Motherbridge of Love

This is a beautiful. Read by Amy Tan. Made me cry. I ordered it right away!
http://www.barefoot-books.com/us/site/pages/motherbridge.php?user_name=&rep_code=

Chocolate Mice

Bissinger's Chocolate Mice has been a tradition in George's family and is one we will carry on. I meant for these to be delivered to Magnolia the day after Thanksgiving to kick off the season but they arrived last night. We will hang them pretty high up on the tree this year. :)

Meeting Sophia!

Magnolia's newest cousin, Sophia, arrived on November the 2oth. Magnolia and I went to visit her today. She's just precious, we loved seeing her! She is so very tiny and so very adorable.
Thank you Mary, Lilah, & Sophia for having us!

13 Months Old

We spent our weekend putting up Christmas lights outside, hanging garland, filling the window boxes with evergreen boughs, and sticking red dogwood twigs in planters. We're definitely in the Christmas spirit this year...for the first time in a long time.

Magnolia is 13 months old today. I can't believe it. Looking back at our photos from China she looks like such a baby without much muscle tone. Now she is a vibrant, healthy baby with rosy cheeks and a lot of smiles. She's walking pretty steadily now and mimicking everything. She does a lot of sign language and is also very vocal. She continues to love books and is constantly bringing me books to read to her. She prefers salt over sugar. One of her favorite things is taking lids on and off things. She can also put the rings on the pyramid toy and stack more than 2 blocks at a time. She hugs and kisses spontaneously and calls us "ma", and "da", and herself "mama." She kisses any baby and anytime she hears the word "baby" she does the sign for it. Today it was in the "Yo Baby Yogurt" commercial. She loves to bring me things and when I say "thank you," she says, "dat." She answers "yes" a lot by grunting and nodding her head. She knows the signs for more, milk, water, eat, baby, all done, thank you, and duck. I'm sure I'm forgetting other new things she does but just wanted to blog what I can think of now as this is becoming her only baby book. She makes me smile and laugh all of the time. It is so much fun to watch her grow. Happy 13 months Magnolia! xoxoxoxo

Happy Thanksgiving

Checking on the turkey
First bite of stuffing, mmm...
First Thanksgiving meal
Pumpkin pie and whipped cream.
A lot to be thankful for...
what a joy...
We are so thankful for Magnolia, for finding each other and for all of the love and joy she has brought us. Most of all, we are thankful for her birth parents for giving her LIFE.
We are thankful for all of our family and friends for all the love, support, and joy they bring us.
Happy Thanksgiving to you!

Up North

First Snow!

This morning we had our first snowfall. I took Magnolia outside to show her.

She was pretty mesmerized by it.
The rest of our week was pretty uneventful. George and I battled colds and Magnolia held strong without catching it. Here are some pictures from the week. As you can see, we didn't get out much.

An egg poacher is a great toy. Putting cheerios in it makes it even better.

She figured out how to get "Joe's O's" out of the box pretty quickly.
Magnolia LOVES Super Why on PBS. She will watch the whole show from start to finish. It's about learning to read so I can't complain and it's how I get dinner done.

Spaghetti and meatballs.
We are looking forward to a weekend together, the three of us, and patiently awaiting the arrival of Magnolia's newest cousin!

Nana & Papa's

Magnolia and I drove to Nana & Papa's over the weekend while George went to a wedding in Houston. (Congratulations Ben & Bridget!) Magnolia was a peach in the car until we got to the middle of nowhere and she started crying so hard that I had to pull over. With nothing else to do, we sat in front seat together eating cookies until she was ready to go again. I wish I had picture of the two of us. :) Magnolia and I stayed with my sister and her family and my brother and his family came into town to stay at Nana & Papa's. It was a full house and Magnolia loved playing with 7 of her cousins!
Lily, Nicholas, Magnolia, Johnny.
Magnolia was like a real live doll for her 5/6 year old cousins, Ellie & Cici.
Nana & Magnolia
Loving nana kisses.

Magnolia's big cousins, Cici, Willa, & Ellie
Cousin play is exhausting.
Willa, Ellie, Cici, & Anthony (in red) taking a bow after their performance.
We had a great weekend! Thank you Emily & Curtis, Mom & Dad for having us!

First Haircut

I trimmed the back of Magnolia's hair today. I was so nervous but it turned out fine. She has such beautiful hair, I think it would be hard to mess it up. I put her in her highchair and gave her two crackers, one for each hand and it was done in seconds. I put her hair in an envelope, dated it, and sealed it. Here are some photos from this week.

She loves to empty her shoe/hat/mitten basket.

She discovered the pots and pans but wasn't that interested. I let her chew on the comb while I took pictures of her first haircut.
Pretty darn cute.
Magnolia loves books. She goes to her pile downstairs and upstairs and flips through them by herself. This week she even brought me one of her favorites for me to read to her. I couldn't believe it.
When the social worker came one of the questions she asked was if Magnolia pointed to things. I told her no. Yesterday she pointed to a picture of me and said "mama." I was doing something else in the room before I even noticed. Then I put together a collection of photos with only one photo of me and I asked her to find mama. She pointed to my picture right away.

The other night we were listening to music while playing and one song had the word "baby" in the chorus. Every time she heard the word "baby" she dropped her toy and did the sign for baby.

She's so much fun and I delight in every one of her milestones.

Weekend at Home

Our social worker ended up canceling our appointment this weekend so we were completely free which we loved. George got to work in his shop and I got to sew. We did some shopping and George cooked dinner. Magnolia, as always, was a complete delight.

We made a trip to Menards to pick up wood. I was sure someone was going to come and tell us how dangerous it is to put a baby in the basket but no one did. She had a graham cracker and she wasn't going anywhere. She liked riding in there!

I asked George to build this step rocking boat. I remember this as a child at Mothers Day Out in St. Louis but was recently reminded of it at our friends house who have one. I thought Magnolia would love it and boy was I right!

Our little lamb helping dad in the kitchen.

Growing

Playing in the sewing room. Modeling the dress I made for her out of an old wool sweater.

I really feel like Magnolia turned ONE. She is learning and growing so much. The week before her birthday she really started to walk without me being in the room, without me there to cheer her on. I taught her once to hold up her index finger when I asked how old she is. She has done it on cue without skipping a beat ever since. She has also fooled me into thinking she's really hurt when I hear her crying while playing only to rush to her side to discover that she's just demonstrating frustration. That's a new one. We've also upgraded our reading time to more books, more advanced books, and longer sitting time for them. She even asks for "more" when we finish a book and peers over the chair looking for more books to read. She also falls asleep while I read to her. I love this very much. We pretty much stayed in the house all week which led to long reading times together and playing in the sewing room. We did venture to the doctor's for her one year check up and she's doing very well. We also went to the library storyhour, out to lunch with friends, and made our weekly trip to Goodwill. Tomorrow our social worker is coming for our first post placement visit. Other than that, our lazy week around the house continues to a lazy weekend around the house. Perfect.