My First Craft at the Library

For the past 3 weeks I have been taking Evvy to story/craft time at the library. I know that she is a bit young for it but I want to start exposing her so that she can learn the right behavior. She LOVES the library. We pulled into the parking lot and she knew where she was and started getting excited and "talking." It was like, "come on mom, let's get in there cause they have lots of books and a nice room for me to play." I love the story time lady "Ms Sharon." She has been doing story time for many years. I used to go with P and her kids when they were younger. Last week we barely got through the short movie they show "it is a book movie" kind of like those old timey filmstrips we used to have when I was a kid. She watched it sort of tonight and then walked around "visiting" other children during the story. For the most part she was well behaved. No tantrums like last week. Then she even stayed and did the craft. OK, so mom did the craft for her. But, she let me trace her hands for the bat and she "helped" me cut it out (she tore the scraps up into tiney pieces). She helped me stick the nose on. Then she carried it around really proud and got mad when I took it away in the car (it had some choking hazards on it that I couldn't monitor with her in the back seat).

Anyway, when we got home I did snap a couple of pictures. She was pretty tired and really didn't want to cooperate. She is adicted to Plaza Sesamo (spanish sesame street) and went right for the remote control and gave me the sweetest smile so what else could I do. She hadn't been home all day and it was 8:00pm. So I sat her on the couch with her craft and you can totally tell she is trying to see around me to watch TV. Oh well. I count it as "spanish" lessons for both her and me and we do watch it together and we don't watch it every day (I TIVO it).

Then we read one book and she was so ready for bed. Mommy is ready for bed too.

Here are a couple of pictures of Evvy and her library bat.

Susan

I really want to pull the nose back off.

Ah, Plaza Sesamo!

OK Mom, move it. Trying to watch Sesamo!

Six Month's Ago Today....

I can hardly believe that I am posting this. Where has the time gone. Six months ago today, Evvy landed in the United States.

One year ago this week, I was supposed to meet my sweet daughter for the first time but the trip was cancelled due to some political issues surrounding adoptions. It was a heartbreaking week for me.

I am so blessed to have this beautiful child in my life. She is truly the joy of my life. She has given me a purpose to live and be a better person and the best mom I can to her.
Here are a few pictures from our past year's journey.

9 days old

Oct 2006 (4 1/2 months old)
April 2007 (pickup trip with Grandma & Grandpa)
On the Plane going home (April 18, 2007)
Home 6 months (October 18, 2007)

Lions and Tigers and Bears...Oh My

Well I don't think we saw any bears but lions and tigers yes. We spent about 4 hours at the zoo today with our friends Julie, Sam, Lucas and Judi & Elaina. What a group of cute kids they are. The weather was perfect as was the company. The kids were definitely done in by the time we got on the tram to come back from Africa to the entrance area. Evvy was out in the car by the time we left the exit and slept until almost 6:00. Hopefully she will still sleep tonight.


Here are some pictures from our day.


Susan

Welcome Elise Katherine!

Friday morning my baby brother welcomed the newest member of his family into the world. Elise Katherine weighed in at 6# 8oz andwas 18 1/2" long. She is a precious little peanut. She looks so tiny but she weighed 1 1/2# more than Evvy when she was born.

Isn't she just beautiful?

Whatever should I wear?

Tonight we were playing in Evvy's room and she got the bottom drawer of her dresser open. I was talking on the phone (bad mommy) and she pulled everything out of the drawer. She had such a good time. She was really trying to put the clothes on too. She kept stretching out the arm hole on a shirt and trying to put her head through it. She just giggled and then started rolling around in her pile of clothes. She was deliriously tired as she didn't get to bed til almost 9:00 which is an hour past bedtime. We just had a very busy evening running errands. Hopefully tomorrow will be more relaxing and maybe she will sleep in cause I kept her up late??? (a mom can wish).

My Pumpkin at the Pumpkin Patch

Today Peggy and I took the kids to the pumpkin patch. There was a children's singer there giving a concert also. We saw Mr Stinky Feet. He was pretty entertaining and the kids seemed to like him. Evvy just loves music and was dancing around. It was a really fun day. The farm had all sorts of fun stuff for the kids: hayride, moon walk, horse swings (Evvy's favorite), rocking barrel horses, corn maize, train rides and pupkins. Lot of fun. We stayed for about 3 hours and I think I got a little sunburned on the face. It was so hot. Not the ideal fall weather that one would hope for going to the pumpkin farm but I think fun was had by all.


Here are some pictures. I will put the rest on our picture website.


Enjoy!
Susan

Giddy-up Horsie!
I'm lost in the Corn Maze!

Hay Ride

Me & My friends at the Pumpkin Patch.

Too Big!

Just Right! Let's go!

Look Who's Walking!

Evelyn has finally decided that she is brave enough to take off on her own. She has been taking 1-3 steps at a time for a couple of weeks now but yesterday she really started taking off. She doesn't have to be prompted and stood up and asked to walk. In fact last night she was practically running! No stopping her now. She is so proud of herself and just giggles when she falls over.

Hopefully Blogger will upload the short video of her walking. We have a busy weekend ahead of us but I will try to post some more pictures/video of the sweetest baby in the world.

Susan

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?

I see Evvy looking at me....

When we were at Tan-Tar-A we ate at a restaurant that had stuffed animals. Evvy really liked the Bear. Brown Bear is one of Evvy's favorite bedtime stories.

I love the last one where it looks like the bear is kissing her hand or she is feeding the bear.

Susan

New Friends

This summer we met some wonderful friends who also have children from Guatemala.

B and her family from the other side of the state came over and Evvy got to meet Max.

Then the weekend before Labor Day, we met a group of families who all have children from Guatemala at a small resort at the Lake of the Ozarks. It was a wonderful weekend and we met some very nice people and Evvy had fun playing and swimming with other kids.

Back to Blogging

OK. I know I haven't posted in a very long time. Just busy and blogging has fallen to the bottem of the list. Evvy is wonderful. She is still not walking but getting braver. She has taken steps just not her preferred method of getting around yet. Although she will walk around the house behind me holding onto my pants with her read right up under my rear end. Kind of funny.

I guess to catch you up I will just add a few short posts about what we have done this summer.

Have fun looking at how much Miss Evvy is growing up.

Susan