Missing Amelia Island

Last Saturday this time, Carolyn and I were just back from an afternoon at the beach.  We had a WONDERFUL time!  This time we spent a week at the condo that we stayed at last summer and this time it was mostly a “girls” trip.  It was Carolyn and Brittney, me and Lexi and for half of the week we had the pleasure of Taylor, Brittney’s friend.  Geoff did come down on Friday evening to have dinner with us and spend the night.  On Saturday, he took Lexi and Brittney back home along with a LOAD of our stuff.  This made it easier for Carolyn and me to get back home.  On the way up, we had so much stuff that we rivaled “The Beverly Hillbillies”.  I don’t think we could have put ONE more thing in the car! 

The weather was great and we just spent the whole week relaxing and enjoying some heaven on earth.  I didn’t get a chance to blog since we had no Internet but actually getting away from the computer for many days was probably good for me!   The only drawback from our trip was that both Carolyn and me came home and began to get sick.  Both of us ended up with Bronchitis and have to spend all of this week fighting it.  Thankfully the girls did not get sick.  I’ve spent a great part of today just relaxing.  My energy level is way down so I’ve been taking breaks and looking at pictures and trying to decide which ones to post.  I’ve tons and of course some are better than others.  So here goes… a little visual candy of our wonderful week.  I’m so lucky to have such a great relationship with my sister.  She is not only my sis, she is my best friend too.  She loves Lexi and Lexi loves her.  Not only that, Lexi loves Brittney and Brittney loves Lexi.  We had a blast with our very special daughters who entered our lives and filled our hearts with love we never knew we were missing. 

Ready for the beach!

Eating a sandwich… “blankie” is never far away!

I told Carolyn that Lexi liked mayo… whoa! Not that much!

Brittney and Taylor loved the waves! This year, Lexi?  No so much!

Our beautiful Polka-dot Bikini girls!

A sleeping beach beauty!

 

Beautiful girls!

Sisters and Best friends

Me and My Beach Beauty

 

 

    

I can’t wait for the next beach trip!

I love our Quirky Girl!

Yesterday Lexi wore one of her new dresses that I bought her for school.  It was adorable.  She wore it over to Mom’s and danced for them, twirling and whirling and bowing and saying “thank you, thank you!”  Well after her nap it turned from one dress to two.  She went into her room and found a $4 WalMart play dress and layered it.  Yep!  Not too cute.  When I tried to get her to take it off, she was having nothing to do with it.  I took it off to show her Daddy her new dress when he got home and she proceeded to have a melt-down.  After I let her put it back on, she was so happy she even posed for me and then made “monkey faces”.  That’s our girl! 

 

Are we ready for this?

This cute little post card came in the mail today for Lexi.  It’s inviting us to Open House and asking us to bring some photos of Lexi with her family, friends, and pets.  I know she’s only going to Preschool for half days twice a week but it’s still surreal.  Just another indication that our little girl is growing up way to fast!

Oh, The Things She Does!

This morning after we sent Neaners off, Lexi and I headed to a different Target than the one we went to yesterday to look for a dress for her that they did not have her size in at the other one.  Never in my wildest dreams would I imagine how funny it would be!  I bravely went into Target without the diaper bag… FIRST mistake!  SECOND mistake… I let her sit in the front of the buggy!  THIRD mistake… let her try to eat a Bob’s peppermint (the kind that melts in your mouth).  FOURTH mistake… no kleenex in my purse!

As I’m walking to the dressing room to try the dress on her and try on a few things for myself, Lexi suddenly says “I don’t like it!” and began to spit out the peppermint in my hands as the slobber drips all down her pretty new dress that Aunt Neaners bought her.  I had NOTHING to catch it with but my hand and no where to put it but back in my purse!  I was in the clothing department and too far away from the kleenex isle to do anything but grab whatever I could which ended up being my Vera Bradley wallet.  Yep!  What a mess!

So we move on to the dressing room and as we are coming out a woman was walking toward us with an eye patch.  Next thing I know Lexi is busting out with “Mama, there’s a PIRATE!”.  The woman looks at us and never cuts a smile and looked ticked off.  I quickly turned the other way and pretended that I didn’t understand what she was saying but of course she says it again and I couldn’t do much but stifle my giggles.  As soon as I could I called Geoff and told him he was in big trouble!  He wanted to know why and I told him for teaching Lexi what a pirate was.  He laughed of course and then reminded me that Lexi watches an episode of Caillou where he pretends to be a pirate.  LOL!

As we were shopping Lexi picked out a new pair of Pj’s and hung them on the cart like nobody’s business.  She even got the right size.  She liked them, Mom should buy them.  Right? 

Next we head over the undergarment section.  This gets pretty interesting too.  Lexi may one day fuss at me for posting this but we all get our turn on this blog every so often with something that could be considered a little embarrassing.  Hopefully, Lexi will always have her cute sense of humor and will laugh at this part of our interesting day!  Lexi tends to be a “poop only at home” kind of gal.  It’s really kind of nice for us.  Take yesterday as an example.  We were gone all day so no poop.  I knew she would need to go and had already told Geoff about my plan (which will unfold soon).  We were walking in the store and suddenly Lexi disappears behind a bra and panty display.  I hear a few familiar sounds and walk over and say “are you going Poop?”.   She looks at me and says “go away!”.  Our girl loves her privacy.  I hung out a little while and thought we had a home run.  I took her out to the car to change her… (Remember Mistake #1?) I get her outside and it was a false alarm.  So  after we left Target I went on to my master plan.  Go shopping at the OshKosh outlet store!  For some reason, our little “at home pooper” has a history of going to OshKosh with me and taking a poop as she plays at the Lego table.  The last three times we had been there we had the same experience.  YUP!  Now it’s 4!  This time, I came prepared with diapers and wipes!  The Oshkosh store for us is a good as prune juice!  LOL!

We headed home after this and the day just kept coming… I’ll try to tell the rest with pictures…

Outside the airport by the water fountain giving me the “don’t even think about taking my picture look”!

Fired up and ready to go after her nap!  Before she came to me she put her boots back on grabbed her juice and blanket and began to tease! If only I could have napped and woke up feeling as well as she did!

Stomping around acting silly in her boots. She looks like she just got off a horse for the first time!

That’s it… Photo opts are OVER!

Later Lexi tried on a new outfit that we bought in OshKosh for the fall.  I thought it was perfect because she can wear the dress now when she starts preschool and then when the weather gets cooler add the leggins.  Of course, she had to add the boots and refused to take it off and even went outside in the HEAT dressed for fall! She must have gotten over heated because then the silliness really started… She decided to make a headband out of her new Necklace that she had to have. 

Still refusing any more photos…

In the midst of a big “NOooooooo pictures!”

But she would smile for her Sissy Sara!

And back to the sillies again!

And as I said earlier… she’s into not letting us put on pj’s including the new ones SHE picked out today… so guess what she is asleep wearing right now?  You got it… the new preschool outfit!  How did we ever manage without this little bundle of joy!

Bye Bye Aunt Neaners!

This surely has been quite a week!  We’ve enjoyed the company of Aunt Neaners since Sunday and took her to the airport this morning.  Yesterday we went on a marathon shopping trip.  We started out with lunch with Geoff and then headed to the stores.  Aunt Neaners spoiled Lexi rotten and bought her all kinds of stuff… a mermaid Barbie doll, new PINK boots, and some clothes.  It was a lot of fun and Lexi was a trooper as we wore her down to a frazzle.  We met Geoff for dinner but by then she was on her last leg and slept through half of dinner. The funny thing was that once Lexi got the boots at Target (our first stop!) that was the end of sensible shoes for the 100 degree weather!  She refused to take the boots off and even wore them in the store still connected with the elastic strings.  She got all kinds of giggles as wore them all over Savannah.  Can’t wait for another visit!

At the airport this morning

A very tired Lexi last night still wearing her pink boots just before bed.  Her new thing is to refuse wear pj’s to bed and wear whatever she has on in the evening.  Gracious, she keeps us guessing!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Happy Birthday Geoff!  You are the light of our lives! 

Official Again!

I’ve been out of town with Lexi on a “girls” beach trip with my sister.  We came home late Saturday night to be joined on Sunday by Geoff’s parents and his Aunt Neaners.   Yesterday, we all got dressed up and headed to the courthouse for the re-adoption in Ga.  It was very quick and easy but it meant so much to us to share this last formality with family.  Afterwards we headed to the local deli and had breakfast together.  It was so nice to have everyone with us.  We were alone in China so it felt as if we were sharing the experience with them all over again.  The judge asked us some of the same questions they asked us in China.  At one point mom told the judge that there was plenty of family that loved Lexi and would make sure she was taken care of.  That’s for sure!

 

Miss Bossy and Lessons learned . . .

Sorry, no picts tonight just stories . . .

A few weeks ago on a Saturday morning, G and Lj let me sleep in and headed to the grocery store for breakfast food.  They came home with an African Violet.  A few days later, I found Lj in the living room trying to remove all the soil from the plant ON the oversized living room chair.  I told her that was a “no no” and tried to explain.  Well, today Sara brought CE and Brennen over so she could go grocery shopping without kids.  The next thing I hear is Lexi quite clearly telling CE “that is Mommy’s plant!”.  He was squeezing a leaf and she knew he was NOT supposed to bother Mommy’s plant.  Let me just say… if ONLY all lessons were learned so easily!

Tonight at dinner we were eating chicken tenders dipped in egg and then dipped in crunched up French’s Onion Rings.  Lexi wanted the “crunchy” part and that helped a lot in getting real food into her besides milk.  She even swallowed the chicken she wanted to spit out in order to get more “crunchy”.  She was born in Southern China and she maintains her “southern” status here in the US South! 

After dinner tonight she had her little magnetic drawing board out that Aunt Carolyn gave her.  She “drew” pictures of me, Geoff, Nana, Papa, Carolyn, Brennen, CE, Sara, Muffin and Smokey. We are about to take our first “girls” trip to the beach on Sunday.  When I tried to tell her about it tonight, I asked if she wanted to go to the beach.  She immediately said yes but then added “Carolyn, John, Brit-NEY, Mama, Daddy”.   So we will see how it goes with only the girls and no Daddy…..

If only potty training was as easy as teaching her Mommy’s plant is Mommy’s plant!

Mama Never Said…

… that any of us were “lying” to her or Dad.  She ALWAYS said “storying”.  I always thought she was being nice about it as I grew up but SUDDENLY today, I GET it.  I GET that it’s much easier to accept that your child is making up a “story” verses telling you an out and out “LIE”.  I say this in jest because I know Lexi is not mentally capable of actually making up a LIE BUT she did tell us her first STORY tonight.  It’s too good not to document!  LOL!

This afternoon a typical southern summer storm rolled in.  It’s really one of the fun things about summer and like my Dad I like to watch the clouds roll in and then the heavy rains fall. That was us this afternoon but we never got the heavy rain.  I had planned to grill dinner… marinated chicken breasts, homemade veggie rice with grilled onions, zucchini, and asparagus.  Yum!  It was delicious if I say so myself but as usual Lexi finished dinner about 2 minutes after we sat down and her Dad and I had barely had a bite.  So I put her down and told her that we were still eating dinner.  That’s when mischievous Lj appeared.  She began to use her crayons to color on her kitchen center.  Her Daddy told her to put the crayons away and that she could ONLY color on her coloring book but that took a little help.  Just minutes later, as I cleaned up in the kitchen I still hear him telling her to straighten up after he had taken the crayons. By then she had decided that SOMEONE was going to hold her no matter what.  He told her he was not finished with dinner but she kept it up.  Finally, he put her in time out.  This of course brought on big crocodile tears and loud crying. 

After I finished putting the food away, I went in the living room where she was sitting and began to talk to her about her behavior.  I asked her WHY she was in time out.  She then began to tell me that she didn’t listen to Daddy and that “he spank her hine (hiney)”.  Now I WAS in the room and knew better.  I said “Daddy spanked you?” and she said “yes, blah, blah. blah… my hine!” At this point I just could not help it and had to turn away to try to hide my laughing.  I knew she was “storying”.  After listening for a few minutes Geoff said “Lexi, did Daddy spank you?” and she said “no”.  So at this point I just said, “go tell Daddy you are sorry and that you are ready to listen”.  She did exactly that and we resumed a normal evening. 

I’m not saying that Lexi does not get what we call a “spank” occasionally.  It’s our word for a pop in the thigh or hand.  Most often it is time out but sometimes only a spank will do.  BUT where she decided to tell me that she got a spank is beyond me.  It was funny and interesting at the same time.  It begs us to wonder if telling stories begin with innocent misinterpretations of young brains.  At this point, given it IS OUR daughter doing the “storying”, I prefer to think she just had a brief misinterpretations or else we may be dealing with DFACS one day! Let’s hope this is not going to be “habit”!  LOL!

Now for some random cuteness…

“Yes, Mom I CAN dress myself!”

 

Never mind that the neck of the pj top is now all stretched out!

Planting project finally beginning to “grow”.

Who loves “Kai-Lan”?

Ready for dinner…. Lexi style!  Finished two minutes later!