With everything to chose from, Graeme went for the Santa potato head first~
Then, he saw his Thomas the train stuff! He still isn't quite sure what all the Christmas is about but he enjoyed every moment!
Lily working at figuring out Graeme's first computer
Graeme, John Christopher and Lily toasting with their Icees (Virgin Margueritas)
The shirt just says it all!
Lily enjoyed playing with John Christopher's scooter
Singing Happy Birthday to Baby Jesus
What happens when Christmas day is a little too long for the wee ones....
We were all exhausted but very happy and blessed to have spent this holiday together!
Lily Wen, John Christopher, Graeme and Luke are ready to open presents.
Lily loved her present from Nanan. Now she can be author/illustrator any time she wants.
Graeme is really getting into the present thing.
John played with his car all evening!
Granny and 4 of her Grandkids. Luke did not want to share his Granny with Graeme. For those wondering if Graeme really does smile that much, this picture is proof. He is still smiling even when Luke is pushing him away. He is the happiest little kid.
Our family of four
Lily and Graeme wrote letters to Santa and left him cookies and milk! They were so cute and so excited. I did not think that they would ever get to sleep.
This was taken last week when Lily was an angel in our church Christmas play. She is very angelic after all!
This is the last picture that I have of my daughter's unadorned, beautiful, petite ear. She has talked for months of having her ears pierced. So off we went to Libby Lu for the ultimate ear piercing, princess for a day, experience.
Not feeling too princess like right here. Where there is true beauty, there is pain. We assured her it only hurt for a minute. Her cousin, John Christopher, repeatedly told her, "Lily, it's gonna hurt. It is REALLY gonna hurt." Nothing changed her mind. Daddy and Graeme couldn't watch. They had to walk away. It might of had something to do with Graeme trying to pick out earrings for himself. What can I say, he loves his sister and wants to do all that she does!
Now her ears have sparkly pink hearts...it HAD to be the pink hearts!
On to the next Christmas Adventure, making cookies...a tradition with cousins!
What kiddo doesn't love the feel of dough and flour in his hands! John Christopher is loving it!
Baby Luke was more into eating the dough....
and just looking so darn CUTE!
The perfect snowman is hard to achieve but she did it!
My sis, Jodi, and her son...family fun!
She is so proud!
Graeme got way into the decorating. He was the first to the table and the last to leave!
Looks good enough to eat!
So they did!
Not quite sure what he thinks about all those textures and the sweetness. The twinkle in his eye is priceless though.
Can't waste that last bite.When I started to write tonight, I thought about what I should title the post. Heading Home seems most appropriate. Home for me will always be my mother's house in Louisiana. As soon as I get out of school tomorrow, we are starting our journey south. We will probably stop half way in Birmingham tomorrow night and continue on Saturday. I used to be a get in the car and drive the 11-12 hour drive straight kind of woman. Lily Wen and I have even made the trip many times and we drive straight through. Coming home this last time, we broke the trip up and can I say that it made a huge difference in all of our comfort!
I have been absent this week...trying to prepare for the trip, complete my therapy logs for school and complete the end of the year close out for the private practice owned by my friend and I. This has not left much time for visiting blogs or blogging. Hopefully on Saturday or Sunday I will catch up!!!!
Six months ago, we met Graeme for the first time! I can't believe that 6 months have passed already. Tomorrow, our social worker is coming to do our first post placement visit. We have cleaned the house and organized and printed the pictures. I think we are as ready as we will be. Since the house is clean and straight, there is of course a winter weather advisory for tonight. If we get the ice that they are predicting, I doubt our social worker will make the trip to see us. I hope this doesn't happen. We are ready and I am sure that she can see by the pictures that he is happy with his forever family! Here's hoping the weather passes us by!
So we were having a quiet morning when someone e-mailed us more pics of the snow in Louisiana. As we were viewing the pics, Lily grabbed Graeme and yanked his arm a few times. He was excitedly pointing to the pictures and it was "blocking" her view. She automatically went to the "naughty spot" for grabbing him (things that hurt self or someone else result in an automatic timeout in our house). You would have thought we had beat her for all the screaming that resulted. Then, as she is "doing her time", I hear, "I don't like my brother. I want to send him back to China." This is the second time this week that we have heard something similar and I just want to be sure that I handle it appropriately. I did assure her that he was part of our family for forever and that there was nothing he would ever do or she would ever do that would ever cause us to "send them back to China". We thought that she handled the adoption of her brother so well and there seemed to be no jealousy until recently. HELP....need advice! (Elizabeth, I know you warned me that she would feel this way. What will make it better?)
I wish I could have seen their faces when they saw that first snow.
It looks like it was a pretty one!
I hope it doesn't take 20 years for them to get another one! Could we all have a white Christmas as we celebrate down south. Now that would be a Christmas Miracle!
We pulled out the Gingerbread House kit and I fought with the icing mix forever!!!!! I'm not kidding...at one point there was icing on my ceiling! Anyway...after we got the icing on the house. It was time to decorate!
Our Little House
Graeme decorated half and Lily the other.
Here they are trying not to drop it.
Barely hanging on! 
He really enjoyed the turkey.
He wanted every last....
BITE!
We finally decorated Graeme's first Christmas tree last night. We started the process a week ago when we pulled out our beautiful prelit Christmas tree, set it up, plugged it in and the bottom half didn't light. Wes and I both worked on the lights changing fuses and bulbs.. no luck it still didn't light. So with the busy week ahead the tree sat until the cancellation of Lily's Nutcracker performance yesterday. Have you ever tried to take lights off of a prelit tree? It took me over 20 minutes to remove one strand of the lights. So after some not so nice words said under my breath and dealing with the scratches on both hands, a new plan was devised. I just put new lights on top of the ones that weren't working. Otherwise, this tree would not get decorated until next year.
People ask if he smiles like this all the time and yes, pretty much he does. His preschool teacher sent a note home that they are amazed that the muscles in his face don't hurt from smiling.
