Things to remember

When it's late and I'm tired after a really challenging day, here are the things I try to to keep in mind. Even though we had weeping and wailing from all of our kids today, we also had some really great moments. For example, Madiyar had a great day at school and I loved celebrating that with him. Max had some struggles but he really worked hard at seeing the positives and he played well with his brothers...and he is still the best squirrel I ever had. Aniyar had a great time playing with his Dad tonight and Tanya found a way to join in and forgive some earlier linguistic misunderstandings. Tanya also showed me again how far she's come...it was 5 years ago today that she arrived in America and now she's a bossy, Jonas Brothers-loving 5th grader. As for Kate...well, she's Kate...and except for a minor meltdown when she forgot to prepare for her piano lesson today and was sure the world had stopped spinning (did I mention that this is Kate, AKA Drama Queen?), we worked things out. At the end of the day we had hugs and I love you's from all the kids, then we celebrated our 12 year old dog's b-day, singing and a cake made of bread and peanut butter was involved. All's well that ends well...now sleep.