Life is jam-packed at the moment. Rita had her tooth removed on Thursday. She was a great patient - having to endure two big shots of pain medication. The dentist was able to remove the tooth easily since it didn't have any roots. The dentist thinks that she had an infection a long time ago, or some sort of chronic infection, which decayed the roots and was now working on the tooth. Her permanent tooth above looks fine, and is expected to come down in 3-5 years although the doctor thought it may be sooner now that the baby tooth is gone. (Tooth mouse report - this time he paid up only $1 due to high gas prices.)

Rita had another *pretty* good week at camp. She had one incident where she purposely threw a ball at a (smaller) boy and made him cry and was given a time out. The rest of the week she was great so by request we went to McDonalds one night; and tonight we had brownie sundaes with fresh strawberries.

Saturday we will be going to the beach during the day, and going to a baseball game in the evening. (I was able to secure our company 'box' at Padres stadium so we are having a team-building event with our families. These are the perks of being in the marketing department at your company.) On Sunday we will probaby go down to some of the young, trendy areas of San Diego (Ocean Beach and/or Pacific Beach) so Lena can go shopping.

Wild Animal Park last weekend

I've been meaning to write about Lena but it's just busy right now. She is doing well, and is quickly learning our routines. This week we met with her counselor to determine her school schedule (English, US History, Algebra II, French III, Photography and Dancing). Last night we went out to dinner and then over to the mall so she could shop at her favorite store - Hot Topic. I've been telling my friends at work that this is payback time for my own high school clothes, shoes, music and hair choices. (Lena shows similar style and personality when I was her age.)

We also learned this week that there is another Russian exchange student going to Lena's high school, and she lives about 20 minutes (walk) from us. So that will be good for Lena as she makes new friends and needs a reprieve from Rita.