Spring!

I have done absolutely nothing I should do today while I tried to work on a bunch of pictures.  I have so many of our trip which is my next post, but I didn't want to overlook a few things that happened first.  No fabulous pictures but some good times with the kids in nice weather...before it snowed again this week!  So here they go in no particular order.

We needed one last round of plan revisions with my dad's help, so we all hit the road a few Mondays ago and made our final changes to the plan plus colored some eggs.  The boys were way into it.

These are from way back on St. Patrick's Day.  Ian came home with all sorts of treats from Miss Jenny, and he was sharing up a storm with Leah.

Just enjoying the weather.  Seth was showing me his loose tooth.

Leah loves ring around the rosy and begs you to do it with her.  

We Gotcha!

I've taken lots of pictures lately, and we just got back from an epic road trip that I need to post about soon, but I feel bad that I haven't made mention here of Leah's special anniversary that happened last month.  March 12th was the one year anniversary of Leah's gotcha day.  Last year (when it was actually March 11th at home) I received the best birthday present ever.  (It turned out to be the best although I felt the most intense nervousness/anticipation/I'm sweating down to my elbows feelings I've ever felt in my life on that particular day!)   I still can't look at pictures of gotcha day without getting all teary, and if I watch the actual movie just cue the water works.  It was emotional to say the least.  One of these days when I have time I want to post some looks back to Leah's time and our time together in China.  I am truly amazed at how far she has come.  The Leah of a year ago was a 16 lb. 16 month old who was just learning to eat solid food, roll over, and stand with help for the first time.  When I look at her today I am sure of two things:  Leah is a valiant little spirit who is tough beyond what I can even imagine, and she has a loving Heavenly Father who watched over her in the toughest of circumstances and has helped her to bloom.  She is amazing, and I feel so blessed to be her mom.  She has brought so much love to our family.  

This is not a great picture at all, but you get the idea.  Leah is holding a picture of herself in China when she was almost a year old.  She weighed less than 12 lbs. and was wearing tiny baby socks that were baggy on her.  Leah now wears a 2T and her feet have grown to a size 5 which is huge for her!  The physical changes in Leah are not the most profound though.  Leah has learned to love.  She now gives hugs and kisses with meaning.  She wraps her arms around your neck and holds on tight.  She giggles until she has the hiccups.  She tells us she loves us and can sing most of the words to "I am a Child of God." She is sweet and smart and everyday I look at her in amazement.  She knows many of her ABCs, speaks in the cutest little sentences, and counts.  She has an amazing memory.  Quick story—at the beginning of Leah's little dance class each week her teacher calls roll.  After about the second week Leah would point to each girl whose name was called.  She learned their names before I did!  This week as a crazy coincidence we ran into one of the little girls from her class on our Spring Break trip.  Leah immediately recognized and called "McKenzie" by name even though she was soaking wet from swimming.  Her mom was shocked and I was too!  Leah is a determined little soul.  I have watched her do things with only one hand that her brothers have struggled with at a much older age...like peel an orange.  Nothing stops this girl.

Something that does my heart good is that finally in the last month or so Leah has slowed down her eating habits a little bit and become picky.  I take this as a good sign that she is finally confident her next meal is coming.  It used to be that she would eat anything and everything as fast as she could, but I think we have gained her trust in this area.  Although her table manners still leave a lot to be desired (this is something the boys laugh about nightly at dinner) she is learning to pick and choose the things she wants to eat and isn't afraid anymore to say no to food.  A great step in her attachment to us!

Leah has us all wrapped around her little finger, and she has taught us all lessons about how to be more compassionate and understanding.  I am so grateful we took this leap of faith and brought our little girl home.  I know she was always meant to be with our family.  It just took a few miracles along the way to get her here.  We gotcha Leah and you're stuck with us forever!

Ski Days

Spring is finally here, and I love it.  I have never been so ready for spring.  It truly was a long, cold, smoggy winter.  Between the move and the weather I felt so cooped up and kind of down at times.  Being outside the last few weeks has done my mood a world of good.  We did have some fun ski days though this year.  I wasn't the best at taking pictures, but we made some great memories.  Even when it's freezing you're still up above the inversion which is great.  Luke and Seth had a blast.  They are both improving so much and loving it.  Seth absolutely loves skiing.  There were a few times he went up for a night party on Friday and then was back up there first thing Saturday morning and stayed all the way until sweep with Jer—he's a die hard!  He is totally crazy too.  From the top of the hill to the bottom he just goes fast!  We got Ian out there this year, and he did great.  I took all three boys up one weekend when Jer was out of town, and it actually went pretty well.  Luke and Seth rode the lift together and basically skied on their own while I helped Ian.  After lunch it really clicked and he was skiing great.  Miss Leah even got in on the action in the backpack at a night party.  I will admit there are times I question my sanity when getting everything ready and hauling everyone up there on Saturdays, but I truly do love it and can't imagine winter without it.  Just getting all the kids into their ski gear is a monumental task.  Luke does his own—hallelujah—but that's it.  I think some sort of medal should be awarded after we've taught four kids to ski.

Here are some pictures of the season many of which were taken in bad light or with my phone, but they  were good times!

    

 This was after Ian pulled out his goggles and then flipped them back into his own eyes.  His crying escalated pretty quickly and like any good mom I got a picture!

Until next year!

Compliment?

Last night at dinner when Luke said, "this actually tastes a lot better than it looks."  Should I take that as a compliment?

Funnies

My kids crack me up.  Here are just a few funny things said and done around here the last while:

**When it was the 100th day of school Seth came home with a picture he had drawn.  They were supposed to write and then draw 100 something they would like and something they would not like.  Seth wrote down Leah with 100 little pictures for the like (awww) and Satan with 100 little pictures for the thing he would not like!  I'm with Seth, one Satan is enough.

**Seth imitates the way I talk to my kids...giving them choices, etc.  Some nights Ian just cannot/will not settle down at bedtime in their shared room.  The other night I was standing outside the door and heard Seth give Ian these choices, "Ian are you going to go to bed, or am I going to punch you in the face?"  He then repeated "What do you choose?  Bed or face?"  I was silently cracking up because the last thing in the world Seth would ever do is go punch his brother unprovoked, so it was funny. I guess Ian chose bed that night.

**Ian is in Sunbeams now (that could be a whole other post) but for weeks he called his teacher whose real name is Sister Nieman by the oh so close yet problematic Sister Demon!  On the way out of class the other day he also said to her "bye chubby head" and then ran off leaving me facing her.  Yikes.  I kind of wanted a hole in the floor to open up.  I hope she didn't take it too personally.  Chubby is a word Ian uses very liberally right now.  It can apply to anyone and "Miss Chubby" or "Chubby Cheeks" are his pet names for Leah right now.

**My birthday is coming up and Ian and I somehow got in a discussion about what I might get.  He shrugged it off and said I would just get some "old work stuff."  When I asked him what that might be he said, "maybe like a new laundry basket."  Seriously?!  Laundry is like the bane of my existence. 

**And last but not least when I picked Ian up from preschool yesterday his teacher told me he gave a   "like 10 minute presentation" during show and tell to the kids about Nephi and Lehi (the ones who were the sons of Helamen) and the Nephi who went back for the plates.  He took a head lamp to show so I really have no idea how he got off on a scriptural discussion, but she said he was quite the storyteller!

Post-edit:  This just in and since I'm right by the computer I'll add it to the list.

Ian:  Why do you have that funny smell?
Me:  What funny smell?
Ian:  That funny smell you have when I kissed you?
Me:  What does it smell like?
Ian:  Dog poop.

Chinese New Year

We celebrated our 2nd Chinese New Year and this time Leah was here to party with us.  There are some really nice people around the valley with adopted Chinese children, and it is really fun to see them all together.  The boys were really looking forward to it, ate a ton of orange chicken, and had a blast.

With all the parents trying to take pictures the old 50 mm is not ideal.  I couldn't get a side angle on it either, so I don't have the whole group.  I need to get a picture from someone else.

We bought Leah a silky Chinese dress, but it's packed up so I put her in a dress she wore in China.  Let's just say she's grown and what was once a baggy dress was now a tight tunic!

 

 In door fireworks!

 This little guy is so cute and even tinier than Leah!

Science Fair

A few weeks ago the boys did Science Fair.  As a science teacher I should have been super stoked, but I'll admit I wasn't so much.  Luke decided to do it and then Seth wanted to also.  You hate to discourage your kids to do something good, but I'll admit selfishly I was kind of hoping they'd forget about it.  Well, they didn't but I came around and it was a good experience.  It was a lot of work for all of us...mostly making the boards, but they learned and had fun.

 Seth did his project on bubbles.

 Luke chose static electricity.  (An added bonus is now his class is doing a Science Fair in March, and we are all set!)

When it came time for the awards Seth won 2nd place in the kindergarten category.  He was so excited!  It was hard for him to get up there and once he did he didn't tell them he was there until they were through the second grade awards.  He won a ribbon and the totally sweet safety glasses in the picture below.  Although the competition was quite a bit more stiff in 3rd grade and Luke didn't win, he did a great job and was excited for Seth.  It turned out to be a great experience.