Thursday, February 28, 2008

Tyler Michael

Here is a smilebox I made for Tyler Michael's mommy and daddy yesterday. He had his first blueberry pancake! He was too funny eating it, not used to anything solid like that!

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makenna cleans!

Click to play MAKENNA CLEAINING
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Makenna was cleaning last night. She saw the broom and dustpan out so she took it upon herself to sweep the kitchen floor! She knew just want to do too, swept the dirt in the dustpan then dumped it in the trash! Too cute. The first picture is of her watching Ryan drive out of the driveway. She loves to stand at the dining room window and watch people leave (actually she first cries because she wants to go with them but then decides it is at least better to watch them drive away)! The last picture is of the girls a couple of mornings ago. They had dumped out all their toys and Hannah was sitting in one of the bins. Makenna insisted on sitting in the small bin with her! They had just gotten out of the tub so their hair wasn't combed yet and they weren't even completely dressed yet!

Things are going OK here. We leave this Tuesday for Chicago Shriners. I have been kind of worried about Makenna as she has been sick. She was on albuterol last week but has not had any the past 2 days. I just hope she is healthy enough for surgery. I am going to take her to Dr. Burke on Monday or Tuesday morning before we leave for Chicago just to make sure he thinks she is well enough. I don't want to drive over there for nothing! Well, I better go, I hear Makenna in the monitor yelling for me. MA! MA! is what I hear, too funny. She has been trying to say Ryan too. It usually comes out IIIa but it is the sound she makes when she sees him so that is what we are thinking!

Here are a couple of pics from breakfast this morning. Makenna had pancakes with fresh blueberries and strawberries with some powdered sugar on them and then a side of banana! She enjoyed it very much as you can tell!
Hannah chose a bowl of cereal with strawberries and blueberries in it. They are too cute for words sometimes!




Sunday, February 24, 2008

Bad Bad Girls....

Click to play Bad Girls.....
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The girls "were" watching Ni Hao Kai Lan Friday night and I was in the dining room working on some things when Scott came home and asked what the girls were fussing about. I replied I didn't hear a thing, had blocked it out begging for 10 minutes without them hanging on me. Scott went in the kitchen and quietly asked me to come in the kitchen and look at the girls. Oh my the sight we saw! Hannah had gotten up on the bar and got the diaper rash cream down and "shared" it with her sister. It was everywhere and all over Makenna. I was so worried about the cream being in her mouth that Makenna went directly to the bathtub without pictures. Hannah only had it on her hands. I had to take a scraper and just like putty, scrape it off the coffee table then use grease cutting 409 and a tooth brush to get it all out. Scott worked on the carpet and after 40 minutes or so we had it cleaned up.
We are hoping we instilled in Hannah to NEVER do that again. We'll see. When we asked why she did that she said "I just had to".
All this just confirms that yes, we are too old for toddlers........

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Life with 2 girls....

I thought I'd post a little bit about what life has been with the girls here lately! As you know Hannah just celebrated her 3rd birthday. It is hard to believe that we have had Hannah in our home for 20 months now! I can't hardly remember when she wasn't here. She is such a sweet and beautiful child. She says the funniest things too. We have been told many times that she speaks at a 4 year old level. She not only knows alot of words but she knows how to put them in context. One day I asked her if she had done something she wasn't supposed to do and her reply was,"Yes I did. It was necessary." , she told Scott's parents that Makenna didn't "cooperate" with the doctors at Shriners! She had been doing so well with sleeping upstairs in her new room with Makenna but here lately she has decided that Makenna "bothers" her too much! For nap time, I allow her to sleep down in our room so they don't wake each other up.
We had been talking to Hannah about going to her big girl class at church since way before we left for China. She has been in the 1-2 year old class since we got her in June of 06! She was literally terrified if we tried to get her to go into the 2-3 year old class. She would shake and scream in fear so we left her in the little class with Makenna but told her when she turned 3 that she was legally too old to be in there and would have to go to her big girl class. Each week we did a count down, 3 more weeks, 2 more weeks, 1 more week... We had her birthday party on Saturday evening and she woke up Sunday morning declaring this was the day she went in her big girl class and off she went!! She colored pictures, sang song, played with Sammy the puppet that helps with story time, and had a great time! She has now gone 2 weeks in a row. In another huge event for her she has given up her pacifiers! We had also talked for the month before her birthday that on her birthday she had to get rid of her "plugs" because she would be too big for them. We gave her the choice of boxing them up and mailing them to China for the boys and girls that don't have plugs to have or give them to our friend Chrissy that is expecting baby Soapy (Sophia)in March. She chose to give them to Chrissy so the day after her birthday, we gathered them up and put them in a baggie. I asked her if she needed one last suck on them and she agreed. She took each one out and carefully put it in her mouth and sucked on it for 5 seconds or so then set it down until she had all of them out of the bag. She put them back in the baggie and cheered "bye bye pluggies" and that was it! She and daddy took them to Chrissy's house and handed them over. That night she was a little leary going to bed that evening and said that she couldn't sleep because she needed something in her mouth! I gave her a sippy cup of water and told her to take a couple of sips of water then lay there and rest. It worked and she slept all night! It does take her a little longer to fall asleep and she is not sure she wants to sleep upstairs now but all in all she is doing well. I told her Monday night that if she slept in her bed all night that she didn't have to take a nap on Tuesday and we would paint her toe nails and make a Kai Lan lantern. She was so excited and did great! So she now has purple toe nails and we have 3 Chinese lanterns hanging from our dining room table light!
I would have to say that the honeymoon is over between she and Makenna! She has gone from being very motherly to treating Makenna like a red headed step sister half the time! I think we are working through some jealousy issues so I am trying to spend more time with Hannah. Scott also takes Hannah with him if he goes anywhere in the evenings. This has helped some too. We have also been putting Makenna to bed and letting Hannah stay up for another hour and playing with her. All in all she is such a blessing. I love to watch her sleep and look at that beautiful little face and just wonder what she is dreaming about, what her dreams are, what she will be when she grows up. Daddy signed her up for preschool last week! I almost forgot to mention that! She will start next fall and she is very excited, not that she knows what she will be doing but she is excited about getting a book bag and going to school like Ryan!
On to Makenna Grace. Where do I start with this little spicey girl! She has had a flawless transition. I know that children do not just bond to their new parents but she honestly does not show one sign of not bonding to us. As long as she has her way she is a delightful child!! We have seen the spicey girl temper move up a notch or 10 in the last couple of weeks. She has gone from screaming if something is taken from her to throwing herself on the floor and literly screaming until she almost passes out! This usually happens when Hannah is taking something from her. She has never done it with Scott or I! IF she sees Hannah coming towards her and she knows that Hannah wants what she has (usually because she snatched it from her) she will begin screaming this high pitched alert the neighbors scream and flop on the floor. Being the great mother I am I usually just laugh at her because it is so funny. She will lay there until she is done then come to me for a hug.
Shriners asked us to break her of her bottle before surgery but that is not an easy task! She has refused to go without a bottle! The problem is that she has a hard time with most sippy cups. She just drools so much more with those than her bottle and it takes forever for her to drink from her cup. At night I have been trying to rock her to sleep because I think she will need to do that after surgery. SHe has acted like she enjoys it although sometimes she just wants to play with my face or hair instead of going to sleep! Her other little thing is pinching! The little snot will grab a hunk of skin, usually your cheek or even your hand and pinch the snot out of it. Hannah and I both have war wounds from her this week on our cheeks! I have been pinching her back but I don't know that it is sinking in that it is bad to do. She has been signing more and has also added a couple of words. She was signing baby to her book the other night and has started saying mum mum (num num what the girls call their blankies), hot, hi, mama, and what I think is Ryan. She was standing at the top of the steps this week yelling IIIIIIan, It did sound much like her other yelling but I have heard it a couple of times. She insists on feeding herself which is usually a huge mess but I guess she must learn. She wants to have her own fork but just holds it in her left hand hand and feeds herself with her right hand! Some how her hair is a showcase for what she had to eat!
Makenna gets upset when someone leaves the house. Since we returned from Shriners we have not taken her out of the house butjust a couple of times. She wants to leave so badly! She will get her coat and try to put it on. When we tell her no she will cry and go to the window in the dining room and watch them leave! It does break my heart but it is what is best for now. We have been lucky enough to escape all the flu and bugs out there. We have had some snotty noses but that is it.
Ryan has had a rough couple of months but seems to be doing much better. He started a new job yesterday and his dad is hoping he can get some free pizza from time to time! A couple of weeks ago, while we were in Chicago, Ryan's brakes went out on his car and he had an accident. He skidded across 4 lanes of traffic and finally came to a stop. We are so thankful that there were no semis coming. It could have been a much different situation. Because of him going through a fence and the damage that was done, his car was not worth fixing. We had just put 800 dollars into it in December so that is wasted as well! Oh the lessons of life!
TJ is doing well, although really sick right now. We appreciate prayers for him as he is batteling a nasty chest cold. He said he doesn't ever remember being this sick. TJ is set to graduate his school on March 21 and got his orders that he will report to Cherry Point NC afterward. We are happy that he will be much closer to home. He thinks that he will be deployed end of the year. He is hoping to make it home for Anna and Ryans' graduation this spring.
That is about all I have on the kids. I hope I didn't ramble too much, just knew it had been a while since I had posted much about daily life. I am sure there will be things I forgot but we'll save those for another day!!
God Bless!

Monday, February 11, 2008

The power of Jesus



I just saw this posted on one of my yahoo groups and it brought me to tears. It is a great representation of how much Christ loves each of us. I hope you watch it and you are as moved as I was. We all lose our way sometimes and it may not be to the degree of the girl in the play but Jesus is still pulling us close to Him.
God Bless.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Smilebox of Hannah's b-day

Click to play Hannah's 3rd bday party
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Can't help it, made another smilebox! I really love this program!!

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Best Cousins....

Click to play Day in the Life of a Boy
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Just made this up for Kayla to see Tyler while she is at work. Thought it was too cute and posted here!

Saturday, February 2, 2008

Hannah's Ohio Birthday



We had Hannah's Ohio birthday party tonight! She was so excited all day long. She had received a beautiful princess dress last year for her birthday and it was just too big so I had put it away. When she said she wanted a princess party, I thought what better time to get it out than now. She didn't remember the dress and I wouldn't show it to her until right before her party! She was so excited. We took a bath and I dried her hair then curled it. We went upstairs and I showed her the dress and she was so happy! As she went down the stairs in her ball gown I remembered thinking that when we looked that this house I told Scott we needed to have a girl to walk down those steps in a prom dress! I sure never thought that we'd ever have a girl but Hannah looked so adorable, like she was going to prom! She waited for her guests to arrive and practiced singing happy birthday to herself several times! She practiced blowing out the candles and testing every party blower to make sure it worked. We ate supper then of course she wanted the coveted cake! She is excited about presents too but my does she want that cake! She managed to blow out the candles in 2 tries (as windy as she is I don't know why it took two tries) and didn't even catch that dress on fire! She opened her birthday card that came in the mail today from Grandpa Jim and it had 10 dollars in it! She was soooooo happy and shouted, I love dollars I love dollars and kissed it!! Oh my, we are in trouble. It was a wonderful evening. She is thrilled with her birthday bashes and I am sure scheming for next year!