Gwangi is the Big One-Oh!

What is one of the coolest ways to celebrate your birthday? 

Live in a country that celebrates Victory in Europe Day with a pretty awesome parade...and be a boy that enjoys tanks and all things military! It's like having your birthday on Christmas each year.

The day was rather rainy and we were amazed at how many people still made it out for the parade and events. The streets, sidewalks, and all walkways were packed for blocks and blocks around the parade route.

It started with some WWII vintage vehicles. This is the T-34. It was a major Soviet tank, some say one of the best designs to come out of the war. There were many of them made.

A close up of the T-34.

The GAZ-AAA, based on a Ford Model A design, it is an original Soviet truck from the WWII era.

This is the GAZ-67B, without a hood. It was based on an American jeep design.

The boys aren't sure on this particular model. Any ideas from the peanut gallery?

There were also many other modern vehicles, some rocket launching vehicles, flyovers of helicopters, and planes today, but we couldn't get any pictures of the airplanes today....

But...the other day we did...we were out walking with our language helper, going to get another fairy tale book to use in our language lessons, and we saw several practice flyovers.

We also got to stop and see some of the dances that they were practicing.

One of the hundreds of signs hanging up around town. This was on the side of the book store we were visiting. Victory Day is a week long celebration here!

My three kiddos, so excited for Gwangi's birthday! He is now in the double digits!

Opening Sissi's gift to him, special cards and crafts galore.

She drew him a set of pictures.

Also, she crocheted for him a parachute for his Capt America doll that I made for him around New Years.

A special snowflake that she made for him.

Wahoo! A new Wii game, from the cousins.

Oh yeah, Indiana Jones!

The boys played this and said it was one of the best games ever. There is also a special bonus game on the disc, one of the original Indiana Jones games...circa '92...they said it was awesome!

We always give books...and lots of them! Several of these used to be Indy's!

And, with help from Grandma and Grandpa, we got the big Lego Super Secret Police Dropship! He was so excited!

Look at this face!

Gift from Daddy to his war game loving son, Gwangi...Custer's Final Campaign, a war game they can play together.

Both of the boys with their new birthday Wii games from their cousins...Tron and Indiana Jones. My boys and their favorite things!

We always let the kids pick their favorite meals for their birthdays. Gwangi picked French toast for breakfast, bacon cheeseburgers and fries for lunch, and deep dish pizza for dinner with a chocolate mousse cake for dessert.

And....for movie night....The Lego Movie!!! He is wearing his shirt and has his two Lego Movie Lego sets on the coffee table so he can "re-enact" his favorite scenes while watching. He has the Melting Chamber set from Christmas and the Super Secret Police Dropship from his birthday.

Dessert! he asked for a chocolate mousse cake! So, I took our favorite, local German chocolate cookies and put them in the food processor with some butter to make the crust. Then, I melted 3 chocolate bars, 2 chocolate and one chocolate with strawberry filling, added a bit of cream cheese that I had been holding on to (I bought it months ago at one of the special stores that carries "foreign foods") and some heavy cream. I poured that in the center and then put it in the freezer for 2 hours.

It was Ah-Mazing!

What a cool day with our big boy! He is growing up so quickly and becoming such an amazing helper and responsible guy. I cannot even explain how precious this boy's heart is!

First outing with the Trekking Union

The weather as we came into the middle of April was finally turning quite lovely and warm enough to think that Indy could take the boys on an outing with the Kyrgyzstan Trekking Union. The group hosts hikes, camping trips, and all kinds of other trips around the country. Most of the listings on their website say that you need special equipment or should be over the age of 12. We figured we could push things with Gwangi being close enough in age, but we decided not to push things with trying to take Sissi. Glad we went with that decision because as you look at these pictures, you'll realize that this "canyon hike" was not a walk in the park.

This was toward the beginning of the hike. The drive to this canyon was about 2 hours away from Bishkek.

At the beginning, warm and sunny.

Some pretty steep walls and a really neat view.

Our oldest guy, Krypto.

Some other people on the trip, heading up one of the canyon walls.

Gwangi, being a bit silly and telling everyone how tough he is. Indy said that our boys were the only ones on the trip and they held up very well on what turned into a 5+ hour hike up and down canyon walls.

The rocks in this area really remind me of some places we've hiked around Colorado.

Indy and Krypto.

Indy and Gwangi.

The boys, sitting on some of the rocks.

I think this is super great shot of Indy and Gwangi.

Getting toward the middle of the hike, it started to get a bit chilly as they got up higher in altitude and the jackets started to come on.

One of the higher cliffs they climbed up.

They thought this looked like a big dinosaur foot print on the ground.

Coming down one of the canyon walls.

Toward the end of the hike it got overcast and the boys got a bit cold, but they really enjoyed this hike and came home with all kinds of stories and memories!

Krypto's 12th Birthday - His Favorite Things

Having your birthday the day after Easter makes for a pretty low key, but fun kind of birthday day!

We cancelled school and our language lessons and let Krypto pick all of his "Favorite Things."

We started off with presents, because what kid can wait until after breakfast to open their birthday presents :)?! Sissi had made him a little packet full of presents.

She took her art lesson from last week and expanded it...lots of complimentary colors layered on top of each other and then designs scraped off with toothpicks to show the colors underneath.

She also crocheted Kyrpto's lobster a little blanket/harness that goes over his head and claws to "keep him warm."

Here is Krypto's lobster with the completed blanket.

Gwangi printed off a Minecraft 3D squid for Krypto.

Playing with the paper squid.

Then, on to the presents from Mom and Dad...we picked up "Wacky Races" from the used bookstore when we were still back in Winston Salem. They were thrilled (can't you tell from Gwangi's face?) and had wanted this for quite some time.

Reading about the series on the back of the case. Oddly enough, there is a "Wacky Races" arcade game at one of the local grocery store/mall type areas, and they have enjoyed playing it since we've been here.

Opening up the next gift.

Some old Disney comics, a Peanuts comic that used to belong to Indy when he was a kid, and....

one of the last reasonably priced "Dan Dare" books available. It's too bad such a fun series is out of print because Krypto really enjoys it. I think he has 5 of them now, including the "Haynes" manual for the Dan Dare spaceships.

Finally, the big gift, a new board game that he's been wanting for close to a year. It's called "The First World War" and the boys broke it out today and played for several hours. They seemed to really enjoy it.

The door way to his bedroom. Not sure if you can see it or not, but I wrote the numbers 1-12 on the balloons. 

He was pretty excited. After gifts and balloons, we had breakfast, coconut and chocolate chip pancakes! Then a few hours of game time followed by bacon cheeseburgers for lunch. It was a good thing that we found some bacon about 3 weeks ago and bought 2 of the 3 packages we saw at the time. We haven't seen bacon again since! After lunch, we had a trip to the library to get some new books to read and then, the rest of the afternoon was game time.

Dinner tonight, his all time favorite, chicken pesto pasta!

For dessert, I made a chocolate coconut cake and we put ice cream on top. We're now watching "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow"...tomorrow, it's back to the regular schedule; but I think we all really enjoyed the day with our new favorite 12 year old!

A Spring Break Outing

This past week was our Spring Break, and we really needed it to recharge!

Most of the days we just slept in, watched movies and worked on crochet and painting projects, played games, and we took a few little outings...like to the library, the post office, and on Friday we took a friend and made it out of the city for a picnic.

The first place he took us was the "Panorama" which is a big hill on the south east side of town. You get a great view of Bishkek, even through the smog and clouds.

On the top of the hill is a large Kyrgyz flag. It was lovely with the sun highlighting it from behind.

Here, our friend is showing us the location of the new American University of Central Asia (AUCA.)

Right in the center of the picture is the new campus. Can you see the large grey building with the "red" windows inset in it? That is the new AUCA where Jeff has met some of the faculty and long term he hopes to teach there.

A view looking north west to the rest of Bishkek. Lots of new building on the south east side of town.

Some of the mountains, covered in clouds, in the distance.

We then went on a drive to the south of town, toward Кашка Суу and Ала Арча, a ski resort and the National Park we visited last fall. The kids got lots of climbing and sliding in down this hill.

In the distance is Кашка Суу, probably one of the closest ski resorts to Bishkek. We didn't make it there this year due to illness, but hope to next season.

The mountains in this area are just lovely, only 45 minutes south of Bishkek.

Lots of free roaming horses on these hills.

The kids again on the hills. They played while I got lunch together in the back of the car. We ate and then went back to town, it was much colder up in the mountains than we had anticipated and we were just not dressed appropriately. My hands were numb in under an hour. A long drive for a short visit, but it was needed, and we hope to return as the weather warms up a bit more.