Happy Mid Autumn Festival!!!

Today is the Chinese holiday, mid autumn moon festival. It is a lunar harvest festival celebrated by the Chinese and Vietnamese. People are given time off to go home and celebrate with their families over a wonderful dinner. It is one of the most important holidays in the Chinese calendar.

One year ago, we were anxiously waiting to hear that our dossier had been sent to China and we had a Log in Date. This meant that we would be included in the shared list that would be released by the Chinese government and we might be one step closer to our daughter. I remember staring up at the moon that night and thinking that we had probably both been looking at the same moon that day. I wondered where she was and what she was thinking.

Tonight, I stared up at the beautiful moon and then I gazed at my beautiful daughter who was playing with her equally beautiful older sister. My heart was at peace. Our family is whole and complete. I have never been happier. I no longer have to wonder where she is or what she is thinking or doing. I can see it with my own eyes. It is amazing :)

A funny thing happened this week......

.......and it has to do with the word Ma Ma. Sofie has always used the Chinese word for Mom, Ma Ma, rather indiscriminately. I know she had no idea what a Mom was or what they do. The same as she had no idea what a family was or how it worked. She used the term Ma Ma whenever she needed something from someone. Everyone was Ma Ma, including Jim. If she needed help the person she needed help from was called Ma Ma.

Something changed this week. She started calling me Ma Ma and only me. She says it differently than before, a different tone to it. She calls it out when she is trying to get my attention and more importantly, she calls for her Ma Ma when she is upset. It just melted my heart.  She knows who her Ma Ma is and more importantly, what her Ma Ma is supposed to do for her. Life is good, very good :)

A great read!!!

I am posting a link to a blog and I hope that you will all read it. It sums up what it is like to be a transracially adopted family.  I know that people are going to say that people stare at us because Sofie is just so darn cute. Yes, there is a lot of that, there is also a lot of the other kinds of stares......and I can tell the difference between the two. Most people don't realize what they are doing, they do it in a kind manner so they think it is OK. What they forget is that there is a child there too. That child can hear and see and totally knows when she is being stared at. This child will get older and will just want to fit in and be a normal kid and not be stared at because she doesn't look like her Mom and Dad and big sister. One day it will matter to that child that she gets stared at and she may not like it. So please read on. I hope that maybe I can educate just one person on what is OK and what is not OK to say while you are around us. I totally understand that people aren't being malicious, I just want to make you aware :)

Please read.....nohandbutours.com


I had some instances in the past that mirror what the author wrote about.  Mostly it was people stating that we have "saved" Sofie or how lucky she is that she was adopted by us. I am still trying to come up with a good answer to both of those comments. They frost my apples!!!! Most of you will have no idea what I am talking about. Those of you who have adopted will. She is not lucky and we did not save her. She has given more to us that we could ever give to her and she has fought harder to live and lost more than we will ever know. I am not a saint....I am just a Mom.

The stares were never more apparent than this weekend at a BB-Q we attended. It is the first time I felt that we were being stared at and not because Sofie is so cute. There is a difference between the two types of stares and if I can tell the difference so can Sofie and Ainsley. It was uncomfortable and awkward and I had no idea how to respond. I have probably had stares like it before, but, I was so busy chasing around a three year old that it is easy to ignore them. No ignoring these ones, we were sitting beside the line to the buffet :) We were totally on display. I am not angry. I knew what we were getting into by adopting and by adopting transracially. I knew that it is sometimes like living in a fishbowl. You are always on display and noticed. I just hope that maybe by sharing this I can help just one person realize that your kindly stare will have an effect on my child. I just hope that I can educate just one person on how to talk to us or what to say or do. Thanks again for listening :)

Quite the week!!

Well, we had quite the week this week.
Started with the mollescum diagnosis and got busier after that. Wednesday we had a little party for Sofie with some of our friends who couldn't make it to the party in August. We all stayed up to late and ate too many cupcakes. Sofie had night terrors all night long. Jim and I both had to work on Thursday, Jim a 24 hour shift,  so we all had to be out the door by 7 am. After work I rushed to pick Sofie up from daycare, came home with Taco Bell, dropped Sofie off at my girlfriends and picked Ainsley up from the same girlfriend, and headed off to Brownies with Ainsley. Sofie crashed in my friends lap at around 6:50. I returned home about 8 and got Ainsley to bed and then headed there myself.
Friday after work, we noticed that Sofie's torso was covered in small reddish welts. I mean covered too. I have never seen so many dots on one kid. Jim took her first to our clinic that is open late that is no longer open late on Fridays and then to Urgent Care. They were there for 3 hours. They diagnosed her with contact dermatitis just because they couldn't diagnose her with anything else :) She has been miserable. We have a steroid cream and Benadryl to give her. Sofie on Benadryl is not a calm thing. She goes crazy!!!!
Today the welts were a little better and not quite as itchy.
Here's hoping that the upcoming week is a little calmer :)

I am beginning to hate doctor's appointments!

Sofie cannot seem to catch a break!!!! While I know it can be infinitely worse, it is still very hard to watch your child get diagnosed with one thing after another. On top of the hearing issues, Dermatology diagnosed her today with Molluscum. It is a very common skin condition. Treatment sometimes involves laser treatments or freezing. Hers cannot be treated as hers are on her face and these treatments are too harsh. We are trying creams to moisturize and Retin A. Hopefully, they should go away on their own over time. They could come back at any time though.

Eye appointment is next week. I am so hoping that this appointment goes well and we don't need glasses :) I have every finger and toe crossed.

A side note, Sofie made about 50 friends at the dermatology office today :) Her smile is just infectious!!!!

It has been a while......

I look at my blog frequently. I ponder over my ticker that shows where all the people who look at my blog are from. I feel like I should write something so they all have something new to read, yet, nothing comes out. I go to sleep instead.
It has been a fun, amazing, long, short, easy, difficult month :)

So much has gone on, lots of which I cannot talk about here. We have had health issues in our extended family, back to school stressors and a toddler who is pushing her boundaries to the max. We have also had amazing family times, new experiences and lots of joy. Life is like a roller coaster...up and down, up and down.
Ainsley has always gotten stressed out over the end of the school year and the beginning of the school year. She is not a fan of change no matter what form it comes in. She never has liked it and never will. I love the joy in both Ainsley's and Sofie's eyes when the school bus arrives at the end of the day and Ainsley jumps off and runs into the yard. Sofie is always jumping up and down waving and Ainsley picks her sister up and gives her a big hug. They truly love each other to the core. It is an amazing thing to watch.
Sofie is trying so hard to speak and I am trying so hard to understand her. She is doing fine with it, I am not! It is getting frustrating for me not being able to understand most of what Sofie says. It would be different if she hardly spoke at all, instead,  she has these big long speeches that she gives and she just looks intently into your eyes as just to make sure that you are focused and are listening to her. I have no idea what she is saying. It makes me sad. I so desperately want to know what is going on inside that sweet little head. When I talk to people about it, I always seem to get the same response, "she will pick it up quickly, just have some patience." I know that she will pick it up quickly :) She is one smart little girl and I have no doubt that she will more than overcome any obstacle or difficulty that life may through her way. I just feel like I am still missing out on part of her life. I missed the first 2 1/2 years of her existence and I feel sad that I don't know what she is thinking or trying to say to me. I am just grateful that it doesn't seem to bug her. It is hard to explain why this bothers me so much.

So, it has taken me over a week just to get this blog post out. So much happens over a week. I went back to work and I went out of town with the girls for an overnight at a vineyard. It was the first time Sofie woke up in the morning and I wasn't there and the first time that I wasn't around during the night. She had a great time with Daddy and her sister. She is much more anxious now and watches my every move just to see where I am going. She came around the corner today and a HUGE smile crossed her face as if to say "you are still here, awesome!!!!" It melted my heart. I have also spoken to a friend about my sadness over the language barrier. She said not to stress over it too much. Just treat it more like a game that Sofie and I are playing. It has really helped.

I am finding that it is so much harder to put things into words now than it was before. Maybe it is due to  a lack of time, maybe there is just so much more going on and I am finding it difficult to process it all.

I will have to continue this blog post tomorrow. Sleep is calling me after a long weekend of too much wine and too little sleep :) Until tomorrow........................

.............................it is tomorrow!! We are heading back into a period of multiple doctor's appointments again. Sofie has had a break for about a month now so it has been nice. Sofie does great at doctor's appointments, Mommy stresses about them :) Tomorrow is a dermatology appointment, next Tuesday is the two hour eyes dilated eye doctor appointment ( should be fun and I am sure it will require  whole blog post all it's own) and next Wednesday is the pre op appointment for her ABR hearing test and dental surgery that will take place on October 11. I cannot lie, I am worried about the ABR and dental. It is not only stressful knowing that she is prone to pneumonia post operatively, but I am worried about the ABR. Part of me is still hoping that the results come out better than what audiology is expecting and the rest of me is worried that the results will come out worse. It is out of my control so I am just trying to do one day at a time :)

Not much else is going on, just dance classes, gymnastics, school, doctors appointments and swimming :) I will now post some pictures as I feel that they sum things up much better than I can!!!

First Day of School

Sofie's first swimming lesson....Ainsley was so concerned about her :)

Sisters having fun

Our beautiful Ainsley

What have you got on your face!!!!!!

I so love her eyes and the freckles

I am not happy!

OK now I am happy!!!!!!!

I love this sweet little face :)

We have done a lot this month. Don't misunderstand by the above ramblings, it has been a month full of so much joy also. I feel so fortunate and blessed to have the family I have and to be loved by two such wonderful little girls and then to share it all with my best friend is almost too much!!! I watch the two of them play together and think what an amazing privilege it is to be able to watch the bond between Ainsley and Sofie being formed. It is a unique privilege to watch them discover what it means to be a sister at the age their age. I think it must be a much different process than that between an older sibling and an infant. I have no experience at that though so it is just a guess.
Thanks for listening to all my ramblings. It felt good to get some things off my chest!!!
You guys are great :)

Sad day

Yesterday was a difficult day. Sofie and Ainsley had their first full day of daycare together. Ainsley had a blast but Sofie cried off and on all morning. Makes me sad.

Last night our eldest dog Domino passed away quietly. She had bad hips and knees and had been having trouble getting around. She was slowly getting worse but last night she took a real turn for the worse. Her breathing was very labored and she was in a lot of pain. She went to go lay in her kennel which is one of her favorite spots. We all gave her a little rub down and when Jim checked on her 10 minutes later, she was gone. She will be missed. She was a unique dog :)

There will be no more banging on the cupboard door where the dog food is to let me know what time it is and that dinner is 5 minutes late. I swear that dog could tell time. There will be no more opening of the door to the cupboard where the garbage is kept. It had to be open at all times and if you closed it, she would open it back up. One never knew when food might fall out of there. There will be no more nasty looks when you have angered her for some reason. I could never figure out what I had done to anger the dog so much. No more angry stares at 9 PM cause that is my bedtime and no one has tucked me in yet!!!! No more dog who will come up and lick your leg for no reason other than it was there!

We will miss her :(

We know that she is in heaven banging on a cupboard door demanding to know "where the BLEEP is my dinner" I hope they have  Mcdonald's french fries in heaven :)

Birthday Party

This past Saturday, we had a birthday party for Sofie. We has some friends over and my Mom and Dad were able to be here for it. We had a great time. I think Sofie finally figured out that the decorations and all the fuss were all about her. Her expression when she opened each gift was priceless. It was a big "WOW.......WHOA" and then she had to show it to everyone, even the clothes. We had a fantastic time celebrating her first birthday with us, with all of our friends around us. It was a great moment. Here are some great pictures :)

Cleft Team Day

Sofie had her cleft team appointment yesterday. She was a rock star. She saw 6 different specialists in the morning and then had a group meeting in the afternoon with everyone including the ENT surgeon. I was a little nervous with her being in a room of about 10 medical people, but, in true Sofie fashion she flashed them all her huge smile and waved hello to all of them. She had a blast. Her repair looks great and no fistulas. They want to wait to start speech therapy for another 6 months in order to let her acquire more words.

They bad news is that we were hoping to put off another round of medical procedures with anesthesia for a while, but, it is not to be. At her first ENT appointment, it was noted that she had some hearing loss. We were hoping that it was just the wax and some fluid in her ears and that the ear tubes would take care of all that. She had a lot of wax in her ears. We had a hearing test at the audiologist yesterday and she was diagnosed with moderate hearing loss which will probably require hearing aids for the rest of her life. Neither Jim or I were prepared to hear that and it hit us pretty hard. Poor thing has been through so much and she just needed to catch a break. She will have so much to deal with throughout her life she just really didn't need this too. Oh well, things can always be worse so we will look at the bright side of things. She will deal with this like she does with everything else....with a smile!

The bad news is that she has to go for a ABR test (auditory brainstem response) and will need to have sedation for it. We have decided to do the dental surgery and the ABR together so she will once again have anesthesia. The ABR will have to be done ASAP so we will not be able to put off anesthesia until November. Sofie just finally got over her pneumonia and now she will have to be put under again. I hope we can ward off the pneumonia this time. Her hearing loss affects her ability to hear common speech and without that she will not be able to hear and form the words she needs to for her to develop speech. I feel better about it today, it was just such a shock yesterday to hear that. I will keep everyone posted as to when the surgery will be :)

3 months ago

Today is our wedding anniversary, 19 years, it is Miss Sofie Lu's 3rd birthday, her first birthday with us and it has been exactly 3 months since we first met that sweet, smiling, scared face in a civil affairs office in Hefei, China. WOW....what a day :)
It has been a while since I have blogged. We are still having issues with Sofie waking up in the middle of the night so I am a little tired and find it hard to find the time to sit down and write....laundry wins all the time!

 I find myself thinking of Sofie's China mother a lot today. I wonder if she is thinking of her, how she is doing today, the day she gave birth to her daughter, the daughter whose bright smile she will never know. I think of the painful decision that she had to make to let her daughter go so the she would hopefully get the medical treatment that she needed. My heart aches for her today. I cannot imagine the pain and grief that a mother experiences leaving their sweet, precious baby in a public place for someone else to find and hopefully bring to a safe orphanage. It just breaks my heart. I am sure that she thinks of her daughter almost every day, but today must be a very difficult day.

I am very thankful today for so much. Thankful for my wonderful family whom I love dearly. My sweet husband, who is my best friend and my rock and my wonderful oldest sweet pea Ainsley who was just in Thunder Bay for 5 days visiting her cousins. She missed her sister so much that she had to call one morning just to talk to her. It was a priceless moment....so sweet. I am very thankful for Sofie getting through her surgery, she is totally back to normal again....eating up a storm! I am also so very thankful for all the twists and turns, ups and downs and disappointments that led us all to each other. So many things in our adoption process either changed or didn't work out. If one single thing had been different, we wouldn't have found Sofie. We were meant to find each other....all of us. She was born on our anniversary, two weeks before we had our very first meeting with the adoption agency. If we hadn't decided to start our journey in the Ethiopia program and then withdrawal from it, we never would have found each other. So many little things had to happen for the timing to be perfect. We were meant to be a family, all of us.

Today we will have a quiet celebration at home. My Mom, Dad and their friend are coming down for a week and they are bringing Ainsley back home. Yeahhhhhh!!!! I miss her so much. This is the first time that my Dad will meet Sofie. I am so excited to see them together. Saturday we are having a big Hello Kitty themed birthday party for Sofie. She has no idea what a birthday is or what it involves :) It should be a ton of fun!!

So I am sending out a huge HAPPY ANNIVERSARY WISH to Jim and a very big HAPPY BIRTHDAY WISH to Sofie. I cannot believe how far we have come in 3 short months. I feel so very blessed :)

My two adorable goofballs......they have such a great sense of humor!!!

My sweet angel!!!

She's BACK!!!!!

The spunk has returned!!!!

Miss Sofie Lu is almost back to her normal self.....almost. She has ditched the no no's (arm restraints) and only has 3 more days of the puree diet. The ear drops were done today and we have 3 more days of the antibiotic.  We are concerned she may have developed a fistula in her palate, but, there is nothing that they can do about it right now if she has so only time will tell. She is still a little clingy but nothing like a few days ago. When I have more time I will go through the whole last week in more detail, mostly to chronicle Sofie's story for her. I am tired and don't have any time right now......I have a pile of laundry to do again :) The best part, her smile is back and it hasn't changed a bit.......as soon as I can get her to hold still long enough I will get a picture of it :)

Set back

It has been a crazy few days. I have had little sleep and no time to myself. Sunday night we ended up in the ER with Sofie who spiked a 104 degree fever. Her ear looked red and she was tugging at it but that didn't really explain the severity of the fever. Turns out she has pneumonia. Poor little thing is just not herself. After a round of IV fluids and IV antibiotics, they finally let us go home around 11 pm. I was so afraid that we would have to stay the night again. The visit to the ER has set us back tremendously. She has regressed an unbelievable amount. She is back to not letting me any farther than a couple of feet from her and she will no longer sleep in her pack and play. She will only sleep with me. Sofie has gone back to rocking back and forth to soothe herself and this morning the catatonic look that we first saw in China was back again. It just breaks my heart to see her like this especially since Saturday afternoon she was outside running around and playing with the kids. This has also taken a toll on Ainsley.  She is very worried about her sister but doesn't quite know how to talk about it or express it. I do not know what we would do if my Mom were not here. She is a lifesaver!!! I think this family might have imploded already is not for her. We certainly would be eating more take out!!!

Please say some prayers for Sofie. I so desperately want to see my spunky little Sofie Lu return :)

All Done...and home already!!

Sofie had all her surgeries successfully completed with no problems yesterday. It took us a while to get her pain under control but then she just took off. This child continues to astound and amaze me. She has been happy with just Tylenol with codeine and ibuprofen. She hasn't had any morphine since last night at 9 pm.  Last night was good. She slept for almost 4 hours in a row. Jim and I did not however so we are seriously tired. I need to go to bed but I wanted to update everyone. I also need to tell a Sofie story.....she does some pretty amazing, funny things.

This morning we were debating whether or not to leave the hospital today, one day early, or stay the time period that we were supposed to. I had decided that we should stay as she just wasn't quite spunky enough for me to want to take her home. She still seemed to be having pain and just wasn't totally settled.  She must have heard me because suddenly she wanted to leave the room and go for a walk. Off she and Jim headed down the hall, her in her jammies toting her IV pole along. She turned into a totally different child just like that. She didn't want to stop at all. Jim finally left the hospital to go pick up my Mom and Ainsley for a visit. We decided to wait until her last dose of Tylenol at 2 pm before we decided whether or not to leave. Our surgeon was fine with us leaving today. Again, Sofie must have figured it all out. She started dancing in the room along with her IV pole and all the tubing. We went and talked to the nurse about getting rid of the pump and just keeping the IV in her arm. So now IV pump free,  she got very upset when Jim left. She took one look at me and pointed to the door. She then crawled out of my lap and started dragging her IV pole across the room. I went over to stop her and she grabbed my hand and put it on the pump and pointed to the door again. She wanted the pump out of the room, NOW!! I put it near the door and she continued to push it right out the door into the hall. She then walked back into the room, grabbed my purse, pointed to me and then to the overnight bag and then back at me as if to say, grab the bag Mommy, we are outta here!! She then proceeded to walk out of the room. Needles to say, we were discharged today mostly to avoid a complete revolt!! She came home and then played all evening until she went off to bed.  Like I said earlier, she totally amazing and astounds me all the time. She is one tough little girl. Some pics to tide you over until I can get her to hold still long enough for some proper pictures.

Pre operatively goofing around with Daddy

Our sweet little angel :)

The view from our room

Naptime with Daddy

Surgery Tomorrow

Sofie will have her lip revision, palate repair, ear tubes and hernia repair tomorrow at 7:30am. I won't go into great detail tonight as I will end up in tears and I have too much to do :) Please keep in in your thoughts. It broke my heart putting her to sleep tonight as she has no idea what she is in for tomorrow and I have no way to make her understand. I just lay beside her and watched her sweet little face as she slept. She is adorable!!!!!

Today we also figured out what she means when she points at something and says "HO". It means NO and I cannot believe it has taken us this long to figure it out. She says it a lot :)

Pictures!!!

Just some recent photos!!!

Too cute!!!!

One Week

One week from today our little Sofie Lu Jingjing will have her palate,lip,hernia and ear tube surgeries done. It is finally starting to sink in and I cannot believe how fast it has come up. Time just seems to fly by. Jim and I are starting to get very anxious about her surgery. Sometimes medical knowledge is not a good thing. I am also very concerned for Ainsley. She is very stressed out about her sisters surgery and she broke down the other night and cried that she doesn't want to be apart from her sister. She is such a sweet, caring little girl who loves her sister dearly. She has already started making cards and posters for Sofie's hospital room. That's my Ainsley!!
The friend that we travelled to Hefei with sent a very sweet care package to us for Sofie's surgery day. It had a Starbuck's coffee card, chocolate, instant espresso, a Crayola color explosion kit, stickers, cute hair elastics, leg warmers for post op and, of course, from her older daughter, nail polish strips for Ainsley :) I so appreciate this wonderful gift. I know how busy she must be because we are too. It would have taken me months to get this together and mail it :) Thank you!!!!!!!!!

I love my Mom and Dad!!!!

My Mom and Dad are the best. Not only for the values that they have taught me, but also, because they have always been there for me with either advice, love, a shoulder to cry on or just support for every decision that I make, good or bad. They are always the word of caution, but then fully support me and my family no matter what. It is very hard living so far away from them, especially once you have children of your own. We have no immediate family near us so we have always had to depend on ourselves or friends for help with the kids. We were a little concerned with Sofie's surgery coming up as to where Ainsley was going to stay. Several wonderful friends, and you know who you are, have offered to help  and we are very thankful for that. I was concerned with Ainsley staying somewhere else other than home. Worse case scenario, Jim would stay home and I would stay at the hospital with Sofie. I didn't really like this as I think that it is very important for Jim to be there with Sofie too. My Mom and Dad were unable to come down and stay with her for a variety of reasons so I hadn't even considered that as an option. My Mom, Dad and my sister have come through for us again!!! My Dad is not able to travel, but, my sister is going to drive my Mom down her for a week and then come back and pick her up. Ainsley will have her Grandma with her and Jim and I will have some help with everything once we come home from the hospital. I cannot tell you what a relief this is and how big of a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I will be forever grateful and thankful for this wonderful gift.....thanks Mom, Dad and Kim :)

11 days until Sofie has her surgery. I think the enormity of it all has finally hit me! I know we will get through this and everything will be OK, but, it is just so hard to think of how much pain our little sweet pea is going to be in....and I can't fix it with a kiss :( Then there is the other part of me, the part that is super excited to see how much her speech changes after she has healed. She is so smart and tries so hard to say English words. I think it is going to be amazing to watch how much she changes....and then I get sad again because the little songs she sings, the speeches she gives and the phrases that she says when she reads a book, her baby talk Mandarin will all soon disappear. I so badly want to know what she is saying and thinking when she sings her songs, but, I probably never will. They are so sweet and I just want to be able to remember them forever.  I had been trying to record all of her words and songs on my phone but she usually either stops when I get it out or I am driving the car when she starts singing :) And then I can hardly wait to see her blow her first bubble. She so desperately wants to blow bubbles...we got a bubble machine but she wants to do it herself. When she blows out, the air comes out her nose and not her mouth, so no bubbles get blown. Today she brought me 2 containers of bubbles in the backyard and then got the sweetest look on her face and then signed the sign for please....broke my heart because I couldn't explain to her that she can't blow bubbles yet!!! Soon though :)

Now on to more :) Sorry, this is becoming a long post!!  I haven't been able to blog much....sleep seems more of a priority now a days. I will try to catch everyone up on the goings on in the Ducharme household.

We seemed to have turned a corner so to speak. Sofie has been spending more time with just Daddy. She stills screams as soon as I leave but it only lasts for about 5-10 minutes and then she is fine. She and Ainsley are playing together and in a room separate from where I am. Sofie doesn't like it when I am in the kitchen cooking. She has to be between me and the counter all the time. Doesn't work well at the stove and I cannot figure out why this is such an issue, unless she really doesn't like my cooking :) Ainsley is back to the same old Ainsley that we know and love. She has stopped talking back to us, is calmer and seems to be more comfortable in her big sister role. It is so nice to have my sweet daughter back and I only hope that the impending surgery doesn't throw all of the fantastic changes right out the window!!

We applied for Sofie's US passport last Monday. It is an odd feeling sending off every document pertaining to the adoption that you worked so hard to get in the first place. Sofie thought so much of the process that she reached up when I wasn't looking and grabbed the original Adoption Registration from China and ripped it in two. After I calmed down, we gently taped it back together and headed off to the post office where, after I sat her on the counter to sign the application, she promptly layed down and fell asleep on the counter of the Post office. The clerk thought it was hilarious!!!

July 4th was HOT and HUMID so we only lasted outside for maybe 15 minutes. Just enough time to get some pictures, not of the girls together as a certain 2 year old would not cooperate :)

The girls are starting to play together more. Being cooped up in the house in the heat did some good. They had a blast in the sprinkler in the backyard.

                                                      Sofie is no longer afraid of water!!!

                                                                    Making "soup"!!!!

                                            Miss Fix It helping Daddy fix the neighbors bike :)

..........and last but not lease, Shiloh the wonder dog or "iloh" as she is now known, got into the action too! She stole my hammer out of my garden bag and took off with it :) New type of dog bone!!