March 16, 2013.....Rolling Along

 

 

 



We have had a very successful month with home-schooling.  Honestly, it is going much better than I could have ever imagined.  We try to start "class" as soon as we get home from dropping Will off at school, and we usually end our day around 2.  We have added lots of hands-on activities like growing plants from seeds (in preparation for our big Science project of planting a garden), and charting our plants growth, and doing crafts that relate to what we are reading.  The new school loaned us some books to use so that she would be familiar with the things that they have been doing. We are seeing lots of changes with our little girl since we decided to make these changes.  The biggest change is that she is happy, really happy. 

 

We celebrated Will's 16th birthday this week.  He got a hand-me-down SUV from us with a new stereo system and back-up camera added.  He decided to wait until spring break to take the driving test so we have a couple of weeks until that happens.  Not sure that I am ready for that!!

March 1, 2013.......Changes

 

 

Leanna has been dealing with a classroom bully for a long time.  I gave the school every opportunity to make it right.  When they failed to stop the nonsense, I stopped it for them.  I withdrew Leanna from the school and enrolled her in a private school.  She will be starting the new school in August and we will be home-schooling until then.  We are all very excited about the new school.  We have been joining in on some of the new school's after school activities and are already seeing positive changes in Leanna's attitude and moods. 

February 9th and 10th, 2013.......Celebrating Chinese New Year

We had a great time celebrating the Chinese New Year and the Year of the Snake with many other families who have adopted children from Taiwan.  Leanna got to see some old friends and made some new friends.  It was a weekend filled with fun!

January 18 -21, 2013....A Weekend Get Away

Leanna - always the happy, easy going traveler! 

 

 

 

 

 We spent the  weekend in Atlnata to celebrate my birthday and the 5th year anniversary of seeing a photo of our daughter for the first time.  Five years ago on this day, we saw 3 little photo's of her (one of those photo's is now in the header) and requested that we be allowed to make her part of our family.  So this weekend we celebrated.  We spent the weekend doing fun things together - just the four of us.  We shopped a little (my favorite thing), we ate at nice restaurants (Will's favorite thing to do), we raced go-karts (Jeff's favorite thing this weekend), and visited a museum with lots of hands-on activities (Leanna's favorite thing to do). 

January 16, 2013......Another lost tooth

Leanna lost her 7th tooth.  The tooth fairy brought her a gold dollar.  Leanna was thrilled!

Leanna and her friend love tattoo's.

January 10, 2013.....A new 'do!

 

 

 

Leanna's hair had gotten pretty long but is very thin and tangles BAD.  She really hates to brush it and honestly, I was tired of fighting over it so when she asked to cut it, I was all on board.  She wanted the full hair salon treatment so she got a wash, scalp massage, cut, and style.  The little cutie was so excited about all of the fuss!  We had them cut it to her shoulders which took off about 4 inches.  We love it!

Christmas 2012

We started out our Christmas Eve at Nana's house (Jeff's Mom) and shared gifts and a meal and lots of good snack foods.

These two little girls can wreck a room in just a few minutes with a handful of gifts.

Proof of their room wrecking skills!

Then we came home to get ready for Santa's visit.  We left food for Santa's reindeer and cookies for Santa.

Sam (the elf) was waiting for Santa at the front door.

 We let the kids open a gift of their choosing from under the tree.  Leanna chose her gift from Mika and LOVED it!!  Baby Mulan is beautiful!

 Christmas morning was a thrill for everyone! 

 

 One of Leanna's favorites was a fortune cookie maker (that was a little disappointing as an actual cookie maker but will make a great play-doh toy).

 I attempted to follow in my mom and grandmother's  traditions and cooked a country ham (then I convinced Jeff and Grandma that they would be SO helpful if they carved it).  It turned out YUMMY!

 We celebrated Christmas with Nanny and Papaw (Jeff's dad) the day after.

 

 Again, those same two little girls can wreck a room in just a few short minutes.