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“Go Diego Go” to NYC we go!

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Heather found out about “Go Diego Go! Live” a while back and I got tickets for all of us for Radio City Music Hall. The date of the glorious event was today – and we had a lot of fun. Our family loves this kind of thing.

But first, it’s important to remember that Diego has become a favorite in our house – from the Diego T shirts to the echoing strains of “Egimo, Egimo” with fist held high in the air, running forth to do good things. Note that “egimo” and said action is twin speak for the opening song lyrics “Diego” and the fist held high is pretending to be Diego as he swings through the jungle on a vine to rescue an animal in trouble.

Heather and I got up early today to get everything ready for us to leave at 8:30 (since Diego was at 11). In a rare and surprising occurrence, the boys slept until 8:15 when we finally decided to wake them. I am sure tomorrow they will wake a 6:30. We piled into the Blue Car and off we went. It was raining about an inch an hour, but we made decent time. We went through the Holland tunnel and the boys counted as many taxis as they could on the way in. “Hey Owen – ANOTHER TAXI!” “Hey Kyle, that was a LONG Bus!” “Look, a mini cooper!” (they never fail to find the mini cooper in the crowd). And “where’s the parking garage?!?! – Papi – over there!!!”

We arrived at Radio City with time to spare. That might be since we sprinted from the parking garage to RCMH hopping over puddles. In fact, there was just enough time to change diapers and buy a “Go Diego Go” spinning light thing (see picture above). The boys chose that over a stuffed baby jaguar and it was a good choice. The spinning light thing did not disappoint.

In the hall, we watched the “real” Diego (read: a way to explain why this Diego is a human and not a cartoon character) and his sister Alicia go on a mission. They had to save Baby Jaguar’s growl form the Bo Bo’s so he could start carnival at the great pyramid. Dora made a special visit via raft and hot air balloon and brought the crown. For those of you who have no idea what any of that means, we’re happy to lend you the videos to get up to speed.

Kyle sat on my lap and Owen sat with, on, under and near Heather. Both boys were loving it and had their normal reactions to extreme stimulation: Kyle sat on my lap, sucked his thumb, stared, completely absorbed, and clicked his spinning light thing at times of extreme delight (and occasionally wiggled his bum to the music), Owen stood up and jumped, sat down, threw his spinning light thing on the seat in front of us, interacted with the folks on the stage and stared at the production, entranced. I can’t imagine two little boys having more fun with their mommy and papi, or a mommy and papi having more fun with their twin two year olds.

After the show ended, we headed back to PA – it was raining only about 3/4″ an hour. We stopped at McDonald’s for a late lunch and sprinted inside (literally this time) to hysterical baby boy laughter at the site and bouncing of all the running. Kyle sat on Ronald’s lap (the big plastic Ronald sitting on the bench) and we gathered ourselves after a morning of serious fun.

When we came home we wound down with a nice bath and some play time. The boys played with Thomas and Thomas went through both the Holland and Lincoln tunnels. Both boys were asleep by 7 PM.

Our family really loves these kinds of things.

A Spring Weekend

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I kinda went crazy with the camera this weekend.
It seemed like every time I turned around there were
precious moments to try to capture.
Of course photos just don’t capture them at all.
There are times when everything feels magical
and life just feels like it is so, so, so very, very, very good.
Photos don’t do those moments justice.
I think this might set a record for the most posts in any
single day for the Johnson-McCormick Blog.
Could we be any more delighted with life right now???
The foursome take a break from the plasma cars (click here)
to play in the sandbox.

Before Kyle and Owen took a long nap (we finally woke
them up at the 2.5 hour mark because we wanted them to be
able to sleep that night), we tried our very first board game!
Owen absolutely loved it! Kyle, not so much!

Owen Finds… and Tastes (!)… a Worm

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I happened to capture this on film…

While the boys were outside playing in the rain this afternoon, Owen found a worm in the driveway. He was holding it. He was showing it to me. He was fascinated by it…


As I was standing there taking pictures of him, and talking with him about the worm, I literally watched his mind kind of think, “hmmm… this worm thing is so interesting! what could I do with it? could I eat it? I wonder what it tastes like?!” And then, suddenly, in a split second, I watched him as he put the worm into his mouth!!!!!!!!!!! Before I could even put the camera down and say anything to him he pulled it out — apparently it tasted yucky!…


A split second later he said, “Mommy, we can’t eat it!” He carried it over to the grass and left it there.

An Early Birthday Present from Charlie & Sandy

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Devoted blog readers might remember that our next door neighbors are also an inter-racial adoptive family. Charlie and Sandy brought home their two kids — Nate & Ambika — from India in October (click here to read previous post from their home-coming day). Nate, Ambika, Kyle, and Owen are quite a group! They play together almost every day. Mostly what they do is ride anything they can find with wheels up and down our two driveways. Recently Charlie and Sandy bought Nate and Ambika plasma cars (click here). These are very cool, and very fun to ride down the driveways, and Kyle & Owen have been greatly admiring their playmates’ “helicopters” (that’s what Kyle and Owen call them — we think because the plasma cars do slightly resemble helicopters). Saturday morning Charlie and Sandy gave K & O an early birthday present!!!!! — A PLASMA CAR for each! This weekend the foursome spent hours (literally!) riding en-masse down the driveways. Childhood does not get much better than this. And add to that –thinking about the fact that these two sets of fun-loving-life-loving siblings were all adopted from orphanage situations of great deprivation… that’s almost too much for the mind to grasp. Life does not get much better than this.

Papi’s Home!!!

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I’m really glad that Braydon and I both have careers that don’t require extensive travel. We both do need to travel from time to time, but it is nothing compared to what some people have to do. I really don’t know how two-career-couples with work that requires heavy travel do it. Braydon was only gone for three days and three nights, but man are we all happy that he’s back!!! Braydon had taken photos with his cell phone camera while he was away — photos of things that only people like Kyle really appreciate — photos of things like the airplanes Braydon flew on, the inside of the airplanes, the rental car Braydon drove, the inside of the rental car, the hotel Braydon stayed at, the inside of the hotel, the office Braydon had meetings in, the inside of the office conference room… you get my drift?! Anyway, Kyle really loved looking at all these photos on Braydon’s phone. Owen, on the other hand was much more interested in getting down to business: all he cared about was getting Papi down on the floor to play.


And Braydon… well, mostly he was just wanting to cuddle with his boys.

Twin Speak & Quote of the Day: "Underpants"

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Back in January I wrote a post about “TwinSpeak” (click here for that post). Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about TwinSpeak because Kyle and Owen are suddenly so very, very verbal. Sometimes I almost can’t even believe it myself, but seriously– I can have full blown conversations with them now!!! And every, every, every, every single day they say something so funny that I’m almost peeing my pants laughing. Their language is so sophisticated now that I rarely don’t understand them. They are totally capable of verbally communicating just about everything that they want to convey. And yet they still have certain TwinSpeak words that they both use; little remnants of their TwinSpeak; specific words that Kyle and Owen — as twins — have developed and use; unique words that only each other (and sometimes Braydon, or I, or other people who spend a lot of time with them) understand. One of the most fascinating parts about TwinSpeak is how twins continue to refer to certain things in their specific “twinspeak”-way long after they know-and-are-fully-capable-of referring to those things in the “correct” way. For example…

Despite being fully aware of the “correct” way of saying these things, and despite being fully capable of saying these things “correctly,” when speaking with each other or in each other’s presence (and only then), Kyle and Owen both still consistently say:

  • unck (pronounced, with a grunt, “uh-en-ck!”) = orange (the color)
  • bulgadada (pronounced, “bull-ga-da-da”) = bulldozer
  • fird beeder = bird feeder
  • whooping crane = whipped cream

Note: if they are on their own, out of ear shot of the other, they will say each of these words “correctly.”

Tonight a funny TwinSpeak thing happened. There is some background info that is necessary here— 1) Since we’re really in the throws of some semi-serious potty training, lately we’ve been talking a lot about underpants around here. Mostly this is in the context of me saying things like, “Look boys! I wear underpants! I don’t wear diapers! I don’t wear pull-ups! I wear underpants!!!” The boys, especially Owen, are very interested in the whole concept of underpants. 2) For a long time I have had a koosh ball basketball hoop in my office, but it has gone unused for years. Late this afternoon I had the boys in my office with me and to occupy them I got out the basketball hoop for them to shoot koosh balls into. They loved it and I decided I may as well bring it home for them. When we got home I set it up in the kitchen.

So, this evening as I was making dinner Kyle and Owen were trying to throw balls into the basketball hoop in the kitchen. Here’s what transpired:

Owen: Look Kyle, underpants!

[I hear this and kind of giggle to myself. Out of the corner of my eye I can see Owen with his hands down and his head looking down — I figure he’s pretending he has underpants on, or something like that]

Kyle: Yes! Underpants Owen!

Owen: Kyle, I can do underpants! Not you! Just me! I can do underpants!

Kyle: [annoyed/mad] No Owen, I can do underpants too!

Owen: No! Not you! Not you Kyle! Just Owen do underpants! You can’t do underpants! You can’t!

Kyle: [now really very annoyed/mad] No Owen! I can do underpants!

Owen: No! Not you! No underpants for you!

[at this point I know I need to intervene — a major brawl is about to break out any second — so I stop what I’m doing with dinner prep and start to move toward them]

Kyle: [now in full-body meltdown mode, about to physically attack his brother] No Owen! No! I can do underpants! Underpants for me too! Yes! Underpants!

Owen: [running for dear life away from Kyle, and starting to lose it] No underpants for you Kyle!

Me: BOYS! BOYS! BOYS! STOP IT!!!!!! Owen and Kyle, both boys can have underpants when both boys go on the potty like big boys.

Owen: No mama.

Kyle: Mama, NO!

Me: Yes! You can both have underpants when you’re ready. Right now you have no underpants.

Owen: [now in a complete hysteric state, on the verge of a total emotional breakdown] No, no, no, mommy, no! Only Owen can do underpants.

Me: [I feel like I’m now on the scene of some sort of crazy toilet-training mediation stake-out] Owen, you are doing so good on the potty. But Kyle will get underpants too, when Kyle is ready.

Kyle: Mommy, watch this! [He has found the koosh ball and is holding it over his head. I turn to watch him as he throws it up toward the hoop]

Me: [feeling very relieved at this sign that they will potentially soon be distracted enough by the basketball hoop to drop the whole underpants thing] Wow Kyle! Great job!

Owen: Mommy, watch this! [He takes the koosh ball and holds it dramatically down between his legs, he then proceeds to very dramatically throw it up toward the hoop]

Me: Wow Owen! Great job!

Kyle: See mommy??? Underpants! Owen can do underpants!!!

Owen: Yes! And not Kyle! Kyle can’t do underpants! Only Owen!

Me: Oh! You mean underhand?!!! Owen can throw the ball underhand!

[They both look at me like I’m stupid.]

Owen: Yes, underpants.

Kyle: [saying it slowly] U-n-d-e-r-p-a-n-t-s.

Me: You say, underhand.

[They both blatantly blow me off and turn away from me.]

Owen: Look Kyle, underpants!

Kyle: Yes! Underpants Owen!

Owen: Kyle, I can do underpants!

Kyle: Yes Owen! You do underpants! Watch this Owen…

….. and they continue playing as though nothing ever happened…..