Counting

This morning in the bathtub...she was counting with dad..and kept going after 20...in fact, she went all the way to 29! She stopped then because she didn't know the word "thirty" (we've never counted this high with her before!)...we were both S-H-O-C-K-E-D!

I went to an adoption conference yesterday. It was amazing. You can see some of last year's sessions here. There were some awesome sessions last year...and this year was NO DIFFERENT! I'm really going to miss this conference when we move. Anyways, Dr. Karyn Purvis was talking about when kids feel connected and safe, they have explosions of language and learning. We have had major explosions since she started sleeping with us...she's clearly feeling very safe and connected. Even if you have no experience (or interest) in adoption, I'd encourage you to listen to the sessions as they are good for any parent or grandparent.

Elmo song

Megan LOVES Elmo. This is her playing with stickers...Elmo stickers. She doesn't want to do any other types of stickers, ONLY Elmo stickers. Did I say she LOVED Elmo? If you ask her if she wants to do stickers, she says "Elmo stickers!" And did I mention that she LOVES Elmo? Yep. I think I mentioned that.

Photos

Here is Megan with her "umbrell-elll-ell-ell-ah"
She was pretty excited it was raining today so she could take it to school.

They used markers at school on Monday...
Despite using a sugar scrub and washing her hands a million times, oh, and a bath this morning, she still has some blue on her fingers. So much for "easy removal"!

Today I finally got smart and decided to use Megan's backpack with rollers for school...the other bag was overflowing. She got this one from Nana for Christmas. So this morning, she had fun pulling it around the house.

Counting some more!

Here is Megan showing not only how to count to 20, but that she can hold up 2 fingers!

We've been busy around our house. The house went on the market this week and we are trying to keep it picked up and clean. What a job!!! We've had a couple of people look at the house, but no offers yet (thank goodness!). I honestly didn't realize how NOT ready I was to sell my house until I got the first "can so-and-so come showthe house tonight?" I really wanted to say "NO! I don't want to sell my house!!!" Of course, there are HUGE benefits of being back "home"...family...okay, that's the only one. And I'm sure the house we find up there when the time comes, we'll love, too. Eventually. We put so many hours into our house to make it the way we like it (minus most of the flooring), I'm not really ready to move on, yet. But, it'll be fine, I'm sure. I think God knew I was going to need some serious transition time with this huge move. DH is still looking and applying for a few jobs. So far, there's not really anything that jumps off the page. And there's not been any interviews. THE job is obviously not ready for us...or rather all of the things that need to line up are not ready for us, yet. Selling our house is only step 1, and we both feel that way. I really don't WANT to move into transitional housing, but truly, I'll survive. Heck, I've survived at lot worse. Can we can say Arkansas??? Geez. But that's another story!

Megan is doing awesome at school. She loves learning, so she's doing really well. Her teachers are really great. She doesn't even so much as sniffle when I leave her now. She's also been napping there. Of course when she does, she only sleeps 60-75 minutes, which is about half what she needs, but at least she is napping. Sometimes those evenings are tough, but we make it through with everyone looking forward to bedtime!

Her new favorite word is: umbrell-ell-llaaahhh. It's really cute to see her say it. In fact, when we were at the store this morning, she kept saying she saw umbrell-ell-las on signs that had kind of an umbrella type look to them. I could see where she could think that, especially if she was looking for them everywhere! She is also making HUGE advancements verbally. Putting words together, saying short sentences, saying what she is thinking. All these months of us constantly talking to her has finally paid off! She's communicating so much better now. Heck, she's made huge changes just in the last week! She keeps changing and growing. Sniff, sniff. She's not a baby anymore!

Fall is here!

The weather has been cool (in the 50s & 60s)...it's SO GOOD to get to wear long sleeves. I've been getting sick of Megan's warm clothes.

This morning we put on her October shirt...and cute orange pants.
She even gave me a smile! YEAH!

This week Nana was here...she & I went shopping on Saturday for a little bit, but had to take a photo before we left. I was tickling Megan to get the cute smile...(whatever works!)

Megan did really well with me working all week. She didn't like it, but she did have fun with Gran-mom and Nana. But, she was pretty clingy in the evenings after I got home. She definitely needed her mommy time then. We'll see how December goes as we're the same thing right after Christmas. Since Gran-mom will have moved by then (they move in 2 weeks), we're still finalizing how the first 2 days will go, but Nana is coming again to watch her the last half of the week again.

Outside Fun

Today is a beautiful day, so this afternoon we headed outside to play for a little while. Of course, I had to grab my camera!

"hhhmmmm...."

"Mom, the ball is over there...please get it"

Things are still a bit nuts around here. Nana flies in Tuesday to help care for Megan while I'm teaching this next week in the classroom. (Grandma V or Gran-mom has Megan calls her) is watching Megan the first half of the week for us.