August 6, 2006

Well, it's 11:18 in the morning and we took a bus and ran to the internet cafe cause it's pouring rain. It's too bad we can't understand the weather channel here or we would have known it was going to rain today and would have come here yesterday. But, oh well. We're here even though sugar does melt!! =) Everything is coming along great. We're a week and a half away from bringing Mason to our apartment and two weeks and three days from coming home!! Woo Hoo!! Mason actually started to make some sounds yesterday. He was imitating our sounds when we tickle him. It was awesome. He is loving to play the chase me game. He'll start running then look back to see if we're chasing him, then he'll turn around and giggle and run some more. His run is adorable. His shoulders are pulled up high and his legs seem to go a lot faster than he thought they could. We weighed him and he's about 20-22 pounds (if our calculations are right) and he's about 75cm tall. He's a bit under developed, but get him home and in no time he'll be right on track.

Last night we had the best chicken. There's this chicken place (we call it the chicken shack) where you can buy roasted chickens. They are perfect to take home make some potatoes and eat. Yummy!! Our water has not gone out for a couple of days so, that's great. And, neither one of us has been sick for a couple of days. Maybe our bodies are finally getting used to the Kazakh weather. The two couples who got here about two weeks ago have court this Friday and both of the ladies (Jeanine and Mary) have been sick for about a week. So, all couples have gotten sick at least once.

That's about all that's going on around here. We hope everyone is doing well back home and can't wait to see you all. Congrats to Bob and Stacey again, we hope everything went well. And, thank you to everyone we've talked to. It's nice to hear your voices and be able to keep up with what's going on back home.

Love,
Ryan, Rachel, and Mason