awards ceremony, which was also neat because we love Dr. Sudha. It was just a great experience and we will definitely be making it a yearly event for our family. If you were not able to go this year you are all definitely invited next year, and to those of you who were able to go with us this year, thankyou so much, it was great to have such a big group. We love you all- Chris, Kaija, Callie, Connor and Cooper

It has been a very busy past few weeks, we have been working hard on getting donations for the Sharing Down Syndrome Association of Arizona, this is a non-profit organization that helps with public awareness and lends support for families with family members with Down Syndrome. It has been alot of fun! There was a competition to see who could raise the most money within the first couple of weeks, and thanks to everyone who donated we were able to raise nearly $900, we are still taking donations until 10/25/08, so if anyone else is interested I will post the link that will let you donate online. But back to the competition we got second place which got us several tickets to watch the Arizona Diamondbacks play the SF Giants, pool side at Chase Field. This was a blast, we shared the pool seats with other members of the Sharing organization and met alot of really neat people and made alot of new friends. There were so many dang cute kids with down syndrome there, and all of them were so happy and sweet-I'll never understand anyone who wouldn't want one. Once again thank you to those who donated to Connor's Crew. Callie turned seven yesterday, but since her birtday was in the middle of the week we celebrated it the weekend before. All she wanted to do this year for her birthday was have a barbque at Granny Dub's-she had so much fun-she loves playing with all of her cousins. We got her a trampoline for her birthday-thanks to Craig's List we got a heck of a deal-anyways, we had it set up in the backyard for 4 days before I couldn't wait anymore and had to show her. She now lives on it. On her birthday we woke her up at 6:00 in the morning with her birthday cake and balloons and she thought it was so cool that she got to have cake for breakfast-so did Connor. Cooper has now discovered his little voice and loves to jabber and squeal and then laugh at himself-he is so cheesey and cute. Anyways-thats about all for now- Kaija